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On March 10th, several days after Incognito Market was assumed to be shut down or no longer be processing transactions, the site posted a message to its homepage that reads as follows:

”Expecting to hear the last of us yet? We got one final little nasty suprise for y'all. We have accumulated a list of private messages, transaction info and order details over the years. You'll be surprised at the number of people that relied on our "auto-encrypt" functionality. And by the way, your messages and transaction IDs were never actually deleted after the "expiry"...”

”SURPRISE SURPRISE !!! Anyway, if anything were to leak to law enforcement, I guess nobody never slipped up. We'll be publishing the entire dump of 557k orders and 862k crypto transaction IDs at the end of May, whether or not you and your customers' info is on that list is totally up to you. And yes... YES, THIS IS AN EXTORTION !!! As for the buyers, we'll be opening up a whitelist portal for them to remove their records as well in a few weeks.”

”Thank you all for doing business with Incognito Market”

Exit scams are not uncommon on dark web markets, but this one is particularly large and openly threatening compared to most. Incognito Market requires the loading of cryptocurrency to a site-based wallet, which can then be used for in-house transactions only. All cryptocurrency on the site was seized from user’s wallets, estimated to be anywhere from $10 million to $75 million. After seizing the cryptocurrency wallets of all of the marketplace’s users, the site now openly explains that it will publish transactions and chat logs of users who refuse to pay an extortion fee. The fee ranges from $100 to $20,000, a volume based 5 tier buyer/seller classification.

Incognito Market also now has a Payment Status tab, which states ”you can see which vendors care about their customers below.” and lists the some of the market’s largest sellers. Sellers which have allegedly paid the extortion fee to not have their transaction records released are displayed in green, while those who have not yet paid are displayed in red.

Additionally, in a few weeks the site claims it will have a “whitelist portal” which would allow buyers to wipe their transactions and re-encrypt chat records.

Whoever is behind the website must be extremely, extremely confident in their anonymity, already working with government agencies, or both, because a bounty on this person is likely worth millions.

French President Emmanuel Macron said last month that he “cannot exclude” the possibility of Western soldiers being sent to aid Kiev in its fight against Moscow, branding Russia an “adversary” while denying Paris was “waging war” against it.

Russia’s military and top officials have repeatedly pointed to the presence of French mercenaries already fighting for Kiev on the ground.

In the statement on Tuesday, the SVR chief said the French Armed Forces had become “concerned” about the rising number of French nationals dying in Ukraine.

The casualty level has supposedly surpassed a “psychological threshold” and could trigger protests, the statement said, adding that Macron’s government was concealing this information and “delaying” the moment it would have to be revealed.

The claims come as the chief of staff of the French Army, Gen. Pierre Schill, said in an interview on Tuesday that France is prepared to take part in the “toughest engagements” militarily, and is ready to face any international developments. He added that Paris could assemble a division of 20,000 troops within 30 days and an army of 60,000 by joining with divisions from other NATO allies.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has also claimed this week that Western mercenaries, including French nationals, are dying in Ukraine “in large numbers.” Commenting on a potential NATO deployment to Ukraine, the president also warned that this would be “one step shy of a full-scale World War III.”

Cross posted this from lemmygrad

https://archive.ph/pMQBo

Time to harass a mf?

Oh yeah this is like the 4th time a demand for further provisional measures were outright ignored (or even refused) by the way.

I wish I'd written an article about this when the war first began. I've known and been saying for months that the process will go like this:

Ukraine will face demolition by war. They've repealed labour laws and banned left wing parties. Now, with the conditions right, the circling sharks of 'investment' have come to feed.

BlackRock and JPMorgan are apparently on a co-venture to get a hold of the contracts, that they'll make billions with, off cheapened labour and a desperate population, extracting the countries wealth to their banks. I'm sure some wealthy Russians and Ukrainians will make lots of money too.

And just watch, as it starts to be hailed as a charitable effort. Proof of Ayn Rand's concept of business altruism..

cross-posted from: https://lemy.lol/post/21905961

By Matthias Williams and John Irish March 19, 20244:34 AM GMT+5:30Updated 17 hours ago

Putin wins 87% of vote in weekend election, says Kremlin Western governments say election was rigged, undemocratic Condemn holding of election in occupied Ukraine regions China, North Korea, India, Iran congratulate Putin

LONDON, March 18 (Reuters) - Western governments lined up on Monday to condemn Russian President Vladimir Putin's landslide reelection as unfair and undemocratic, but China, India and North Korea congratulated the veteran leader on extending his rule by a further six years.

The contrasting reactions underscored the geopolitical fault lines that have gaped wider since Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine two years ago, triggering the deepest crisis in relations with the West since the end of the Cold War.

Arriving in Brussels on Monday, EU foreign ministers roundly dismissed the election result as a sham ahead of agreeing sanctions on individuals linked to the mistreatment and death of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny.

"Russia's election was an election without choice," German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said at the start of the meeting.

Playing on Moscow's reference to its war in Ukraine as a "special military operation", French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne said Paris had taken note of the "special election operation". Advertisement · Scroll to continue "The conditions for a free, pluralistic and democratic election were not met," his ministry said.

British Foreign Secretary David Cameron said the election outcome highlighted the "depth of repression" in Russia.

"Putin removes his political opponents, controls the media, and then crowns himself the winner. This is not democracy," Cameron said. France, Britain and others condemned the fact that Russia had also held its election in occupied regions of Ukraine that it claims to have annexed during the war.

