Speaking now, @chrisinsilico, the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower - how @carolecadwalla (who is held back at the @guardian newsroom writing tomorrow’s big story) provided the patient and nurturing environment that allowed him to come forward... 
... what persuaded him to talk to her was that she was a journalist willing to share with other journalists for the greater good, such as C4 and NYT, rather than clinging to her own exclusive as most would.
He started as an anonymous source for her early stories...
He started as an anonymous source for her early stories...
... he feels that the Tech journalists dismissed the story and ignored the reality, while Carole didn’t understand the Tech, but saw the significance. He spent the time explaining to Carole what all the Tech tools and processes were...
... he’s angry that Facebook are trying to paint him as a ‘suspect’ in the data breach, when actually he was the one working with the authorities to get CA investigated properly when Facebook refused to investigate themselves...
... his lawyer had been in contact with Facebooks lawyers and agreed that they would meet for an open collaboration to brief them on CA activities, but then out of the blue they announced he was a ‘suspect’ on Friday and made it confrontational...
... Facebook then deleted his account. He says that’s made him realise their power even more. The things he finds he can’t access now - like Tinder - because he can’t have a Facebook account. Our online presence exists only at the whim of Facebook now...
... previously he worked in data analytics for the Lib Dem’s in the 2010 election. He found that very frustrating as he reported the collapse in public support in response to forming coalition with Tories and they criticised him for not being positive or a team player for it...
... psychometrics in relation to politics seeks to score people on the OCEAN model...
Opennes
Conscientiousness
Extroversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism
visionone.co.uk/ocean-personal…
As well as demographics like income, social economic status etc...
Opennes
Conscientiousness
Extroversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism
visionone.co.uk/ocean-personal…
As well as demographics like income, social economic status etc...
... the psychographic approach is much more reliable for classifying people politically... eg many Lib Dems have demographic profiles like labour or conservatives - but on the Ocean model Lib Dems are high on most levels, but very low on agreeable!! ...
... He says that in military doctrine you have a 5 dimensional battle space:
Land, sea, air, space, and information.
Information includes Media, propaganda, and also civic information - Think tanks etc.
The idea of CA was to occupy this 5th dimension of the battle space...
Land, sea, air, space, and information.
Information includes Media, propaganda, and also civic information - Think tanks etc.
The idea of CA was to occupy this 5th dimension of the battle space...
... in actual battle that’s very resource intensive, trying to change what a general thinks or believes for example... but online you can create a programmatic approach for an entire nation... you can spread entire rumour campaigns, undermine people’s trust in institutions...
...We call it fake news, but it’s always been called disinformation when UK/US etc have done this in Africa, Central America, etc... it’s just that this 5th dimension weapon has now been turned on us...
... Chris introduced by Nix to Steve Bannon (‘then just a guy with a blog for angry white dudes’)... they talked (about fashion! “Politics and fashion are the same thing - representing your place in society”).
They discussed that you have to understand culture to change it...
They discussed that you have to understand culture to change it...
... if you can measure or predict the attributes that make a person’s character, you can spot traits in culture... then you can map the bit of ‘culture’ you want to shift, and identify people you can influence to shift...
...Steve Bannon wasn’t impressed by Nix’s Old Etonian society approach.. wanted co to be serious science/academia... so Nix decided they needed to set up a fake Cambridge office next to the university to make it seem connected. Then when named the company put Cambridge in name...
...then Mercer got involved and that created the perfect storm. He was a billionaire because of machine learning and super smart, and Bannon with this extreme vision of what he wanted to do, and then Nix to be the classy frontman...
...CA is more of a concept rather than a company, it’s really the london office of SCL elections. Most staff are paid by SCL. CA is just branding so it wasn’t seen that a military contractor was getting involved in elections...
...They came up with the plan that Mercer could put money into a political consultancy, but because he owned it it wasn’t a donation, it’s an investment. Then the consultancy can work for campaigns. He wanted influence and power...
...started working on the US election the way they did for foreign countries. Eg language constructs - what you might describe as a ritual abroad would be a tradition at home. So they went investigating as if it was foreign. helped them ask right questions, build better model...
