The Implications Of Fusing 5G And Blockchain

Authored by Ben Whittle via CoinTelegraph.com,

Analysts have been anticipating the implications of the Internet of Things (IoT) for several years. However, there have been two main impediments to its success: capacity and security.

But now, the introduction of a new technology could change that. This year, major carriers like AT&T and Verizon will be introducing 5G, the latest generation of cellular mobile communications. The 5G platform brings a high data rate, reduced latency, energy savings, cost reduction, higher system capacity and massive device connectivity, according to analysts.

image courtesy of CoinTelegraph

The combination of 5G and blockchain technology has the potential to unleash a surge of economic value. In order to understand this connection between 5G and blockchain, one must think of the relationship as multifold. The power of 5G coverage through its reduced latency, high speeds and capacity allows for IoT devices to become widely used. Simultaneously, these devices can leverage the security, decentralization, immutability and consensus arbitration of blockchains as foundational layers.

That means smart citiesdriverless vehiclessmart homes and other sensor-driven enhancements will finally have a technology that can handle their needs.

As foundational layers, blockchains can provide consensus and security while the majority of IoT transactions and contracts occur on second-layer networks, with the opportunity to settle payment channels and transaction disputes on-chain. The network capacity of IoT, however, will be enabled by the power of 5G coverage.

Furthermore, 5G will directly assist blockchains by increasing node participation and decentralization, as well as allowing for shorter block times, driving forward on-chain scalability — all of which, in turn, further supports the IoT economy.

Here is a first look at how 5G is rolling out and when real usage might be seen.

The rollout of 5G

Network providers have started rolling out 5G within select United States cities, while global coverage is expected to come online in 2020.

Verizon will start delivering its coverage in Chicago and Minneapolis from April 11, with services moving to 30 cities throughout the remainder of 2019.

On the vendor side, Samsung is expected to release its 5G-compatible Galaxy S10 model next month. Other companies, such as Huawei and LG, have announced models of their own that are expected soon.

In terms of modems, we are still waiting to see one that supports both 5G and LTE. Qualcomm is expected to release such a product, the X55, in either Q3 or Q4 of this year.

Apple consumers will have to hold off until 2020 before seeing a 5G-compatible iPhone, though, with the company apparently still evaluating market conditions.

Waking up the Internet of Things

The benefits of 5G are its high speeds, capacity, low latency and ability to connect with vast numbers of devices. Latency refers to the time between when a signal is sent and received. In blockchain terms, latency is the time between a transaction being broadcast and it being received by nodes. However, for IoT, whether it be applied to smart homes or autonomous vehicles, achieving low latency is critical if devices are going to communicate with each other without experiencing long lag times.

This reduction could unlock another concept, the Internet of Skills (IoS). This is the process by which specialists conduct their work remotely through virtual reality headsets. For instance, a dentist would be able to perform procedures remotely. If latency cannot be minimized, then the specialist will not be responsive enough, endangering the patient and undermining the entire function.

It is these new applications that are driving the projections for the economic impact of 5G. A study from Qualcomm showed that 5G could lead to $12.3 trillion in additional global GDP by 2035.

Importantly, 5G — with speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second — is an improvement to current home broadband services, as well as cellular networks. To put this in perspective, the average global, nonmobile internet speed stands at just 7.2 megabits per second. As such, 5G could well become the de facto internet network worldwide.

The effects of 5G on IoT and related concepts are going to be further augmented by multi-access edge computing. This is a form of networking whereby service is disseminated from centralized nodes to peripheral ones, resulting in an even greater increase to speeds while also reducing latency.

IoT will rely on this capacity and ability for tremendous numbers of devices to connect with each other. It has been estimated that there could be as many as 100 billion IoT connections by 2025, according to research from Huawei, with growth likely turning exponential after that.  

Ramping up automation

When talking about automation, it is typical to think in terms of robots replacing paid jobs currently done by humans. However, in reality, the scope of automation may eventually be far broader than this, including the replacement of chores and unpaid mundane tasks.

This can already be seen in the advent of smart homes, with domestic appliances communicating with each other, keeping stock levels and managing inventory. Autonomous cars and trucks are already moving past testing, with legislation being the main impediment.

Within the next decade, traditional industries — such as agriculturemining and drilling — all anticipate automation through high-speed IoT, powered by billions of sensors and devices communicating over 5G.

Bottlenecks

These applications are dependent on extensive 5G coverage to provide the capacity, speeds, and latency required for these systems to perform as intended at a global scale.

But two other potential roadblocks toward 5G could present themselves.

First, malicious devices could cause chaos within networks, empowered by their interconnectivity.

Second, the 5G rollout will encompass an explosion in transactions and payments between these devices. Such volumes will likely dwarf the current capacity of centralized and decentralized financial infrastructure.

The blockchain referee

Blockchain innovations could likely solve the first problem. Public, decentralized blockchains are proficient at ensuring immutability, tamper-resistance and establishing consensus among distrusting entities.

Thus, they can be used as a foundational layer for settling disputes between IoT devices that cannot settle transactions or smart contract conditions. Since these devices can transact with money and operate vehicles, establishing an underlying protocol layer with robust security is paramount. Blockchains can excel at this.

Decentralized blockchains offer further benefits over the current client-server model used in IoT. Their decentralized architecture means that identity can be protected and guaranteed. Currently, IoT devices identify themselves via cloud servers, with their identification data held in these databases. As such, the data can be compromised, stolen or imitated, presenting a major security threat to any application that runs atop such a network.

By using a decentralized blockchain, we can protect these identities through the use of asymmetric cryptography and secure hashing algorithms. Devices would be registered according to their own corresponding blockchain addresses, guaranteeing their identity. This blockchain layer can provide a level of security and frictionless identification unmatched by the existing centralized infrastructure.

Scaling up

Unfortunately, the second problem of scale cannot be directly solved by blockchains. The sheer extent of IoT means that decentralized blockchain architectures are not capable of handling the necessary throughput. This is at least true on layer one — i.e., blockchains themselves.

It is both possible and preferable to defer the majority of transactions to layer two protocols like the Lighting Network that operate on top of blockchains, through the use of payment channels or sidechains.  

However, given that every device will need to have its own address and on-chain transactions, there will need to be an on-chain capacity that reaches tens of thousands of transactions per second. In short, scalability must improve significantly on both layers.

Blockchains such as Bitcoin Cash ABC, with block size increases, and Ethereum, through sharding,are building out far greater on-chain capacity. Simultaneously, we are seeing the steady progress of the Lightning Network as it rolls out, along with sidechains such as Liquid from Blockstream, while Ethereum’s Plasma network continues to advance. The buildout of 5G and layer two blockchain infrastructure are fortuitously occurring simultaneously, providing the necessary scalability and coverage for an IoT-oriented economy.

