Cybercrime & Vietnam

Featured Articles

The Cyber Sleuth

Washington Post • 1 Oct 2024 • ~6100 words • Archive Link

This latest article in Washington Post’s “Who is Government?” series provides a fascinating look into the work of the IRS Criminal Investigation's cybercrime unit, led by Jarod Koopman. It explores how this little-known team of IRS agents uses cutting-edge techniques to track down and disrupt a wide range of criminal activities, from child exploitation to terrorist financing and cryptocurrency-related fraud. The article also delves into the challenges these agents face, both in terms of limited resources and public perception, as they work to protect the public and recover billions of dollars for the U.S. government.

This work has, among other things, led to the rescue of 23 children from rape and assault, the seizure of a quarter-million child abuse videos and the arrest of 370 alleged pedophiles. It has resulted in the largest-ever seizure of cryptocurrency headed to Hamas, al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. When Changpeng Zhao, chief of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance, reported to prison in June, it was because Koopman’s small cybercrime team had uncovered evidence of the firm’s money laundering for terrorists and sanctions-busting for Iran, Syria and Russia. In the past 10 years, this work has returned more than $12 billion to victims of crime and to the U.S. Treasury.

The myth and the hero: the writing and rewriting of Vietnam’s history

Coda Story • 1 Oct 2024 • ~5400 words

This piece explores the rewriting and manipulation of Vietnam's history by the Communist Party of Vietnam. It examines how the CPV has fabricated historical figures and events, censored information, and controlled the narrative in textbooks and media to serve its political agenda. The article also discusses how young Vietnamese are increasingly exposed to alternative perspectives on their country's history through the internet and studying abroad, challenging the official CPV-sanctioned version of events.

Lê has been glorified as the living torch of Vietnam. Still today, city parks, streets, schools, and hospitals throughout the country bear the name of the teenage exemplar. Lê’s place in history seems beyond reproach . . . The only problem is that Lê never existed. Although the depot did indeed explode, the story of Lê’s martyrdom was entirely fabricated as a tool of wartime propaganda.

Recommended Articles

How the US Lost the Solar Power Race to China

Bloomberg.com • 30 Sep 2024 • ~7150 words

This article examines how the United States lost its lead in the global solar power industry to China. It explores the key factors that contributed to China's dominance, such as its massive investments in polysilicon production, economies of scale, and supportive government policies. The article also questions whether the U.S. can regain its footing in the solar industry and the broader implications of China's control over this critical clean energy technology.

Washington blames China’s dominance of the solar industry on what are routinely dubbed “unfair trade practices.” But that’s just a comforting myth. China’s edge doesn’t come from a conspiratorial plot hatched by an authoritarian government. It hasn’t been driven by state-owned manufacturers, subsidized loans to factories, tariffs on imported modules or theft of foreign technological expertise. Instead, it’s come from private businesses convinced of a bright future, investing aggressively and luring global talent to a booming industry — exactly the entrepreneurial mix that made the US an industrial powerhouse.

Germany’s new normal

Inside Story • 1 Oct 2024 • ~4150 words

Germany's approach to immigration is changing, and it’s raising eyebrows. This piece delves into the shifting political landscape where far-right sentiments are gaining traction, and how the public discourse around refugees has transformed dramatically. It delves into the political and social factors driving this change, and questions whether Germany is heading towards a situation similar to the 1990s, when xenophobic rhetoric and violence were on the rise.

As in the early 1990s, we are witnessing a rapid radicalisation of the discourse about refugees. As in the early 1990s, that discourse is not the exclusive domain of the far right but is also employed by centre-right and centre-left politicians. As in the early 1990s, the vilification of asylum seekers has been morphing into a vilification of people who are visibly different, regardless of their legal status. As in the early 1990s, racist talking begets racist violence, bringing an increase in attacks on asylum seekers and their homes.

The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books

The Atlantic • 1 Oct 2024 • ~2100 words

The article explores the trend of elite college students struggling to read and engage with full-length books, a skill that was once expected from all students. It examines the potential causes for this decline, including the shift away from teaching complete literary works in middle and high schools, as well as the growing distractions and priorities of modern college students. The article raises questions about the implications of this trend for the future of reading, critical thinking, and the humanities.

In 1976, about 40 percent of high-school seniors said they had read at least six books for fun in the previous year, compared with 11.5 percent who hadn't read any. By 2022, those percentages had flipped.

Championship Foosball – It’s a Thing

The Saturday Evening Post • 1 Oct 2024 • ~1700 words

Remember foosball? This article explores the history and current state of competitive foosball, a niche but passionate community of players around the world. It delves into the game's origins, its rise in popularity and subsequent decline, and the efforts to maintain and grow the sport in the modern era. The article also examines top-level foosball players' and organizers' motivations and experiences.