... then they could develop hypothesis about campaigns or phrases that would hit home, and then test them out quantitively online at scale. So they’d hear that washington was dirty or a swamp in interviews, and test ‘drain that swamp’... images as well as words...
... they tested lots of images of walls, people scaling walls. Considered German experience with the Berlin Wall and what worked psychologically and in culture change... “building the wall is not to stop immigrants - most come on a plane - it’s to embody separation”...
... so the mission was to get America feeling more separated. You just had to build the wall in peoples heads, you don’t need to actually build it. It becomes enduring to create psychological difference...
Bannon very good at using exclusion and identity politics like this...
Bannon very good at using exclusion and identity politics like this...
...Chris did research in the southern states, and the keybto research is first justvlistening, however uncomfortable. He found that people who had strong racist views... would talk about how *they* couldn’t be their real selves... they felt ‘victimised’...
... they would use language of ‘the closet’ - they had to be secretly racist, secretly sexist, secretly homophobic. ‘In the closet’ as a gay man Chris found this bizarrely relatable. It started to get ‘dark’ for him working on this...
... initially they’d just felt they had unlimited money to research what they liked... but then they started to see what the research was being used for... and who it was helping. He’d be in a room hearing how evangelical Christians could use CA to oppress gay rights...
... Alexander Nix is very charming, but he feels he owns you. If you say anything he dislikes he will lash out. Added to that we were working for increasingly psychotic people.
Chris then found out that his predecessor had been found dead in his hotel room...
Chris then found out that his predecessor had been found dead in his hotel room...
... Chris left in 2015 and went to work for Trudeau campaign.
Private Eye claim he celebrated in a Facebook post that ‘we won’ when Brexit happens. He says he is a eurosceptic, especially as he’s not European. Doesn’t feel part of it, or care too much...
Private Eye claim he celebrated in a Facebook post that ‘we won’ when Brexit happens. He says he is a eurosceptic, especially as he’s not European. Doesn’t feel part of it, or care too much...
... but the Trump campaign he found troubling. He hadn’t really known what candidate CA were working for up to 2015... but then Trump emerged, Bannon joined his campaign, and then he started to see all the campaigns he’d been part of researching...
... and then he saw the claims about Russian collusion. He remembered a professor from Russia working on their research, and Russian companies being involved. Got very concerned and started to work towards blowing the whistle.
... he says CA keeps claiming they just have consumer data, but that doesn’t have the psychographic profile.
Facebook is about curating who you are - what you like, what you watch, who you know, what you talk about.
That’s the data they need for a psychographic profile.
Facebook is about curating who you are - what you like, what you watch, who you know, what you talk about.
That’s the data they need for a psychographic profile.
...Chris had access to all the companies systems, so he took that and put it on an encrypted drive. It wasn’t hard. He’d started to feel things were wrong and just did it by instinct...
...Chris says if you’ve done something wrong the first step is to admit it. He’s just on that first step, owning up to something he had a fundamental role in. He’s working with the authorities for some months now. He’s made mistakes and he’s sorry for that...
...Chris says he’s going to see what good he can turn it into, but doesn’t know what he’s going to do in the future.
That’s the end, there is a long and loud round of applause, which makes Chris look a little emotional.
That’s the end, there is a long and loud round of applause, which makes Chris look a little emotional.
... there’s much more to come out - and this week feels like a turning point.
Look out for more on this from @carolecadwalla at the @guardian tomorrow, and watch the exposes from channel 4 News.
Thanks for reading - goodnight from the @frontlineclub - I’m off to the bar!
Look out for more on this from @carolecadwalla at the @guardian tomorrow, and watch the exposes from channel 4 News.
Thanks for reading - goodnight from the @frontlineclub - I’m off to the bar!
If you’ve been following the #cambridgeanalytica story, here’s the whistleblower speaking in his own words tonight...
#CambridgeAnalyticaUncovered
#CambridgeAnalyticaUncovered
Congratulations to @peterjukes @Byline_Media and @frontlineclub for putting on such an important event in such a timely way. Candid answers from @chrisinsilico and great interviewing by Peter too.
I tried to keep up with my tweetnotes...
I tried to keep up with my tweetnotes...
