Tag: Extremism

Dan Larimer Reveals New Project to Combat “Tyranny” of Twitter

by Cryptobriefing

Key Takeaways

  • Larimer has long had an interest in social media platforms, although previous attempts like Voice were highly centralized.

  • He encouraged people to abandon Twitter after Donald Trump was banned for inciting a violent riot in the U.S. capitol.

  • The Clarion project was announced the day after far-right platform Gab was hacked.


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After quitting his role as EOS CTO in January, Dan Larimer has announced a new censorship-resistance social media project called Clarion.

Larimer Takes on “Big Tech”

Larimer made a GitHub post explaining the concept of his new project. He described a censorship-resistant “friend to friend” network that mirrors the “performance and reliability of a centralized service with the freedom and independence of a decentralized service.”

Larimer claimed that his project would free friends and family from the so-called “tyranny of Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Amazon, and Google.”

The project drew inspiration from RetroShare, Hive (formerly Steemit), and Voice, with Larimer saying RetroShare is much closer to the desired level of centralization. Clarion will facilitate email, video chats, and other forms of message propagation.

Larimer wrapped up his announcement by claiming “Big Tech” has locked its users into its services and no longer produces tools to empower people.

Far-Right Politics on the Blockchain

In January, Larimer indicated that his interest in censorship-resistant technology was due in part to Twitter banning former U.S. President Donald Trump from Twitter.


Trump was banned on January 08 for inciting violence at the U.S. capitol, with Larimer stating that it was “time to abandon Twitter” the next day.


Larimer also appeared to encourage users to download the Parler social media app from Apple before it was removed. Parler gained notoriety as a hub for white supremacists and far-right extremists marketed as a censorship-resistant social media platform.

Parler was banned from Amazon and other platforms, as Larimer seems to reference in his cryptic GitHub post.

However, Parler suffered a major security breach when hacktivist @donk_enby scraped the platform and extracted publicly available metadata revealing extensive information on Parler users, including identities and metadata.


The information could potentially identify many of the people who were involved in the storming of the U.S. capital.


Far-right social media platform Gab was also breached recently, including Donald Trump’s personal account. With Gab and Parler both out of action, the far-right social media presence is limited to more centralized platforms. Larimer announced his project the day after the Gab hack was made public.

Disclosure: The author held Bitcoin at the time of writing.

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US Lawmakers Question Tron Founder Justin Sun and DLive CEO on Extremist Content Following Capitol Riots

by Blockchain News

Two U.S. lawmakers have published an open letter to Tron founder Justin Sun and DLive CEO Charles Wayn in the wake of the Capital riots—asking them to explain how they moderate extremist and white supremacist content.

US Lawmakers Question Tron Founder Justin Sun and DLive CEO on Extremist Content Following Capitol Riots

The letter was published by U.S. lawmakers Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) and Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) on Feb. 9 and it also specifically asked Sun and Wayn whether DLive identified any crypto donations from foreign entities to the individuals present on Jan. 6 at the Capitol Riots.

The pair of U.S. lawmakers—who are part of the House Select Committee on Intelligence—published the open letter on The Verge on Tuesday amd asked Sun and Wayn to explain how they plan to prevent extremist content from being broadcast on the crypto streaming platform in the wake of last month’s attempted insurrection in Washington at the confirmation of President Joe Biden.

The US representatives asked for Sun and Wayn to explain in detail how DLive, the decentralized video streaming alternative to YouTube, can protect younger users from extremist content and whether the company has any methods to identify bad actors financing extremist content.

DLive is a decentralized video streaming platform that aims to disrupt the existing monopolized video streaming services on the internet, which are dominated by a few market players such as Twitch and YouTube. DLive is a subsidiary of BitTorrent, which was acquired by Justin Sun’s Tron Foundation in 2018. Users are paid through crypto from their viewers when the content creator stream videos.

During the Capitol hill insurrection in January, several far-right extremists leverage DLive to live stream their attack on the Capitol building. DLive CEO Wayn announced after the domestic attack that only gaming content would be able to receive payments.

Several of the live streaming extremists on DLive were arrested following the attacks and the open letter addresses these users, it reads:

“Several of these individuals earned thousands of dollars in DLive’s digital currency that day, and a number received large donations through the platform ahead of the event. One individual received $2,800 in a live stream on January 5th, 2021, in which he encouraged his viewers to murder elected officials.”

