Getting to the Truth About Illuminati.am

I took some interest in a Twitter account for Illuminatiam who claim to be the real Illuminati and state that their goal is to lead the human race to a better and brighter future.

In addition to the mentioned Twitter account, they also have two websites the "official " site and another which is the link most often distributed to the public. They also have accounts on Facebook, Vine (I guess to appeal to teenagers who may wish to join), Google+ (for some reason), Instagram and a YouTube channel where they posted this really well-made video.

All of these social networking sites are listed on their Verified Accounts page, in order to let their followers know which accounts are truly associated with them and aren't fakers along for the ride..

This seemed to be harmless enough. I followed them on Twitter for awhile until I got bored and unfollowed them. I'm still on their email list (handled by Mailchimp) which I ignored, until recently.

One day out of curiosity, I revisited the Twitter feed to see what they were up to and I really can't say that I was surprised by what I found: they were selling stuff.

When I say "stuff", I'm not talking just about their book. They're also selling medallions and even a nifty box to keep them in, as well as some items which have been discontinued, such as "Banner of Light" for members to hang on their wall, etc.all of which is sold via their Department of Distribution. The Department's website is given as departmentofdistribution.com but it simply redirects to here.

Their book "Illuminatiam: The First Testament Of The Illuminati" is sold through Amazon and Illuminatiam is listed as the author. You are able to read an excerpt of the book online, but the entire book was uploaded to the Internet by an unknown third party who apparently got their hands on a copy, photographed the pages and uploaded the pictures. Unfortunately, that link is no longer available. 

So, how to find out who these people are? One way to start is to try to discover to whom the websites are registered.

Illuminatia.am

Registrant:

Obsidian Maskreet

8549 Wilshire Blvd

Beverly Hills, 90211

US

Administrative contact:

Helen Milano

ILLUMINATIAM

8549 Wilshire Blvd

Beverly Hills, 90211

US

IlluminatiOfficial.org is registered anonymously through Domains By Proxy. No surprises there.

DepartmentOfDistribution.com is simply listed as registered by Helen Milano of Illuminatiam LLC, with no address provided. However, there is an Illuminatiam LLC registered in Wyoming to Dan Keen. The name Dan Keen is associated with numerous companies registered in Wyoming, not just Illuminatiam. One reason to have a registered agent out of the state you live in could be for tax purposes. Wyoming is considered much friendlier than California when it come to business taxes and whoever is running Illuminatiam had better be paying taxes with all the stuff they are selling to their followers.

Okay, so let's take these one at a time:

The address 8549 Wilshire Blvd in Beverly Hills, CA appears to simply be a mail drop service. However, a phone number is also provided: 310-883-4423 and finding who the phone number belongs to is simple enough. It is currently being used as the business number of Spees Fitness, which is owned by Tanner Spees. You can visit his website, Facebook and Istagram pages.and the same phone number is used as in Illuminati.am's WhoIs record.

So, who is Tanner Spees? He's a circuit training instructors based in Los Angeles. He's got a nice website, I must admit. I couldn't find any connection between him and Helen Milano, aside from his phone number associated with a website she registered.

Hellen Milano claims to work for a public relations company called Lirim and her company supposedly handles public relations for Illuminatiam. I found the company website, Twitter and Facebook pages. The company makes this claim about themselves

Lirim is a public relations firm specializing in image management, branding, and global marketing strategies for religious and governmental heads of state.

Even though the website is registered in California to a person named Dana Camden, but using the same address given for Illuminati.am, I could find no listing of it as a registered business in that state. I couldn't find anything about who their past or present clients are, which is odd because you'd think that glowing reviews from their clients would attract new clients. The only client they appear to have is Illuminatiam, though they claim to have a large number of them. I'm rather suspicious about their claim to be working on behalf of "religious and government heads of state" because people in such positions already have subordinates to handle public relations on their behalf and wouldn't normally need to hire from the outside.

Helen Milano posted this in her Twitter feed and pinned it at the top, so it's the first thing you see when you get there

Clearing up confusion: I am not the author of the Illuminatiam Testament. I'm the PR director at @LirimPR and @Illuminatiam is our client.

— Helen Milano (@HelenMilanoPR) January 11, 2015

Fair enough. Although it is never explained why the Illuminati would even need a public relations company, especially one which doesn't seem to be very well-known. You'd think that they'd hire a larger firm with more resources.

So, why register the website under her own name, using a rented mailbox and another business' phone number? Well, that may simply be one of the services Lir.im provides. However, I couldn't find any other websites registered under her name or using that particular address except for IlluminatiTestament.com and one other site which I will discuss shortly.

Illuminatiam doesn't seem to do very much, aside from offering items for sale to their followers and occasionally posting what I suppose are uplifting messages to encourage their flock.

In fact, they even boast about shutting down what they call "fake Illuminati profiles"

In 2015, our associates closed over 475 fake Illuminati profiles. Beware impostors. Visit https://t.co/A9R2zAcxLK for our official pages. ▲

— Illuminatiam ❂ (@ILLUMINATIAM) December 29, 2015

No proof is offered to prove any accounts were ever shutdown by Illuminatiam's followers. But, if that has actually occurred, it would be a rather disturbing development. This makes it look like Illuminatiam is trying to assert itself as the real Illuminati and is trying to silence the competition. After all, there is very little that excites people more than being a member of an elite, semi-secret organization. It gives them a sense of purpose and a feeling that they are better than the unwashed masses around them. This isn't always a bad thing. It is usually just harmless self-indulgence on the part of the gullible. But sometimes, groups like this can become quite dangerous. Sometimes, the leaders of such groups inspire their followers to commit crimes and in other cases, followers do things on their own while thinking that the leaders may approve.

So far, Illuminatiam hasn't asked their followers to do anything except buy their products.

Recently, Illuminatiam posted this on their Twitter feed

An important announcement will be made in 2016. Follow the Illuminati's official pages to ensure you receive it. ▲ https://t.co/tfR2pb2RSe

— Illuminatiam ❂ (@ILLUMINATIAM) December 14, 2015

I suspect that Illuminatiam will release an "Illuminati Bible" in 2016, the initial Testament having been released to see how many people would actually purchase a book they were selling. Perhaps, sales of that book, as well as the medallions and other items they've sold in the past, were good enough that they may feel that it's a potential gold mine waiting to be exploited.

Add to that the fact that the domain IlluminatiBible.com has already been purchased and it's simply waiting to be built-up makes me pretty certain that this is what's going to happen next year. Here's the WhoIs report for that site.

Domain Name: ILLUMINATIBIBLE.COM

Registrar URL: http://www.godaddy.com

Registrant Name: Helen Milano

Registrant Organization: Lirim Public Relations

Name Server: NS09.DOMAINCONTROL.COM

Name Server: NS10.DOMAINCONTROL.COM

DNSSEC: unsigned

In my opinion, Illuminatiam is a money-making scheme cooked-up by a few people who can build a decent website, make a good video, spread themselves over social networks, post some esoteric verbiage on their Twitter feed and market some junk to sell to the gullible. Sadly, they seem to have some people who post that they are "always loyal" to the Illuminatiam on Twitter, as well as actually buying whatever they're selling.