One other route for system architects would be to add other structures, such as graphs between the base blockchain layer and IoT devices. Designs such as directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) can be used to achieve far higher throughput. However, this typically results in undermined security and decentralization.

Navigating the trilemma of scalability, security and decentralization is a prerequisite to any blockchain-based IoT network, and deficiencies in any of these three areas could be cataclysmic for users and would undermine the purpose of using such a protocol in the first place. Until developers can produce alternative designs that achieve high throughput without sacrificing security or decentralization, IoT networks will have to use the more limited, yet secure blockchain structure.

Tamper-resistant data

5G empowered IoT devices are set to drive a massive increase in data transfer. Cisco projects that they will generate 847 zettabytes by 2021. Although blockchains at their core are distributed data storage systems, it is unfeasible to store significant amounts of data on-chain. If this IoT data is not stored on-chain, though, this still leaves it open to attacks.

However, it is quite possible to store hashes of data on-chain, with links pointing out to external data storage sites for the whole dataset. Indeed, such external storage could be run on other decentralized protocols, such as the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) or OrbitDB. While this does not guarantee the same level of tamper-resistance, it does offer a stronger level of security than centralized alternatives. Importantly, by storing hashes on-chain, any tampering of the data will result in a change in the hash, thus drawing attention to such an attack, along with a time record via the timestamp.

Empowering smart contracts

Blockchains can also directly benefit from 5G in terms of functionality and performance.

One such example is smart contracting. Blockchain smart contracts often depend on oracles. These oracles relay external data to the contract. Of course, this information can only be transmitted with internet access. For applications such as supply chains, 5G can facilitate these oracles in remote areas where they otherwise would not be possible.

Network improvements

Blockchains can also derive network improvements from 5G.

The massive increases in range and bandwidth, in parallel with the reductions in latency aided by edge computing, could lead to a surge in additional nodes joining public blockchains. By extending coverage to remote areas as well as providing increased connectivity to nonstatic devices such as mobiles and tablets, there could be significant increases in network participation and, with that, improved security and decentralization.

In addition, due to latency reductions, developers would have more scope to experiment with reductions in block times, thus increasing on-chain throughput. In turn, this would offer far better support for IoT devices using blockchains for settlement, consensus and security.

A multi-fold relationship

To truly appreciate the values of 5G, IoT and blockchain, you have to consider them as synergistic rather than offering wholly separate value propositions. With the right architecture, this technology stack — along with second layer solutions, edge computing, virtual reality, augmented reality and IoS — is set to create an unprecedented amount of value while simultaneously radically altering working conditions, employment and recreation.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2OBDZq9 Tyler Durden

Russia’s 4th Richest Woman Killed In Freak Private Jet Crash

In a time when the public is especially sensitive about any airplane disasters, coupled with the now traditional interest in Russian oligarchs, a tragic story from Sunday afternoon combines both: the co-owner of Russia’s second biggest airline Siberia Airlines (aka S7), and Russia’s fourth richest woman, Natalia Fileva, was killed in a freak crash when her private jet crashed in Germany, taking the lives of a pilot and another passenger as well, the company said.

A six-seater private jet with Fileva on board took off from Cannes in France and was en route to the central German town of Egelsbach when it disappeared from radars at 13:22 GMT (15:22 local time), according to flight tracker Flightradar24.

The plane crashed in a field near the town of Erzhausen, some 10 kilometers (6 miles) south of Frankfurt, police said, adding that at least three people, including the pilot, were on board. The identity of the other person who accompanied Fileva is still unclear, with some reports suggesting her father was on the plane.

The Epic E1000 airplane

According to RT, the US-made Epic E1000 turboprop light aircraft crashed into the ground as it was preparing to make a landing at Egelsbach airport. The plane was destroyed and completely burnt out as it hit the ground, according to police. The debris is scattered around an area of a 20 meter-radius.

The cause of the crash has not yet been identified, S7 said.

Natalia was the wife of Vladislav Filev, the CEO and co-owner of S7 Airlines – Russia’s biggest private airline holding company. Her personal wealth amounted to $600 million according to Forbes magazine.  S7 is the main competitor in Russia to Aeroflot. It has 96 aircraft that fly to 181 cities and towns in 26 countries, the company’s website says.

Natalia Fileva

“The S7 Group holding team expresses deepest condolences to the family and significant others,” the company said adding that Russian and international authorities would investigate the crash.

Aeroflot also paid tribute: “As head of the S7 Group of Companies, Natalia achieved outstanding success, helped strengthen domestic civil aviation and increase the authority of Russia as a great aviation power.

“The management and staff of Aeroflot express sincere condolences to the relatives and friends of Natalia and the entire staff of the S7 Group of Companies. We grieve with you, colleagues.”

An S7 Airlines airplane

Russian specialists will take part in the investigation of the tragedy. So far German media reported that the pilot had not notified aviation authorities of any malfunctions during the flight, although so far no speculation of foul play has emerged.

Meanwhile, adding to the freak nature of the event, two other people died when a police vehicle rushing to the scene of the crash collided with another car near the airport. The three police officers in the police car suffered serious injuries, DPA reported.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2OAyiJ2 Tyler Durden

Paul Craig Roberts Rages: Western Culture Has Died A Politically Correct Death

Authored by Paul Craig Roberts,

It is amazing the power that politically correct kooks have acquired over language, art, and literature. It is a sign that the West is culturally dead.  

When high museums rename paintings because some emotional weakling declares the name to be offensive, it becomes obvious that the custodians of Western culture have lost their belief in Western culture. 

When universities cover up murals because of a claim they are offensive to people whose presence on the campus is miniscule if present at all, you know that learning is no longer the purpose of the university.  

When a people are afraid to use the words and terms of their forefathers, you know they have been intimidated to abandon even their own language and ways of speaking.  

Western culture today consists of pornography, sexual deviants, whinning whimps devestated by mere words, self-hatred, and craven cowards afraid to stand up for themselves against the onslaught of hate directed toward them by political correctness freaks.

The political correctness people are the most alienated and emotionally weak element in the society.  Yet they dominate in the media, entertainment, universities, and art world.  How is it possible that the Washingtonians are prepared to take us to war with real people—Russians, Chinese and North Koreans—two countries that have already whipped us once—and Persians, an ancient race that even the Romans had a hard time with?  Do the fools in Washington really think that our homosexualized, feminized, transgenderized military can take on Russians, Chinese, and Persians?  Hollywood can make all the movies it wants with female superheroes, but superheroes are the last thing whinning American feminists are.

