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In response to donors' requests, the Wikimedia Foundation started accepting cryptocurrency donations in 2014.

Eight years later, a longtime Wikipedia editor is arguing "it is no longer ethical" to continue to accept crypto.

"Cryptocurrencies have been joined by a bubble of predatory, inherently harmful technologies," the editor, Molly White, wrote in an opinion piece for the organization's newspaper, The Signpost, published Sunday. White, known on the site by her handle GorillaWarfare, is also a software engineer at HubSpot and has written on blockchain technologies and privacy.

Early cryptocurrency advocates promised the tech would become an alternative to traditional banking. It was meant to create privacy, anonymity, decentralization, and freedom, particularly for those who couldn't afford traditional banking. It was to help those who couldn't open accounts, get loans or credit cards, or afford processing fees.

"The idea was that this would give financial freedom to a lot of people," White told Insider over email.

But, as cryptocurrency has matured into Web3, "those values don't really seem so central anymore," she told Insider. "Most projects are more interested in making a quick buck, and are in fact very centralized."

Instead of decentralized freedom, much crypto wealth has landed in the hands of the few while becoming a risky speculation investment that "resembles a landscape with scammers and marks," her piece argued in classic Wikipedia style full of footnotes to document her points.

More than that, White maintains that crypto mining is harmful to the environment and is misaligned with the Wikimedia Foundation's Resolution for Environmental Impact approved by the board of trustees in 2017 to "reduce the impact of our activities on the environment." She cites research on how China and Kazakhstan, the two largest centers for mining bitcoin, have relied heavily on coal to power such operations and have begun to crack down on mining.

She says continuing to accept crypto risks damaging the nonprofit's reputation.

"Tons of people dismiss concerns about the environmental damage of the Ethereum blockchain because the project plans to move to a proof-of-stake soon," she reflected. Proof-of-stake is an alternative approach to proof-of-work's computational-intensive approach, which validates transactions through a math puzzle. Instead, transactions are approved by individual validators through a consensus process.

"Problem is, Ethereum has been saying they will move to proof-of-stake 'soon' for years now, while doing enormous environmental damage," White said.

White doesn't stand alone. Mozilla paused cryptocurrency donations after a tweet announcing a partnership with BitPay drew backlash. The Mozilla cofounder Jamie "jwz" Zawinski went so far as to call the crypto world "planet-incinerating Ponzi grifters." BitPay is a processor that charges a 1% processing fee and is also used by Wikimedia.

Whether White's plea will have an impact is unclear, but the organization says it's listening to its community on the matter. "We are monitoring recent concerns raised by the community around cryptocurrency donations, and considering them seriously as we determine our path forward," a Wikimedia Foundation representative said.

The person also described cryptocurrency as "still a small portion of the overall revenue to the Wikimedia Foundation," bringing in $130,100.94 last year. That's 0.08% of revenue from donations, making it the foundation's smallest funding source.

Despite this, White argues against its optics.

"The fact of the matter is that most cryptocurrency donations to the WMF came in via Bitcoin, an enormously damaging currency with no intentions to move to a more sustainable model," she emailed Insider, using an abbreviation for the Wikimedia Foundation.

"People are trying to use technology alone to solve social problems, and that's never going to work," she continued. "Its promises weren't any more realistic ten years ago than they are now."

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Wikipedia Editor Urges the Org to Stop Accepting Crypto - Business Insider

A streaming website that features Iranian state television programming has acknowledged suffering technical issues amid reports that dissident hackers played an anti-government message on the platform

ByThe Associated Press

February 2, 2022, 11:32 AM

2 min read

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- A streaming website that features Iranian state television programming has acknowledged suffering technical issues amid reports that dissident hackers played an anti-government message on the platform.

Telewebion said it suffered infrastructure irregularities Tuesday and suffered an archive failure, without elaborating on the cause.

The problems came as a video message circulated online claiming to be from a self-described group of hackers called The Justice of Ali" in Farsi. In the video, which Farsi-language news networks abroad say played on the streaming platform, a masked man appears and a muffled voice says Iran's government will no longer silence us.

