Ciro Santilli (@cirosantilli) - New articles

Optical component Updated 2025-07-16

Quantum electrodynamics bibliography Updated 2025-07-16

fafnir.phyast.pitt.edu/py3765/ Phys3765 Advanced Quantum Mechanics -- QFT-I Fall 2012 by E.S. Swanson mentions several milestone texts including:

Advanced quantum mechanics by Freeman Dyson (1951)

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Year On Updated 2025-07-16

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Video 1.

Learning Approach Uncollege by Dale Stephens (2011)

Source.

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Bisulfite sequencing Updated 2025-07-16

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The main way to sequence DNA methylation. Converts methylated cytosine to uracil, and then we can sequence those.

Video 1.

Bisulfite Sequencing by Henrik's Lab (2020)

Source. Nothing much new that we don't understand from a single sentence in the animation. But hey, animations!

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SARS-CoV-2 protein Updated 2025-07-16

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Year 3 of the mathematics course of the University of Oxford Updated 2025-07-16

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CIA 2010 covert communication websites / Backlinks Updated 2025-08-08

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Announcements and updates by self:

2023-06-10: initial announcements
- twitter.com/cirosantilli/status/1667532991315230720. Follow up when more domains were found: twitter.com/cirosantilli/status/1717445686214504830
- www.reddit.com/r/OSINT/comments/146185r/i_found_16_new_cia_covert_communication_websites/. Marked as SPAM 5 by mods days later. After reaching 92 votes, a very positive reply for that niche sub, and being obviously on topic. Weird. Anyways, did its job and likely kicked off hackernews.
- www.facebook.com/cirosantilli/posts/pfbid04KvRbEXghJakcD4AQz4379L5oVjPZ6vrBF1Eak3p81VnqRSXuXdvvYonCWPhGfQXl
2023-10-26 twitter.com/cirosantilli/status/1717445686214504830: announcement by self after finding 75 more sites
- Shared by others soo after:
- news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36279375#36280220 (212 points). Shame that this was published when we only had about 20 websites. As of writing we had 240. Might have been a greater hit then.
  Figure 1. Source.
- www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/14705gp/cia_2010_covert_communication_websites/ failed attempt with bad link unfortunately
2024-01-15: twitter.com/cirosantilli/status/1747742453778559165 Oleg Shakirov's findings
2024-01-23: mastodon.social/@cirosantilli/111807480628392615 ipinf.ru gives 4 hits and 4 new suspects, announced at:
2024-09 Aratu Week 2024 Talk by Ciro Santilli: My Best Random Projects
2025-03-13: 44 new domains found: Section "44 new CIA websites"
2025-04-14: cqcounter screenshots used to confirm many new hits: Section "60 new CIA website screenshots discovered on CQ Counter"
2025-05-23: Section "Backing up CIA website archives for research and posterity"

Pings by self:

2025-03-13:
- x.com/cirosantilli/status/1900278353065894324 pings x.com/JackRhysider Jack Rhysider, host of the Darkent Diaries podcast
- x.com/cirosantilli/status/1900828210578727276 pings x.com/JennaMC_Laugh Jenna McLaughlin and x.com/zachsdorfman Zach Dorfman, authors of the 2018 Yahoo articles
2025-03-31 going to find random interested people on Twitter:
2025-05-05:
- inteltoday.org/2021/07/31/us-national-whistleblower-day-july-30-2021-i-john-reidy-declare-cia-debacle-in-iran-china/#comment-46375 pings the author Dr. Ludwig De Braeckeleer. Besides his interest in intelligence, the dude actually also won a Breakthrough Prize in Physics, holy fuck it's mind boggling.
- x.com/cirosantilli/status/1919391488422662245 pings x.com/marisaataylor Marisa Taylor, author of the 2014, McClathy DC article
- x.com/cirosantilli/status/1919859345593880812 and x.com/cirosantilli/status/1919846838850499002 pings x.com/billmarczak Bill Marczak and x.com/thezedwards Zach Edwards, technical analysts for the Reuters article
- x.com/cirosantilli/status/1919860643408007644 pings x.com/joel_schectman Joel Schectman and x.com/bozorgmehr Bozorgmehr Sharafedin authors of the Reuters article
- x.com/cirosantilli/status/1919870831758365113 pings x.com/zachsdorfman Zach Dorfman (protected account) author of the Foreign Policy article
- x.com/cirosantilli/status/1920073080363241727 pings x.com/markmazzettinyt Mark Mazzetti, x.com/nytmike Michael S. Schmidt and x.com/mattapuzzo Matt Apuzzo authors of the 2017 New York Times article. Could not find a Twitter for the fourth author Adam Goldman.
- x.com/PeteWilliamsNBC Pete Williams author of the 2018 NCB News artricle: he's retired and not active on Twitter, not going to bother pinging