The people running Illuminatiam aren't stupid enough to tangle with the Tax Man and have registered themselves as an LLC in Wyoming, which taxes businesses at a lower rate than California, where Illuminatiam seems to have its base.

I've seen a lot of websites that claim Illuminatiam is some sort of cult or is actually the real Illuminati. Personally, I don't suspect anything of the sort.

In my opinion, it has all the marks of a money-making scheme, nothing more. The most frequent complaint I have seen about buying their swag is that it takes several weeks for them to actually ship the products to buyers. So, despite their supposed power and influence, the Illuminatiam can't mail t-shirts in a timely manner.

Over a year after I posted this entry, I discovered that it had been used as source material for an episode of the Quinnsider, which is rather cool, even though they got my last name wrong. The host, Quinn Wolf, disagreed with my belief that Illuminatiam is likely just a money-making scheme because they seem to have gone to too much effort for that to be the case. But, I think that the simplest explanations are often the most accurate.

Illuminatiam now has an online forum for its members to participate. Since I'm still receiving their emails and I received an invitation, I tried to join. I tried to join, but apparently they don't want me in their forums because they seem to have rejected my attempts to create an account and log-in, likely because of this blog post you are reading.

Yeah, I'm just crying myself to sleep over that. 

I'm still subscribed to their email list and I'll probably stay on it, just to see what else comes down from these clowns, unless they realize their oversight and kick me off.



Duane Browning

Venmo: @Duane-Browning-1

CashApp: $DuaneBrowning

Before You Buy That Used Cell Phone

I was recently speaking to a friend who had bought a used cell phone for her husband to use at his new job. Like most people, she wanted to save as much money as she could and didn't want to spend $600+ dollars for the iPhone 6Plus when she could spend about half that amount.

So, she and her husband went to a store that sells secondhand phones, picked one they like for what they thought was a good price and went home with their phone.

They discovered later when they tried to conect the phone to her cellular account that the phone had been reported stolen, They went  back to the store, told the owner what had happened and he traded them the stolen one for another phone he assured them wasn't stolen property.

However, that phone also turned out to be stolen.

I still remember the days when cell phones had just become available to the public when if your phone had been stolen, there was nothing to stop someone from using your phone after they had stolen it or from selling it to someone else who could also use it, etc.

Sure, you could call your provider to report the stolen phone and have it disconnected from your network. But, the thief could simply have it connected to another one who would have no way of knowing that the phone they were connecting to was stolen property.

Thankfully, those days are coming to an end and there are ways to prevent your phone from being used by a thief who has stolen it, as well as to protect yourself from buying a secondhand phone that had been stolen from someone else.

Every cell phone has a unique IMEI number assigned to it and no two phones will have the same number. These numbers are stored in databases which are easily searchable by the public.

Bookmark these addresses on your cellphone browser for when you go shopping to buy a secondhand cell phone for yourself or a friend.

Apple
https://www.icloud.com/activationlock/

Swappa
https://swappa.com/esn

IMEI
http://www.imei.info/

CheckESENFree
http://www.checkesnfree.com/


Duane Browning


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Danica Dillon versus Josh Duggar

Like many people, I read with great interest the news report of a porn star, with the stage name Danica Dillon, who claims to have been paid for sex on two separate occasions by Josh Duggar.

According to her story, Duggar was very rough with her during their first appointment. She claimed that he had flipped her around "like a rag doll". According to her interview with Entertainment Tonight he approached her again some weeks later, apologized for being so rough with her and asked for a second chance. She relented and she said that he was "a completely different person", though still a little rough.

Aside from a bit of titillation and a sense of "gotcha" on Duggar, with the revelations of his sexual abuse of young girls and his two Ashley Madison accounts, this seemed like small potatoes by comparison.

Jump forward a couple of months and Danica Dillon is reported to have filed a half-million dollar lawsuit against Duggar for his behavior during their two trysts earlier this year. Despite her earlier claim that he was only "a little rough" during their second encounter, she now claims that the second time was as violent and tortuous as the first. According to her court filings, she is so traumatized by what Duggar supposedly did to her that she has to undergo counseling and is unable to work in her profession.

Okay, I've got a few observations to make about this. But, first...

Full Disclosure

I used to work in Honolulu strip clubs as a disc jockey and was in the business for several years and during that time, I became very familiar with strip clubs and somewhat familiar with the porn industry, as well as the escort business.

I have absolutely no problem with anyone who chooses to work in the Adult Industry as a stripper, porn actor or escort, as long as they do so of their own free will.

Porn Star = Great Sex?

Some guys might be under the impression that having sex with a porn star might be the best sex they could possibly have and would be an experience beyond any sex they could have with anyone else. If you see ads posted by porn stars who advertise themselves being available as escorts, you'll see that their asking prices are far above what other escorts would ask for.

In the Age of the Internet we now live in, it's possible to find out how much an escort would ask for versus how much a porn star would and the results are quite significant. On average, a porn star escort asks for "donations" roughly 5 to ten times what other escorts do. So, Danica Dillon's $1500 is about average for a porn star escorting.I've seen figures that are much higher, ranging into thousands of dollars for one hour of their time. Of course, they wouldn't ask for that kind of money if they didn't think they could get it.

You may be wondering if it's worth it. Is sex with a porn star actually better than sex with any other woman, including escorts who don't work in porn?

Fortunately there are websites where men who patronize prostitutes can post reviews of how much or little of a good time they actually had and if it was really worth the money. Guys who have paid for sex with porn starts occasionally frequent these sites and talk about their time with whatever porn star they had sex with.

Overall, the results I've seen didn't indicate that these men enjoyed having sex with a porn star any more than with other escorts they had already seen and some men didn't think it was worth it at all. Often, porn stars who also work as escorts don't want reviews of them posted on the Internet, possibly for that reason.

So, from what I've read of reviews posted by johns, having sex with a porn star is no better or worse than having sex with any other woman. Maybe she might be willing to do things your wife or girlfriend wouldn't, but she'd probably not be better than other escorts in your city who charge a fraction of whatever the porn star does. So, sex with a porn star is kind of like buying a brand name shirt, you could have gotten something just as good for a lot less money.

And now, here are my opinions and observations on this lawsuit.

Unclean Hands

First of all, Danica Dillon's suit appears to be tainted by what lawyers refer to as "unclean hands". Dillon admits to accepting money from Duggar on two occasions in exchange for sexual services. This is prostitution and prostitution is illegal in all 50 states, with limited exceptions in Nevada. In Pennsylvania, where the first encounter took place, prostitution is a third degree misdemeanor. It is extremely unlikely that Danica wouldn't have known this when she agreed to accept the $1500 from Josh to go to a hotel room to have sex with him. They weren't just two consenting adults having sex, they were both breaking the law: Duggar for offering her money for sex and Dillon for accepting money for sex. The starting point for both events is a criminal act. By filing the lawsuit, Dillon is publicly admitting that she has engaged in prostitution.

