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Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

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Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#41

Post by jlg23 »

quanticle wrote: post #39
ForHackernews wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, you don't exactly have to be a government agent to sneak into a hotel room. "Hey, I think I lost my keycard, can you run me another one? The name's Farr...room 221."

Which is why most reputable hotels will ask for a photo ID when running a new key. At least that's the procedure I had to go through when I last forgot my keys in my hotel room and locked myself out.

That never happened to me, even in hotels with guards wearing pumpguns and elevators that needed key-cards to be inserted if you wanted to go up (e.g. the Marriott in Paramaribo).

Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#42

Post by gravypod »

rdl wrote: post #35
gravypod wrote: post #34

> one even took his own life after Jake stole his research Who was this?

Pretty obvious, although not my story to tell. Hint: not aaronsw. Fortunately the set of hackers/computer security people in this social circle who have killed themselves in the past 15y is still fairly small.

I've not been involved or looked at anything in the tor or C3 circles up until these allegations.

It isn't very obvious because I know no one involved.

Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#43

Post by peterwwillis »

quanticle wrote: post #39
ForHackernews wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, you don't exactly have to be a government agent to sneak into a hotel room. "Hey, I think I lost my keycard, can you run me another one? The name's Farr...room 221."

Which is why most reputable hotels will ask for a photo ID when running a new key. At least that's the procedure I had to go through when I last forgot my keys in my hotel room and locked myself out.

The simplest method to get into a room is to wait for it to be cleaned, and once the door is open, simply walk in and take whatever you want. The maids will not ask you for ID. If you want to make it seem extra plausible, wave a similar hotel key at them as if you would have used it to open the door.

As for getting a replacement key, yeah, that usually does require some work. In lieu of asking for a replacement you can call the front desk on your cellphone and tell them you're standing outside your room and can't get to your key, and can someone come unlock the door for you.

Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#44

Post by nullc »

dmix wrote: post #20
djcapelis wrote: post #10

Meredith and Andrea were, according to too many people yesterday: untrustworthy and biased. Many comments here urged everyone to suspend judgement, not rush to conclusions and not take allegations overly seriously. (Not always a bad idea, but apparently much less important today.) Now that Nick has written his story however, it goes back on the front page of HN and the comments here basically support it as totally cr…

Did Meredith and Andrea actually share a story? I thought it was just a tweet. I reread the thread in question and yes...that is exactly what people were saying. Basically: Let's hold judgement until we have more information. Unlike two vague tweets Nick wrote a very detailed story with lots of background. To compare the reaction to those two instances is very disingenuous.

Meredith has been stalking Jake for years, posing a lot of strange and clearly false accusations that fold up after on a small amount of investigation.

I ran into a case of this a couple years back, when there was some campaign about "plagiarism" where I had direct personal experience that it was untrue. I posted about it and was harassed too.

AFAICT, for some reason or another there is a fair amount of toxicity around the tor project. I've never personally seen Jake generating it, but I wouldn't really know. But the obvious toxicity and witch hunt culture caused me to unsubscribe from the lists and avoid that community since several years ago.

Nick's story is interesting-- but it begins with a long series of vague allegations which are never backed up by the document. What it does show is that Nick put a person claiming Jake was a USG agent on a program, which I can understand why some might think it inconceivable that Nick would do so unless he'd been unduly influenced somehow, and then he got harassed over it. That sucks, but it doesn't rise to supporting the claims made in the first third of the document.

Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#46

Post by kurotowa »

gravypod wrote: post #42
rdl wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty obvious, although not my story to tell. Hint: not aaronsw. Fortunately the set of hackers/computer security people in this social circle who have killed themselves in the past 15y is still fairly small.

I've not been involved or looked at anything in the tor or C3 circles up until these allegations. It isn't very obvious because I know no one involved.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2723959

https://twitter.com/maradydd/status/302264789311299585

Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#48

Post by nullc »

nickfarr wrote: post #29
9918819911 wrote: post #8

I get the impression that almost everyone in this space overreacts and throws dirt at each other. Here is how others of the Tor project reacted in a similar situation: https://pando.com/2014/11/14/tor-smear/

This is why it took me so long to come out with this story. The last thing I want to do is put myself out there only to be dismissed as part of a larger smear campaign (as I was at the time.) Further: This is a direct description of what I have come to know as Jake's M.O. Not an isolated incident. This has to do with one person's behavior, it has nothing to do with the projects that person was involved with. Maybe wh…

Hi Nick. I'm sorry to hear you had a bad experience. :(

But your document contains serious allegations which the body of it does not support:

> Jake has targeted, abused and silenced many close friends of mine, many of whom are researchers you probably know and respect. Whether it’s ripping off research or just harassing someone into submission, somehow we all felt powerless to do anything about it. He’s the perfect bully.

> Every criticism of him is met with suspicion, every accusation is some government-conspiracy-takedown.

> Those that tried to stand up to him were destroyed, one even took his own life after Jake stole his research. But that’s not my story to tell.

If you're not going to support these claims, you shouldn't make them. Now I get to feel like shit for calling this out-- and potentially causing you stress, because I am sympathetic to your experience...

I think your message would carry more weight if it was limited to your message, rather than setting the framing with a large number of serious but unsubstantiated claims.

Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#49

Post by 2close4comfort »

9918819911 wrote: post #8

I get the impression that almost everyone in this space overreacts and throws dirt at each other. Here is how others of the Tor project reacted in a similar situation: https://pando.com/2014/11/14/tor-smear/

It is the defense mechanism of those with questionable technical skill to back up their own egos. Those who spend that much time talking can't be actually producing anything useful.

Re: Nick Farr's 30c3 Jake Appelbaum story of abuse and harassment

#50

Post by anotherevan »

nickfarr wrote: post #29
9918819911 wrote: post #8

I get the impression that almost everyone in this space overreacts and throws dirt at each other. Here is how others of the Tor project reacted in a similar situation: https://pando.com/2014/11/14/tor-smear/

This is why it took me so long to come out with this story. The last thing I want to do is put myself out there only to be dismissed as part of a larger smear campaign (as I was at the time.) Further: This is a direct description of what I have come to know as Jake's M.O. Not an isolated incident. This has to do with one person's behavior, it has nothing to do with the projects that person was involved with. Maybe wh…

Psychopaths have a lot more experience at being psychopaths than regular people have had experience at dealing with psychopaths.

From what you describe, I don't think you were weak or cowardly, just inexperienced. There is absolutely no shame in that. Hindsight is useful for learning, but not for admonishment (by yourself or others). You had to make lots of decisions fast, amongst a bunch of bad choices with unknown outcomes. Your success rate for surviving bad situations so far is 100%, so don't beat yourself up too much, and tell the retrospective armchair philosophers to jog on.

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