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Join us for the Montreal Anarchist Tech Convergence
The weekend of September 7th and 8th, 2024
In and around Bâtiment 7 Tiohtià:ke (Montreal, Quebec)

Amid the crushing destruction wrought by the sprawling military-industrial complex and the recuperation of the hack by capitalist tech bros, anarchist resistance exists within the cadaverous monster of Leviathan itself.

The Montreal Anarchist Tech Convergence is an opportunity for anarchists to discuss and explore the potential roles of technology in our lives and struggles. Let's learn about security best practices, self-hosted autonomous ways of connecting and finding each other, and media projects that allow us to form international communities of solidarity and how to build stuff out of garbage left behind by capitalism.

More info

Location | Schedule | Unconference | Accessibility | Food | Workshops

Contact

🗯️ https://kolektiva.social/@MTL_ATC <-- Check here for updates!

📧 mtl-atc@riseup.net

Location

The 2024 Montreal Anarchist Tech Convergence is taking place at Batiment 7 in the Pointe St-Charles neighborhood.

The main address is:
1900 Rue Le Ber
Montreal, QC
H3K 2A4

The MATC will take place in multiple spaces throughout B7: Espace Tapage, COOP Press Start and Recyborg.

To find us at the welcome table, please come to the entrance of Tapage / Rebycorg, mid-way down the North side of the building!

The event is free but we will collect donations to cover the costs of the space!

Map of B7

Schedule

See complete workshop descriptions below!

Saturday, September 7th

10:30 - 11:00

11:00 - 11:50

12:00 - 12:50

13:00 - 13:50

14:00 - 14:50

15:00 - 15:50

16:00 - 17:50

Sunday September 8th

10:30 - 11:00

11:00 - 12:50

13:00 - 13:50

14:00 - 14:50

15:00 - 16:50

17:00 - 17:50

Unconference

There will be a room available for an "unconference" schedule. Bring your own last-minute proposals especially for Sunday!

Accessibilty Information

Masks!

Masks are required and will be provided at the welcome table!

Physical Accessibility

Please consult Batiment Sept's own Accessibility Information

Food

Vegan lunch will be provided on a by-donation basis. Baitment Sept also houses a bar (Sans Taverne) and a grocery store (Épicerie le Détour for coffee, drinks, and food.

Workshop Descriptions

Subverting state-run firewalls

Saturday 11:00 - 11:50 @ Tapage

This will start with a talk that summarizes a variety of technical means for subverting and bypassing internet firewalls that are used to control access to online content. The focus will be on state-level internet firewall deployments, and lead into a discussion on how we, as anarchists, can conceptualize and engage in struggles and solidarity against restrictions on internet access without buying into appeals to liberal notions of democracy/human rights or uncritical acceptance of the corporate hegemony of the "free and open internet".

The Rise of Cybernetic Capitalism

Saturday 11:00 - 11:50 @ Press Start

Capitalism is a constantly evolving system. For fifty years, we have lived under its neoliberal form – an international economic and political regime, dominated by banking cartels and other vehicles of finance capital. But today, as the world lurches towards a new era of trade protectionism, economic crisis and global war, the neoliberal order finds itself in decline. Some say it’s already over. Which leads to an obvious question: what comes next? This workshop will look at one potential successor: a cybernetic capitalism dominated by tech and artificial intelligence. A socioeconomic system built on a foundation of constant, ubiquitous surveillance – mining raw data the fuel the predictive algorithms and generative AI that automate many of the traditional functions of the economy and state security apparatus. This workshop will look at one potential successor: a cybernetic capitalism dominated by tech and artificial intelligence. A socioeconomic system built on a foundation of constant, ubiquitous surveillance – mining raw data the fuel the predictive algorithms and generative AI that automate many of the traditional functions of the economy and state security apparatus. This workshop will look at one potential successor: a cybernetic capitalism dominated by tech and artificial intelligence. A socioeconomic system built on a foundation of constant, ubiquitous surveillance – mining raw data the fuel the predictive algorithms and generative AI that automate many of the traditional functions of the economy and state security apparatus.

Using OSINT for research on the far right // L'utilisation de OSINT pour les enquêtes sur l'extrême droite

Saturday 12:00 - 12:50 @ Tapage

This workshop outlines how social media and other open source intelligence (OSINT) can be used in conjunction with specialized tricks and tools to identify anonymous far-right people on the internet.

L'atelier portera sur comment les médias sociaux et autres sources de renseignements de source ouverte (OSINT) peuvent être utilisés en conjonction avec des outils spécialisés pour identifier des personnes anonymes de l'extrême droite.

Ethical Licenses and Post-Open Source

Saturday 12:00 - 12:50 @ Press Start

In the last 10 years, with the emergence of Tech Giants as economic powerhouses, many have started to question the liberal ethos of "Free Software".

