LWD

joined 1 year ago
sorted by: new top controversial old
DHS allows surveillance based on sexual orientation. Reddit's privacy moderators ban any mention of it in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 3 points 2 days ago (1 children)

In fact, if you Google “FOSStodon Elon Musk,” an interesting trend appears. Anything I clicked that was critical of Musk and posted to the instance this year was deleted

Holy shit. Can you provide some examples?

Carrotcypher freaks out about any anti-Musk article in any subreddit he doesn't control, and many he does, but I didn't think the moderation was happening behind the scenes on FOSSTodon too. Which is especially reprehensible because the creators, admins, and other mods of FOSSTodon all seem pretty resolute in condemning Musk before he went full fascist.

I noticed this stuff was more measured before mid January (almost right around the Trump inauguration) but it's started expanding pretty rapidly. Maybe I need to put in a little extra legwork and figure out which news sites are being auto-censored based on his personal opinions faster than I had anticipated.

r/privacy mod breaks "no self-promotion rule" in self-pinned comment in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
71
r/privacy mod breaks "no self-promotion rule" in self-pinned comment (archive.is)
submitted 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) by LWD@lemm.ee to c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
11 comments fedilink
 

Mod Carrotcypher links to their own personal blog and then pins their own post.
carrotcypher linking to themself

Opsec101's homepage, made by Carrotcypher:
the opsec101 homepage

And here's a look at rule 3!
rule title: "DON'T ENGAGE IN SELF-PROMOTION."

Call me picky, but I think the moderators should follow the rules they write and enforce.

1
NSA chief and deputy fired (www.reuters.com)
 

Found as yet another censored r/privacy post!

Understand that the decision to fire the chief and his deputy may be in fact be the most dangerous decision Trump has made so far. Timothy Haugh like his last 2 predecessors were restricting the access and control Peter Thiel had through his company Palantir over the CIA/NSA to commit domestic surveillance. Palantir is the 2nd biggest defense contractor for the CIA/NSA along with providing day-to-day operations for both agencies. The goal for Palantir is and always has been domestic surveillance. Palantir is an intelligence corporation which provides advanced analysis, sigint, osint, criminal and threat awareness and kill chain efficiencies to all levels of US, UK, and corporate agencies.

(comment source)

1
DHS allows surveillance based on sexual orientation. Reddit's privacy moderators ban any mention of it (lemm.ee)
 

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/60365167

Case 1

Original post

Moderator carrotcypher says "removed for paywall." When asked about which rule this breaks, receives no response. The post is then locked.

Case 2

Original post

Same as the first, except this time there is no paywall - the link is to a freely accessible advocate.com page.

It is censored with no explanation.

Case 3

Original post

Same as Case 2, moderators censor the post and leave no explanation.

Case 4

Original post

This one is finally given a removal reason: a rule that does not exist in the sidebar, and seems to have nothing to do with the post ("Your post has been removed for being too specific to a company or single product.")

But in a censored comment, the OP of the post says they received a different removal reason:

Holy shit I'm banned for 30 days for "conspiracy spreading". This sub is cooked

This time, other people notice the censorship and the nonsensical nature of the official removal reason.

Since this removal, there has been no further post of this news in r/privacy. Sources tell me the moderators refuse to explain their decision.

DHS allows surveillance based on sexual orientation. Reddit's privacy moderators ban any mention of it in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 26 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Carrotcypher is one of the moderators of the FOSStodon server.

https://hub.fosstodon.org/team/

Carrotcypher also moderates over 50 other subreddits, and is often the top active moderator on them. Here are some of those subreddits, from most to less popular:

  • r/opensource
  • r/OSINT
  • r/tails
  • r/signal
  • r/opsec
  • r/KeepOurNetFree
  • r/Mastodon
  • r/Infosec
  • r/europrivacy
  • r/netneutrality
  • r/snowden
  • r/foss
  • r/SimpleXChat

I presume the FOSStodon admins, as well as some of the moderators in the subreddits that aren't fully taken over, are not aware of this activity.

Here are some other assorted notes:

69
DHS allows surveillance based on sexual orientation. Reddit's privacy moderators ban any mention of it (lemm.ee)
 

Case 1

Original post

Moderator carrotcypher says "removed for paywall." When asked about which rule this breaks, receives no response. The post is then locked.

Case 2

Original post

Same as the first, except this time there is no paywall - the link is to a freely accessible advocate.com page.

It is censored with no explanation.

Case 3

Original post

Same as Case 2, moderators censor the post and leave no explanation.