Reactions by others:

2023-06-19: www.reddit.com/r/numberstations/comments/14dexiu/after_numbers_stations_vanished/ (30 points) off topic on that sub, but thankfully was not deleted, interesting sub topic
2023-10-26: Google Analytics backlink from lms.fh-wedel.de/ path unknown. Some shitty German university: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fachhochschule_Wedel_University_of_Applied_Sciences LMS stands for Learning management system, apparently a Moodle instance. Maybe they have some Open educational resources, but all in German so pointless
Second wave:
- 2023-12-01: news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38492304 (65 points). Second submission but pointing to OurBigBook.com rather than cirosantilli.com: ourbigbook.com/cirosantilli/cia-2010-covert-communication-websites We take those. Reached only 65 points as of January 2024.
- 2023-12-02: buttondown.email/grugq/archive/december-2-2023/. "grugq" is the handle of a zero day dealer whose received some scrutiny in 2012 after a Forbes protile was written about him: archive.ph/7mUG5. He comments:
  I don’t think anyone anticipated that databases leaked by hackers would enable OSINT researchers to conduct counterintelligence investigations that rival the state security services.
  presumably referring to DNS Census 2013.
2024-01-12: twitter.com/jeremy_wokka/status/1745657801584656564 (40k followers, mid of thread)
2025-04-02: www.reddit.com/r/wikipedia/comments/1kd7rzo/comment/mqoocu7/?context=3 user Gilda1234_ mentions this project in a comment to "Between 2010 and 2012, China identified and killed at least 30 CIA informants in the country" by idlikebab
2025-05-26 The CIA Secretly Ran a Star Wars Fan Site by Joseph Cox from 404 media, an upstart publication covering edgy digital subjects. This was likely a result of Ciro publicly pinging x.com/zachsdorfman Zach Edwards, one of the analysts for the Reuters article, at x.com/cirosantilli/status/1919846838850499002, as he is cited in the article as having done a technical review. This had a massive knowdown effect and several other media picked the story up. Ciro announcing it at:
Forum threads spawned from it:
- Reddit
  - www.reddit.com/r/StarWars/comments/1kvtzwm/the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site/
  - www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsEU/comments/1kvu5g8/the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site/
  - www.reddit.com/r/nottheonion/comments/1kxtpw4/the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site/
    www.reddit.com/r/nottheonion/comments/1kxtpw4/comment/muu531n/
    They aren’t the only ones who do stuff like this, Russian agents were using Ronaldo highlight vids on YouTube to communicate 😭
    A source: www.thesun.co.uk/sport/33904606/putin-spies-cristiano-ronaldo-youtube-videos-messages/
  - www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1kye0pj/the_cia_operated_a_network_of_gaming_sites_and/
    www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1kye0pj/comment/mv0rxcv/
    In one case in Iran, somebody from the US embassy would take a big stack of envelopes, to to the same post office every time, and mail them all in one big batch... That didn't end well.
    In another case in Iraq, somebody got ahold of a ton of old soviet satellite phones and they were distributed among this particular group of people in Iraq. The same model sat phone. That didn't end well.
  - www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/1kvvx48/the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site_the/
  - www.reddit.com/r/realtech/comments/1kvwigb/the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site_the/
  - www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1kw991t/the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site/
  - www.reddit.com/r/LowStakesConspiracies/comments/1kwbf2y/the_cia_run_a_star_wars_fansite/
  - www.reddit.com/r/andor/comments/1kw587c/very_andor_the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan/
  - www.reddit.com/r/BrasildoB/comments/1kw6qah/um_brasileiro_acaba_de_publicar_detalhes_sobre_os/
  - www.reddit.com/r/mexico/comments/1kwhuqg/la_incre%C3%ADble_web_de_star_wars_que_us%C3%B3_la_cia_para/