The real questions for the politically correct crowd are:

(1) why isn’t war politically incorrect, and

(2) why isn’t it politically incorrect for the politically correct arbiters of language to call the rest of us names? The real racists in America are those who call white people racist.

What Your Sons and Daughters Will Learn at University

By Philip Carl Salzman

Universities in the 20th century were dedicated to the advancement of knowledge. Scholarship and research were pursued, and diverse opinions were exchanged and argued in the “marketplace of ideas.”

This is no longer the case. Particularly in the social sciences, humanities, education, social work, and law, a single political ideology has replaced scholarship and research, because the ideology presents fixed answers to all questions. And, although the most important thing in universities today is the diversity of race, gender, sexual practice, ethnicity, economic class, and physical and mental capability, there is no longer diversity of opinion. Only those committed to the ideology are admitted to academic staff or administration.

Universities have been transformed by the near-universal adoption of three interrelated theories: postmodernism, postcolonialism, and social justice. These theories and their implications will be explored here.

There Is No Truth; Nothing Is Good or Bad

Postmodernism: In the past, academics were trained to seek truth. Today, academics deny that there is such a thing as objective Truth. Instead, they argue that no one can be objective, that everyone is inevitably subjective, and consequently everyone has their own truth. The correct point of view, they urge, is relativism. This means not only that truth is relative to the subjectivity of each individual, but also that ethics and morality are relative to the individual and the culture, so there is no such thing as Good and Evil, or even Right and Wrong. So too with the ways of knowing; your children will learn that there is no objective basis for preferring chemistry over alchemy, astronomy over astrology, or medical doctors over witch doctors. They will learn that facts do not exist; only interpretations do.

All Cultures Are Equally Good; Diversity Is Our Strength

Our social understanding has also been transformed by postmodern relativism. Because moral and ethical principles are deemed to be no more than the collective subjectivity of our culture, it is now regarded as inappropriate to judge the principles and actions of other cultures. This doctrine is called “cultural relativism.” For example, while racism is held to be the highest sin in the West, and slavery the greatest of our historical sins, your children will learn that we are not allowed to criticize contemporary racism and slavery in Africa, the Middle East, and the equivalents in South Asia.

The political manifestation of cultural relativism is multiculturalism, an incoherent concept that projects the integration of multiple incompatible cultures. Diversity is lauded as a virtue in itself.  Imagine a country with fifty different languages, each derived from a different culture. That would not be a society, but a tower of babble. How would it work if there were multiple codes of law requiring and forbidding contrary behaviors: driving on the left and driving on the right; monogamy and polygamy; male dominance and gender equality; arranged marriage and individual choice? Your children will learn that our culture is nothing special and that other cultures are awesome.

The West Is Evil; The Rest Are Virtuous

Postcolonialism, the dominant theory in the social sciences today, is inspired by the Marxist-Leninist theory of imperialism, in which the conflict between the capitalist and proletariat classes is allegedly exported to the exploitation of colonized countries. By this means, the theory goes, oppression and poverty take place in colonies instead of in relation to the metropolitan working class. Postcolonialism posits that all of the problems in societies around the world today are the result of the relatively short Western imperial dominance and colonization. For example, British imperialism is blamed for what are in fact indigenous cultures, such as the South Asian caste system and the African tribal system. So too, problems of backwardness and corruption in countries once, decades ago, colonies continue to be blamed on past Western imperialism. The West is thus the continuing focus on anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist sentiment. Your children will learn that our society is evil, and the cause of all the evil in the wider world.

Only the West Was Imperialist and Colonialist

This ahistorical approach of postcolonialism ignores the hundreds of empires and their colonies throughout history, as well as ignoring contemporary empires, such as the Arab Muslim Empire that conquered all of the central Middle East, North Africa, southern Europe, Persia, Central Asia, and northern India, and occupied them minimally for hundreds of years, but 1400 years in the central Middle East and North Africa, and occupy them today. China, once the Communists took power, invaded Inner Mongolia to the north, Chinese Turkestan to the west, and Tibet to the south. Once in control, the government flooded these colonies with Han Chinese, in effect ethnically cleansing them. Postcolonialists have nothing to say about any of this; they wish to condemn exclusively the West. Your children will learn to reject history and comparisons with other societies, lest the claimed unique sins of the West be challenged.

Western Imperialism Was a Racist Project

Postcolonialists like to stress the racial dimension of Western imperialism: as an illustration of racism. But postmodernists are not interested in Arab slave raiding in “black” Africa, or Ottoman slaving among the whites in the Balkans, or the North Africans slave raiding of whites in Europe, from Ireland through Italy and beyond. Your children will learn that only whites are racist.

White Men Are Evil; Women of Color Are Virtuous

Social justice theory teaches that the world is divided between oppressors and victims. Some categories of people are oppressors and other are victims: males are oppressors, and females are victims; whites are oppressors, and people of color are victims; heterosexuals are oppressors, and gays, lesbians, bisexual, etc. are victims; Christians are oppressors, and Muslims are victims. Your sons will learn that they are stigmatized by their toxic masculinity.

Individuals Are Not Important; Only Category Membership Is

Social justice theory has taken university life by storm. It is the result of the relentless working of Marxist theory, adopted by youngsters during the American cultural revolution of the 1960s, then brought to universities as many of those youngsters became college professors. Marxism as an academic theory was explicitly followed by some in the 1970s and 1980s, but it did not sweep everything else away, because the idea economic class conflict was not popular in the prosperous general North American population. The cultural Marxist innovation that brought social justice theory to dominance was the extension of class conflict from economics to gender, race, sexual practice, ethnicity, religion, and other mass categories. We see this in sociology, which is no longer defined as the study of society but has for decades been defined as the study of inequality. For social justice theory, equality is not the equality of opportunity that is the partner of merit, but rather equality of result, which ensures the members of each category at equality of representation irrespective of merit. Your sons will learn that they should “step aside” to give more space and power to females. Your daughters, if white, will learn that they must defer to members of racial minorities.

Justice Is Equal Representation According to Percentages of the Population

As there is allegedly structural discrimination against all members of victim categories, in order for equality of result to prevail, representation according to percentages of populations must be mandated in all organizations, in all books assigned or references cited, in all awards and benefits. Ideas such as merit and excellence are dismissed as white-male supremacist dog whistles; they are to be replaced by “diversity” of gender, race, sexual preference, ethnicity, economic class, religion, and so on. (Note that “diversity” does not include “diversity of opinion”; for only social justice ideology is acceptable. Any criticism or opposition is regarded as “hate speech.”) Academic committees now twist themselves into pretzels trying to explain that “diversity is excellence.”