The letter also asks:

“Did DLive or BitTorrent identify any foreign-based blockchain donations to individuals who were subsequently removed from the platform after the January 6th Capitol riots?”

The two US lawmakers who authored the letter are part of the House Select Committee on Intelligence—one of the congressional committees looking at how the Capitol Riot insurrection occurred and whether crypto played a role in financing it.

A hearing will be held later this month by the House Financial Services Subcommittee on the financing of domestic terror following the Jan. 6. Insurrection on Capitol Hill where the discussion will likely focus on a $500,000 transaction in Bitcoin made by a French extremist and blogger to pay right-wing figures who appear to be heavily involved in the attack.

Image source: Shutterstock

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US Lawmakers Ask Justin Sun, DLive How They Moderates Extremist Content

by Coindesk

A pair of U.S. lawmakers have asked Tron founder and CEO Justin Sun and DLive CEO Charles Wayn to explain how they plan to prevent extremist content from being broadcast on the crypto streaming platform in the wake of last month’s attempted insurrection in Washington, D.C.

In a letter, first published by The Verge on Tuesday, Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) and Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) asked Sun and Wayn to detail how DLive is combating “domestic extremism and white supremacy on the platform,” how it is protecting younger users from extremist content, and whether the company has any way to identify individuals financing extremist content.

DLive is a subsidiary of BitTorrent, which was acquired by the Tron Foundation in 2018. Users can stream videos and be paid by their viewers in crypto, though after the insurrection Wayn announced that only gaming content would be able to receive payments.

“Several of these individuals earned thousands of dollars in DLive’s digital currency that day, and a number received large donations through the platform ahead of the event. One individual received $2,800 in a live stream on January 5th, 2021, in which he encouraged his viewers to murder elected officials,” the letter said.

The lawmakers are part of the House Select Committee on Intelligence, which appears to be just one of the Congressional committees looking at how the insurrection unfolded and whether crypto played a role in financing it.

The House Financial Services subcommittee on National Security is holding a hearing later this month on financing of domestic terror in the wake of the Jan. 6 incident, which seems likely to discuss a $500,000 transaction in bitcoin made by a French blogger to right-wing figures who may have been at the Capitol.

“Did DLive or BitTorrent identify any foreign-based blockchain donations to individuals who were subsequently removed from the platform after the January 6th Capitol riots?” the letter asks.

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Alt-Right Groups Received $500K in BTC Month Before Capitol Riot: Chainalysis

by Coindesk

Alt-right extremist groups and a handful of personalities linked to last week’s storming of the U.S. Capitol building received a bitcoin donation worth about $522,000 one month before the D.C. siege, according to crypto tracing firm Chainalysis.

Chainalysis explained in a Thursday blog post that an unnamed French blogger sent 28.15 BTC to 22 wallets on Dec. 8. Nick Fuentes, the far-right internet personality whose livestream from the Capitol takeover resulted in his banning from the streaming site DLive, received the single-largest donation: about $250,000, or 13.5 BTC.

There is no evidence that Fuentes entered the Capitol during the events of Jan. 6. However, he was present at the initial rally, was spotted on the Capitol grounds and promoted President Trump’s “Stop the Steal” event for weeks, Chainalysis said.

The rest of the funds appear to have been split among a smattering of other accounts with ties to far-right ideologies, Chainalysis said. Neo-Nazi blog Daily Stormer received 3% of the total, anti-immigration group VDARE 3.3% and white nationalist leader Patrick Casey 5%, among others. Yahoo News first reported the story.

In all, the transactions represent an unprecedented crypto windfall for the domestic extremists groups that Chainalysis said it tracks.

Chainalysis declined to identify the alleged donator by name due to privacy concerns and ongoing legal proceedings. However, it described the individual as a French blogger who may now be deceased. Chainalysis pointed to a seeming suicide note posted online one day after the donations initiated.

The individual laments what he claimed to be the “decline” of Western civilization and the “rejection of our ancestors and our heritage.” That language tracks with rhetoric common in white nationalist circles. He pledged to “leave my modest wealth to certain causes and people” upon his death.

Investigators are still working to determine how much planning went into the Jan. 6 Capitol storming.

For its part, Chainalysis declined to directly link the donation to the political violence in Washington, D.C., but the “timing warrants suspicion,” Chainalysis wrote.

“As mainstream payment platforms remove extremist groups and figures, we may see them embrace cryptocurrency more as a donations mechanism,” the company said.

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