  - www.reddit.com/r/KotakuInAction/comments/1kwoch5/the_cia_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site_to_secretly/
  - www.reddit.com/r/starwarscanon/comments/1kwoxoq/til_the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site/
  - www.reddit.com/r/TrueAnon/comments/1kwhxmj/cia_ran_star_wars_fan_site/
  - www.reddit.com/r/MauLer/comments/1kxqim9/figures/
  - www.reddit.com/r/Intelligence/comments/1kwybso/cia_uses_star_wars_website_to_communicate_with/
  - www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsCirclejerk/comments/1kwzeto/in_my_mind_all_last_jedi_haters_are_feds/
  - www.reddit.com/r/memes/comments/1kw5x9n/the_cia_really_gets_creative_sometimes/
  - www.reddit.com/r/BurnNotice/comments/1kw4b5k/the_cia_secretly_ran_a_star_wars_fan_site_for/
    www.reddit.com/r/BurnNotice/comments/1kw4b5k/comment/muemkhk/ brings up europeangoldfinch.net
    Europeangoldfinch.net was a website used by Michael Scofield that allowed the Fox River Eight to communicate with each other on its online message board
    first described in Season 2 of Prison Break in 2007.
- Decent tweets:
  - x.com/CultureCrave/status/1927119278047727908 600k followers
  - x.com/val_reloaded/status/1927349417306161165 Argentinian Twitcher 400k followers
- news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44098274 failed unfortunately
- knockout.chat/thread/72492/1
- fanlore.org/wiki/2009-2013_CIA_communications_websites
- YouTube
  Video 1.
  The Cia Runs A Star Wars Fanpage by PeepIsAwesome
  . Source. 2025-05-27. 180k subs. This one focuses on talking about the games and uses this article as the mainreference. He makes that nice note that the game Star Wars Battlefront II reached all time highs in the days following the CIA releasej
  www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/battlefront-2s-huge-steam-resurgence-isnt-a-mystery-when-you-realize-its-just-really-good/
  The articles apparenty coincided with the reelase of Star Wars Battlefront III alpha to lukewarm reception.
  Video 2.
  Star Wars Fan Sites Are Run by THE FEDS?! by Clownfish TV
  . Source. 2025-05-27. 600k subs. Video didn't take off however. The channel seems to be semi dead. But it is cool to see an American with YouTube-worth eloquence going over it.
  Video 3.
  CIA Used Star Wars Fan Sites to SECRETLY Communicate with SPIES by Tyrone Magnus
  . Source. 2025-05-28. 2M subs. He's basically reading the techspot article: www.techspot.com/news/108062-cia-used-star-wars-fan-site-secretly-communicate.html.
  Video 4.
  Le fiasco des sites secrets de la CIA by Sylvqin
  . Source. 2025-08-28. 520k subs. French.
  Video 5.
  2025-05-31. 500k subs. The CIA's Secret Star Wars Blog Got People Killed by Seytonic
  . Source.
  Seytonic had previously covered Reuters article at this other video:
  Video 6.
  Undercover CIA Websites Got Informants Killed by Seytonic
  . Source. 2022-10-03.
  Video 7.
  CIA Star Wars Site by UFD Tech
  . Source. 2025-06-10. 1.35M subs.
  Video 8.
  How 20 CIA Spies Mysteriously Disappeared in China by shnoop
  . Source.
  2025-06-13. 12k subs. This video draws on some research from this article, citing it on the source list: docs.google.com/document/d/1k7-YoOMRTL8qKE_FoRnyvR1QDa0JTBJo_a-SRwVMEu4/edit?tab=t.0 and using some of the screenshots.
  This video has some good mentions of the details of Jerry Chun Shing Lee's story which Ciro Santilli was not aware of.
  Video 9.
  The CIA's Secret Star Wars Fan Blog by Half as Interesting
  . Source. 2025-06-26. 3M subs.
- other voice media:
  - www.smashingsecurity.com/419-star-wars-the-cia-and-a-whatsapp-malware-mirage/
- Meneame, a Spanish Reddit: 2025-05-27 www.meneame.net/m/tecnolog%C3%ADa/increible-web-star-wars-uso-cia-espiar-espana-mexico-otros/standard
Other media that picked it up:
Starting on that same day someone made starwarsweb.net redirect to cia.gov at 2025-05-26T13:28:02Z: www.whois.com/whois/starwarsweb.net
2025-08-01 saw another mini-trend due to The CIA Built Hundreds of Covert Websitesby Alan Macleod: www.mintpressnews.com/cia-secret-network-885-fake-websites/290325/
This then spawned some sindicated posts:
and forum threads:
- 2025-08-04 www.meneame.net/story/cia-creo-cientos-sitios-web-encubiertos-esto-ocultaban-eng/c01#c-1

