The following article is a supplement to the MRC Report: The Biden Administration Waged War on Free Speech with 57 Censorship Initiatives.
Initiative #10: INCAS
Type of Censorship: Partnership
Agencies Involved:
- Department of Defense
- Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
- United States Army
- Army Cyber Command (ARCYBER)
- Army Intelligence & Security Command (INSCOM)
- United States Mission to NATO (USNATO)
Summary:
The Department of Defense’s intelligence agencies created a censorship algorithm to suppress speech contrary to their agenda.
The “Influence Campaign and Sensemaking Awareness” project began as part of a $59.5 million program on informational warfare from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). For the project, DARPA — in concert with U.S. Army Cyber Command (ARCYBER) and the U.S. Army Intelligence & Security Command (INSCOM) — developed tech to covertly “change narratives online” by targeting user’s “psychographic attributes” and “moral and sacred values.” DARPA crafted a data-sharing agreement with Twitter (now X) to build, train and perfect its weapons of mass deletion. ARCYBER and INSCOM then deployed the tool as part of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) campaign to censor so-called mis-, dis- and/or “malinformation.”
Key Individuals:
- Lloyd Austin, Secretary of Defense
- Maria Barrett, Army Lieutenant General
- Michele Bredenkamp, Army Lieutenant General
- Timothy Brown, Commanding Major General of INSCOM
- Dennis Egger, INSCOM Open Source Senior Intelligence Advisor
- Stephen Fogarty, Army Lieutenant General
- Brian Kettler, DARPA Program Manager
- Julianne Smith, U.S. Permanent Representative to NATO
- Lydia Snyder, Special Advisor to the Commander of ARCYBER
- Stephanie Tompkins, Director of DARPA