The Kremlin dismissed such criticism, saying the 87% of the vote won by Putin during the three-day election showed the Russian people were consolidating around him. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Russia's election had no legitimacy. President Vladimir Putin speaks after polling stations closed in Moscow. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab "It is clear to everyone in the world that this figure (Putin)... is simply sick for power and is doing everything to rule forever," Zelenskiy said. U.S. President Joe Biden has not yet commented but a White House spokesperson on Sunday said Russia's election was "obviously not free nor fair".

OUTSIDE WEST, PUTIN CONGRATULATED In sharp contrast, Chinese President Xi Jinping congratulated Putin, and said Beijing would maintain close communication with Moscow to promote the "no limits" partnership they agreed in 2022, just before Russia invaded Ukraine. "I believe that under your leadership, Russia will certainly be able to achieve greater achievements in national development and construction," Xi told Putin in his message, according to Xinhua News. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman offered his congratulations on Putin's "decisive" victory and the Kremlin said the two men expressed readiness on the telephone to pursue their "effective coordination" in the OPEC+ oil producers group. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi echoed that message, saying he looked forward to strengthening New Delhi's "time-tested special and privileged strategic partnership" with Moscow. India and China, along with Russia, are members of the BRICS group of emerging economies that aims to challenge U.S. domination of the global economy. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi, accused by the West of supplying weapons to Russia, also extended congratulations to Putin, stressing their desire for further expansion of bilateral relations with Moscow. In Africa, where the West has been struggling to win support for its efforts to isolate Moscow over the Ukraine war, some newspapers saw Putin's re-election as reinforcing the stance of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. Those three states in the Sahel region have strengthened ties with Russia following coups in recent years at the expense of their traditional French and U.S. allies. "In Africa, this re-election could sound like a non-event, but given the context in the Sahel it takes on a particular meaning, because Putin embodies the new geopolitical balance of power on the continent with a growing (Russian) presence and influence," said Burkina Faso daily Aujourd'hui au Faso". The Reuters Daily Briefing newsletter provides all the news you need to start your day. Sign up here. Reporting by Reuters bureaux; Writing by Matthias Williams in London and John Irish in Paris Editing by Gareth Jones and David Gregorio.

Banning Russia from team sports and making individual athletes go through a 2 year vetting process. Not political

Russia hosting its own international sports competition after the Olympics. Political

cross-posted from: https://lemy.lol/post/21900068

17 Mar 2024 09:00 AM (GMT)

At least four foreign students have been injured after a Hindu far-right mob allegedly stormed a university hostel in India’s western Gujarat state and attacked the group of students for offering prayers during the holy month of Ramadan, local media has reported.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs on Sunday pledged to take “strict actions against the perpetrators”, as the local police in the home state of Prime Minister Narendra Modi said an investigation was under way in connection with the attack at the Gujarat University.

Further evidence of Cuba's deviousness that their super weapon leaves no physical trace

Image is of President Vladimir Putin, with his cook Prigozhin, though he is more famous for other things.

I'm assuming we all know what a "Russia" and a "Putin" is, so I'm skipping the background section.

On March 15th, Putin handily won the presidential election. This is perhaps one of the least surprising things to happen in the last couple years, and all claims and debates about electoral corruption are missing the point (in this particular election at least). The reason why Putin won is not fascist brainwashing or Putin having a high Persuasion/Intimidation DC, and it's not even really about the laws that make opposing the Ukraine War illegal. Wages are up significantly, unemployment is at record lows (for the post-USSR period, of course), as is poverty, and the ruble is about as stable as it could be given what the West has tried to do to it. The government has been forced to massively intervene in the economy to keep things afloat, buying up properties that have been ditched by foreign and domestic billionaires, though obviously Russia's wealthy are still plenty powerful. Inflation is up, but wages are comfortably outpacing it. And the Communist Party remains a relic of a bygone era, disconnected from the young people who might hypothetically propel a revolution.

Russia is still in the transition from switching to a Western-oriented export economy to an Eastern-oriented one. Nonetheless, Russia is now China's single largest oil supplier (unseating Saudi Arabia), delivering half of all their oil to China, and trade between the two countries has massively increased. Where Western brands have retreated from Russia (and not many actually have), more Russia-friendly corporations, and Russian businesses themselves, have filled the gaps.

By going through the news, I've seen a lot of economies that are not doing well at all. Most countries seem to be in that category. Either they have general growth but a deeply struggling populace, or the government is trying to keep the population afloat but running up huge debts in the process, or the government is failing on both counts. Russia is one of the few countries on the planet that I can confidently state is actually doing quite well objectively, which means it's doing extremely well relatively. Considering the Western economists regularly delivering portents of doom in early 2022, and salivating over how they were going to divide the country following the inevitable economic collapse, this is a hilarious state of affairs.

In the long term, their predictions may come true. It is entirely possible that a post-war Russia will slump, returning to neoliberal policies and continuing their nonsensical allergy to budget deficits. Russia might not be a mere gas station, but a substantial amount of the economy is made up of fossil fuel exports, which might be troublesome in a greener future, especially as China, their main oil market, is one of the few countries on the planet that seems serious about renewable/nuclear energy. And the limited labour force means that long-term growth is inherently limited without some creative measures, even with the potential influx of whatever remains of the population and territory that Russia seizes in Ukraine. Perhaps it is in this crucible of disillusionment and hardship, after seeing that good things are indeed possible if the government wishes them to be so, that a socialist Russia could rise again. But we aren't there yet, and the growth continues for now.

Much of this information is, again, from Michael Roberts. It seems like we're both doing the same strategy of hopping from election to election.

Apologies for the lack of updates (again!), I've been going through book titles again for the reading list (I've probably got a thousand or more to get through) and also trying to touch grass more. I'm not very good at balancing things out, I tend to do the hyperfocus-on-one-thing-until-it's-done approach.

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