A disinfo operation broke into the content management systems of Eastern European media outlets in a campaign to spread misinformation about NATO. Wired reports: On Wednesday, security firm FireEye released a report on a disinformation-focused group it's calling Ghostwriter. The propagandists have created and disseminated disinformation since at least March 2017, with a focus on undermining NATO and the US troops in Poland and the Baltics; they've posted fake content on everything from social media to pro-Russian news websites. In some cases, FireEye says, Ghostwriter has deployed a bolder tactic: hacking the content management systems of news websites to post their own stories. They then disseminate their literal fake news with spoofed emails, social media, and even op-eds the propagandists write on other sites that accept user-generated content. That hacking campaign, targeting media sites from Poland to Lithuania, has spread false stories about US military aggression, NATO soldiers spreading coronavirus, NATO planning a full-on invasion of Belarus, and more.

"They're spreading these stories that NATO is a danger, that they resent the locals, that they're infected, that they're car thieves," says John Hultquist, director of intelligence at FireEye. "And they're pushing these stories out with a variety of means, the most interesting of which is hacking local media websites and planting them. These fictional stories are suddenly bona fide by the sites that they're on, and then they go in and spread the link to the story."

FireEye itself did not conduct incident response analyses on these incidents and concedes that it doesn't know exactly how the hackers are stealing credentials that give them access to the content management systems that allow posting and altering news stories. Nor does it know who is behind the string of website compromises, or for that matter the larger disinformation campaign that the fake stories are a part of. But the company's analysts have found that the news site compromises and the online accounts used to spread links to those fabricated stories, as well as the more traditional creation of fake news on social media, blogs, and websites with an anti-US and anti-NATO bent, all tie back to a distinct set of personas, indicating one unified disinformation effort. FireEye's Hultquist points out that the campaign doesn't seem financially motivated, indicating a political or state backer, and notes that the focus on driving a wedge between NATO and citizens of Eastern Europe hints at possible Russian involvement.

When a customer gets refunded for an app they purchased, Apple doesn't refund the 30% cut they took from the developer, says developer Simeon Saens of Two Lives Left. While [online] payment processors generally don't refund fees on refunded payments, "the App Store doesn't position itself as a payments processor the way Stripe does, so it sounds really weird that they would act like one," writes HN user chadlavi. Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney says in a tweet: This is a critical consideration in these 30% store fees. They come off the top, before funding any developer costs. As a result, Apple and Google make more profit from most developers' games than the developers themselves. That is terribly unfair and exploitative. "If the app store took a 3% chunk and never refunded it regardless of the ongoing status of the transaction, that would put them right in line with other payment processors," adds chadlavi. "It would also still net them billions of dollars, I think!"

UPDATE: In a follow-up tweet, Simeon says he "was mistaken in my original (now deleted) tweet." He adds: "Apple does not keep the 30% commission on a refund the refund happens as you'd expect. I don't know where I got the idea that it worked the way I thought it did."

Slashdot reader ravenscar did some digging in the Apple developer forums and found that "Apple has the right to keep its 30%... [but] rarely exercises this right and most developers see a 1 to 1 relationship on funds received vs funds refunded in these situations." They go on to say: "I can't find any cited examples of Apple keeping the commission."

Ton Roosendaal, Chairman of Blender Foundation (which accepts donations to support activities to provide free and open accessible services for all Blender contributors), writes: Microsoft makes use of Blender to generate synthetic 3D models and images of humans that can be used to train AI models. For researchers, having access to high quality free/opensource 3D software has proven to be of great benefit for scientific projects. You can check some of their work here. To express their support, Microsoft is joining the Blender Foundation's Development Fund as a Corporate Gold member per July 1st, 2020. We at Blender are very proud of this support statement, it's another important signal that the industry migrates to open source and finds ways to contribute to it.