Reckless Disregard for Personal Safety

Assuming what Dillon claims happened is what really happened, looking at it from a neutral point of view makes me wonder why she seemed to be so unconcerned for her personal safety while it was happening. Never mind the fact that she went to a hotel room with a guy she didn't know and had just met earlier that night. She claims that he didn't use a condoms. While I can't claim firsthand knowledge, even streetwalkers don't have sex with customers without a condom (convenience stores in areas where streetwalkers can be found often keep large stocks of condoms for sale) and I think most professional escorts would do the same. Yet, Dillon risked catching a sexually-transmitted disease, as well as pregnancy by not insisting he use one. Also, if he was so rough, did she tell him to stop while it was happening? Reading the news stories and watching the video posted above, she seems to have just laid there while he physically and verbally abused her. For all she knew, he could have killed her in that hotel room and her children would have had to go on without their mother. Imagine that: your mom gets killed turning a trick in a hotel room.

Way to give a shit about not only your own safety, but the welfare of your kids, Danica.

Oh, but it doesn't end there. She let him have a second chance only a month later. Any jury would ask themselves, if he was so bad the first time, why did you let him do it again?

Do you suppose I could go out with a woman, beat her up and rape her, then go back a month later to apologize, ask for a second chance and get one? I don't think so. What woman in her right mind would give me a second opportunity? Apparently, Danica Dillon would.

According to the court document, for the first encounter, Duggar actually followed Dillon to her hotel and propositioned her there. Didn't that creep her out, just a little? Most women would have had alarm bells going-off in their heads at that point.

She Can't Work? Really?

Dillon claims that the two encounters with Duggar left her so traumatized that she can't work in her chosen profession.

What "chosen profession" is that? If she's saying that she can't dance in strip clubs anymore, a quick look at her Twitter feed tells me differently. She has continued to tour around the USA and work at exotic dance clubs.

Maybe she can't make porn anymore? Again, her Twitter feed doesn't indicate that, though she has slowed it down a bit, claiming to need to concentrate on her personal life. But that decision came after the announced lawsuit.

Or is it because she can't work as a prostitute anymore? Well, that really can't be considered damaging, since she wasn't supposed to be prostituting herself in the first place.

So, exactly how has she been negatively effected by her encounters with Josh Duggar? Her claims of being mentally traumatized by him must be weighed against the first interview she did and the fact that she agreed to see him a second time.

Don't Expect to Get Paid, Danica

Dillon claims that, despite Duggar agreeing to pay her $1500 for the first time and only giving her $1000. I don't know if he paid her whatever he promised for the second time.

Still, if she's anticipating some big payoff, she might not want to get her hopes up. Duggar's family life is in tatters and his reputation is down the toilet. Josh isn't going to be bringing in the Big Bucks for a long time, if ever. If his wife decides to divorce him, Duggar's finances will be destroyed and there will be nothing left for Dillon to squeeze out of him.

It's entirely possible that Josh Duggar will try to rehabilitate his image when he gets out of rehab. Assuming his wife doesn't divorce him, he may try to reinvent himself in the same way that Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart did after their sexual misbehaviors became public knowledge. He might write a book about his "struggles with sexual addiction" and go on speaking tours around the country.

But, I wouldn't put too much faith (see what I did there?) in that being a way for Duggar to repair his shattered reputation. While Swaggart and Bakker did make minor comebacks, they were never as big as they had been pre-scandal. American evangelical Christians aren't known for being very forgiving in regards to sexual scandals committed by people they once idolized.

All that being said, I really can't see a judge or jury awarding Dillon any sort of damages. Remember, her "trauma" was the result of committing the act of prostitution on two occasions. In other words, she wants to be paid damages for injuries she suffered while she was breaking the law.

As I mentioned, prostitution is illegal in all 50 states, with limited exceptions in Nevada, and the government wants to discourage people from either being or patronizing prostitutes and rewarding damages to Dillon would, in effect, be rewarding her for breaking the law. The government's responsibility is to punish lawbreakers and awarding her damages could be seen as condoning her actions and the State cannot do that.

To make matters worse for Danica, her real name is now public knowledge, as is the fact that her husband is in the US Navy. I have no idea how the Navy would react to that bit of information, especially if he were in a supervisory role where he is stationed.

Simply by looking through her Twitter feed, Danica has gone back to her life of porn with a little bit of extra fame on the side. But, I hope she's not anticipating a big payoff from Josh Duggar in her future, because I think she'll be waiting a long time.

So, you may wonder what she should have done?

In my opinion, she should have just chalked the first appointment up as a lesson learned: don't take total strangers to your hotel room. She got roughed-up, scared and insulted. For that, she got $1000 cash money.

There have been prostitutes who have gotten killed by their customers.So, Danica Dillon can just cry me a river.


Duane Browning

From ExposingJohns to FlushTheJohns

It seems that some scams are here to stay. Whether it's the notorious 419 scam or fake lotteries, some ideas have so much traction that there will always be new people out there willing to give it a try for themselves.

Such is the case with ExposingJohns.com and its copycats. I've seen or heard of various sites that will post a man's name, phone number, city of residence and photo, etc and accuse him of soliciting prostitutes via the Internet. Sites like these claim to be acting in the Public Good and men whose information has been posted are expected to either pay hundreds of dollars to have their information removed from the site or risk their friends, relatives and coworkers seeing it and to suffer the resulting damage to their reputations.

I wrote about another would-be ExposingJohns replacement, Solicitly.com, which I stated was a rather unimpressive site which the people behind it seemed to have given-up working on. In the comments for that blog post, I was informed of yet another new blackmail site called FlushTheJohns.org and I decided to have a look.

Overall, it's pretty well-made. They seem to have copypasted text directly off ExposingJohns' site before it was taken down and put it up on their own without changing the text. See this on their Removal FAQ page

Why are ExposingJohns.com users doing this? Don’t we have a right to privacy? 

Everyone; including wives, girlfriends, boyfriends, family members, co-workers, current employers and neighbors have the right to know what’s going on online and in their neighborhoods. Just like any other illegal activity of concern that is exposed. ExposingJohns.com is no different than a complaint board that exposes the information of those who abuse the trust of the public. There are very serious issues arising such as the spread of STDs to the innocent, child exploitation and human trafficking. In our day and age, this is all now exacerbated by the easy sale of sex online. Since it is so easy to commit such crimes online it is our user’s job to make it easy to be exposed.

So, we're not dealing with mental giants here. At last count, the site has 8,554 listed posted. Most of these don't have the personal names of the men who supposedly called, though many do have city of residence. Random checks of phone numbers through the Facebook search engine yield no matches, so far. So, FlushTheJohns seems to not want to invest as much effort behind its site as ExposingJohns did.

Of course, the website is registered anonymously. Frankly, I would have shat myself if they weren't.