Case 4

Original post

This one is finally given a removal reason: a rule that does not exist in the sidebar, and seems to have nothing to do with the post ("Your post has been removed for being too specific to a company or single product.")

But in a censored comment, the OP of the post says they received a different removal reason:

Holy shit I'm banned for 30 days for "conspiracy spreading". This sub is cooked

This time, other people notice the censorship and the nonsensical nature of the official removal reason.

Since this removal, there has been no further post of this news in r/privacy. Sources tell me the moderators refuse to explain their decision.

r/privacy moderator censors criticism of CEO James Dolan in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 1 points 4 days ago

If the moderators aren't capable of handling this amount of work, they should divest themselves from the communities they volunteered for. Especially if their leisure time on Reddit is spent losing arguments to other people on subreddits they run.

r/privacy moderator censors criticism of CEO James Dolan in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 0 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Now, or after a couple more posts? I have commented about this moderator's political attitudes elsewhere but I still have a bit of a backlog of posts to release info about.

r/privacy moderator censors criticism of CEO James Dolan in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 3 points 4 days ago (5 children)

They also ban criticism of the US government, US billionaires, and Israeli spyware... I sure can fault them for doing this

https://lemm.ee/post/59706303

r/privacy moderator censors criticism of CEO James Dolan in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 2 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (3 children)

Yep, Carrotcypher is in the mod list.

https://hub.fosstodon.org/team/

I presume the admins just don't know about this. They also moderate over 50 subreddits, including the Mastodon one. They tend to be the controlling moderator, or the top moderator that is regularly active.

Doing my best to compile more content about it...

r/privacy moderator censors criticism of CEO James Dolan in c/yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Oh yeah, there's more where this came from. I've got a little backlog of content

Zorin OS 17.3 replaced the default Browser from Firefox(Old) to Brave(New). in c/firefox@lemmy.ml
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 3 points 4 days ago

How does this affect people who upgrade? They just have Firefox plus a second browser?

1
Madison Square Garden Bans Fan After Surveillance System IDs Him as a Critic of Its CEO (gizmodo.com)
 

I discovered this article after it was censored from the Reddit privacy community.

Thank goodness there are still some places where you are allowed to criticize the rich and powerful.

3
r/privacy moderator censors criticism of CEO James Dolan (lemm.ee)
 

Original post

This action was taken under an unannounced rule that can label and censor criticism of anyone or anything with "FUD."

You'll find it's only used to protect the rich and powerful, though.

Unable to simply delete the post, the moderators scrubbed comments from anyone who named and shamed CEO James Dolan, but allowed his supporters to remain uncensored.

James Dolan is a thin-skinned billionaire crybaby who runs Madison Square Garden like it’s his own little surveillance state. The fact that he's using facial recognition tech to ban people—not for crimes, not for safety concerns—but for criticizing him is some straight-up dictator energy.........This isn’t just petty. It’s dangerous. It’s the kind of fascist-lite garbage we’ve been warning about for years: once the powerful get their hands on surveillance tools, they will abuse them to silence dissent. Dolan just doesn't care who sees it. He’s too arrogant, too insecure, and too rich to be held accountable.

The madison square garden ceo, james dolan, is the biggest thin-skinned pussy I have ever read about. Someone who band an individual due to a critical remark they made and put on a shirt? Pathetic lol.

Criticism of basically anyone rich or powerful was removed.

Criticism of Tucker Carlson was removed.

Firefox maker Mozilla prepares Gmail-like Thundermail in c/firefox@lemmy.ml
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 1 points 4 days ago

I think the purpose is to find a source of revenue so that they don't have to ruin their product. There's a lot of potential good here, in addition to the unfortunately undeniable potential bad.

Firefox maker Mozilla prepares Gmail-like Thundermail in c/firefox@lemmy.ml
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 0 points 5 days ago

Until the lawsuit between Steve Teixeira and Mozilla reveals the truth, I'm going to withhold my judgment about how fascistic Mozilla was internally.

Teixeira claimed Mozilla conducted an audit that found them pretty lacking in the equality department IIRC, and Mozilla's own lawyers disputed many things but not that.

1
"Age verification" laws are privacy-killing laws (lemm.ee)
 

"Age verification" laws are actually "upload your ID or get your face scanned to access every website, ending anonymity and associating your identity with everything you do online" laws and if more people understood that they would not be down for this authoritarian nonsense

1
Unmarked Vans. Secret Lists. Public Denunciations. America’s Police State Has Arrived. (www.nytimes.com)
1
Inside Palantir’s Expanding Influence Operation (www.techtransparencyproject.org)
Firefox 137 Released with Address Bar Revamp & Tab Groups in c/firefox@lemmy.ml
[–] LWD@lemm.ee 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

You can close a group and reopen it later.

