{"id":1901899,"date":"2023-03-21T06:26:32","date_gmt":"2023-03-21T10:26:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/craigslist-craig-funded-the-censorship-industrial-complex-to-silence-dissent-online\/"},"modified":"2023-03-21T06:30:33","modified_gmt":"2023-03-21T10:30:33","slug":"craigslist-craig-funded-the-censorship-industrial-complex-to-silence-dissent-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/craigslist-craig-funded-the-censorship-industrial-complex-to-silence-dissent-online\/","title":{"rendered":"Craigslist Craig Funded The Censorship-Industrial Complex To Silence Dissent Online"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fcraigslist-craig-funded-the-censorship-industrial-complex-to-silence-dissent-online%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1901899&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div class=\"article-content\">\n<p>The billionaire founder of Craigslist, Craig Newmark, is <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2023\/02\/13\/craigslist-craig-is-dumping-his-billions-into-fake-news-to-help-democrats-win-elections\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">using<\/a> his fortune to further shape journalism into partisan activism to help Democrats win elections. He is the nation\u2019s leading financier of the \u201cmis\u201d- and \u201cdisinformation\u201d industries and is now the largest private stakeholder in America\u2019s legacy journalism schools. <\/p>\n<p>The most recent <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830002742657027?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Twitter Files<\/a> released by Matt Taibbi add a deeply disturbing new layer to the story. They show Newmark is at the very heart of an incestuous web of government agencies, nonprofit organizations, and corporate media institutions operating in concert to censor political opponents on social media.\u00a0Newmark is financing the largest coordinated assault on American free speech in living memory.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-2-long d-flex justify-content-center\" style=\"margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center; \" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-1833122104\">\n<div id=\"div-gpt-ad-1379703300879-0\" class=\"mb-30\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-79b8648c99dc31c754c983de2d40ef7b fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-2\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-79b8648c99dc31c754c983de2d40ef7b\"><\/div>\n<p>On March 9, journalist Matt Taibbi <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830009822650368?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">outlined<\/a> how pre-Elon Musk Twitter acted as \u201ca partner to government,\u201d working in concert with the Department of Homeland Security, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Health and Human Services, Treasury, the National Security Agency, and local police. An elaborate system for reporting hundreds of thousands of accounts was set up, and <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830013748514816?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Twitter obliged<\/a> by deleting thousands of accounts on demand. <\/p>\n<p>According to Taibbi, the grounds for reporting and deleting many accounts were \u201cshaky.\u201d He pointed to examples of several legitimate journalists and even leftist news outlet <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/truthout\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">TruthOut<\/a> appearing on internal \u201cdisinformation\u201d lists.<\/p>\n<p>However, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830029410070528?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Taibbi states<\/a> the majority of requests for censorship did not come from government agencies. Instead, Twitter relied upon a coalition of machine learning, internal human review, and outside \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830032526417928?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">partnerships<\/a>\u201d to detect \u201cmisinformation\u201d on the site. <\/p>\n<p>These outside partnerships played an aggressive role in pushing Twitter censorship. <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830035336601603?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Taibbi calls this group<\/a> the \u201cCensorship-Industrial Complex.\u201d A 2020 <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830038658486274?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">internal email<\/a> from Nick Pickles, then public policy director at Twitter, set up a working group with nine disinformation non-governmental organizations (NGOs): First Draft, Centre for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD), International Republican Institute (IRI), Atlantic Council\/DFRLab, Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO), Brookings, National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the National Democratic Institute (NDI).\u00a0<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-9ae8dc41884ac6da870b43d22fc3a8ee fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-6\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-9ae8dc41884ac6da870b43d22fc3a8ee\"><\/div>\n<p>As Taibbi <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830047269396483?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">points out<\/a>, the NGOs should have checked the power wielded by government agencies within Twitter. In reality, members of the Censorship-Industrial Complex entered into an incestuous working relationship in which it became difficult to disentangle one from the other due to their shared drive for censorship to further leftist political goals. <\/p>\n<p>It was well understood that a unified front could be <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830050708721664?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">financially rewarding<\/a> and that, united, they were the de facto arbiters of truth online. Massive public funds were being injected into supposedly non-governmental organizations to help in this colossal censorship program.<\/p>\n<p>Taibbi gives examples of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.disinformationindex.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Global Disinformation Index<\/a> receiving funding from the government\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.state.gov\/bureaus-offices\/under-secretary-for-public-diplomacy-and-public-affairs\/global-engagement-center\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Global Engagement Centre <\/a>(GEC) and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsguardtech.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Newsguard<\/a> receiving funding from the U.S. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defense.gov\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Department of Defense<\/a> (DOD). When the government is funding the NGOs whose job it is to push back on government censorship of free speech online, the outcomes are predictable.<\/p>\n<p>To add another layer to this sordid story, the glue that binds this fusion of government, NGOs, and the media together are the billionaire investors funding the NGOs. Chief among these is Newmark. His fingerprints, and financial backing, are all over the Censorship-Industrial Complex.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-4aa4c8d72fa43adaa46a5615532ecb5c fdrlst__b89e9-paragraph-10\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-4aa4c8d72fa43adaa46a5615532ecb5c\"><\/div>\n<p>For example, <a href=\"https:\/\/firstdraftnews.org\/about\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">First Draft<\/a> was set up to counter what it decided is \u201cmisinformation\u201d in newsrooms in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election. In 2017 it was incorporated into Harvard\u2019s Shorenstein Center, to which Newmark donated $5 million to set up <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/technology\/2023\/02\/02\/misinformation-harvard-donovan-close\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Joan Donovan\u2019s now disgraced<\/a> Technology and Social Change Project. In 2019 Newmark further gave First Draft <a href=\"https:\/\/firstdraftnews.org\/articles\/first-draft-launches-nationwide-project-to-help-prepare-us-newsrooms-for-online-threats-ahead-of-2020-election\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">$1.5 million<\/a> to help train journalists to identify disinformation in the run-up to the 2020 election.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/cepa.org\/about-cepa\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Centre for European Policy Analysis<\/a> (CEPA) is based in DC and receives undisclosed but \u201cgenerous\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/cepa.org\/about-cepa\/our-supporters\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">funding<\/a> from Newmark to <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/cepa\/status\/1516876861858529281?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">stop the spread of \u201cdisinformation<\/a>\u201d relating to the war in Ukraine.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Newmark is also deeply involved with the Atlantic Council\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.atlanticcouncil.org\/programs\/digital-forensic-research-lab\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">DFRLab<\/a>. In the 2020 fiscal year, he donated <a href=\"https:\/\/www.atlanticcouncil.org\/in-depth-research-reports\/report\/2020-annual-report-honor-roll-of-contributors\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">up to $500,000<\/a> to the same organization. In 2022 the Council\u2019s Cyber Statecraft division announced the launch of its \u201cOpen Source Policy Network\u201d with \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CyberStatecraft\/status\/1549030582256025600?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">generous<\/a>\u201d but undisclosed funding from Newmark. He was an <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DFRLab\/status\/1309907210458329089?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">expert guest speaker<\/a> at the Atlantic Council\u2019s \u201c2020 Election Integrity and Foreign Influence\u201d panel before that year\u2019s presidential election.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Atlantic Council also receives <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830083835342849?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">millions of dollars in funding<\/a> from the U.S. government and defense contractors annually. This blurred line between government and non-government organizations within the Censorship-Industrial Complex ensured that the goals of both were closely aligned. Also, importantly, if there was pushback or concerns within Twitter regarding one partner, Twitter\u2019s only recourse was to resort to CEPA, First Draft, or a different NGO within the network that Newmark also funded. Even when government agency advisors and NGOs disagreed on censorship, Newmark could be certain his agenda would prevail.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Newmark\u2019s largest individual donation to any of the NGOs in the Censorship-Industrial Complex went to the Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO). He donated $5 million dollars to fund the department in 2019. Newmark put his money behind one of the most controversial figures in online disinformation studies \u2014 Ren\u00e9e DiResta. <\/p>\n<p>DiResta is the co-director of the center, but her involvement in the 2018 New Knowledge scandal should preclude her from ever again being taken seriously in the field. New Knowledge was a Trump-era media darling and a politically motivated attempt to link the 2016 election to Russian disinformation influence. <\/p>\n<p>The project ended in scandal when co-founder Jonathon Morgan <a href=\"https:\/\/dailycaller.com\/2018\/12\/21\/senate-russia-report-russian-bot\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">admitted to creating bots<\/a> and a faux conservative Facebook page to interfere in the 2017 Alabama special election by spreading disinformation about GOP candidate Roy Moore. The New Knowledge affair remains the largest disinformation campaign of the Trump era, and Ren\u00e9e DiResta was the director of research for the company at that time.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Newmark\u2019s sponsorship of known politically motivated bad actors doesn\u2019t stop there. He also bankrolls The Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD), which is housed within the German Marshall Fund. Newmark is a major donor to the Fund. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gmfus.org\/2021-donors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">In 2021<\/a> he gave up to $1 million and another $500,000 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gmfus.org\/2020-donors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">in 2020<\/a> to support the ASD\u2019s in-house Russian disinformation influence tracker, <a href=\"https:\/\/securingdemocracy.gmfus.org\/hamilton-68-a-new-tool-to-track-russian-disinformation-on-twitter\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Hamilton68<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>During the height of the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, anyone seeking \u201cevidence\u201d to support claims that Russian bot armies had swung the election for Trump <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2023\/01\/28\/left-wing-think-tank-responsible-for-fake-russia-stories\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">pointed to Hamilton68<\/a> as evidence. The program claimed to track the influence of 600 Russian bot accounts on Twitter, a <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2023\/02\/01\/twitter-media-and-democrats-are-all-guilty-in-the-hamilton-68-scandal\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">claim later discredited<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>Even in 2018, Twitter\u2019s own Trust and Safety head, <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1619029853264826370?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Yoel Roth<\/a>, knew that Hamilton68 was a disinformation tool, yet Twitter <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1619029865310883842?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">kept the scandal quiet<\/a>. Importantly, <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/0z521\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Hamilton68 was programmed<\/a> by none other than New Knowledge\u2019s Jonathon Morgan. Newmark\u2019s continued financial support for both ASD and SIO makes it impossible for him to deny his political motivations and preference for bad actors.<\/p>\n<p>The \u201cTwitter Files\u201d have proven beyond doubt that big tech conspired with a cabal of government agencies, NGOs, and the media to censor conservatives on Twitter since 2016. As Taibbi <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mtaibbi\/status\/1633830047269396483?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">puts it<\/a>, \u201cintel officials, \u2018researchers,\u2019 and executives at firms like Twitter are effectively one team.\u201d And the financial captain of that team is Newmark.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>As it turns out, Newmark is not only quietly shaping the future of American journalism and politics, but he is spearheading government-NGO censorship and the misinformation industry with a win-at-all-costs mentality. The Censorship-Industrial Complex represents the greatest threat to free speech online in living memory, and Craig Newmark is bankrolling it.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fdrlst__b89e9-9aee4386dc56ccc20fef2612e4a087d5 fdrlst__b89e9-after-post-content\" id=\"fdrlst__b89e9-9aee4386dc56ccc20fef2612e4a087d5\"><\/div>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\">\n<div class=\"article-author-description fst-italic\">   Dr. Eoin Lenihan is an independent educator and extremism researcher. His work has been  featured on AlJazeera and Fox News. He has also written for Arutz Sheeva, Quillette, The Post  Millennial, and The Daily Caller. His peer-reviewed paper \u201cA classification of Antifa Twitter accounts  based on social network mapping and linguistic analysis\u201d was published in Social Network Analysis  and Mining, and it is the largest academic quantitative analysis of Antifa to date. You can find more  from Eoin on Twitter: @EoinLenihan and on his website: www.eoinlenihan.weebly.com.<\/div>\n<div class=\"article-tags bdr-top-black mt-30 mt-sm-60 pt-15 pt-md-45\">\n<ul class=\"list-unstyled d-flex flex-wrap align-items-center mb-0 mx-n10 p-0\">\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/big-government\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">big government<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/big-tech-censorship\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">big tech censorship<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/censorship\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">censorship<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/censorship-complex\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">censorship complex<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/craig-newmark\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">Craig Newmark<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/craigslist\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">Craigslist<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/elon-musk\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">Elon Musk<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/matt-taibbi\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">Matt Taibbi<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/twitter\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">Twitter<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"mt-10 mx-10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/tag\/twitter-files\/\" class=\"btn btn-black btn-small\">Twitter Files<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>&#8216;From <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2023\/03\/21\/craigslist-craig-funded-the-censorship-industrial-complex-to-silence-dissent-online\/?utm_source=rss&#038;utm_medium=rss&#038;utm_campaign=craigslist-craig-funded-the-censorship-industrial-complex-to-silence-dissent-online\">&#8220;Craigslist Craig Funded The Censorship-Industrial Complex To Silence Dissent Online&#8221;<\/a>&#8216;<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p><span style=\"font-size:11px\"><em>&#8220;The views and opinions expressed here are solely those of the author of the article and not necessarily shared or endorsed by Conservative News Daily&#8221;<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The billionaire founder of Craigslist, Craig Newmark, is using his fortune to further shape journalism into partisan activism to help Democrats win elections. He is the nation\u2019s leading financier of the \u201cmis\u201d- and \u201cdisinformation\u201d industries and is now the largest private stakeholder in America\u2019s legacy journalism schools. The most recent Twitter Files released by Matt<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1724,"featured_media":1901900,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546],"tags":[19687,12293,18201,18446,13729,9826,4464,5796],"class_list":["post-1901899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist","tag-censorship-industrial","tag-complex","tag-craig","tag-craigslist","tag-dissent","tag-funded","tag-online","tag-silence"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1724"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1901899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1901900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1901899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1901899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1901899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}