However, the servers are out of Sofia, Bulgaria and this gives us a place to start. The servers are owned by a Bulgarian company called Qhoster and it appears to be a legitimate company that's been around for awhile. As pointed-out in a previous article, Bulgaria doesn't even have any laws related to Internet-based crime, so using Bulgarian servers would seem like a good play.

On their site, FlushTheJohns says this

Can I pay you to take down a post about me? 

No. You may not pay us to take down a post about you. We would not take down a post for any amount of money. You can offer us $1,000, $10,000 or $100,000. We do not remove posts simply upon demand, request, nor as a result of threats, cajoling, or assertions of liability. We only remove posts if ordered to do so by a court order, the original poster or a trusted arbitrator.

Since the site is using foreign servers and gives no address where a court order would be served, the last sentence is a fucking joke. As far as who a "trusted arbitrator" would be, you only need to go to one of the entries and click the button that says
 

Doing that takes you off Flushthejohns.org and to DisputeThis.net which is a website that claims to serve as an arbitrator that resolves disputes over Internet content.

The agreement that you see at the link (here's a sample) informs you that you must agree to pay $399 to have the content removed. It also contains rather odd language for a legal agreement, rather like a layman wrote it. I'll underline and bold the relevant part:

By submitting a Complaint with us, the decision rendered by DisputeThis constitutes their sole and exclusive remedy and the you waives any and all claims and causes of action, actual and potential, known and unknown, accruing from the beginning of time until the effective date of the arbitration decision, against DisputeThis, the original host website, and their representatives, contractors, and employees. 

"From the beginning of time"? Are you fucking stupid?

This idiotic language inspired me to have a closer look at DisputeThis, despite the rather hostile tone FlushTheJohns takes against them

In an effort to help facilitate people who may be falsely posted as a cheater on our website, we used to use a 3rd party arbitration company called DisputeThis. However, they have been doing things behind our backs to take us down and have been asking too many questions about who we are. If you us their service, tell them to leave us alone, not the webmasters. You can also use a service called Truth In Posting (truthinposting.com) for removal.

Given that ExposingJohns seemed to have a similar relationship with their one-time advertiser, InternetReputation.com, I don't take this statement seriously and neither should you.

Okay, first of all, DisputeThis.net seems to be a very new site, only being created in October 2014. It is also anonymously registered and its servers are in the Netherlands. The Dutch servers are interesting, especially since the mailing addresses given on their website are in Australia and Vietnam, with the Vietnam office apparently being their headquarters.

This sounds like the "trusted arbitrators" are trying very hard to not have people know who and where they are. This is further evidenced by the provided pictures of their "staff".

Recognize this guy? You should. According to DisputeThis, he is their case manager and his name is Paul Walshe. But, doing a quick and simple Google Image search reveals that this picture is apparently clip art and this picture is given various names across various websites.

How about her? According to DisputeThis, she's Karen Wilson, the business account manager. You'll find her picture in many of the same places as the first one.

Supposedly, this is Nick Eubanks, who handles software support. You may have guessed by now that he's just another piece of clip art.

So, neither of these sites could be trusted.

The "Evidence"

Getting back to FlushTheJohns, looking through the profiles they've posted so far, it's obvious that they haven't invested as much effort as ExposingJohns did. While they post phone numbers, they typically don't include photos of the men they are accusing. 

As far as the accusatory texts offered as evidence, ExposingJohns showed that texts could easily be fabricated. While some of the texts shown are rather tame (e.g. saying "What's up?:) others are a bit more flagrant and certainly do look like the type of message sent to prostitutes by potential johns.

Nevertheless, there is no real evidence that any of the phone numbers given on FlushTheJohns is really the source of the texts displayed. For matters of  criminal prosecution, there is no unbroken line of evidence. It's simply the word of whoever is behind FlushTheJohns and the men being accused.

If any man receives a text from FlushTheJohns demanding payment to delete the profile or that they would press charges, the potential victim can simply tell them to go fuck themselves. There is absolutely nothing that could be done to any of the accused men based on "evidence" posted on the website.

Here are two things any first year law student could tell you:

1. Suspicion is not evidence; and
2. Accusation does not equal guilt,

In Conclusion

If your name and/or phone number is posted on FlushTheJohns and they send you a text message demanding payment, tell them to fuck-off and then change your phone number. If anyone asks you why you changed your number, tell them that telemarketers are harassing you.

If a friend, relative, coworker, employer or spouse confronts you with whatever is posted about you on the site, deny everything. Tell them that you've been receiving harassing text messages from Internet scammers or telemarketers.

If they ask how they got your phone number, tell them that you don't know. Maybe they hacked a website (e.g. Amazon.com) that you bought something from. Who knows?

Let me tell you one way that scammers can get your phone number and discover your name and city of residence:

There are millions of cellphone numbers out there and many of them have been collected by hackers over the years and put up for sale on the Dark Web. Numerous banks, online merchants and even the Federal Government have fallen prey to hackers.

Someone planning a scam, like FlushTheJohns, could buy some of these lists and enter the phone numbers into an address book. Once entered, they go to Facebook and click "Find Friends" and Facebook will search for profiles with that phone number. Too many people enter their phone numbers when they sign-up for Facebook, especially when they use the mobile app. If they make themselves searchable by their phone number, it's that much easier for scammers to find your profile, which tells them your name and city of residence.

It could be done even more simply by using a computer program to generate the numbers for them, so they won't have to pay for the lists.

With this knowledge, they can generate a profile for you on their site, create some phony texts messages on a template and post it online.

This is all done with the somewhat justifiable hope that the costs of acquiring the phone numbers, as well as the expense of maintaining the website will be offset by payments from frantic men eager to have the profile deleted as quickly as possible.

So, any threats of criminal prosecution by FlushTheJohns are empty threats and shouldn't be taken seriously. Just follow the advice I've offered and you should be okay.

The Nuclear Option

I feel that I should mention that one reason ExposingJohns may no longer exist is that it pissed-off the wrong person. That person went on to Hackers List and paid someone to hack ExposingJohns and take it offline. My blog entries related to ExposingJohns experienced a sudden and dramatic increase in views on the days after the hit was put out. Only a few days later, ExposingJohns was no longer posting john-shaming profiles and now serves as a site where you can download files.

For the record: it wasn't me who hacked ExposingJohns and I have no idea who put out the contract. Even if I knew, I wouldn't rat them out, because Anonymous is Legion. They don't forgive and they don't forget.

So, the people behind FlushTheJohns may not want to invest too much time behind this scheme, since lightning could conceivably strike twice. They posted over eight thousand profiles so far. So, for all this to be worth what time, effort and money they have already invested, at least half of their prospective victims will have to pay-up. If not, it was all for nothing.

Duane Browning

New Blackmail Site Solicitly.com

I have to admit that I've been quite happy that ExposingJohns.com is apparently gone. But, I was wondering if another site would soon come along to take their place and I began search the 'Net to see if anyone was still receiving text messages from exposingjohns or someone like them.

In fact, another site has recently come online, but the situation isn't as bad as I had initially feared.