Notable reactions to the websites themselves:

2022-09-29 www.reddit.com/r/soccer/comments/xrgua4/the_cia_used_a_message_board_on_a_fake_soccer/ "The CIA used a message board on a fake soccer website called "Iraniangoals.com" to communicate with Iranian spies, dozens of whom were arrested after the website was discovered." by user Carlos-Dangerzone

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ELF Hello World Tutorial / Executable hd Updated 2025-07-16

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Running:

hd hello_world.out

gives:

00000000  7f 45 4c 46 02 01 01 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |.ELF............|
00000010  02 00 3e 00 01 00 00 00  b0 00 40 00 00 00 00 00  |..>.......@.....|
00000020  40 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  10 01 00 00 00 00 00 00  |@...............|
00000030  00 00 00 00 40 00 38 00  02 00 40 00 06 00 03 00  |....@.8...@.....|
00000040  01 00 00 00 05 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000050  00 00 40 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 40 00 00 00 00 00  |..@.......@.....|
00000060  d7 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  d7 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000070  00 00 20 00 00 00 00 00  01 00 00 00 06 00 00 00  |.. .............|
00000080  d8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  d8 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  |..........`.....|
00000090  d8 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  0d 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |..`.............|
000000a0  0d 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 20 00 00 00 00 00  |.......... .....|
000000b0  b8 01 00 00 00 bf 01 00  00 00 48 be d8 00 60 00  |..........H...`.|
000000c0  00 00 00 00 ba 0d 00 00  00 0f 05 b8 3c 00 00 00  |............<...|
000000d0  bf 00 00 00 00 0f 05 00  48 65 6c 6c 6f 20 77 6f  |........Hello wo|
000000e0  72 6c 64 21 0a 00 2e 73  79 6d 74 61 62 00 2e 73  |rld!...symtab..s|
000000f0  74 72 74 61 62 00 2e 73  68 73 74 72 74 61 62 00  |trtab..shstrtab.|
00000100  2e 74 65 78 74 00 2e 64  61 74 61 00 00 00 00 00  |.text..data.....|
00000110  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
*
00000150  1b 00 00 00 01 00 00 00  06 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000160  b0 00 40 00 00 00 00 00  b0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |..@.............|
00000170  27 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |'...............|
00000180  10 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000190  21 00 00 00 01 00 00 00  03 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |!...............|
000001a0  d8 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  d8 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |..`.............|
000001b0  0d 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
000001c0  04 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
000001d0  11 00 00 00 03 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
000001e0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  e5 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
000001f0  27 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |'...............|
00000200  01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000210  01 00 00 00 02 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000220  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  90 02 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000230  08 01 00 00 00 00 00 00  05 00 00 00 07 00 00 00  |................|
00000240  08 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  18 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000250  09 00 00 00 03 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000260  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  98 03 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000270  4c 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |L...............|
00000280  01 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000290  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
000002a0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 03 00 01 00  |................|
000002b0  b0 00 40 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |..@.............|