Members of Oppressor Categories Must Be Suppressed

Of course, the requirement of representation according to population applies only one way: to members of victim classes. If whites, men, heterosexuals, Christians, etc. are underrepresented, that is fine; the fewer the better. For example, females now make up 60% of university graduates, although in the general age cohort males are 51%. There is no social justice clamoring for males to be fully represented.  Members of disfavored oppressor categories are disparaged. The classics of Western civilization should be ignored because they are the work, almost exclusively, of “dead white men.” Only works of females, people of color and non-Western authors should be considered virtuous. So too in political history. The American Constitution should be discarded because its writers were slaveholders.

Victims of The World Unite!

“intersectionality” is an idea invented by a feminist law professor. It argues that some individuals fall into several victim categories, for example, black, female lesbians have three points in the victim stakes, as opposed to male members of the First Nations who receive only one point. Further, on the action front, members of each victim category are urged to unite and ally with members of other victim categories, because sharing the victim designation is the most important status in the world. This leads to some anomalies. Black victims of racism are urged to unite with Arab victims of colonialism, even though Arabs have been and still are holders of black slaves.

Being Educated Is About Being on The Right Side

As Karl Marx said, “The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways. The point, however, is to change it.” The objective of a university education today is to ensure that students chose “the right side” in changing the world. The idea that it probably makes sense to try to understand the world before attempting to change it, is rejected as outmoded, modernist empiricism and realism, now superseded by postmodernism and social justice. If there is no Truth, and whatever one feels or believes is one’s truth, then trying to gain an objective understanding of the world is futile.

Things you are not allowed to say anymore.

JoyCamp says:

“This is a PSA (Progressive Service Announcement). JoyCamp has compiled a comprehensive list of words, phrases and “microaggressions” you’re NOT allowed to say anymore. Watch the video to ensure that you are able to protect yourself from saying the wrong thing! Then share it with your friends to keep them out of trouble as well.”

“Censorship helps to promote tolerance and thus, diversity, while simultaneously protecting us from hate speech and bigotry, therefore creating a safer, less offensive world for all.”

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2JTCzbV Tyler Durden

The Beginning Of The End Of SWIFT: Russian Banks Join Chinese Alternative Global Payments System

With Russia actively dumping US dollars and buying gold at the fastest paced in decades, the writing is on the wall when it comes to what the Kremlin thinks of any possibility for a detente in the painfully strained US-Russian relations.

Russia

And with Russia now clearly seeking to end monetary ties with a dollar-denominated “west”, there is just one alternative – China. Which is why it will probably not come as a surprise that several Russian banks joined the China International Payments System (CIPS) also known as China’s “SWIFT”, to ease operations between the two countries, according to a senior official at the Central Bank of Russia (CBR).

“As for the cooperation on payment systems, a range of banks are already connected to CIPS, allowing to facilitate payments routing procedure,” Vladimir Shapovalov, who heads a division dealing with foreign regulators at the CBR’s international cooperation department, said earlier this week during the international Russian-Chinese forum.

Meanwhile, as RT writes, the regulator hopes that in turn, Chinese counterparts will pay more attention to Russia’s own SWIFT alternative, the SPFS (System for Transfer of Financial Messages), as “it can further boost bilateral trade”, the official added.

As RT adds, Russia has been actively demonstrating the SPFS network, which was created in 2014 in response US threats of disconnecting Russia from SWIFT, to foreign partners, including China after its export version was finished late last year. The first system transaction involving a non-bank enterprise, was made by Russian oil major Rosneft in December 2017. Some 500 participants, with major Russian financial institutions and companies, have already joined. And with Europe contemplating alternatives to SWIFT in order to keep funding the Iran regime in light of its exclusion from the dollar-based monetary system following Trump’s reimposition of Iranian sanctions, it would land a major blow to the US Dollar’s reserve status if Brussels announced that it, too, would be joining either the Chinese or Russian alternative to dollar hegemony, a process which based on reserve managers’ declining allocations to US dollars

Reserves

… is already taking place.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2FPP0BD Tyler Durden

Wave Of Hate-Crime Hoaxes Stokes Panic In Portland

Jussie Smollett isn’t alone in trying to fake a hate crime for personal or selfish reasons. Hate crime hoaxes happen more often than many well-meaning Americans probably realize, and often they’re orchestrated as part of a trend intended to provoke hysteria and panic. Sometimes, innocent conservatives guilty of nothing more than living in the area where the “crimes” allegedly occurred are falsely accused of carrying out the attacks, and subjected to a storm of online threats and abuse. The political subtext of these false reports is easy to spot. Just like the Smollett case, they’re intended to portray Trump supporters and conservatives as violent bigots and homophobes willing to indiscriminately target members of the trans and gay communities.

And according to an investigation by New York Post columnist Andy Ngo, Smollett isn’t the only hate crime hoaxer to avoid punishment. In the Portland area alone, trans and LGBT activists have incited a panic with reports of attacks on LGBTQ individuals that, when investigated, were either never reported to police, or, in some cases, the details gathered by police differed dramatically from what was disclosed in viral social media posts, in such a way as to suggest that an attack never occurred.

Proud

Ngo’s piece begins with the Feb. 10 “attack” on Sophia Gabrielle Stanford, who launched a GoFundMe page that described her as the victim of a “brutal and aggressively blatant hate crime” that recounted how unidentified assailants had beaten her unconscious with a bat.” The page stated that Stanford had suffered a “serious concussion” and would need “intensive physical therapy, CT scans and counseling”.

The post went viral and raised thousands of dollars. But when Ngo investigated, he discovered that the details from a police report of the incident varied dramatically from Stanford’s account. Per the report, Stanford even made an idle threat against the officers who were questioning her: “If you don’t treat me right, my people will get you.”

In the early hours of Sunday, Feb. 10, emergency services received a call about a woman, identified as Stanford, found on a sidewalk with scrapes on her face and knuckles, claiming that she may have been assaulted. The responding officer, Edgar Mitchell, noted that Stanford smelled of alcohol.

“I asked [Officer Zachary Roe] what happened,” the report states. “Roe said the individual admitted to being intoxicated, and Roe believed the person fell and hit her head.”

Stanford either could not or would not state her name to the police. The responding officer was unable to discover Stanford’s name and claims that she made a threat: “If you don’t treat me right, my people will get you,” she said, according to the report.

The report also states that Stanford lost a pistol and bag she was carrying at the time of the alleged attack. A local resident found both items and flagged down another officer, Cuong Nguyen. When Nguyen attempted to return the gun to Stanford at nearby Emanuel Hospital, where she had been transported, she was already discharged.