I first heard about this pissant little website on the forums at FTC.GOV

Lilyhammer | August 22, 2015 Exposingjohns.com is gone but it has been replaced by a new domain name solicitly.com

So, I decided to have a look and what I found didn't impress me. To date, they only have 70 profiles posted, with names, city of residance, phone numbers and pictures that probably were lifted from their Facebook pages. So, they seem to have followed the same formula as exposingjohns and also repeating the same bullshit line that exposingjohns did by claiming to be doing a public good.. However, they don't include the "evidence" on the profile like exposingjohns did. To see it, you have to contact them via their contact page.

All of the posted profiles appear to have been created on or about 30 May 2015, but none since then. It is possible that they got started and simply gave-up, due to the amount of work required. But, I am not so complacent to simply ignore them. It is entirely possible that the people behind exposingjohns may also be involved with Solicitly.com.

Despite their claim to be based in Nicosia, Cyprus, their website is registered in the USA.

Domain Name: SOLICITLY.COM
Registry Domain ID: 1930275508_DOMAIN_COM-VRSN
Registrar WHOIS Server: whois.bluehost.com
Registrar URL: http://www.bluehost.com/
Updated Date: 2015-05-18T20:52:06Z
Creation Date: 2015-05-18T20:52:06Z
Registrar Registration Expiration Date: 2016-05-18T20:52:06Z
Registrar: FastDomain Inc.
Registrar IANA ID: 1154
Registrar Abuse Contact Email: abuse@bluehost.com
Registrar Abuse Contact Phone: +1 801 765 9400
Reseller: BlueHost.Com
Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited (https://www.icann.org/epp#clientTransferProhibited)
Registry Registrant ID: 
Registrant Name: DOMAIN PRIVACY SERVICE FBO REGISTRANT
Registrant Organization: 
Registrant Street: 1958 SOUTH 950 EAST  
Registrant City: PROVO
Registrant State/Province: UTAH
Registrant Postal Code: 84606
Registrant Country: UNITED STATES
Registrant Phone: +1.8017659400
Registrant Phone Ext: 
Registrant Fax: 
Registrant Fax Ext: 
Registrant Email: whois@bluehost.com
Registry Admin ID: 
Admin Name: DOMAIN PRIVACY SERVICE FBO REGISTRANT
Admin Organization: 
Admin Street: 1958 SOUTH 950 EAST  
Admin City: PROVO
Admin State/Province: UTAH
Admin Postal Code: 84606
Admin Country: UNITED STATES
Admin Phone: +1.8017659400
Admin Phone Ext: 
Admin Fax: 
Admin Fax Ext: 
Admin Email: whois@bluehost.com
Registry Tech ID: 
Tech Name: DOMAIN PRIVACY SERVICE FBO REGISTRANT
Tech Organization: 
Tech Street: 1958 SOUTH 950 EAST  
Tech City: PROVO
Tech State/Province: UTAH
Tech Postal Code: 84606
Tech Country: UNITED STATES
Tech Phone: +1.8017659400
Tech Phone Ext: 
Tech Fax: 
Tech Fax Ext: 
Tech Email: whois@bluehost.com
Name Server: NS1.BLUEHOST.COM
Name Server: NS2.BLUEHOST.COM
DNSSEC: unsigned

Doing a quick check of the profiles listed, I noticed that many of the listings were of men from only a handful of states, so far::

• Eleven out of the seventy listings were from Ohio, with the majority coming from Cincinnati. That's a little more than one out of six, which is surprising. 
• Nine of the listings were from Missouri, which is about one out of seven. Most of the Missouri men  listed are from Springfield.
• Another nine men are from Illinois, five of them are from Peoria.
• Two of the four men from Wisconsin are from Green Bay.
• Both of the Virginia men are from Williamsburg.
• Both of the Maryland men are from Annapolis.
• Both of the men from Louisiana are from Shreveport. 
• Several listings simply state that the men are from the United States, likely because their Facebook profiles don't indicate their city of residence. Checking the area code wouldn't provide exact information because many people have a phone number with an out-of-state area code, especially if they've recently moved and don't need/want to change their number.
• Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Vermont and Washington have only one listing each.
• The states which have the most listings are very close to each other. Missouri (9), Illinois (9), Indiana (3) and Ohio (11) altogether have 32 listings, which is almost half of the men listed. So, it seems that a man is less likely to find himself listed here if he lives far enough away from this part of the United States.

So, Solicitly got off to a fair start with 70 profiles posted in about a day. But, there hasn't been any activity since then. Emails sent to the people behind the site do not receive a response and the postal address of 100 East Avenue, Nicosia, Cyprus doesn't seem to really exist. The closest I came to tracking the address on Google Maps seems to pinpoint it as being in Northern Cyprus, also known as the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyrus which is a self-declared independent country that is only recognized as a separate nation by Turkey. If the scam is taking place in Northern Cyprus, it is beyond the reach of Cypriot authorities because the Turkish military won't let them cross the border. But, Northern Cyprus has its own police force, so the scammers would have something to worry about if the Northern Cypriot authorities decided to crackdown on them.

Except for the 70 men listed on the site, Solicitly isn't as bad as exposingjohns was, yet. It looks as if they got started and uploaded a bunch of profiles in one day and then gave-up, perhaps after realizing how much work would actually be involved in building and maintaining it. My attempts to contact Solicitly were unsuccessful.

I don't see this site amounting to much, but I will keep an eye on them.


Duane Browning

ExposingJohns.com Scam Evolves

UPDATE FOR 23 AUGUST 2015

The site exposingjohns.com is down. It is impossible to know if this is permanent or temporary. If you've read my previous blog on this topic, the site went offline for a period of time, only to reappear again soon afterwards.

According to exposingjohns.com's registration information, the site's registration expires on 15 April 2020, so that may not be the reason.

However, I also learned that someone had posted a job offer on Hackers List for a takedown of the site on 27 July 2015.

hackers needed for a new project check out https://t.co/S87MvjBgjK http://t.co/cNif4hivzh. #hackerslist

— HackersList (@HackersList) July 27, 2015

*****End of Update*****

So much about the ExposingJohns.com scam has changed in recent months that I'd have to go back and rewrite my entire original blog post to accommodate it all. Rather than do that again, I'm just going to write this one.

First, while the registration for the site remains with Net4India, the involvement of Palladas appears to have been discontinued. The Palladas-linked address http://37.0.123.249/ has gone offline and I don't know to where it has been moved.

People have mentioned being unable to get a response when they send an email to support@exposingjohns.com but also to have received text messages demanding payment to have their names removed from the site. So, while getting no email response, they'll receive text messages.

Furthermore, I haven't seen new names being added to the site in quite awhile. Yet, entire pages have been removed. Many of the older pages didn't have names on them, just phone numbers and city of residence. It's possible that the names that were removed didn't have names attached, so were of no use to ExposingJohns for the purposes of blackmail. This gives the appearance that whoever is behind it all has decided to simply use the names they've already got and try to squeeze them for cash. They already have thousands of names, so the potential for profit still exists.

