This is on the heels of some chud “infiltrating” the Minnesota signal chats.
A couple of notes here:
Organizers have to walk a tight balance between security and usability when organizing these rapid response teams. That said, NO software is going to serve you well without a solid security culture. Give that link a read, but here are the questions the folks at Anarchist News presents us, reformulated for ICE Resistance:
Questions
- What security concerns do you find are most overlooked in [Rapid Response] circles? What about overdone?
- How are security concerns changing in light of the development of companies like Flock Safety, Oracle and Palantir? (Do you know what a Flock camera is, and how to spot it?)
- What are ways security culture and protocols change between [Rapid Response] groupings, particularly those separated by geography? (Say, in different cities or [states]) [How can you find out?]
If you are a member of a RR group ask yourself these questions now. Ask your teams how you can develop a security culture. You must understand how this security failure happened (using a zero blame approach) and learn from it.
How do people get invited to your RR groups? Is it open invite? Or is a trusted group handling invites?
How often do you audit it’s members to see if anyone stands out?
Are people using their real names in your RR group?
Another note regarding communication platform:
I find this essay Why not signal? useful in terms of both outlining the shortcomings of signal and outlining alternatives and their pros and cons. You might have pre conceived notions about the author, but leave those aside for the sake of improving your own operational security if you are actively in a RR group.
That said, I want to reiterate the above: NO software is going to serve you well without a solid security culture.
Stay safe out there.