When Ngo tried to reach out to Stanford, she swiftly blocked him across social media. But in the weeks after Stanford’s story went viral, a number of “hate crimes” were reported across Portland, inspiring a panic in the city’s sizable LGBTQ community. As a result, some refused to travel alone at night. Workshops popped up where members of the community were taught “how to spot a fascist.” Yet, though no assailants were ever positively identified, members of the Proud Boys who were facing criminal charges over a street brawl with members of Antifa were targeted by social media pages, that encouraged readers to commit acts of “retaliatory” violence.

about a week after Stanford’s alleged assault, another “fat-queer activist” published a claim on social media about an attack on her and her partner, claiming that “two young white men” in a “maroon SUV” had lobbed a full beer can at her and called her a homophobic slur. A photo of Bruso’s partner was posted with a picture of a bruise on her cheek.

But though Bruso said the incident had been reported, when Ngo contacted police, he found no record of an incident at that location on that day.

On Feb. 17, Jenny Bruso, a self-described fat-queer activist, posted a claim on Facebook and Twitter that echoed Stanford’s harrowing story. She said that her partner, Brie Jones, was attacked by “two young white men” in a maroon SUV who pulled up beside her at a busy intersection, called her a homophobic slur and threw a full can of beer at her face. She was allegedly knocked to the ground from the impact. Bruso posted a photo of Jones with an abrasion on her cheek.

I spoke with staff at businesses along that intersection, but nobody I talked to had witnessed an attack. When Bruso’s post went viral on Facebook and commenters raised questions about the incident, she deleted the post.

“I, WE, owe you NOTHING,” Bruso wrote on Facebook. “The intention was to warn our communities and that’s precisely what I did.”

Bruso originally said the attack was “reported,” but Portland police stated in a report that there was no case number associated with the incident as of Feb. 27, 2019. I contacted Bruso several times by email asking where she reported the incident. She didn’t respond.

In response, activists sent out “attack alerts” and circulated the addresses of the alleged “attackers”, one of whom, a former member of conservative groups in the area, was accused of being involved in the attack against Bruso and her partner because, according to Doxxers, he owned a maroon SUV. However, Ngo found that the SUV in question had been repossessed months before the attack occurred, and that there was no reason to suspect his involvement in the attack.

Meanwhile, these and other hate crime reports have been uncritically shared by the Portland Mercury, a local news organization, and Portland Mayor Tom Wheeler, who amplified the rumors on Twitter. Yet all the Proud Boys members who have been blamed for the string of attacks denied their involvement – not that there is any actual evidence linking them to the incidents.

Claims that the LGBTQ community should fear and distrust the police in progressive Portland have been used to amplify the paranoia. But in a city where the mayor doubles as the police commissioner, the notion that police would simply ignore allegations of a hate crime, or refuse to take them seriously, simply beggars belief.

Yet, the fact that Smollett has gotten off without any repercussions (so far, at least) for blatantly faking a high-profile hate crime should only serve to embolden hoaxers looking to follow in his footsteps.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2COVQoQ Tyler Durden

Celebrity Jeweler Who Gifted Elon Musk $40,000 Ring Winds Up ‘Locked Inside His F*cking Tesla’

People become Tesla skeptics in many different ways. Some are investors that take a hard look at the company’s financials. Others witness Tesla accidents or wind up getting a glimpse into the company by working there. 

And some – like celebrity jeweler Ben Baller – wind up locked in their Tesla vehicles, trapped, with no way to get out.  

“I wish this was a fucking joke,” Baller says in his recent Instagram story video, mirrored on one Twitter user’s account.

“I’m locked inside my fucking Tesla. I know I’ve been the Tesla fan, I’ve said so many good things about Tesla. But I’ve been locked in the car now for 37 minutes fucking waiting for roadside assistance. “

He continued: “The electronic door – the door is handled by the push button or the key or opening the door handle – and nothing’s fucking working.”

Baller had made headlines back in December 2018 when he gifted Elon Musk a custom $40,000 Tesla ring. Three months later, the man who wrote to Musk on Instagram, calling him “an inspiration” and thanking Musk for “what [he’s] done for Americans”, found himself locked inside his Tesla with no way out. 

“This ring was designed and created here in America, just like your cars. We salute you for giving 50,000 jobs to Americans and putting USA back on the map as a serious contender in the auto industry,” Baller said in December, likely unaware that several rounds of crushing job cuts and layoffs were forthcoming at Tesla. 

According to NextShark, Baller used a trillion cut diamond to emphasize the “T” logo on the front of the ring, which he surrounded by round brilliant white diamonds and rubies which were pavé set by hand. On the back of the ring, custom cut diamond baguettes spell out “Tesla.”

“Please accept this 1 of 1 custom Diamond and Ruby #Tesla ring for being an inspiration to me and my best friend Paul,” the jeweler-to-the-stars wrote back in December. 

We guess the next time we’ll hear about this ring will be when it’s on an episode of Pawn Stars, or is a featured item at a Department of Justice auction. Meanwhile, if no one hears from Ben Baller over the next day or so, can someone go check on his Tesla?

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2K4069Y Tyler Durden

China’s Social Credit System – It’s Coming To The United States Soon

Authored by Marin Katusa via InternationalMan.com,

In 2015, a 16-year-old student from Jiangsu, China, tried to board a train.

She couldn’t even purchase a ticket.

The student, Zhong Pei, tried enrolling in classes at her university. But she was not allowed to do that either.

Zhong had committed a serious crime: She was guilty of being related to someone else.

Her father had killed two people and died in a car accident. So the Chinese government blacklisted her as “dishonest.”

It took her four months before she was able to overturn the decision and go to her university.

China’s Social Credit System – America’s New Nightmare?

What Zhong experienced was the result of testing for China’s new “Social Credit System.”

The SCS aims to be a unified program that provides a “social credit score” for every one of China’s 1.3 billion citizens.

But the Chinese government needed help develop the algorithms that determine social credit scores. So it enlisted eight companies for pilot programs, including its two largest, trusted social media companies: Tencent and Alibaba. They both came up with their own solutions: Alibaba’s affiliate Ant Financial rolled out its own “Sesame Credit” system. And Tencent had a nationwide system that was trialed for less than a day before it was taken down with pressure from the People’s Bank of China.

Both Alibaba and Tencent own enormous Chinese payments systems. They also own the largest Chinese marketplaces.

So Tencent’s program and Alibaba’s Sesame Credit can easily measure how much, how often, and what is bought online in China… and more importantly, when it is paid for.

Chinese regulators are pressuring both as neither have received an official licence to operate their social credit systems. But Tencent and Alibaba are pushing aggressively because they see the benefits – these seemingly innocent systems could help bring order to the chaos of Chinese commerce.

The plan, however, does not stop there. And the Chinese government has already laid the framework for the dystopian future.