As radicals, why publish code under a "Free" license if it ultimately ends up enabling surveillance capitalism and the State?

This guided discussion on so-called "Ethical Licenses" (Hippocratic License, Leftcopy, Anti-Capitalist License, etc.) and Post-Open Source aims to discuss these topics and try to make sense of our current options as anarchists in tech.

How bad is it doc? On the threat of physical access and some mitigations

Saturday 14:00 - 14:50 @ Tapage

The conventional wisdom is that physical access == game over, and for high value targets this is likely still the case, however, it's not always so simple.

This talk will describe the current state of risk involved in physical access to phones, desktops, and servers. It will attempt to give insight into the common practices following device seizure, will demonstrate what can be uncovered by forensic analysts who seize or otherwise obtain direct and unrestricted access to a device, and will make some recommendations on how we might mitigate these risks.

Pourquoi mes courriels ne se rendent pas - Comment fonctionnent les courriels en 2024, dans un milieu dominé par Google et Microsoft

Saturday 14:00 - 14:50 @ Press Start

État des courriels en 2024. Explication des besoins techniques pour s'assurer que les courriels sont acceptés par les différents serveurs. L'essentiel de la présentation est technique mais devrait être accessible pour des personnes qui n'ont pas beaucoup de connaissances en informatique ni sur le fonctionne du web.

Decentralizing leaks

Saturday 15:00 - 15:50 @ Tapage

Skill-share about building knowledge using leaked data. Every day, hackers and whistleblowers risks their safety and freedom to extract data from banks, corporations, and governments. Phineas Fisher wrote: "with 100 hours of work, one person can undo years of work by a multi-million dollar company. Hacking gives the underdog a chance to fight and win." Often, this data emerges in ephemeral forms, on a message board, a dark net website, or a social media channel. These brief sources of information, too often disappear under fits of censorship. DDoSecrets formed to collect the results of these spontaneous releases, and then keep the most valuable information accessible in the long term. Distributed Denial of Secrets, or DDoSecrets, has been publishing since 2018. Their archive now includes more pages than the Library of Congress. So, can leaked data stop a war? We will focus on a leak from the Israel Ministry of Justice, to discuss the risks and rewards of reading other people's emails.

Critical discussion about AI in the military

Saturday 16:00 - 17:50 @ Tapage

A critical discussion about existing applications of AI in the military and initiatives within tech community to resist against it. I will provide a small overview of the topic and then open the floor for discussion with the audience

Démantibulothon

Saturday 16:00 - 17:50 @ Recyborg

Formation d'initiation au machine du quotidien au travers du démontage et de l'identification des matériaux

A website that is also a zine

Sunday 11:00 - 12:50 @ Tapage

Making a website is fun. What if your website also printed as a fully formatted 8page zine? We're going to use glitch.me to look at some code, and then we'll duplicate it to edit it and see how it works! For people who want to make something that works both URL and IRL. <3

Mapping the Montreal Private Rental Market

Sunday 14:00 - 14:50 @ Tapage

As rents skyrocket in Montreal, more and more tenants know less and less about their actual landlords. Using property records and company registration data , I will present a picture of the full networks of ownership of private rental units in the Montreal rental market. Drawing on this picture, I identify five different modes of opacity in the rental market: 1) Fundamental, 2) Organizational, 3) Geographical, 4) Legal, and 5) Data. More than just an academic curiosity, these are also potential points of strategical intervention for housing organizers and tenants who want to make housing affordable again. The talk is organized around a set of maps and figures that present the big picture of these findings, followed by a conversation on potential strategies of intervention.

Applied Privacy 101

Sunday 15:00 - 16:50 @ Tapage

We invite participants to take control of their online privacy and security through concrete steps and hands-on activities. The workshop will cover essential topics such as web browsers, browser extensions, mobile apps & their settings, password managers, and more.

Newbies welcome! No prerequisites required. We hope for a multi-level group to skill-share.

While we will prepare topics and resources to share with folks, we also invite attendees to share their own tips, skills, and experiences by splitting into groups based on interest, to talk and take action on a subject, and add to a collaborative resource/tool list.

We encourage participants to bring their own laptops and/or phones to follow along and re-configure them to better fit their goals and needs, with help from peers.

Working with Satellite Data

Sunday 17:00 - 17:50 @ Tapage

Today, there are more than 11,000 satellites circling the earth, many of them gathering high-resolution "remote sensing" image data at various frequencies from every square inch of the planet. Most of these satellites are controlled by powerful private and governmental actors, with the data stashed away fully or only partly accessible through paywalls. However, at the meantime, there is also a growing field of "open" remote sensing that leverages a set of freely available datasets. In this workshop, we will familiarize ourselves with using PySTAC for accessing open satellite datasets. Participants will use Python to gather and analyze data from a location of interest and then run some very basic analytics on it. Previous familiarity with programming is preferable, but not mandatory.