Arizona is leading a multi-U.S. state probe into whether Apple's deliberate slowing of older iPhones violated deceptive trade practice laws, Reuters reported Wednesday, citing documents. From a report: Last week, a separate document released by a tech watchdog group showed the Texas attorney general might sue Apple for such violations in connection with a multi-state probe, without specifying charges. In the ongoing probe since at least October 2018, investigators have asked Apple for data about "unexpected shutdowns" of iPhones and the company's throttling, or slowing down, of the devices through power management software, documents Reuters obtained through a public records request showed. Apple came under fire in 2017 when Primate Labs, the maker of software for measuring a phone's processor speeds, revealed that some iPhones became slower as they aged.

The top executives at four of the world's largest and most powerful technology companies are testifying now before Congress in the culmination of a year-long antitrust inquiry. You can watch the livestream below (link).

A group of Japanese lawmakers is seeking to restrict the use of TikTok and other apps developed by Chinese firms, following in the footsteps of India, which has already blocked dozens of Chinese apps, and the U.S., which is floating the idea. From a report: The decision was first reported by Japanese national broadcaster NHK. The lawyers shared the same concern as officials in the U.S. and India that their domestic user data could end up in the hands of Beijing, and planned to submit the proposal to the Japanese government as early as September. Japan was one of TikTok's first overseas success cases despite being considered a tough nut for foreign internet firms to crack. The nascent localization team went all out to attract celebrity users and made its breakthrough with Kinoshita Yukina, a TV personality, after holding "six or seven rounds of discussions" with her studio. Kinoshita's participation ushered in other stars, who brought with them flocks of fans to the platform. In the Japanese iOS store, TikTok has consistently ranked at the top among entertainment apps and is the fifth-most downloaded app across all categories in the country as of this writing, according to research firm App Annie.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said on Wednesday that popular Chinese-owned video-sharing app TikTok was under a national security review and that his agency would make a recommendation to the president on the app this week. From a report: The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which reviews deals by foreign acquirers for potential national security risks and is led by Treasury, is looking at TikTok, Mnuchin told reporters at the White House. The committee has the power to force companies to unwind deals or put in place measures to protect U.S. national security. "TikTok is under CFIUS review. We will be making a recommendation to the president this week so we have lots of alternatives," he said.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: In a video posted Monday online, a group of people calling themselves "America's Frontline Doctors" and wearing white medical coats spoke against the backdrop of the Supreme Court in Washington, sharing misleading claims about the virus, including that hydroxychloroquine was an effective coronavirus treatment and that masks did not slow the spread of the virus. [...] The members of the group behind Monday's video say they are physicians treating patients infected with the coronavirus. But it was unclear where many of them practice medicine or how many patients they had actually seen. As early as May, anti-Obamacare conservative activists called the Tea Party Patriots Action reportedly worked with some of them to advocate loosening states' restrictions on elective surgeries and nonemergency care. On July 15, the group registered a website called "America's Frontline Doctors," domain registration records show. One of the first copies of the video that appeared on Monday was posted to the Tea Party Patriots' YouTube channel, alongside other videos featuring the members of "America's Frontline Doctors."

The video did not appear to be anything special. But within six hours, President Trump and his son Donald Trump Jr. had tweeted versions of it, and the right-wing news site Breitbart had shared it. It went viral, shared largely through Facebook groups dedicated to anti-vaccination movements and conspiracy theories such as QAnon, racking up tens of millions of views. Multiple versions of the video were uploaded to YouTube, and links were shared through Twitter. Facebook, YouTube and Twitter worked feverishly to remove it, but by the time they had, the video had already become the latest example of misinformation about the virus that has spread widely. That was because the video had been designed specifically to appeal to internet conspiracists and conservatives eager to see the economy reopen, with a setting and characters to lend authenticity. It showed that even as social media companies have sped up response time to remove dangerous virus misinformation within hours of its posting, people have continued to find new ways around the platforms' safeguards. [...] At least one version of the video, viewed by The Times on Facebook, was watched over 16 million times.