Laws from 2012 and 2016 require internet companies to retain customers’ real names and information.

There will be no opting out from this future.

In 2020, the system will become the Social Credit System (SCS). And it will be owned and operated entirely by the Chinese state government.

The SCS will take into account not only purchases, but also hobbies, your lifestyle, and even who you hang out with.

If you raise a child, attend government events, or do well at your job – things considered ideal for a model citizen – your social credit score will go up.

However…

If you drink too much, play too many video games, or speak ill of the government – your social credit score will go down.

It’s a national database that will hold information on every citizen.

It will assess information as innocent as whether an academic degree was actually earned. And as personal as if a female is supposed to be taking birth control.

In short, the SCS will not be a measurement of how regularly you pay your bills.

It will show the government precisely how well you toe the party line.

Social Credit – Obedience to an Authoritarian State

It’s a great idea, right?

There are a lot of people in China. And it’s hard to prevent crime.

Just think of all the great things it will do for the country:

  • Citizens know exactly how trustworthy someone is before they befriend them.

  • Bad driving gets punished (if you have ever driven in Vancouver, Canada-this would be a welcomed feature). While good driving gets rewarded.

  • People become more confident in public institutions.

If your social credit is high, you’ll reap huge benefits…

  • You’ll be able to rent better cars and homes, without a deposit.

  • Your children will have access to the best schools in your area.

  • You’ll get access to better health insurance.

  • Prospective employers will be more likely to hire you.

  • It’ll be easier to get the paperwork to travel or to get a loan.

Chinese officials say that by 2020, the SCS will “allow the trustworthy to roam everywhere under heaven…”

But that’s only looking at the benefits for people with a high score.

Here’s the end of that quote: “while making it hard for the discredited to take a single step.”

If your credit score drops too low, you’re basically ejected from society.

  • You’ll be rejected for housing and loans.

  • Your children won’t be able to attend good schools – even if their grades say otherwise.

  • You’ll have a harder time finding a date (dating sites and apps in China allow people to advertise their social credit score).

  • You’ll be turned away from good job opportunities.

  • Your internet speed could be cut.

Or, like Zhang, you’ll be locked out of being able to buy train tickets and plane tickets.

You won’t be able to leave the country.

In effect, the SCS is designed to completely eliminate mobility – social, class, or travel – for those who do not agree with the government’s definition of a model citizen.

If the punishments are so severe, surely it must be hard to get a low score. Only for horrific crimes, right?

Wrong.

The common slogan in China is: “whoever violates the rules somewhereshall be restricted everywhere.”

Punishment is already happening on a broad scale. Chinese authorities have already banned more than 10 million people deemed “untrustworthy” from boarding flights and high-speed trains.

It’s actually really easy to watch your SCS drop. Hang out with someone with a low score, and your own will go down.

You can lose points based on spending time with your family and friends.

By the way, that’s how North Korea keeps its citizens in line.

It gets worse. When you check your score, you can see precisely who is dragging it down. So you know instantly who to avoid in your life.

In a speech, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence described the SCS as:

“…an Orwellian system premised on controlling virtually every facet of human life.”

Every Move You Make, Every Step You Take… China’s Watching You

Here’s the kicker: The Chinese people seem to want this system.

It’s perfectly gamified, after all. People want to participate in the system to watch their score go up. They’re also unknowingly participating in a system of ostracism and social pressure.

The social credit system is a tool to get people to fall perfectly in line.

It’s not mandatory yet. Which means that all the people who want to do it – the ones who willingly toe the party line – are going to get in early to get super high scores. It will seem innocent. Fun, even.

The social credit system is not scheduled to reach full nation-wide implementation until next year. But parts of it have already been put into play.

Many communities around China are already running their own versions of the social credit system…

Last year, 17 million flights and 5.4 million high-speed rail trips were denied to would-be travelers who found themselves on the government’s blacklist.

It’s said that most of the people on the blacklist are debtors. These are people who have defaulted on loans.

And some of the current implementations of the social credit system only deduct social credit points when you break the law. Like getting a speeding ticket.

Again, there’s a Sesame Credit app, which encourages users to compare their credit scores to those of their friends. It’s an obvious push to get people to share their ratings as a status symbol.

More than 100,000 Chinese people have “tweeted” their SCS scores on the Chinese equivalent of Twitter.

Above: A billboard in a Chinese community displays citizens with the highest social credit score.

The madness has not yet begun.

The logical implications of the system are horrifying to think about.

You can literally die a death by a thousand paper cuts. Buy the wrong thing on Alibaba too many times, and you can no longer even get a job.

Hang out with the wrong friends too many times, and you can’t get a loan or trade in the stock market.

And once you’re out of society, you’re out for good. There’s virtually no way to get back in. You’re muted and invisible. Persona non grata.

It’s an appalling return to the caste system of India. If your credit score is too low, you’re untouchable.

People will turn on each other. China’s elite State Council published a planning document on the SCS that says that the “new system will reward those who report acts of breach of trust.”

That’s a page straight from Soviet Russia’s KGB – only more effective.

Accurate information on China is hard to obtain. It’s likely the current reality is already far worse than we know.

The Land of the Decree, and the Home of the Slave

The majority of the elements are in place for the Social Credit System to be implemented.

Not in China.

In the United States.

We have:

  • The databases

  • The digital surveillance

  • The national credit score system

  • The systems of reward and punishment

  • The government-knows-best attitude

  • The electronic purchasing data

  • The ubiquitous social networks

Think about it. China started with Alibaba and Tencent.

In the United States, we have Amazon and Facebook and Google.

They know everything you read, see, search, buy, and say.

Your Android or iPhone already tracks your location and reports it hundreds of times per day.

And that information is already being used for complete censorship.

In 2018, Facebook began a program that assigns every user a reputation score, which predicts their “trustworthiness.” Sound familiar?

Here is how China implemented the Social Credit Score system in just under five years:

  • They subjected all online behavior to intense study.

  • They collected, stored and analyzed all social media and banking information.

  • They began to severely regulate the freedom to travel.

And here’s what’s going on in the United States…

Police threat-scoring algorithms are used to determine who the police should be tracking and surveilling. Social media is already being used in these algorithms.

For the past decade, the NSA has been gathering information on people’s social media, locations, friends, and who they travel with.

The agency can enrich the data with bank information, social media information, voter information and even GPS location information.

The TSA has a rapidly expanding “no-fly” list. The list has no government accountability, and there is no recourse – unless, of course, you’re a powerful government official who ends up on it.

Indeed, a report from the World Privacy Forum indicates that in such a credit score system “error rates and false readings become a big issue.”