I thought tab groups on the desktop were neat but ignorable... Until browser vendors started implementing stuff like this. Now it's basically a halfway point between an open tab and a bookmark. Excellent for organization.

1
r/privacy moderators blacklist German tech news site Heise, censor posts critical of DHS (lemm.ee)
 

Heise blacklisted

The post

After Trump's decree: fight for US funding for Tor, F-Droid and Let's Encrypt

Censored, all comments locked.

The removal reason

Site is NOT privacy-friendly since it requires agreeing to allow them to use tracking cookies on end device for personalized add and content. Now blacklisted. ......... Please use a credible source, and try to link to the original author’s work, not a blog trying to steal their thunder (or clicks).

Why this is bullshit

This is not a normal removal message. Most of this removal reason is from a template, the portion including "Now blacklisted" was manually added and has never been used before.

Heise is based in Germany, where the best privacy laws (the GDPR) are enforced strictly. If this site is blacklisted, then any site can be blacklisted.

"Please link to a credible source" is part of the original community rules, and maybe the moderator who edited the message forgot to remove it, because Heise is credible.

US border security questions are suppressed

The post

Traveling into the US with an iphone: question about border security [question tag] ....... So I've read that you should delete any apps that may have anti-Trump content (social media, WhatsApp, etc.), but even if you factory reset your phone, all the phone messages are still there, right? ........ Is there a way to save text messages in the cloud and have them NOT on your phone (and restore them later)? ......... Maybe just traveling with a burner phone is the only way. ......... I just saw two stories of American citizens being detained at airports and ICE searching their phones for anti-Trump stuff.

Censored, all comments locked.

The removal reason

Your submission could be seen as being unreliable, and/or spreading FUD concerning our privacy mainstays, or relies on faulty reasoning/sources that are intended to mislead readers. You may find learning how to spot fake news might improve your media diet.

Why it's bullshit

Their post is based on legitimate concerns from legitimate news sites. There is no FUD here, there is no attack on any "privacy mainstay" unless the moderators believe the US surveillance apparatus needs to be protected by them.

And if we needed more evidence the moderators are protecting the DHS, they also removed this comment from the thread's OP:

DHS revokes legal protections for 532,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans: https://www.npr.org/2025/03/22/nx-s1-5337214/dhs-revokes-humanitarian-parole-cubans-haitians-nicaraguans-venezuelans

Bonus: mods censor a guide to safe border crossing

The post

"How to protect your phone and data privacy at the US border," by Johana Bhuiyan, The Guardian - https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/mar/26/phone-search-privacy-us-border-immigration .......... To safeguard your phone and data privacy when traveling to the United States, especially if you're a visa or green card holder, prepare for potential device searches by CBP. Decide beforehand if you will comply with a search request, keeping in mind the risks of refusal, such as device confiscation. Turn your phone completely off before entering the United States (to ensure a heightened state of security and to clear the memory) and ensure it requires a strong password for decryption, disabling biometric unlocks. Instead of wiping your phone entirely (which could raise suspicion), selectively delete sensitive data and empty trash folders. Encrypt your device data and consider moving data you don't want searched to a trusted and secure cloud storage, as CBP policy restricts searching online cloud services. Remember that border enforcement can be unpredictable, so these precautions can help minimize risks during inspection.

The removal reason

carrotcypher: Repost as a link post

Why this is bullshit

No rules were broken. Moderator carrotcypher cannot even be assed to fabricate one. (Why not just blacklist The Guardian too?)

3
CEO of Brave rants about "lefties," "glowies," George Soros (lemm.ee)
submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by LWD@lemm.ee to c/technology@lemmy.world
44 comments fedilink
 

The IRS rules governing nonprofits still required the Mozilla Foundation to beg big to go big: the parent had to go find big grants from Soros, Ford, Knight, MacArthur, and give smaller grants to many. This put it in the lefties-only-no-righty-Irish-need-apply revolving-door personnel sector of NGOs and nonprofits (too many glowies there for me, too). Which meant I had a hostile MoFo over my head the minute I got CEO appointment from the MoCo board...

Of course I can't comment on anything about my exit, for reasons that only the most loopy HN h8ers still can't figure out.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43251203

view more: next ›