Our picksRussia Infecting the Planet with Disinformation | COVID-19 & Creeping Authoritarianism | Army’s “Safety Bubble,” and more

Russia Is Infecting the Planet with Disinformation (Stewart McDonald, The Times)
The modern conspiracy theory is far more subtle.
We should learn from some recent examples. Remember Russia’s interference in the last US election? What sometimes started as community Facebook groups for football fans or gardening hobbyists was found to be a Russian state effort, via its notorious Internet Research Agency, to slowly build an audience ripe for manipulation.
And so it is with some outlets that present themselves as legitimate news sources, such as Sputnik and RT — described by Putin’s former economic adviser, Andrei Illarionov, as “the best Russian propaganda machine targeted at the outside world”. They do so by sharing news content that you can easily find elsewhere, along with talk shows and columnists you that won’t, but all with the aim of building a false relationship of trust.
These outlets care little about the impact of their actions on public health. They exist within a greater state architecture to legitimise and proselytise for the oppressive government in Moscow. Don’t be taken in by it.

U.S. Army Wants to Train Hundreds of Soldiers in Coronavirus ‘Safety Bubbles’ (Katie Bo Williams, Defense One)
Entire companies and battalions could be isolated in the field for a month, Secretary McCarthy said in an interview.

When Creeping Authoritarianism Finally Prevails (Anne Applebaum, The Atlantic)
In Hungary, the pandemic was just an excuse.

World Risks Permanent Surveillance with Coronavirus Controls (DW)
Don’t “sleepwalk” into permanent surveillance in the coronavirus pandemic’s aftermath, warn 100 civil society groups. Digital surveillance rolled out to curb the virus should be limited in time and scope, they say.

Ransomware Strikes Biotech Firm Researching Possible COVID-19 Treatments (Jeff Stone, Cybrscoop)
As the COVID-19 pandemic was spreading through the U.S. last month, hackers struck a California-based biotechnology company which makes tools that researchers are using to learn about the coronavirus.
In a financial disclosure form filed to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Wednesday, 10x Genomics Inc. said it experienced an attempted ransomware attack that also involved the theft of company data. The firm restored normal operations “with no material day-to-day impact,” and said it is working with law enforcement to investigate the breach.
The company currently is part of an international alliance that is sequencing cells from patients who have recovered from COVID-19 as part of an effort to understand possible treatments for the disease.

Coronavirus and the Fake News outbreak (Kerstin Schweizer, DW)
False Information, Conspiracy Theories and Distorted Images. As Coronavirus Spreads, So Do the Fake News Stories.

What Motivates Cyber-Attackers? (Chris Mack, SCMagazine)
Intrinsic motivations are driven by internal rewards which immediately satisfy the individual, whereas extrinsic motivations are behaviors which result in external rewards.

Coronavirus: Inside the U.K. Government’s Influential Behavioral ‘Nudge Unit’ (Kim Sengupta, Independent)
Former intelligence analyst specialized in China and cyber warfare has just joined key team