‘Europe Is Punching Technofascists in the Face’
In my Hot Type column in Byline I investigate Europe’s big moves against big tech and the broligarchs in the wake of the Epstein scandal
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“Since the overlords of human perception from Silicon Valley turned out to be regulars on Epstein Island, Europe is confronted with strategic necessity to protect their own citizens’ brains.”—Alexandra Alvarova, disinformation analyst
Not sure why anyone still feels a need to react to Trump’s memetic warfare. He told us who he was a decade ago. Those reposting his cruel and racist memes are redelivering the psychological payload. We are more than a decade into the Great Propaganda Wars, and pro-democracy forces should know better by now.
If you are unclear about the origins of memetic warfare, HiFi, Jim, and I offer a good explainer on last night’s RadPod & (Not So) Chill, which also features highlights from our latest interview with Craig Unger.
I believe it’s important to pay attention to good things that are happening, and right now, they are happening in Europe.
For today’s Hot Type column in Byline, I wrote about how Europe is punching technofascists in the face in the wake of the Epstein scandal.
Thank you as always to everyone who supports my work here and at Byline. I believe the work of independent investigative reporters exposing the transnational crime wave has revealed the failing of corporate media in stark contrast.
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Below is an excerpt from today’s Hot Type.
Epstein, Trump and How Europe Is Punching Technofascists in the Face
Byline political columnist Heidi Siegmund Cuda investigates Europe’s big moves against big tech and the broligarchs in the wake of the Epstein scandal
“Since the overlords of human perception from Silicon Valley turned out to be regulars on Epstein Island, Europe is confronted with strategic necessity to protect their own citizens’ brains.”—Alexandra Alvarova, disinformation analyst
It’s strange seeing things we have reported for years finally make their way above the fold in mainstream newspapers.
A decade ago, I was writing reports on convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein and his ties to convicted sex felon Donald Trump, and their ties to Russia. I found tweet after tweet dating back to 2016, where I note that so much of what we’re enduring globally is a massive coverup for transnational human trafficking.
With the latest email dump exposing Epstein’s links to the FSB and deep connections to Silicon Valley’s elite, it’s worth revisiting my interview from last year with Craig Unger, about the ‘red sparrows’ in Epstein’s direct employ. All too often, the women are overlooked. But as you’ll see in this report, Hot Type: Epstein and Russian Connections to One of the World’s ‘Sleaziest Pimps’, Russian operatives were hiding in plain sight, with their links to Silicon Valley, tech execs, and AI exposed.
While the Epstein scandal parade consumes the US — and is being used to take aim at Keir Starmer in the UK — Europe is punching technofascists in the metaphorical face.
France
One of the biggest targets of Russian and US disinformation campaigns is French President Emmanuel Macron, whose wife Brigitte has also suffered relentless attacks. But in speech after speech, we see Macron getting it: “We had the immense naivety to entrust our democratic space to social networks that are in the hands either of big American entrepreneurs, or of large Chinese companies, whose interests are absolutely not the survival or the proper functioning of our democracies,” he said in speech at the 35th anniversary of German reunification. “If we Europeans do not wake up, to say, ‘We want to take back control of our democracies,’ in 10 years, all those who are playing on or with this infrastructure will have won. And we will be a continent, like many others, of conspiracy theorists, extremists, noise and fury.”
Western Europeans are waking up, and France may be in the lead.
Not only did the first arrest of a tech CEO for crimes on their platform occur in France in August 2024 with the arrest of Telegram’s Pavel Durov, but on Tuesday, Paris prosecutors raided the office of Elon Musk’s X platform as part of an investigation over child abuse images and deepfakes. They also summoned Elon Musk and former X CEO Linda Yaccarino for questioning.
In addition, France is aggressively pursuing digital sovereignty by replacing US-based, non-European technologies like Zoom and Microsoft Teams with their own video conferencing tool called Visio, aiming for 2027.
As part of its digital detox, the French initiative — focused on protecting sensitive citizen data — aims to transition 2.5 million civil servants to localized platforms, terminating reliance on US-based tech.
Spain
In one of the more fascinating developments, Spain’s President Pedro Sánchez, who has faced fiery ongoing digital army attacks, announced a flurry of changes to the country’s tech regulations.
Pledging to protect children from the “digital Wild West”, Sánchez said Spain plans to ban social media for children under the age of 16. Australia became the world’s first country to bring a ban last year, with France, Denmark and Austria considering national age limits, as well.
In addition, Sanchez announced at the World Governments Summit in Dubai on Tuesday that Spain will make company executives responsible for “illegal or harmful content” on their platforms, rankling Elon Musk and Pavel Durov, who both spent the last few days post-whinging.
