Mike Benz Profile picture
Mar 7, 2023 • 14 tweets • 6 min read • Read on X
THREADđź§µ: DHS's cyber agency CISA scrubbed its website last week to purge all reference to domestic censorship work, per @FFO_Freedom.

CISA deleted 2 years worth of confessions to getting platforms to stop "domestic disinfo" by US citizens.

Full Report: foundationforfreedomonline.com/wp-content/upl… Image
Since May 1, 2021, CISA.gov/mdm had an open public declaration that it classified US citizens who espouse “misinformation” on social media as "domestic threat actors” and therefore as a cyber threat to be neutralized by DHS’s cyber division, CISA: Image
DHS had been using this language of "domestic threat actor" to describe accused US citizen "misinformation" posts since its Oct. 2019 Whole-Of-Society Disinfo report.

See, after Mueller Russia probe fizzled July 2019, DHS pulled a foreign-to-domestic switcheroo right after: Image
For those new here, this is DHS's Foreign To Domestic Disinfo Switcheroo in action:
In its Oct 2019 domestic censorship blueprint document, DHS labeled right-wingers on social media who ostensibly made satirical memes about Colin Kaepernick and Nike as being "disinformation threat actors":

ciacco.org/files/D2DF/Com… Image
DHS worked hard to graft the linguistic jargon of the cybersecurity & counter-hacking world onto a new world of cybercensorship & counter-disinfo.

"Threat actors" were suddenly part of a "Disinformation Kill Chain" for backing Brexit or opposing war:

ciacco.org/files/D2DF/Com… Image
Back then, DHS didn't loudly and proudly claim open power to coordinate the censorship of domestic political speech.

That changed in Jan 2021, when CISA's "Countering Foreign Influence Task Force" rebranded with a foreign AND domestic focus: Mis, Dis and Malinformation (MDM). Image
So from May 1, 2021 until Friday, Feb. 24, 2023 at 4:37 pm, CISA targeted "domestic threat actors" who posted "misinformation" opinions (mostly about elections or Covid).

CISA's new focus on both foreign AND domestic censorship to "reflect the changing information environment": ImageImage
But sometime between Fri, Feb. 24 at 4:37 pm & Sun, Feb. 26 at 5:55 am, CISA’s once public declaration of long-arm jurisdiction over domestic opinions online seems to have been walked back.

Cisa.gov/mdm now redirects to a foreign-only focused disinfo page: Image
Every reference to CISA's extensive, years-long domestic censorship operations has been scrubbed.

The word "domestic" has been purged from the page altogether. It now reads like they've only been after "foreign actors" -- not "domestic threat actors" -- all along: Image
CISA even purged the references to its domestic "disinformation switchboard", which CISA officials & advisors used to openly brag was sicced on domestic social media account targets using DHS's cyber control center, EI-ISAC.

For example, the below, public for 2 years, is gone: Image
So why is CISA - once the Great Government Hope of the censorship industry - walking it all back now?

Did CISA get too cocky, with director Jen Easterly claiming its jurisdiction extended into the "cognitive infrastructure" inside US citizens heads?

wired.com/story/rewired-…
CISA played an instrumental role in the effective killing of free speech online after the 2016 election.

Now they appear to be trying to quietly return the murder weapon to the crime scene after holding onto it for 3+ years, right as investigators are looking at them for it.
Is it the Jim Jordan subpoena to the tech platforms on government collusion?

Is it upcoming House hearings?

Is it the political momentum of the Twitter Files?

Given the Enron-sized scandal already at play here, here's an Enron-sized question to CISA:

Why?

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More from @MikeBenzCyber

Apr 16
BREAKING 🚨 The US State Department has just placed all 30 full-time staff at the Global Engagement Center’s remnant known as R-FIMI on leave, eliminated all 50 full-time staff positions and delivered a notice to Congress ending R-FIMI’s existence and $65 million in funding 🧵👇
This historic development today was made possible by @SecRubio and Acting Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy @DarrenJBeattie, as part of a complete restructuring of the State Department’s activities and capacities to prevent the abuses and weaponization of the past.
@SecRubio @DarrenJBeattie The development today is the State Department’s initiation of a RIF (Reduction In Force) that will permanently end the positions at GEC / R-FIMI, so there is no more reshuffling of positions or simple renamings of the office to carry out the same malign censorship efforts.
Read 6 tweets
Mar 10
Bad Kitty has published a very important series here, with a lot of details that I think need to be cleanly organized and sense-made for a wider audience so what she’s uncovered really hits home. I’ll be going over these on tonight’s sub stream at 10pm ET
Read 4 tweets
Feb 19
It’s important to understand the relationship between USAID external policies and immigration & refugee internal policies.

Remittances from migrants & refugees in the US provides more money to the home networks USAID sponsors in target countries than USAID itself đź§µ Image
2/ Remittances are when a migrant or refugee has money or makes money here in the US, and then sends money back to friends and relatives in their home country.

So, for example, Ukraine refugees who flee then have their lives paid for here by aid programs will send cash back home Image
3/ And indeed, this is one of the main reasons we import masses of refugees from conflict zones or war zones as part of a Pentagon effort to fund one side of a war or paramilitary struggle. The refugees’ network back home is one we want to financially capacity-build Image
Image
Read 4 tweets
Feb 2
If it weren’t for USAID’s censorship funding and NED’s censorship operational network, there would still be a free Internet in Brazil. And Jair Bolsonaro would still be its rightfully elected President.
2/4
3/4
Read 4 tweets
Dec 21, 2024
The “Benz breaks news that seems too crazy to be true” to “Bombshell Congressional report showing everything is true” 2 years later pipeline remains undefeated 👑
See the FFO report and thread that broke this whole story and network open:
The link for the original FFO report on all this (25 pages long, 250 hyperlinks, 15 embedded videos with confessions from all key actors involved) migrated to this new link since we first posted the above thread: foundationforfreedomonline.com/dhs-censorship…
Read 4 tweets
Aug 28, 2024
2 weeks after Tucker interviewed Pavel, the CIA-founded Radio Free Europe (run directly by the CIA for its first 20 years), ran a long piece insinuating Russia was secretly controlling Telegram & Ukraine must seize control of it instead as a military intelligence imperative. Image
Straight out of a Benzpill lecture, the piece begins by lauding how wonderful Telegram is for (CIA-backed) rent-a-riots in Belarus, Iran, & in Russia itself. It applauded Telegram’s 2014-2020 era bc Pavel never gave in to the foreign gov’ts the CIA was using Telegram to topple.


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72% of Ukraine uses Telegram. It was only 20% 2 years ago. So now everyone, including Ukraine’s military & high-level politicians, are all there using it for war & business. If Russia has a Telegram backdoor, the CIA-founded media org argued, Ukraine is totally, totally screwed. Image
Read 6 tweets

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