
CIA ‘Siren Servers’ can predict social uprisings 3-5 days in advance - andrewke
http://sociable.co/technology/cia-siren-servers-social-uprisings/
======
contingencies
I was personally in Western Tunisia (on the Algerian border) as the Tunisian
uprising, the first of the Arab Spring, began. I was there a month. The
protests were in full swing for weeks in every village in the west before
_anything_ hit western media. No travel warnings or any of that backdated
pretend bureaucracy. I very much doubt the CIA had much of an idea what was
going on outside the capital. The only western presence I saw during the whole
period was a German diplomat taking his friends to see some ruins further
east, which I doubt he would have been doing if he knew there was serious
unrest. Internet is barely utilized there - how are they going to gather
intelligence? It really gives you food for thought. Stay off the wires
(including finance), and it's very hard for them to see much of anything.

~~~
SomeStupidPoint
A more effective strategy to constant surveillance is to simply raise the
background level to just below actionable threshold, so that way their
intelligence is effectively useless. That is, really, you should just sit
around all day and talk about how you dislike what they're doing, think
they're career criminals betraying the nation, that you want to actively do
something about it, etc. Bonus points for mixing that conversation with
discussion about how you'd like to tour DC and see the various monuments,
including the Washington monument, Lincoln memorial, and WWII memorial.

If the background unhappy chatter is close to actionable (or is in the mind of
the classifying algorithms), then actionable chatter (eg, actually planning an
attack) can only be distinguished from background chatter near when the plans
become "active" in some sense, and likely too late to meaningfully respond to.
(To use a physics analogy: if you try to predict cavitation in flowing water
really close to boiling, it's harder.)

In many senses, simply embracing openly that we're _very_ angry as a society,
even in the face of constant scrutiny, prevents that same constant scrutiny
from determining when we're planning something. It can only really tell that
we're pissed off, in general.

~~~
api
Maybe you could create AI agents to flood the Internet with seditious chatter.

~~~
Create
Amongst many, IBM has done something that does this and the opposite. It was
funded by public money (DoD).

~~~
rboyd
That sounds pretty interesting. Where could I learn more on this?

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Dowwie
Every time I read about expensive programs like these I think of what else
that money could have been spent on that would prevent the need for
populations to rise up against their governments.

~~~
gus_massa
It's the CIA, there is a high chance that they are spending more money to fuel
the revolution.

~~~
analog31
Well, that's one way of knowing when uprisings will happen. Deming wrote that
if you have a policy of rewarding people for fighting fires, you also need to
watch who is setting those fires.

~~~
maccard
The cobra effect is a great example of this:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobra_effect)

------
slim
“much harder to convey confidence for the policymaker who may make an
important decision from advanced analytics with deep learning algorithms.”

This is an unsolvable problem. From the policymaker's point of view saying
"deep learning told me so" is exactly the same as saying "god told me so"

~~~
qznc
"god told me so" worked very well for thousands of years.

~~~
heartsucker
It certainly worked, whether or not it worked "well" is up for debate.

~~~
samstave
defacto, no debate...

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thomasthomas
"In certain sectors such as finance, it can be self-detrimental as in the case
of the financial meltdown in 2007-2008. When a predictive system becomes too
efficient, it undermines the very foundation upon which it stands.

If you’ve gathered enough wealth and your services are so efficient that their
values skyrocket, but there’s no money left for anyone to afford them, then
you’ve fallen victim to the seductive power of siren servers."

what the fuck is this author talking about? this is so incoherent. CIA can
predict black swan events now and the super computers can accumulate so much
wealth that no one can afford it? what is this website? is this satire?

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Jamesbeam
I can not predict social unrest 3-5 days before it happens but my google alert
for "black man shot by police" can do the same reliably 24 hours before social
unrest starts.