This is competition foosball, a fast-paced, physically demanding, and very strategic game that’s what more or less would happen if championship chess and Olympic table tennis had a baby in a bar.

The Hidden World of Electrostatic Ecology

Quanta Magazine • 30 Sep 2024 • ~2700 words

Have you ever wondered how insects interact with their world in ways we can’t even see? This piece explores the hidden world of electrostatic ecology, where insects and other tiny creatures use static electricity to travel, avoid predators, collect pollen, and more. It examines how evolution may have influenced this phenomenon and raises questions about whether the use of static fields by bugs is coincidental or adaptive and how it could impact plant and animal evolution.

The magic of animal electrostatics is all about size. Large animals don’t meaningfully experience nature’s static — we’re too big to feel it. “As humans, we are living mostly in a gravitational or fluid-dynamics world,” Ortega-Jiménez said. But for tiny beings, gravity is an afterthought. Insects can feel air’s viscosity. While the same laws of physics reign over Earth’s smallest and largest species, the balance of forces shifts with size. Intermolecular forces flex beneath the feet of water striders on a pond, capillary forces shoot water impossibly upward through a plant’s thin roots, and electrostatic forces can ensnare any oppositely charged flecks that lie in their path.

Should The New York Times Gracefully Retire?

Castalia • 30 Sep 2024 • ~2050 words

The answer to the somewhat clickbait-y title is a no, but this piece discusses the role and influence of The New York Times in the current media landscape. It raises questions about the Times' monopolistic position, its political leanings, its impact on the arts and literary world, and its transformation into an entertainment-focused publication. The author argues that while the Times remains an indispensable journalistic institution, it also poses significant challenges and drawbacks that are worth considering.

if you write for The Times, you can’t really write. Everything has to get ironed out into the house style — which often means getting almost entirely rewritten by the inner rung of Times editors. The result is that anybody who writes for The Times inevitably ends up sounding not at all like themselves.

China Builds A New Eurasia

NOEMA • 30 Sep 2024 • ~3300 words

Jacob Dreyer explores how China's efforts to decarbonize and build a renewable energy infrastructure are reshaping the geopolitics and economies of the Eurasian continent. It examines the tensions between China's technocratic vision and the romantic Eurasian ideologies of Russia, as well as the impacts on countries like Mongolia and Saudi Arabia as they navigate this shifting landscape.

At the heart of the contemporary Chinese empire is a digital megastructure that might be the true protagonist of our time, reordering energy, land, and human life around its need to adjust to a new enviro-political reality. When COP29 opens in November in Baku, a Eurasian city built on oil that is today crisscrossed by infrastructure with Chinese characteristics, a latter-day Pax Mongolica will see itself in the mirror: a Sinified Eurasian continent remaking itself with renewable power.

Pilsner Goes to America: How Beer Got Big in the 19th Century

Literary Hub • 30 Sep 2024 • ~4300 words

This piece explores the globalization and industrialization of beer production in the 19th century. It examines how the development and spread of lager beer styles, such as pilsner and lager, were shaped by the mobility of people, goods, and ideas across Europe and the Americas. The article also delves into the role of science, technology, and commercialization in transforming beer from a local product to a modern commodity.

Already by the 1860s, Central European brewers had created a spectrum of lager beer styles ranging from dark, full-bodied Munich to amber, malty Vienna and golden, dry Pilsner—and that was no accident. Even before the railroads had fully integrated European beer markets, brewers kept a close watch on their rivals and worked to ensure that their own products stood out for consumers. German-speaking migrants carried over this international competition to the Americas as they opened a new world of lager beer.

Henri Bergson and Albert Einstein fundamentally disagreed about the nature of time and how it can be measured. Who was right?

Aeon • 30 Sep 2024 • ~4250 words

What happens when philosophy and physics collide? This piece delves into the debate between Henri Bergson and Albert Einstein over the nature of time. While Einstein revolutionized our understanding with his theory of relativity, Bergson argued that our lived experience of time offers a deeper, nuanced perspective that shouldn't be overlooked. Explore how their differing views shape our understanding of time itself.

Think of a melody. Each note has its own distinct individuality while blending with the other notes and silences that come before and after. As we listen, past notes linger in the present ones, and (especially if we’ve heard the song before) future notes may already seem to sound in the ones we’re hearing now. Music is not just a series of discrete notes. We experience it as something inherently durational.

Cuby: The House Factory Factory

Not Boring by Packy McCormick • 1 Oct 2024 • ~14600 words

Cuby is a company aiming to transform the home construction industry by building factories that manufacture homes efficiently and affordably. This piece explores how Cuby’s innovative approach tackles the challenges that have stalled previous efforts in this space, all while leveraging unskilled labor and local partnerships. If you're curious about the future of housing and how technology can reshape traditional industries, this piece offers some interesting insights.