Well burn hijabs. Well burn their pictures and propaganda posters, the man says. We will break their idols. We will reveal their palaces so that the people can punish them.

The Justice of Ali did not immediately respond to a request for comment via an account it used in an earlier conversation with The Associated Press. In August it released footage showing grim condition at Iran's notorious Evin prison it claimed it obtained through a hack.

The video comes just ahead of commemoration ceremonies for Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution this month. It also follows an apparent hack Thursday that saw multiple channels of Irans state television broadcast images showing the leaders of an exiled dissident group and a graphic calling for the death of the countrys supreme leader.

The incident Tuesday potentially marks the latest in a series of embarrassing cyberattacks against the Islamic Republic, as world powers struggle to revive a tattered nuclear deal with Tehran. Other attacks, which Iran has blamed on Israel, have targeted its nuclear program.

In October, an assault on Irans fuel distribution system paralyzed gas stations nationwide, leading to long lines of angry motorists unable to get subsidized fuel for days. An earlier cyberattack on Irans railway system caused chaos and train delays.

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Iran state TV streaming site targeted with dissident message

In a letter sent to the president of USA Wrestling, Bruce Baumgartner, Iranian wrestler AlirezaDabir wrote,"I am very sorry to announce that the national wrestling team of the Islamic Republic of Iran, due to not granting visas to 6 members of this team, is not able to participate in a friendly match with the U.S. national team."

Fox News Digital broke the story in January that Dabir, who obtained a U.S. residency green card, urged the violent destruction of America during an event celebrating the life and work of the U.S.-designated terrorist Qassem Soleimani.

Soleimani led the Quds Force, a division of Irans Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a U.S.-designated terrorist entity that has been responsible for killing more than 600 American military personnel. He died in a targeted killing in January 2020, slain by an American drone strike in Baghdad.

Dabir won a gold medal in freestyle wrestling at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

Sardar Pashaei, the Iranian American former head coach of Irans national Greco-Roman wrestling team, toldFox NewsDigital,"I am glad that the U.S. State Department did not issue visas to those who said Death to America and at the same time wanted to enter the United States. This policy must be implemented by the U.S. government against all Iranian officials who hate the United States. Why should people like [former Iranian Vice President] Masoumeh Ebtekar, who took the U.S. embassy hostage in Iran and humiliated Americans, have her family in the U.S.?"

Alireza Dabir of Iran receives gold medal for 58 kg freestyle wrestling at Sydney 2000 Summer Olympic Games. (Associated Press)

IRANIAN DISSIDENTS WARN REGIME IS CREATING PROXY TERRORIST NAVAL UNITS TO BACK HOUTHIS IN YEMEN

Pashaei, himself a former world champion in Greco-Roman wrestling, added, "The reaction of the USA Wrestling on this issue was very unfortunate. During this time, they remained completely silent and continued to try to bring in Iranian officials who threatened the American people. We urge USA Wrestling sponsors, including the Marine Corps, to reconsider their support for the U.S. wrestling federation."

Rich Bender, the executive director of USA Wrestling, previously declined to answer Fox News Digital queries about Dabirs loathing of America and his call for the violent destruction of the United States.

Pashaei manages the United for Navid organization, which campaigns to secure justice for the murdered Iranian Greco-Roman wrestler Navid Afkari. Irans theocratic regime executed Afkari in September 2020 for his role in a 2018 protest against its political and economic corruption. The clerical states opaque judiciary in Shiraz, where Afkari was hanged, claimed he killed a security guard tracking the demonstrators, but the prosecution provided no proof that Afkari committed murder. The Trump administration sanctioned prison and judicial officials for the murder of Afkari.

Masih Alinejad, anIranian American journalist and womens rights campaigner andthe founder of United for Navid, tweeted: "Death to America getting [i.e., preventing] Alireza Dabir, Irans wrestling chief from coming to America. He also defends war criminal Gassem Soleimani in this video. @UnitedForNavid is the voice of Iranian people who never support a terrorist & refusing to say dealt h to America.@sardar_pashaei."

The Iranian regime-controlled Fars News Agency, which is affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp, pinned the blame on Fox News Digitals exposure of Dabirs anti-American tirade andPashaei for the cancellation of the wrestling competition in Texas.