000002c0  00 00 00 00 03 00 02 00  d8 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  |..........`.....|
000002d0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  01 00 00 00 04 00 f1 ff  |................|
000002e0  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
000002f0  11 00 00 00 00 00 02 00  d8 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  |..........`.....|
00000300  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  1d 00 00 00 00 00 f1 ff  |................|
00000310  0d 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000320  00 00 00 00 04 00 f1 ff  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000330  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  2d 00 00 00 10 00 01 00  |........-.......|
00000340  b0 00 40 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |..@.............|
00000350  34 00 00 00 10 00 02 00  e5 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  |4.........`.....|
00000360  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  40 00 00 00 10 00 02 00  |........@.......|
00000370  e5 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |..`.............|
00000380  47 00 00 00 10 00 02 00  e8 00 60 00 00 00 00 00  |G.........`.....|
00000390  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 68 65 6c 6c 6f 5f 77  |.........hello_w|
000003a0  6f 72 6c 64 2e 61 73 6d  00 68 65 6c 6c 6f 5f 77  |orld.asm.hello_w|
000003b0  6f 72 6c 64 00 68 65 6c  6c 6f 5f 77 6f 72 6c 64  |orld.hello_world|
000003c0  5f 6c 65 6e 00 5f 73 74  61 72 74 00 5f 5f 62 73  |_len._start.__bs|
000003d0  73 5f 73 74 61 72 74 00  5f 65 64 61 74 61 00 5f  |s_start._edata._|
000003e0  65 6e 64 00                                       |end.|
000003e4

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Biology Updated 2025-07-16

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City in the United Kingdom Updated 2025-07-16

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Holonomic function Updated 2025-07-16

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XY sex-determination system Updated 2025-07-16

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Don't repeat yourself Updated 2025-07-16

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Media rationale of Ciro Santilli's website Updated 2025-07-16

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Meritocracy Updated 2025-07-16

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Regular expression Updated 2025-07-16

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Steve Jobs quote on saving lives with a faster boot Updated 2025-07-16

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www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=Saving_Lives.txt

This idea also comes up in other sources of course.

Video 1.

Margin Call (2011) bridge scene

. Source.

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The truth will set you free Updated 2025-07-16

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Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory Updated 2025-10-14

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One of the first formal proof systems. This is actually understandable!

This is Ciro Santilli-2020 definition of the foundation of mathematics (and the only one he had any patience to study at all).

TODO what are its limitations? Why were other systems created?

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ELF Hello World Tutorial / Generate the example Updated 2025-07-16

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Let's break down a minimal runnable Linux x86-64 example:

hello_world.asm

section .data
    hello_world db "Hello world!", 10
    hello_world_len  equ $ - hello_world
section .text
    global _start
    _start:
        mov rax, 1
        mov rdi, 1
        mov rsi, hello_world
        mov rdx, hello_world_len
        syscall
        mov rax, 60
        mov rdi, 0
        syscall

Compiled with:

nasm -w+all -f elf64 -o 'hello_world.o' 'hello_world.asm'
ld -o 'hello_world.out' 'hello_world.o'

TODO: use a minimal linker script with -T to be more precise and minimal.

Versions:

NASM 2.10.09
Binutils version 2.24 (contains ld)
Ubuntu 14.04

We don't use a C program as that would complicate the analysis, that will be level 2 :-)

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Ciro Santilli @cirosantilli 37