Stymied for new information, I decided to try my hand at contacting them myself and sent two emails to support@exposingjohns.com to see what, if anything, would happen.

Using a spare account with a fake name, I sent the first email on 14 May 2015 and the second on the 16th. I waited for a few days (the site says that they'd respond within 24 hours) but got busy with personal affairs and gave-up, figuring that I'd have the same luck as everyone else who had tried: None, whatsoever.

Imagine my surprise when I received two emails in response to mine.

The first arrived on 20 May 2015, but not from ExposingJohns. It was from another site called LawRep.org and reads as follows:

From: support@lawrep.org
To: me
Sent: Wednesday, May 20, 2015 4:49 AM
Subject: ExposingJohns Removal 

Your email address was given to us by our  associates at removenames.com
We have reason to believe that you were posted on exposingjohns.com . If
you weren't  posted on exposingjohns please reply with the word
unsubscribe.
If you were posted on exposingjohns, the problem you have is it shows up
on Google for everyone to see. You have to get the page deleted
so that it drops off Googles search engine. We can represent you and get
the post deleted. If you want our help contact us.
--
Regards
James McELroy
Account Rep.
LawRep.org

• So, who is LawRep.org? Well, it's an anonymously-registered site (of course) and the registration is out of Kirkland, Washington. They claim to be professionals in the business of online reputation management, though they aren't lawyers, which is odd for a site called "LawRep". If you're not a lawyer, you're not a "law rep", you're just some guy with a laptop. Their offer to "represent" me is spurious, since only a licensed attorney could represent me in legal matters.

They even take partial credit for helping to take down two sites, predatorwatch and potentialprostitutes, but are simply making the claim without providing evidence that they had anything to do with it. They could have, but it's just as likely that they are simply taking credit for other people's work, including mine. It is unlikely that they had anything to do with it, since their website was only created in April 2015 and both of those sites were long gone by then.

Their website provides contact information, including an address and phone number.

The address 2637 E Atlantic Blvd #32763 Pompano Beach, FL 33062 seems to be a mail drop. The phone number is (800) 210-6587 and that phone number has been associated with such things as Cosmetic Garments SmokersRx and Tummy Tuck Recovery, whose website tummytuckrecovery.com used the exact same servers, Softlayer, as LawRep.org does. Also, noteworthy is that LawRep's mailing address is in Florida, just like ExposingJohns former address and they're both in the area of Miami, Florida.

Now, that's a rather odd coincidence, don't you think?

They didn't say exactly how RemoveNames even got my email address. As far as my fake name being listed on ExposingJohns, it isn't and they would have known that if they'd bother to check. It  looks like they just went through ExposingJohns' inbox and sent the same reply to everyone who had contacted them.

Okay, I did mention that I received two emails in response to mine. The first was from LawRep, but the second actually came from support@exposingjohns.com! I was so excited that I nearly kissed my neighbor's ugly cat.

From: support@exposingjohns.com
To: me
Sent: Saturday, May 23, 2015 12:17 AM 

Subject: Re: Question Regrading payment
We do not post edit or remove profiles. That is between the poster and
the individual who was posted.. We do not give out any information on
the poster, they are anonymous. 

If you have the thousands of dollars you can try a lawyer.
Your best option for removal is Googling exposingjohns removal. 

Reputation companies like internetreputation.com ,lawrep.org ,
defamationremovallaw.com can get you removed or go directly to the
removenames.com directory and pick one of the many reputation management
companies, they can help. 

Good Luck
Support

An IP trace indicates that this email may have originated in Germany, using the servers of United  Gameserver Gmbh, which is a gaming site. They could have masked their actual originating IP or  they could have hacked into the servers. Either way, it doesn't matter.

Okay, they listed websites by name to "help" me get my fake name taken off their own site:

• InternetReputation.com the company that used to advertise on their site;
• LawRep.org the guys who sent me the first email;
• DefamationRemovalLaw.com Attorney Aaron Minc, Esq is a Cleveland, Ohio-based lawyer who specializes in online reputation management. He is a real lawyer and is part of the law firm Dinn Hochman & Potter, LLC. Here is his profile page on the firm's website. Mr Minc has positive reviews of his work and I could find nothing negative said about him in my searches. He seems legitimate and I don't believe that he is part of this scam in any way.
• RemoveNames.com which is the source that LawRep.com gave for how they got my email address. Just like LawRep.org, their site is anonymously-registered.

I was surprised to learn that what ExposingJohns and sites just like them are doing is perfectly legal. Here's an article from Mr Minc's website that explains why these site are not, in fact, breaking any laws.

What should leap right out at you from the email I received from ExposingJohns is the statement that they don't remove profiles. It's not that they cannot, they will not. So, when they say "Good Luck", they actually mean "Fuck You".

The worst thing about all this is that with the names, phone numbers posted online, any scammer could try to cash-in on ExposingJohns, even if they had nothing to do with posting them online in the first place. Get the number, send a text demanding payment and let the money start rolling in. Seems like a scammer's wet dream.

But, you're not completely helpless here. Here are my suggestions:

1. if you receive a text claiming to come from ExposingJohns, file a police report. This might not do any good, since they don't appear to be breaking any laws;
2. change your phone number. If they can't call or text you, they are out-of-luck in trying to harass you by phone. Your friends and family will quickly forget your old phone number;
3. set your Facebook profile so that people looking for you cannot use your phone number to find you. It would be better to not link your phone number to your profile. This is how the ExposingJohns got your name and other details in the first place. 
4. set your Facebook profile to private so that only people you approve will be able to see your information. If you're not active on Facebook delete your profile;
5. go to the ExposingJohns profile you're listed on to see the picture of you they are using and then remove that picture from your Facebook profile. Use something else, like the logo of your favorite sports team;
6. if anyone asks about all these changes, tell them you're being harassed by telemarketers. If your boss or prospective employers mentions the ExposingJohns profile, tell them that you were being harassed by telemarketers or by somebody who got mad at you over something you posted on the Internet and you had to change your phone number as a result. Since online trolls are known to be particularly mean-spirited, they'll probably take your word for it. 

Since the information is already on the Internet, there is no taking it back. Even if your profiles gets taken down, there is no way to know if someone has simply saved the information on their computer and would just repost it somewhere else. That's why I think that paying a company to delete your profile seems to be a waste of money. You may notice that many of these companies offer online monitoring services for a few months after the initial takedown. Once it expires, then what? The scammers who put it up initially could simply put it back up or another group of scammers could do the same thing. How much money are you going to spend and for how long?

Just follow the suggestions I've given above and you should be okay.

Duane Browning

The Return of the Manicheans?

Manichaeism was a religion started by a man known to us today as Mani, around 280AD in what is today Iraq.

While much is known to us today about the religion, a lot more is unknown and even much of what we do know is from accounts written by people in opposition to Manichaeism. In other words: a lot of what we know about Manichaeism was written by their enemies, not themselves.

According to most accounts, Manichaeism died-out in China by the 14th century AD and it had already been extinguished in its native Iraq some centuries earlier.

