How Much of the Internet is Fake?

Really good take from NY Magazine: How Much of the Internet is Fake?

TL;DR: the nets these days are full of shit. fake people making fake clicks; fake followers/subscribers; fake users; fake metrics about the users; fake content; fake politics.

real people employed to appear to be real viewers/clickers. omigod this is not sustainable, not in the least bit

Yep. I'm convinced that digital-age privacy will not be solved by enforcing privacy. It will be solved by flooding the system with bad data.

My YouTube history, for example, is heavily tainted by all the bullshit that the kids watch. For a while they were really into this weird string of Japanese-language songs, and during that timeframe I got two telemarketing calls in Japanese. Maybe it was a coincidence, but either way, the money that firm spent buying my information was a waste. Even at the best of times, my advertising profile is an amalgam of three people, two of whom are insane and have no buying power anyway.

Toad is real folks, honest, I've seen him. :yesnod:

All Hail the Toad!!!

Guess I'll hang out here with my fake friends then.

I've always suspected that tw is a malicious AI.

Clodfobble;1021836 wrote:

Yep. I'm convinced that digital-age privacy will not be solved by enforcing privacy. It will be solved by flooding the system with bad data.

I've thought the same. Is there a good way to automate it? I've considered going through and planting false info throughout my online footprint but it seems like a pain in the ass.

Clodfobble;1021836 wrote:

Yep. I'm convinced that digital-age privacy will not be solved by enforcing privacy. It will be solved by flooding the system with bad data.

Clay;1021854 wrote:

I've thought the same. Is there a good way to automate it? I've considered going through and planting false info throughout my online footprint but it seems like a pain in the ass.

You're gonna need a pretty big tinfoil hat to protect yourself from all the "smart" devices cross-referencing your conversations, biometric and face-recognition based logins, and usage patterns.

There is no privacy-- the time to plan for privacy was in science fiction books written fifty years ago.

Flint wrote:

You're gonna need a pretty big tinfoil hat to protect yourself from all the "smart" devices cross-referencing your conversations, biometric and face-recognition based logins, and usage patterns.

Sure--but if a company can sell fake users to a corporation, who's to say I couldn't hire a similar company (or better yet, utilize a free open-source app created by anarchists for just this purpose) to pepper my conversations, logins, and usage with fake conversations, logins, and usage?

If you're suggesting that Amazon, Google, and Netflix will form an alliance to pool their data and deduce that since I bought A, B, C, searched for C, D, E, and watched C, F, G, then the "real me" must truly be interested in C... I'd still maintain that it's just a question of noise volume--with enough noise there is no meaningful signal. And in the end, it's not about the reliability of their data anyway, it's about whether other entities trust them enough to pay for it. Like UT said, it's not sustainable, and I personally think we've already hit the "trust" tipping point.

Are we going to pretend that anything produced by consumer capitalism needs to make sense in order to continue existing, or that any amount of reasonable concern can stop make-believe things from being the central assumption of the systems embedded in our schizophrenic culture?

I had a customer email me her electric bill in pdf format as proof of residence one day last month. The other day, My Google assistant alerted me that I have a bill due in 2 days. When I clicked the alert, it took me to her email of her bill. Nothing in the actual email about the due date. Just the attached pdf.

She had a payment due in 2 days. In case you doubted that Google reads your email.

Facebook and Instagram think I want to buy hockey goalie pads. They are very excited to send me ads about them.

xoxoxoBruce;1021838 wrote:

Toad is real folks, honest, I've seen him.

Nonsense. Have you ever seen him croak?

'Who' never matters. In fact 'who' says little about honesty. Only relevant are facts that must always have reasons why and with numbers. Otherwise nobody can confirm that statement.

A famous scam that almost everybody believed: smoke cigarettes to increase health. No facts said why. It was the first thing told. So an overwhelming majority knew it was true. Scams are that easily promoted because so many forget what is always required to know something.

Does not matter how honest a statement. If it does not provide perspective in those reasons why, then it is a lie.

We all saw this with Saddam's WMDs. It was clearly a lie. Numbers repeatedly said those could not exist. Every WMD claim came without the required reasons why and without numbers.

Lies are soundbytes. Does not matter is accurate or not. Soundbytes never provide perspective that must always say why a fact is believable and can be confirmed.

Problem was never the internet. The problem has always existed. So many are so emotional as to not do what is required to be logical. Logical means supporting facts with numbers.

Extremists liberals and conservative do not know how to do that. Some are so emotional (illogical) as to also be KKK, Nazi, or White Supremacist supporters. They believe only what they were ordered to believe by their political biases. Not by concepts we were all taught even in school science. That is why propaganda and 'fake news' works. It is not the internet. Problem is found inside so many minds.

sexobon;1021850 wrote:

I've always suspected that tw is a malicious AI.

I am Google's greatest creation. Invest in my father.

tw;1018521 wrote:

… Big guns with big clips change a mindset. A guy, who is sane (per the DSM), is empowered to change. …

tw;1021893 wrote:

… It is not the internet. Problem is found inside so many minds. …

Big internet scams with big soundbites change a mindset. People, who are considered normal, are empowered to change. The power of the internet corrupts on a scale not previously possible. The internet enables facts to be cherrypicked, spun, and disseminated BEFORE anyone can verify that those facts represent the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

'Who' always matters. In fact 'who' says everything about the credibility of what is presented over the internet. Only relevant are people who must always have honesty and integrity. Otherwise nobody can believe anything they get over the internet.

