A Saudi Prince's Attempt to Silence Critics on Twitter (2020) (opens in new tab)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24342948 - Sept 2020 (96 comments)

> his position at the company did allow him access to the private information of many users, including their phone numbers

Yep, and this is after them for years claiming "not using" your phone number after alleged "verification" until EU forced them to admit they were lying.

> Twitter lawyers brought Alzabarah in the following afternoon, accused him of improperly accessing user accounts

I guess I have to side with the FBI on this one. There was no reason for Twitter to contact the employee, they could have seen what the employee was doing by accessing all these Saudi profiles and then giving the benefit of the doubt to the FBI.

I recently managed to watch Fogel's _The Dissident_.

The Twitter manipulation campaign that's covered in the movie was fascinating.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dissident

It's on Apple TV. It's a shame that Netflix appeared too nervous of the backlash to run it.

In related news, the US seems fine with bombing Iran-backed militias in Syria, but when news about MBS OK-ing the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi came out, crickets.

> In May 2017, President Donald Trump made his first overseas visit, a trip to Riyadh. Not long after his arrival, the president toured King Salman’s new anti-terrorism center, which focused on tracking extremists on Twitter. Afterward, the president, his wife, the king, and Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt gathered around an illuminated orb at the center of the room and posed for a photo. Standing just outside the frame was the kingdom’s new social media specialist, Ali Alzabarah.

https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/257/584/509...