Mani was born into a family of Christians. But, their faith was not the Christianity we know today, but was a blend of Judaism and Christianity and they were  known as the Elcesaites. Even the name Mani might not even be his real name, but simply a title. The title "mani" is derived from the Babylonian-Aramaic word "Mânâ", meaning "illustrious" and the man himself soon began using the name as his own. His real name is not known to us with certainty.

Mani is said to have written several books , none of which is available to us today beyond mere fragments. Scholars have tried to piece them all together, but the passage of time, persecution by various governments and lack of sympathetic bodies (such as a library) who would preserve them, means that it is highly unlikely that we will ever get a complete text of any book that Mani wrote. This is not unusual, since many books of various types and authors from Antiquity have been lost to us beyond recovery.

So, after a period of phenomenal growth, Manichaeism was persecuted out of existence, never to be seen again as a living religion.

Or will it?

Imagine my surprise to discover that there are people today who claim to be Manichean, (also spelled Manichaean). Not only that, they've got actual churches, patriarchs and written scriptures.

Here's a video posted a few years ago by a man who claimed at the time to be the Patriarch of the Manichaean Church and he goes by the title His Holiness Mar Innai Kharba.

The video was posted in 2013,  and there are several videos on the channel, Maninaye Patriarchate, but no new videos have been posted in two years. ("Maninaye" is supposedly how the ancient Manicheans referred to themselves) Likewise, their Twitter account hasn't been active since 2013. A new Twitter account and YouTube channel have been opened and they are active. Innai Kharba no longer claims to be the Patriarch of the Manichaean Church, but only the representative of the Kingdom of Light Church.

This group claims that a man known as Mir Izgadda is "the savior of Manichaeism" and is the "Divine Messenger of this Age". They do this in spite of Mani himself declaring himself to be not only the Paraclete Jesus spoke about in the Gospel of John (14:6, 14:26,   15:26 and 16:7) but also the last prophet to be sent to Mankind. In other words, he's a sort of Manichean Messiah. Supposedly, Mir Izgadda lives in Tehran, Iran and that the Mother Church of Manichaeism is also located there. This is interesting, since the Iranian Government makes no mention of Manicheans currently living in their country.

Here's what Mir Izgadda is supposed to look like


He's kind of young to be any kind of religious leader, I think. Not to worry, though. He's got all kinds of Divine powers, so I guess it keeps him looking young. Too bad that he couldn't even keep his Twitter account going, though. I suppose divine powers have their limits.

Here's another picture of him, which was probably the source of the one above


Oddly, there are a number of people with the name Tarendra who own several websites associated with this group:

Darren Tarendra owns

• religionoflight.org (posts Epistles, general letters, studies, and news)

Mahvar Tarendra owns

• mithranet.com (their social networking site)

and Mir Tarendra is the registrant of

• maninaye.com (expired website)
• liberationherald.com (supposedly purchased from the Old Order Manichaean Brethren by Jonathan bar Stephen Tarendra, which I suspect to be the real name of Mir Tarendra, though I have no proof, aside from the fact that Mir Tarendra is the registrant of this site)
• marmani.org (links directly to manichaean.org)
• oldorder.org (expired website)
• manichaean.org
• manichaeanchurch.org
• maninaye.org (expired website)
• torahcovenant.org (an apparently Jewish website, but links to two other sites claiming affiliation with a group claiming to be Orthodox Jews who follow the teachings of Rabbi Yehoshua, also known as Jesus Christ. So, these guys are as Jewish as the Pope)

Let's not forget that Aaron Tarendra is part of the Synod of the Arkhegosate in the U.S and Michael Tarendra serves as their spokesman from Iran.

Mir Tarendra also owns tarendra.org which claims to be a religion all by itself. It doesn't refer to itself as Manichaeism, but as "Tarendraism" and its followers are called "Tarendrans". I find it rather disturbing when people name religions after themselves. Even Jesus and Muhummad didn't do that.

Check this out

The words and sayings of Mir Tarendra form the main basis of the sacred texts of Tarendrans. All that our Lord teaches or conveys to us from the Great Father who is outside time and creation, is holy to us.The main text known as the “Holy Book of Light and Truth” or the “Book of Tarendra” contain not only the teachings of the Divine Messenger for our modern day, but also some more ancient texts from the time of Enoch, the psalmists and various prophets.Our Holy Book is available in whole or in part in sixty languages. More information will be posted here along with links to download or purchase copies of the Book of Tarendra.

On this page, a picture previously said to be that of Mir Izgadda is shown, but is not identified. Neither is Mir Izgadda mentioned by name and who is being referred to as "the Divine Messenger for our modern day" could easily be assumed to be Mir Tarendra, not Mir Izgadda.

First, we're talking about Mani, then it's Mir Izgadda (the supposed Divine Messenger and Core of Manichaeism") and now it's Mir Tarendra. Who's the inspiration of this religion, anyway?

So, whenever these "Manicheans" quote from scripture, they aren't quoting from any of the books written by Mani (which have mostly been lost) but from books written by Mir Tarendra.

Okay, there's more

Mir Tarendra, whose name means “Lord-Chief of the Stars” can be viewed as one of the final Messengers of the current age. In most cases there are no specific time limits set on the mission of any particular Divine Messenger and in some instances, the same Divine Messenger may be sent to serve in more than one age – for example, Mar Mani the Prophet, who was born in 216 C.E. and once again serves in this modern day period of time.

Yes, "tarendra" does mean "prince of stars" in the Sanskrit (Sanskrit, not Persian or Aramaic) language. So, what? While not common, I found several people with that name in a simple Facebook search. I should also mention that just about everyone with the name Tarendra, either as a first or last name was from India, not Iran.

Nothing about these guys seems legitimate.

Manichaeism itself borrowed heavily from other faiths, especially Christianity and it continues with these people calling themselves a church and giving themselves titles like Patriarch. Even the original organization of the Manichaens looks like a copy of the structure of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches.

I'm kind of curious as why these people even celebrate the Sabbath, which they call "Shabta". What authentic Manichean text indicates that Mani ever told his people to observe a Sabbath day, from sunset Friday to sunset Saturday, just like the Jews. Granted, they don't have all the same restrictions on Sabbath observance that Jews do, but I'm curious about how they got the idea to include it in their religion.

I've noticed these guys saying "shlama" (Aramaic word for "peace") to each other, just like Jews say "shalom" or Muslims say "salaam". Men call each other "akhi" (Aramaic and Arabic for "brother"). Jews say "shalom", which is Hebrew for "peace" because their Bible was written in Hebrew. Muslims say "salaam", which is Arabic for "peace" because the Qur'an is in Arabic. These modern Manicheans also use Il'Yah as the name of God, which is actually a Slavic word, derived from Hebrew "Elyahu", which means "My God is He". Ilyah is also a Kurdish word that means "great" or "glorious". The Aramaic name for God is "Elah" or "Elaha", which they use on one of their websites, but otherwise stick with Il'Yah. I guess "Ellaha" doesn't get much use because it sounds too much like "Allah". But, since none of the current Manichean books are in Aramaic, why do they use Aramaic words, in the first place? Is this a bit of cultural appropriation? Mani wrote most of his books in Syriac, a dialect of Aramaic, but his last book was written in Farsi. The Syriac/Aramaic language doesn't appear to have any sort of significance in Manichaeism, either in ancient times or now.

