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Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

seattletimes.com

71–80 of 139 posts

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#71

> The Post publicizes material obtained through hacking with caution, only after verifying its authenticity and ascertaining that there is news value in bringing such information to light. Sure you do. So let me just check here: Political purity as an employment requirement... Firing people for this is fine, right? What happens when the popular politics change? The "Moral Majority" folks were accused of wanting to be…

> Sure you do.

I mean, I'm not sure what your point is. This is absolutely a key problem that newspapers have; on the one hand, no-one wants a news environment where newspapers just publish press releases, but on the other hand most people don't want a repeat of the News of the World scandal either. Newspapers have to tread a fine ethical line on just how involuntarily disclosed information can or should be used.

Clearly, an environment where newspapers _never_ reported on leaks or hacks would be a problem; realistically they'd just be press release services at that point. On the other hand, an environment where newspapers uncritically published every leak and hack would _also_ be a problem; this would cause a lot of problems and would, frankly, be such a huge volume of information that it would be useless. They _have_ to editorialise.

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#72

> Alayon told The Post that he does not own the “racisminc,” Holocaust-denial or other web addresses but declined to say if he had owned them in the past Njalla is a registrar that allows purchase of domain names with Monero and other cryptocurrencies. So this will never happen to any domain squatters and enterprisers here, as there would be no identifying information such as the kind needed to process credit card tr…

This is what cryptocurrencies are good for: Protecting and helping the absolute worst of humanity.

and also everyone

it is only happenstance that online purchases require name and address, as this is required to process over credit card networks at lower transaction fees (due to slightly lessened ability for payment fraud - which could be reversed - from the payment processor's perspective). As crypto currencies do not have reversal without nearly complete network consensus, such information is not applicable.

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paradox of tolerance; the only way to have a tolerant society is to be intolerant of intolerance. You have to make that exception or you lose the entire thing. Very much a “sorry not sorry” about “cancel culture”.

Popper didn't say to be intolerant of all intolerance, he said only to be intolerant of intolerance that cannot be countered by reasoned argument or kept in check by popular opinion. In no sense are far-right ideas "popular", and they are easily countered by reasoned arguments. Popper's paradox of intolerance is probably the most misused and misquoted argument in online debates these past few years.

Except they are proving difficult to keep in check. January 6th was pivotal because 1. It's very lucky it didn't go in the other direction, 2. People watching learned a few lessons for the next time.

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what cryptocurrencies are good for: Protecting and helping the absolute worst of humanity.

and also everyone it is only happenstance that online purchases require name and address, as this is required to process over credit card networks at lower transaction fees (due to slightly lessened ability for payment fraud - which could be reversed - from the payment processor's perspective). As crypto currencies do not have reversal without nearly complete network consensus, such information is not applicable.

There's a certain sense to that. If it is effective for the worst of society who are constant targets, it will work for grandma. However that is assuming the technology can become user friendly/cheap.

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#75

> The Post publicizes material obtained through hacking with caution, only after verifying its authenticity and ascertaining that there is news value in bringing such information to light. Sure you do. So let me just check here: Political purity as an employment requirement... Firing people for this is fine, right? What happens when the popular politics change? The "Moral Majority" folks were accused of wanting to be…

> Sure you do. I mean, I'm not sure what your point is. This is absolutely a key problem that newspapers have; on the one hand, no-one wants a news environment where newspapers just publish press releases, but on the other hand most people don't want a repeat of the News of the World scandal either. Newspapers have to tread a fine ethical line on just how involuntarily disclosed information can or should be used. Cle…

This better illustrates my point there: https://greenwald.substack.com/p/new-proof-emerges-of-the-bi...

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not freedom of consequences: that is a bit too vague. What if the consequence is that somebody shoots you dead if you say the wrong thing? According to you, they still have free speech? Actually I think some real world dictator was literally making that joke, proclaiming that there is freedom of speech in his country. He just can't guarantee for the outcomes.

Then the murderer broke the law and will be prosecuted for that. If the government doesn’t prosecute them as they support the action then there’s no freedom of speech. This is why freedom of speech is generally discussed within the context of the government as the government enforces other laws.

I mean if the government kills them, obviously. Would it then be free speech? Everybody could say what they want, it's just the consequence could be a death sentence.

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not freedom of consequences: that is a bit too vague. What if the consequence is that somebody shoots you dead if you say the wrong thing? According to you, they still have free speech? Actually I think some real world dictator was literally making that joke, proclaiming that there is freedom of speech in his country. He just can't guarantee for the outcomes.

What about people who proclaim they didn't want to get the vaccine because of their freedom, and then die from covid as a consequence? Did they still have their freedom when forcibly intubated while in a medically induced coma? Maybe people consider death as the ultimate freedom, freedom from interference of society.

That is why people are supposed to have arrangements with other people who can decide for them when they are in coma. Usually it is family, but you can also designate other people.

At least in my country that is the case, not sure how the US handles it.

Certainly there are people who prefer to not be forcibly intubated. Or consider other cases where life supporting machines are even more gruesome.

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#78
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty amazing that this is what gets downvoted in this site.

This entire comment section is maybe the clearest example I have seen in a long time of why so many other industries outside of tech kind of look at the tech scene as a amoralistic dumpster fire. I never used to see the value of trying to include humanities as a part of a tech degree until a few years ago and now I think it can't happen fast enough. So many of the arguments presented here wouldn't pass any kind of a…

I strongly suspect you never had a 101 humanities class. Pretty sure "philosophy" is all about what you know and what you can and what you have to believe.

Maybe you confuse it with "Bible class 101", where you get told a set of moral rules that you are supposed to follow and never question, because they are supposedly given by god.

Still, I would be curious to hear your reasoning of why it is supposedly morally mandatory to believe in the Holocaust?

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Popper didn't say to be intolerant of all intolerance, he said only to be intolerant of intolerance that cannot be countered by reasoned argument or kept in check by popular opinion. In no sense are far-right ideas "popular", and they are easily countered by reasoned arguments. Popper's paradox of intolerance is probably the most misused and misquoted argument in online debates these past few years.

Except they are proving difficult to keep in check. January 6th was pivotal because 1. It's very lucky it didn't go in the other direction, 2. People watching learned a few lessons for the next time.

I disagree that they are difficult to keep in check. Jan 6th was a failure of capitol police and other law enforcement agencies. The mob that breached the capitol was around 800 people, which is easily managed by a small police force.

They had ample evidence that these protests would be in the tens of thousands. I'm sure you've seen the police presence for BLM protests, so I think the response here speaks for itself. I honestly don't see how this indicates the far-right are difficult to keep in check. It really shows that law enforcement didn't even try, either because they didn't believe they would become riotous or violent, or (hopefully not) for more nefarious reasons.

Re: Fallout begins for far-right trolls who trusted Epik to keep identities secret

#80
post #44

Let's get the facts straight: - The Epik leak contains 15 million records [1], including scraped data of people who have never had any relation to Epik whatsoever. - Epik has operated as a seemingly ordinary domain registrar since 2009, and controls over half a million domains [2]. Their rise to infamy over far right wing hosting did not occur until around 2018 [3]. Despite this, the leak contains their entire histor…

This is actually pretty accurate summary of the situation.

Doxxing people is never cool. It’s a great responsibility no one should have, especially when innocent people can get hurt in the process. Mistakes in correlating the data have already been made.

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