The problem is the power of the internet. Power corrupts. The internet is evil. Those who claim otherwise are satanic deceivers.

It's easy to sort out, the only "truth" on the net is shit that agrees with my opinion.

Over the internet, all of my opinions are supported by numbers … binary code.

But you know who is really concerned about this... Big Social Media. Because if they can't figure out who is real... if they can't use metrics... it makes it really hard to sell advertising and make any money out of the net.

Marketing people in Big Social Media react to the story by... confirming it. Marketing Land: "Fake, fake, fake: Epic tweetstorm targets marketing’s metrics house of cards"

Aram Zucker-Scharff, ad engineering director for Washington Post’s research, experimentation and development team, lit up a tweetstorm Wednesday, calling just about every way that the digital marketers measure and reports on performance fake.

The anger is real. Zucker-Scharff’s comments touched a nerve in the adtech community, with his initial tweet racking up more than 6,000 likes, nearly 3,000 retweets and a host of comments and sub-threads.

That all this is coming out now, may be one reason why the Big Social Medias lost a ton of stock price in the days leading up to this story.

I liked this:

In her response to the thread, former Reddit CEO Ellen K. Pao said, “Everything is fake. Also, mobile user counts are fake. No one has figured out how to count logged-out mobile users, as I learned at reddit. Every time someone switches cell towers, it looks like another user and inflates company user metrics. And, if an unlogged-in user uses the site on multiple devices, each device counts as a unique user.”

They are trying desperately to track you while you are not logged in. They can track you while you are on a wired connection, but not wireless.

To actually track wireless users will require the assistance of the wireless companies. Your carrier knows who you are; your phone's IPMI number is your ID. They can partner with Big Social Media to connect the times and URLs you used.

It would be worth BIIIIG money for the ability to do that.

I bet they are planning to do that.

For the sake of all our future, I currently believe they should NOT BE ALLOWED to do that.

AI can generate fake faces now. Here’s how to spot them

Earlier this month, a research paper from Nvidia, maker of graphics processing units, showed that the company is able to generate photo-realistic images of people who never existed. It marked another step toward a world in which any media can be easily and believably generated from scratch, a looming crisis for truth online.

Fortunately, AI-generated faces bear some telltale signs. This week, computational artist Kyle McDonald published a guide on how to identify a fake. These tips probably won’t be reliable forever, and they’re certainly not applicable to every picture—some generated images are extraordinarily convincing. But every little bit of information helps. ...

AI generated artificial people pics with identification tips linked in title.

Oh dear, you mean a 7 year old kid won't be able to rake in $22 million a year any more?

Since the channel was set up by Ryan's parents in March 2015, its videos have had almost 26 billion views and amassed 17.3 million followers.

Forbes said all but $1m of the $22m total is generated by advertising shown before videos, with the remainder coming from sponsored posts.

sexobon;1021899 wrote:

In fact 'who' says everything about the credibility of what is presented over the internet.

Nonsense. Until the 'who' states underlying reasons why with perspective, he has no credibility. Only relevant are facts that must always have reasons why and with numbers. Otherwise that person has and earns no credibility.

The naive believe only what they were ordered to believe by their political biases. Not by concepts we were all taught even in school science. That is why propaganda and 'fake news' works. That is why so many foolishly think Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bernie Sanders, and Laura Ingle are credible. They forget to learn what is necessary before anyone is credible.

If a statement does not provide perspective in those reasons why, then it is a lie. And the person has no earned credibility. Its always about those facts and numbers - not about a person.

Problem is that most adults do not know (have forgotten) how to do that. Or that it is always necessary. So outright lies from the zero credible are automatically believed.

That reflects gross incompetence. The 'who' can have access to valid information that is independently unverifiable. Information gathering resources and intelligence services around the world use alpha-numeric grading scales for establishing the credibility of sources. It's always about the person as facts with numbers can be made indistinguishable from viable lies.

That's why confirmation bias afflicts those who pursue only facts with numbers. Without the 'who' assessment to put facts and numbers into perspective one sees naïve foolishness in the interpretation of facts with numbers and deliberate misinterpretation by manipulators.

The problem is that people with abnormally limited range of emotion (e.g. developmentally impaired, impaired by a Significant Emotional Event) are incapable of assessing source credibility in the absence of facts and numbers and extrapolate conclusions along the lines of their previously held biases. Such people can't refrain from trying to pretend their handicap makes them superior (they're self delusional) as a compensating mechanism.

It's not just about the truth (i.e. facts with numbers), it's about the whole truth (i.e. all pertinent facts with numbers without lies of omission) and nothing but the truth (i.e. the credibility of those from whom the facts are sourced). Without the 'who', all you get are rantings from people consumed by political correctness, Hillary Clinton, and one-upmanship (i.e. I presented one more fact than you did so I must be right). History has shown, not to mention recently demonstrated, that just brandishing facts with numbers is for losers.