AI ChatBot as Research Assistant

[CraginS]

Some weeks back, Grandpa Rob @rslade flagged two Community accounts that are almost definitely chatbots, @nancy_perez and @crystal_waston. Both accounts have posted innocuous statements in ongoing threads that do not really add to the conversation, but simply make a statement or define a term related to the thread.

In the thread on BlockChain Security in Industry News (https://community.isc2.org/t5/Industry-News/BlockChain-Security/td-p/10550)

each of those accounts played their game again, but this time I found the original articles online that the bots plagiarized from. You can see my notes in that thread. Here is the interesting part: Had nancy-BOT and crystal-BOT actually cited the articles they used, that information would have been quite useful to the original questioner, @Adesoji.  Both full articles are quite relevant to the questions he asked about blockchains.

So, we are led to wondering if the underlying AI programming for both nancy-BOT and crystal-BOT could be slightly modified to change them from minor annoyances in the Community to actually useful research assistants.

Amanda @amandavanceISC2 let us know the (ISC)2 staff is trying to find out who is running the two bot accounts. If we can get the operators to fess up. maybe we can help turn their research into something to "use their powers for good."

Let's keep our fingers crossed.

[SamanthaO_isc2]

Hello @Shannon, 

These accounts have been handled by the Administrators of the Community. In order to keep our internal policies and procedures secure, we can not share anything further than this. We do want to thank you and all Community members who brought this to our attention and encourage you to continue to report suspect accounts and content in the Community for the Admins to handle.

[Shannon]

---

@SamanthaO_isc2 wrote:

Hello @Shannon, 

These accounts have been handled by the Administrators of the Community. In order to keep our internal policies and procedures secure, we can not share anything further than this. We do want to thank you and all Community members who brought this to our attention and encourage you to continue to report suspect accounts and content in the Community for the Admins to handle.

---

Thanks for confirming that, @SamanthaO_isc2

[rslade]

> Shannon (Contributor II) posted a new reply in Tech Talk on 10-24-2018 03:03 PM in the (ISC)² Community :

> I'm curious to know
> what the final outcome of this was, assuming the investigation is over...

I can't, of course, speak for what the final outcome was, and I'd be interested as
well. But I note that crystal posted a couple of days ago, and that post no longer
shows up on searches. I think we can safely infer that the Powers-That-Be have
determined that nancy and crystal are somehow non-legit, and are manually taking
down their posts from here on in. (I'm not sure why they are leaving the old posts
up ...)

====================== (quote inserted randomly by Pegasus Mailer)
rslade@vcn.bc.ca slade@victoria.tc.ca rslade@computercrime.org
Politics for the age of cable TV. Fleeting impressions, an
illusion of meaning floating over a sea of undefined emotions.
We're talking about a virtual politics unconnected to any
reality, one which redefines reality as itself.
- `Kingdom Come', J. G. Ballard
victoria.tc.ca/techrev/rms.htm http://twitter.com/rslade
http://blogs.securiteam.com/index.php/archives/author/p1/
https://is.gd/RotlWB

[rslade]

> SamanthaO_isc2 (Community Manager) posted a new reply in Tech Talk on 10-24-2018 03:21 PM in the (ISC)² Community :

>  In order to keep our internal policies and procedures
> secure, we can not share anything further than this.

Yeah, that's taking "security by obscurity" just a tad too far ...