I need to also point-out that the title "Mir" that they like to use for themselves is actually derived from the Arabic word "Emir", which means "lord". The Persians adopted its use after Islam was introduced to the region. It would be more correct for them to use the word "Mar", which is a Syriac (the language of Mani), word which means "my lord". It had been used by Syriac Christians as a title for Bishops and also by Middle Eastern Jews as a title for well-respected Rabbis. I haven't found anything about it being used in respect to Manichean leaders until these guys started using it.

What these "Manicheans" or "Tarendrans" are spreading around is simply a religion assembled like a plate at a salad bar. A little bit of authentic Manichaeism, a bit of Atenism, add some Christianity and some Judaism to make people feel more comfortable and spice it up with some esoteric knowledge for good measure. Voila! You have Modern Manichaeism. It even has the added benefit of mysterious men who receive direct inspiration from God. What's not to love about it?

Why does this look like a bunch of guys from the Tarendra family got together and decided to start their own religion? Of course, co-opting an existing one would be rather difficult, because that faith would still have followers and scholars who could easily refute whatever claims some charlatan would make, not to forget the holy books would still be around. But, if you take the name of an old religion with no living followers and which is virtually unknown outside of scholarly circles, it's just so much easier. Rather than try to sell a new religion, they could simply claim to be an old religion, returning to the open world after a long exile in the shadows. It's an intriguing story. 

Well, it would be intriguing to a total idiot.

Normally, I wouldn't give a shit about this sort of thing. But, when someone claims that they've got a direct connection to God and that we'd better get ready for the End of the World, I get a little nervous. 

These Manicheans (or Tarendrans) don't seem to even have the staying power of the people whose religion's name they're using. Most of their YouTube and Twitter accounts they had started around 2012 are either inactive or have just a tiny number of followers. Most of their online activity today seems to be relegated to talking to each other on Mithranet. They hit the ground running three years ago, but soon ran out of steam when they didn't get as big a response as they may have hoped for in the beginning.

Here's a funny story: a few years ago, James Taranto a writer for the Wall Street Journal wrote an article that the Manicheans found offensive because it supposedly "blasphemed" by misusing the name of Mani. Actually, it wouldn't be blasphemy, because that would be an offense involving misusing the name of God, the proper word would have been "sacrilege". Anyway, the Westmoreland Times published an article where the Manicheans demanded both an apology and the removal of the article from the Wall Street Journal's website. Of course, the article is still available and I seriously doubt if the WSJ ever issued any kind of apology.

In the Westmoreland Times article, it also mentioned that Manicheans in Thailand, Laos and Cambodia observed a "Water festival". Actually, it isn't even referred to as a water festival by the participants. The festivities were actually the celebration of the New Year, which included - but does not center around - people throwing water on each other. The religious ceremonies held are Buddhist, not Manichean.

Manichaeism died-out centuries ago after long-term persecutions by governments as diverse as the Abbasid Caliphate, the Roman and Chinese Empires as well as the Persians. Christians, Muslims, Zoroastrians, etc all did their part. So, no one has clean hands. But, there must have been something inherently wrong with Manichaeism itself for it to vanish like it did. 

While Manicheans were persecuted, so were the Jews. The Jews suffered millennia of persecution from pagans to Christians to Muslims and they're still around. The Manicheans suffered for a few centuries and they're gone. Six million Jews were killed in Europe in the 20th century and they've bounced back. They even have their own country now. So, Jews endured thousands of years of persecution and they're still around. Manicheans couldn't survive 1200 years.  

Oh, and one more thing. These people are claiming that they have people in Iran, as well as in Syria and Egypt. It's worthwhile to point out that these people of "The Religion of Light" make no bones about their contempt for the Islamic religion. Here are some examples:

Innai Kharba said this:
"I posted this because I feel that people should know what the Religion of Light thinks about this topic.
Our teachings tells us very clearly that Islam is evil. Its founder was a false prophet and Islam is a demonic religion. No one who remains in it will enter the Kingdom of Light.
The actions of individuals who are Muslims that are kind or caring are to be respected. It does not mean we respect the religion they are part of, however.
No amount of kind acts turns a demonic religion into a divinely revealed and covenanting faith.
When a Muslim or a Wiccan or a Mormon or an Atheist is being kind, it is not because of their respective belief systems that they are manifesting kindness, but that aspect of their own souls that is shining through, in many cases, in spite of the religions they happen to espouse.
It is a good thing if Muslims protect a synagogue. I hope there are more actions from islamic communities that reflect this sentiment.
But with that being said, it does not, nor will it ever, mean that Islam is a path to paradise which it is not. A single kindness by a Muslim community does not wipe out the countless acts of hostility perpetrated by Muslims in the world. The kind act of a Muslim is a very good thing. The state of being in Islam, hoping in vain that it will be your path to Paradise, is not a good thing."

from Mitnaranuta d’Mir Izgadda – Chapter 67

Islam
25. Islam itself is a house of death, destruction and violence.
26. Islam, claimed by some to be a religion of peace, is one of the most violent ideologies in existence.
27. Islam is guilty of the murder of millions of innocent people and thousands of Manichaean sons and daughters.
28. Abraham is appalled at the activities of darkness which is so prevalent within Islam and has said that those who continue practising its falsehood are doomed to the lowest realms of hell where wild dogs snap at their hands and at their faces like the hungry and unsatisfied demons in which they serve.

Under "Additional Commandments Held in Common by Friends of Mar Mani"

Do not teach that “Allah” is the same as “Yahweh” or the Great Father.
Do not teach that “Muhammad” was a divine messenger sent by God.

You can also read this publication which goes into detail.

And there's this video which should remove all doubt about how they feel about Islam and Muhummad

If these guys really are in these countries (which I doubt) they should be aware that speaking so openly about their hatred of Islam is neither wise nor healthy. It might make them more popular in the West, but they'll make more enemies than they know what to do with if the Muslims in those countries knew how they really felt about their religion.

I'm not convinced that these people really have churches in Iran or that Manicheans are currently in Iran, Syria or Egypt. While the websites mention Manichaeans in Iran, Syria, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan, the websites they have aren't in any of the languages of those countries. Their sites are published in English, Spanish and Portuguese.  I haven't seen anything of theirs in Farsi, Pashto, Arabic or Uzbek.

I'll take a stab in the dark and hypothesize that most, if not all, the names mentioned on their websites as Church leaders are fake too. They never give an address where you can contact their guys in China or even in the USA; you have to email them through the website. How do we even know these people exist in real life? We don't. We're just supposed to take their word for it. Since they tried to pass-off a Buddhist New Year festival as a Manichaean ceremony, I'll need a bit more evidence than their say-so.

Duane Browning