Implications on the Yuan and U.S. Dollar

Never underestimate the currency butterfly effect. This has huge implications for the yuan, which is the currency of China. The Social Credit Score will have incredible implications on business, government and ultimately, the strength of the currency.

The world has never seen anything like this. And it’s only going to grow. China is the first country to implement this and certainly won’t be the last. You know others will do so to maintain power, increasepower and manipulate power.

Pay attention to this and it will be very important in the coming years, and will have significant indirect effects to your portfolio.

What could possibly go wrong?

Last year, Chinese authorities said that part of the program would be to freeze the assets of anyone deemed to be “dishonest.”

Imagine all of your assets suddenly disappearing because a red light camera read your license plate wrong.

The infrastructure for this system is already in place in the United States.

It’s just not about train rides or university classes anymore.

Any individual not aligning with the current social and governmental norms will face poverty… homelessness… starvation… or worse.

Under the new system of life by government approval, survival becomes simple:

Obey… or die.

*  *  *

Clearly, there are many strange things afoot in the world. Distortions of markets, distortions of culture. It’s wise to wonder what’s going to happen, and to take advantage of growth while also being prepared for crisis. How will you protect yourself in the next crisis? See our PDF guide that will show you exactly how. Click here to download it now.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2I4eKeM Tyler Durden

As VIX Vega Soars, Another VIXplosion May Be Coming

Back in January 2018, just weeks ahead of the infamous VIXtermination event on Feb. 5 2018 that wiped out virtually all inverse VIX ETPs in seconds, we predicted that such an event was imminent as a result of a sharp spike in the total outstanding Vega across the entire levered and inverse volatility derivative space, which had reached an all time high.

And while since then, the VIX ETP market had been relatively quiet as a result of last year’s fireworks which wiped out countless retail investors and other vol sellers, another VIX “event” may be coming.

According to JPMorgan’s Bram Kaplan, after a years of relatively quiet, the net exposure among VIX ETPs has recently spiked to their largest net long position in 1.5 years, tilted long by ~$150Mn vega, which is just shy of the record vega exposure hit in early 2018 and which precipitated the VIX ETP implosion. However, unlike 2018, this time the trade is in the other direction as investors piled into long and levered VIX ETPs beginning in February, as soon as the VIX index fell below 16, to as JPM suggests. “position for/speculate on the next volatility spike.”

Specifically, over this period, investors have deposited $600MM net into unlevered long VIX ETPs, and $1.1Bn into levered products (the majority of which went into 2x levered TVIX). Following these flows, the vega notional in levered and inverse VIX ETPs has increased significantly, but remains well below pre-Feb’18 levels.

And here is the cautious conclusion from JPM, which notes that while the bank doesn’t – yet – expect these ETPs to drive end-of-day short gamma rebalancing effects anywhere close to those experienced on 2/5/18, “their end of day rebalances are becoming material.” To wit, the next chart illustrates how the end of day rebalance requirements for levered and inverse VIX ETPs has been increasing as a percentage VIX futures volumes, but remains small (so far, at least) compared to pre-Feb’18.

The key thing is that as noted above, unlike last year’s vol selling stampede, the current build-up of long vega exposure in VIX ETPs suggests they could provide a headwind to the next volatility spike… 

… as investors are likely to take profits on these positions and/or invest in inverse products to monetize the spike. On the other hand, should the EOD rebalance persist, growing increasingly skewed in one direction as contrarian traders boost their bets on a VIX spike in the coming months using various ETP products, then it is only a matter of time before another major VIX spike takes place, only this time instead of wiping out the vol buyers, it results in a very generous pay day.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2YEdQM5 Tyler Durden

Trump Was Not Just Spied Upon, It Was Entrapment!

Authored by Roger Simon via PJMedia.com,

It’s bad enough, as has been evident for some time, that Donald Trump and his campaign were being spied upon by our own government, but it’s highly likely they were also subject to literal entrapment–at least a serious attempt was made.

I don’t mean the entrapment of promulgating the salacious Steele dossier both to the public and the FISA court as if it were the truth. That was more of a smear to justify a phony investigation. I mean something more subtle and LeCarré-like coming from the depths of our intelligence communities. It raises once more the question of the power of such agencies in a free society, a conundrum with no easy answers but of great significance to our lives.

For all his New York rough-and-tumble, Trump was an innocent abroad when he arrived in Washington. Way back in January 2017, he was warned by old-timer Chuck Schumer that “intel officials have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you.”

The Senate minority leader–Deep Stater par excellence–knew whereof he spoke. But Trump somehow survived the storm, although sometimes it seemed as if he wouldn’t. Now, some of the obvious parties –John K. Brennan and James Clapper with their apparatchik miens — have suddenly found themselves in the crosshairs, as the Washington Times notes:

Special counsel Robert Mueller’s finding that there was no Trumpcampaign conspiracy with Russia to steal the 2016 election has unleashed a tsunami of outrage toward Obama-era intelligence chiefs, particularly former CIA Director John O. Brennan and former FBI Director James B. Comey, who are accused of pushing the allegation during congressional hearings, in social media posts and in highly charged interviews on television over the past two years.

Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper also leveled up highly publicized comments that President Trump could even be an “asset” of Russian President Vladimir Putin, part of a slew of remarks that critics say went far beyond the usual partisan sniping that can accompany a change of administrations.

More’s afoot here, however, considerably more because the entire American intelligence system and the unique power referred to by Schumer are also now in those same crosshairs, as they should be. But many of the men and women involved are less overtly Soviet in their style than Mssrs. Brennan and Clapper and slip more easily under the radar.

Notable among these, and perhaps able to reveal much of the McGuffin to the mystery of where this all started and how, is Stefan Halper.  Mr. Halper is “an American foreign policy scholar and Senior Fellow at the University of Cambridgewhere he is a Life Fellow at Magdalene College and directs the Department of Politics and International Studies.” He is also a spook who worked for Nixon, Ford, and Reagan, no less, and was a principle American connection to the UK’s MI-6.

Mr. Halper has (ahem) other connections:

A top FBI official admitted to Congressional investigators last year that the agency had contacts within the Trump campaign as part of operation “Crossfire Hurricane,” which sounds a lot like FBI “informant” Stefan Halper – a former Oxford University professor who was paid over $1 million by the Obama Department of Defense between 2012 and 2018, with nearly half of it surrounding the 2016 US election.

Hmm…. The perspicacious Margot Cleveland had more to say the other day at The Federalist in “Who Launched An Investigation Into Trump’s Campaign Before Crossfire Hurricane.

“Crossfire Hurricane,” as most know, is the codename the wannabe hipsters at the FBI gave the Trump-Russia investigation. But more important is the word “before” in Ms. Cleveland’s title.