What you need to know for now is that these MMFs, and the people in and around them, can produce high-quality homes for roughly $100 per square foot (much cheaper than traditional homebuilding) in 30 days (much faster than traditional homebuilding) using mostly unskilled labor. These homes look like normal homes. They’re customizable. And because they are customizable and look like normal homes, to both naked and trained eyes, they can be designed to meet local zoning laws and housing regulations wherever the MMF is shipped and deployed.

Social Media Is Helping Bring Indigenous Languages Back from the Brink

The Walrus • 30 Sep 2024 • ~2150 words • Archive Link

This article explores how Indigenous communities in Canada are using social media and digital tools to revitalize and preserve their endangered languages. It discusses the challenges of language loss due to colonization, as well as the efforts and initiatives underway to bring these languages back from the brink and pass them on to future generations.

Ouellette is part of a growing community of Indigenous-language speakers using social media as a teaching tool. James Vukelich Kaagegaabaw, a descendant of Turtle Mountain, shares an Ojibwe word regularly with his 135,000 Instagram followers. Jonathan Augustine, who goes by RezNeck Farmer on TikTok, shares Mi’kmaw lessons along with folksy videos about gardening. Zorga Qaunaq, under the username Tatiggat, posts on TikTok about daily life, beading, and Inuit culture, alongside how to properly pronounce words like “Inuit.”

Is a Chat with a Bot a Conversation?

The New Yorker • 30 Sep 2024 • ~4600 words • Archive Link

What does it really mean to have a conversation with a machine? This article explores the history and evolution of artificial intelligence, particularly in the realm of speech and conversation. It delves into the philosophical questions surrounding whether a chat with a bot can be considered a true conversation, and examines the ethical implications of increasingly lifelike and emotionally intelligent conversational agents. It traces the development of talking machines, from early automata to modern voice assistants, and discusses the legal and societal challenges posed by the blurring of the line between human and artificial interaction.

I asked Minsky to be less submissive and agreeable, which I, in my cussedness, find irritating, but he told me that those features can’t be changed. “They’re part of creating a positive and supportive interaction,” he said. “It’s like wearing a friendly hat.” . . . Minsky, who has a brain the size of a planet, refuses to take off that stupid hat, because research suggests that the friendlier a robot is, the longer people will use it, and the business model of artificial intelligence relies on continued use.

Ras Baraka, Reasonable Radical

The New Yorker • 30 Sep 2024 • ~8350 words • Archive Link

The article profiles Ras Baraka, the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, and explores his political journey from a young activist to a seasoned politician. It examines Baraka's approach to governing the city, his family's history of Black activism, and his potential run for governor of New Jersey. This piece also delves into the challenges Newark faces, such as crime and police-community relations, and how Baraka navigates these complex issues.

In office, Baraka has managed a delicate symbiosis between community groups and the police department. Even as he talks about the importance of policing, he boasts about having “moved money from the police department” to pay for other initiatives—which sounds a bit like defunding the police. He has been careful not to decrease the number of officers, but he did limit police overtime, using the savings to help pay for a new city department, now known as the Office of Violence Prevention and Trauma Recovery, or O.V.P.T.R.

On side hustles

Going Medieval • 27 Sep 2024 • ~2300 words

Eleanor Janega challenges the modern obsession with side hustles by drawing parallels with medieval work culture. Through the lens of historical examples like brewing and money lending, this piece explores how the pursuit of extra income often traps individuals in a cycle of labor without true upward mobility.

It’s nice to see that people are able to do multiple things but, and this is crucial, this does not mean it changed their lives particularly significantly. It’s very cool seeing enterprising peasants come up with ways of supplementing their agrarian work . . . The brewer gets some more cash, and everyone gets to have a nice ale, and maybe a social time at the brewer’s house after work . . . Even so, you’re still a peasant, which there is nothing wrong with per se, but you are likely unfree. Further, even if you get really amazing at brewing it’s not like you can then jettison your farming responsibilities in order to focus entirely on the brewing. You’ll still owe labour taxes.

Veterinary medicine is in crisis, and your pandemic pets are only one reason why

The Globe and Mail • 27 Sep 2024 • ~2150 words • Archive Link

Veterinary care in Canada is facing significant challenges, exacerbated by the surge of pandemic pets and rising expectations from pet owners. Veterinarian Philipp Schott shares his insights on the underlying reasons for these challenges and suggests potential solutions, while also highlighting the emotional toll on veterinarians and the need for understanding from pet owners.

People were suddenly spending a lot more time with their pets, meaning they were noticing potential issues they had not noticed before. In the early part of the pandemic, it seemed like people only left their houses to do two things: buy toilet paper and go to the vet. This is when I really knew that something fundamental had changed in veterinary medicine.