In response, Spain’s Deputy Prime Minister Yolanda Díaz just announced: “I have left X. That network is a place of hate. We are not vassals of Elon Musk or Trump.”
Poland
Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s Government is driving a massive tech and cybersecurity expansion in Poland, focusing on defense and anti-drone technology — relying on Polish and Norwegian firms. In addition, Poland is probing links between Jeffrey Epstein and Russia, while also promising to investigate any ties to the trafficking of Polish victims.
“More and more leads, more and more information, and more and more commentary in the global press all relate to the suspicion that this unprecedented paedophilia scandal was co-organised by Russian intelligence services,” Tusk said on Tuesday.
Taking the Broligarchs Down
“Spain, France, and Poland are very clearly on the same team,” information security analyst Jackie Singh told Byline Supplement. “There has been a decision to take the broligarchs down. It’s clear they are VERY f***ing serious.”
Italy-based geopolitical analyst Monique Camarra, who writes the EuroFile Substack, told me: “European leaders have a duty to go after big tech if they are breaking our laws. We still believe in the law in the EU, even if the shitshow continues in the US. They bought up influence in the US, not here.”
Canadian political philosopher Dr Michael MacKay sees hopeful signs in Europe.
“The EU is enforcing its privacy regulations and freedom of expression principles in a consistent way,” he said. “National governments, in particular France and Spain, are enforcing their own laws against fraud and criminal conspiracy to online communities as they do to face-to-face communities.”
He said a very positive development is the roll-out of W, an online platform that he says “takes seriously the grown-up notion that freedom and responsibility go together.”
In its mission statement, W says it will be a trusted social media platform “built on verified human users, transparency, privacy, and free speech.”
“It is hosted in Europe but is open to users anywhere in the world,” said MacKay. “My hope is that W can attract journalists and quality advertisers the way Twitter did before Elon Musk destroyed honest verification and community-standards moderation.”
MacKay praised Finland’s focus on building online literacy, and said he sees Canada strengthening its Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement with the European Union as a powerful alliance.
Austrian disinformation analyst, Dietmar Pichler, said the problems on big social media platforms are so severe, something’s got to give.
“International troll networks aim to divide, destabilize, and weaken our Western democratic societies,” he said. “They do this not only through coordinated posting and the spreading of malign information, they also manipulate the algorithms of the platforms by mass liking and sharing posts that are useful for their narrative or strategy, for instance to support polarization. This means that platforms show postings in your newsfeed from accounts you never followed, because the algorithm decided that they are relevant or popular. However, this assessment can be based on a false boost created by mass likes and shares from trolls and bots.
“The EU Digital Services Act requires platforms to make their algorithms more transparent and to prevent systematic attacks via troll farms on our information space.”
He said that in “the case of individuals, real people living in the EU, and also voices from outside, the Digital Services Act does not equal censorship.”
“We are facing massive attacks on social media, and when we look at what platforms proactively show us in our feeds, we see content from profiles and channels we did not follow or subscribe to, simply because the algorithm decided to show it to us. When this includes channels of the Russian embassy or hardcore anti-Western propaganda actors, agents of influence, and militants from all sides, then we have a problem and the platforms need to act.”
Pichler said he has a strict, pro-freedom of speech stance and is not in favor of blocking social media platforms in the EU, but as a delivering vehicle for information warfare, they need to be addressed in an efficient way…
“Regulation is only one step in the journey. I see that in many panel discussions about disinformation, experts spend 90% of the time talking about regulating platforms, while nobody speaks about narratives, subtle propaganda, agents of influence, offline pro-authoritarian talking points, and similar issues. We need a broad mix of measures to counter the malign campaigns targeting our democracy.”
Alexandra Alvarova, who hosts multiple podcasts on disinformation airing in the Czech Republic, said after this explosive week, she expects less talk, and more action from European leaders.
She told me: “Since all the overlords of human perception from Silicon Valley turned out to be regulars on Epstein Island, Europe is confronted with the strategic necessity to protect their own citizens’ brains.”
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The above is an excerpt from Hot Type. As always, I ask those who can afford to support a small global team of investigative reporters to please take out a subscription to Byline Supplement.
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More info about Bette Dangerous - This magazine is written by Heidi Siegmund Cuda, an Emmy-award winning investigative reporter/producer, author, and veteran music and nightlife columnist. She is the cohost of RADICALIZED Truth Survives, an investigative show about disinformation and is part of the Byline Media team. Thank you for your support of independent investigative journalism.
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Great article and Radicalized pod. For years, you guys have been at the forefront,