The Post further noted that the academic, since identified as Stefan Halper, first met with Trump campaign advisor Carter Page “a few weeks before the opening of the investigation,” and then after Crossfire Hurricane’s July 31, 2016, start, he met again with Carter Page and “with Trump campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis,” offering the latter his “foreign-policy expertise” for the Trump team. Then in September, Halper “reached out to George Papadopoulos, an unpaid foreign-policy adviser for the campaign, inviting him to London to work on a research paper.”

Papadopoulos and Page are the two naifs of the most obvious sort (sorry, guys) we have all seen on television who spent the last couple of years having to defend themselves against absurd charges. Considering the timing, it’s pretty obvious they were being set up (i. e. entrapped) on some level well back during the Obama administration.

Who ordered it is the obvious question, but I’m not going to leave it there. I suggest that an attempt was being made to implant Halper in the Trump campaign, one way or another, not just for spying purposes but actually to help create this collusion of the campaign with Russia–that is, to help manufacture it.

Putting it another way, someone or some group wanted to create — or, more subtly, to encourage the creation — of Trump-Russia collusion from the inside in order to destroy Trump before, or failing that, after he was elected.

How’s that for a nefarious plot? Worthy of LeCarré or maybe even Graham Greene. But is it true? I wouldn’t bet against it. Something close anyway.

By the way, if I am right, this won’t be the first time for Halper. And unfortunately for Republicans, the shoe was then on the proverbial other foot. As Glenn Greenwald wrote last year:

Four decades ago, Halper was responsible for a long-forgotten spying scandal involving the 1980 election, in which the Reagan campaign – using CIA officials managed by Halper, reportedly under the direction of former CIA Director and then-Vice-Presidential candidate George H.W. Bush – got caught running a spying operation from inside the Carter administration. The plot involved CIA operatives passing classified information about Carter’s foreign policy to Reagan campaign officials in order to ensure the Reagan campaign knew of any foreign policy decisions that Carter was considering.

Republicans can console themselves that their malfeasance was more benign, relatively. This new one was outright sedition involving a foreign power. It is a blow to the heart of our democratic republic. We need Halper, under oath and unredacted. Whether that’s possible is another question.

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2TKYcuD Tyler Durden

Hollywood Boycotts Brunei-Owned Hotels In Response To Sharia Death Penalty For Gay Sex

Hollywood starts have launched a boycott of nine Brunei-owned hotels after the tiny Islamic nation on the island of Borneo announced that they would be enforcing the death penalty for gay sex and adultery. 

While the new laws were announced five years ago with the nation’s adoption of Sharia law, the death penalty for homsexual sex and adultery will begin on April 3, according to CNN.

Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah of Brunei with his wife Raja Isteri Pengiran Anak Saleha

Spearheaded by actor George Clooney, the boycott has been joined by the likes of Sharon Stone, Elton John, Jamie Lee Curtis, George Takei and others, who refuse to patronize the Brunei-owned establishments: 

“I commend my friend, George Clooney, for taking a stand against the anti-gay discrimination and bigotry taking place in the nation of Brunei – a place where gay people are brutalised, or worse – by boycotting the sultan’s hotels,” tweeted Elton John on Saturday. 

The 72-year-old, a veteran gay rights campaigner, said his “heart went out” to staff at the hotels, but that “we must send a message, however we can, that such treatment is unacceptable”. –The Guardian

Last week Clooney called for the boycot, saying “Every single time we stay at or take meetings at or dine at any of these nine hotels, we are putting money directly into the pockets of men who choose to stone and whip to death their own citizens for being gay or accused of adultery.”

Brunei has been ruled for 51 years by Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah as an absolute monarchy. While homosexuality is already illegal there, it will now become a capital offense. 

Will they also boycott Saudi properties? 

There are now 11 countries in the world where homosexual acts are punishable by death, including Afghanistan, Iran and Saudi Arabia. 

Kingom Hotel Investments, owned by Saudi Prince Alwaleed, owns nearly 50% of the Four Seasons hotel chain, while Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates’ Cascade Investment Management owns approximately the same amount. 

***

As we noted last week, here’s a map of mostly Islamic republics where homosexual acts are illegal and/or punishable by death. 

And via the Washington Post:

Places where homosexual acts can be punished by death

Afghanistan

The Afghan Penal Code does not refer to homosexual acts, but Article 130 of the Constitution allows recourse to be made to Sharia law, which prohibits same-sex sexual activity in general. Afghanistan’s Sharia law criminalizes same-sex sexual acts with a maximum of the death penalty. No known cases of death sentences have been meted out since the end of Taliban rule.

Iran

In accordance with sharia law, homosexual intercourse between men can be punished by death, and men can be flogged for lesser acts such as kissing. Women may be flogged.

Nigeria

Federal law classifies homosexual behavior as a felony punishable by imprisonment, but several states have adopted sharia law and imposed a death penalty for men. A law signed in early January makes it illegal for gay people countrywide to hold a meeting or form clubs.

Qatar

Sharia law in Qatar applies only to Muslims, who can be put to death for extramarital sex, regardless of sexual orientation.

Saudi Arabia

Under the country’s interpretation of sharia law, a married man engaging in sodomy or any non-Muslim who commits sodomy with a Muslim can be stoned to death. All sex outside of marriage is illegal.

Somalia

The penal code stipulates prison, but in some southern regions, Islamic courts have imposed Sharia law and the death penalty.

Sudan

Three-time offenders under the sodomy law can be put to death; first and second convictions result in flogging and imprisonment. Southern parts of the country have adopted more lenient laws.

Yemen

According to 1994 penal code, married men can be sentenced to death by stoning for homosexual intercourse. Unmarried men face whipping or one year in prison. Women face up to seven years in prison.

Mauritania

Muslim men engaging in homosexual sex can be stoned to death, according to a 1984 law, though none have been executed so far. Women face prison.

United Arab Emirates

Lawyers in the country and other experts disagree on whether federal law prescribes the death penalty for consensual homosexual sex or only for rape. In a recent Amnesty International report, the organization said it was not aware of any death sentences for homosexual acts. All sexual acts outside of marriage are banned.

And now we can add Brunei

There are 65 countries where homosexual acts are illegal

Noteworthy laws:

Pakistan

Death penalty laws exist but are unlikely to be implemented, according to the 2016 IGLA report.

Chad

A 2014 law makes same-sex relations a crime punishable by 15 to 20 years in prison.

India

A ban on same-sex relationships was tossed by the legal system in 2009 but reinstated in 2013. The supreme court said the government, not the courts, would have to change the law.

 

via ZeroHedge News https://ift.tt/2FMvzJZ Tyler Durden