IS THE BIDEN ADMINISTRATION SEEKING TO REJOIN CONTROVERSIAL UN AGENCY ACCUSED OF AIDING IRAN AND NORTH KOREA

In January, aU.S. State Departmentspokesperson told Fox News Digital on "The U.S. and Iranian Wrestling teams are scheduled to compete against one another in an event planned for February 12, 2022,called The Bout at the Ballpark.

"Matters involving visa issuance for any individual members of the Iranian team are subject to Privacy Act concerns and will be adjudicated strictly in accordance with U.S. law," the spokesperson continued.

"As National Security Advisor [Jake] Sullivan said earlier this week, We are united in our resolve against threats and provocations. We are united in the defense of our people. We will work with our allies and partners to deter and respond to any attacks carried out by Iran. Should Iran attack any of our nationals it will face severe consequences."

Benjamin Weinthal is a Jerusalem-based journalist and a fellow for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. You can follow Benjamin on Twitter, @BenWeinthal

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Iran regimes Death to America wrestling head cancels ...

Protesters light candles during a demonstration in Manila, Philippines, to condemn the execution of two teenagers in Iran because of their homosexuality, in an August 5, 2005 file photo. JAY DIRECTO/AFP/Getty

Dubai, United Arab Emirates Iran has executed two gay men who were convicted on charges of sodomy and spent six years on death row, a rights group reported. Homosexuality is illegal in Iran, which is considered one of the most repressive places in the world for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.According to a report on Sunday by the Human Rights Activists News Agency, the two men were identified as Mehrdad Karimpour and Farid Mohammadi.They were sentenced to death for "forced sexual intercourse between two men" and hanged in a prison in the northwestern city of Maragheh, some 310 miles from the capital, Tehran.Last July, two other men were executed on the same charges in Maragheh, the group said. It added that last year, Iran executed 299 people, including four convicted of crimes committed as children. Also in 2021, Iran sentenced 85 people to death.Last October, the U.N.'s independent investigator on human rights in Iran, Javaid Rehman told the U.N. General Assembly's human rights committee that Iran continues to implement the death penalty "at an alarming rate."Under Iranian law, sodomy, rape, adultery, armed robbery and murder are among crimes that can lead to the death penalty.

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Iran purportedly executes 2 gay men over sodomy charges ...

The days events, which were supposed to be about unity, only served to highlight Republicans persistent division over Mr. Trumps attempt to overturn the 2020 election, as their leaders try to move forward and focus attention on what they call the failings of the Biden administration. More than a year later, the party is still wrestling with how much criticism and dissent it will tolerate.

Shame falls on a party that would censure persons of conscience, who seek truth in the face of vitriol, Senator Mitt Romney, Republican of Utah, wrote on Twitter. Honor attaches to Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for seeking truth even when doing so comes at great personal cost.

He did not mention that the party chairwoman who presided over the meeting and orchestrated the censure resolution, Ms. McDaniel, is his niece.

The censure was also condemned by Senator Bill Cassidy, Republican of Louisiana, who, like Mr. Romney, voted to remove Mr. Trump from office for inciting insurrection on Jan. 6, and Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland, also a Republican, who called Friday a sad day for my party and the country.

Republican National Committee members defended the measure, describing people who have been questioned by the Jan. 6 committee as victims in a broader Democratic effort to keep focus on the attack at the Capitol.

The nominal Republicans on the committee provide a pastiche of bipartisanship, but no genuine protection or due process for the ordinary people who did not riot being targeted and terrorized by the committee, said Richard Porter, a Republican National Committee member from Illinois. The investigation is a de facto Democrat-only investigation increasingly unmoored from congressional norms.

The Jan. 6 committee, which has seven Democratic members, has interviewed more than 475 witnesses, the vast majority of whom either volunteered to testify or agreed to without a subpoena. It has no prosecutorial powers, and is charged with drawing up a report and producing recommendations to prevent anything similar from happening again.

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G.O.P. Declares Jan. 6 Attack Legitimate Political Discourse - The New York Times