Suck this CIA.

~~~
icebraining
I think you'll find a lot of false positives, as unfortunately that alert will
be sent more than once a week:
[http://www.killedbypolice.net/](http://www.killedbypolice.net/) (M/B means
Male/Black)

~~~
steveeq1
Yes, and what percentage of those killings are actually justified? The police
have an inherently dangerous profession.

~~~
icebraining
Justified or not, I still consider those deaths unfortunate.

~~~
steveeq1
All lives matter.

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je42
"We have, in some instances, been able to improve our forecast to the point of
being able to anticipate the development of social unrest and societal
instability some I think as near as three to five days out"

with that in mind, i would say that they still have a lot of false
positives...

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M_Grey
Would you trust the CIA's predictions, and that they were accurate rather than
self-serving?

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blackkettle
Welcome to Psychohistory. Thanks Hari.

~~~
Intermernet
No problem, it's just a 30,000 year dark age.

We come out OK at the end of it!

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h4nkoslo
Likely because they're detecting their own signals.

It's pretty clear by now that for instance the "color revolutions" were
instigated in a large part by the US government; social media manipulation was
a prominent attack vector.

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nkoren
I don't see anything too alarming here. Predicting social uprisings 3-5 days
in advance is easy, as long as you're happy with a few hundred false positives
for every solid hit. Signal-boosting is only useful to the extent that it
doesn't equally boost noise.

Besides, I'm quite sure that this other initiative is producing far more
actionable data, even if it's hardly breaking news:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juQcZO_WnsI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juQcZO_WnsI)
(2011)

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nowherehere
In my limited experience, I feel like the CIA has a lot of room for
improvement. Reminds me of this-

[http://www.nytimes.com/1992/05/21/world/director-admits-
cia-...](http://www.nytimes.com/1992/05/21/world/director-admits-cia-fell-
short-in-predicting-the-soviet-collapse.html)

There's the problem of guys like Michael Morrell, who have no operational
experience but go on Charlie Rose and advocate murdering Russian and Syrian
officials. Not that I disagree but why publicly talk about it? Morrell's an
economist. The agency being run by political bureaucrats I suppose is
inevitable but it's unfortunate.

However, my experience on the science and technology side is also lacking.
There's some super smart people who seem to lack any directive of strategy. I
sometimes think, is this guy really this ridiculous or is he levelling me?

I love the CIA and am biased in their favor, but I can't think of any personal
experience that makes me have confidence in them. Perhaps they are good at
operational missions, but they are run by bureaucrats and the science side has
the lack of socially smart, well rounded individuals.

The mystique and aura of powerfulness is seductive but the reality of the
world is, everyone is much stupider than you can imagine. It's a wonder the
world works at all.

~~~
samstave
>" __ _run by political bureaucrats I suppose is inevitable but it 's
unfortunate._ __"

So if it is unfortunate, what classification of people, in your opinion,
should be running it?

What a weird comment you have posted... You love the CIA? are you a sadist?

I am serious about that question, as while I agree that all states need their
intelligence services - the CIA has done some downright EVIL shit. And if you
"love the CIA" and are unfamiliar with their history, then you're a fucking
moron.

Now, its not to say that the US needs to, in their own best interest, remain
as a world super-power... and we shall -- but its to focus on the fact that we
can do so in a better fashion.

I take the words "I love the CIA" to mean that you're either a sadist, a child
of an op, or young and stupid, and by stupid - I just mean not critically
thinking about what you have said/what your understanding of the CIA has
done/is.

Again, The US will be the predominant power in the world for the foreseeable
future, but have some humanity -- something the actions of the CIA fucking
lack.

And if you love the CIA so much, you'll realize that they own this country,
and that is not necessarily a good thing, you sound naive.

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austinkurpuis
He has some interesting points. I can't say I agree with his opinion of where
the "real value" of a service comes from. No doubt a service would be nothing
without it's users, but it would also be nothing without the blood sweat and
tears of the developers who built it.

In the end we're creating something that people want to use and giving people
something like Instagram for free is all the reward they deserve. If you
Instagram where to pay their users they'd go bankrupt. It's not a viable
business plan.

I also feel like he's missing the whole point of open source. No one ever said
it would distribute wealth. Bryan Cantrill said it best: "You should open
source your project because you never know when a magical little pony is gonna
come flying by and shit out a fucking rainbow right in front of you.".

------
gaius
_A siren server is the biggest and best computer on a network. Whoever has the
most powerful computer would be the most powerful person, whether they plan to
be or not_

That makes no sense. It's not even wrong, it's a bunch of words strung
together that don't mean anything.

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hackuser
In another article covering this story, I found this interesting quote:

 _" What we’re trying to do within a unit of my directorate [for Digital
Innovation] is ... leverage what is becoming the instrumentation of the
globe," [Deputy Director for Digital Innovation Andrew] Hallman added._

[http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2016/10/cia-says-it-
can...](http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2016/10/cia-says-it-can-predict-
social-unrest-early-3-5-days-out/132121/?oref=d-river)

------
mocana
I welcome the CIA's attempt at modernizing. Let's face it: their recent track
record at predicting major social movements has been terrible. The Arab
spring, Tianamen square. They found out like the rest of us: cable TV and
Internet. Monitoring social networks would seem like a good approach. I am
wary of this technology being pointed domestically. Supposedly the U.S. is not
in the CIAs purview, but there is probably no legal impediment to "lending" it
to the FBI, or Homeland Security or whatever.

------
ganwar
The article mentions deep learning as being one of the technologies that is
being utilized here. I find it difficult to put all the pieces together on the
efficacy of the system and the technologies being used as Deep learning is one
of the most un-explanatory technology. That in turn raises some questions over
the effectiveness of a system that predicts social and financial unrest. How
did you do that?

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whybroke
Or you could just announce you have such a technology and thereby slightly
inhibit the organization of uprisings via the Panopticon effect. All for the
cost of sending a few emails.

Of course the reason what I say is unlikely is because actually building the
system, functional or not, would justify an ever expanding budget.

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tednoob
I am not certain, but I think Recorded Future does something similar, and
according to Wikipedia they are backed by the CIA.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recorded_Future](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recorded_Future)

------
Fjolsvith
Something like this will become really useful when Google and Amazon are
recording everything in US homes.

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abhianet
Cool. I wonder how they test this stuff.

~~~
petra
Probably feed it with historical data and see if it can tell what has
happened.

~~~
dredmorbius
Backcasting is a fairly standard testing method, though you've got to be
careful about overfitting.

I need to RTFA, but this sounds like it might have relations to Peter
Turchin's work on cliodynamics.

~~~
alexc05
RTFA won't do you much good. It's pretty light on detail. (IMO) It spends most
of its time meandering about and trying to sound like some sort of really
mind-blowing techno shaman.

So much so, that I doubt the authenticity and accuracy of the information that
presented.

I felt like it read a little more like a paranoid fringe article.

I mean "Siren" in this case is named for the seductive nature of the power of
the servers (greek myth reference) as opposed to a "warning siren" sounding
the alarm of unrest.

It gets worse, rambling on about the danger (and inevitability) if/when this
power falls into the hands of corporate america.

Cliche

~~~
eveningcoffee
Dangers coming from usage of systems like this by a private corporation is not
a cliche. It is a real danger.

If it has not clicked for you then advertising network is a behaviour control
mechanism.

~~~
witty_username
HN is a behaviour control mechanism. _Other people_ upvote articles and
downvote anything they don't like. Therefore ensuring you are forced fed with
only articles _they_ like. Your behavior is controlled by all these other
people.

/s

~~~
eveningcoffee
Sure it is and without sarcasm. Even when you do not post anything here then
reading what is posted influences you toward certain target. Perhaps you get
more interested in Javascript for example or most probably, startups.

The question is not in this. The question is in the scale of the operation and
actual spread of the influence.

~~~
witty_username
HN is big and people spend a decent amount of time on it.

~~~
eveningcoffee
Still it is minuscule compared to some real large scale operations.

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canjobear
What's the precision/recall?

