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Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

krebsonsecurity.com

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Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#191

Post by bombcar »

bedhead wrote: post #134
oaiey wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One upvote returned ;)

Ha, thanks. Seriously, this was not a run-of-the-mill journalistic mistake for which one apologizes for and moves on. This was so brazen I couldn't even believe it at the time, my assumption was that he was short Ubiquiti's stock or something. What Krebs did was so egregious and so extreme that I really have no idea why the world hasn't turned its back on him as a journalist.

Because there are no journalists left, it's all entertainment, and we were entertained.

I don't like it, but that's what it is.

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#192

Post by bombcar »

pdntspa wrote: post #158
acoard wrote: post #6

An accurate but pretty lacklustre "mea culpa" and retraction. I don't mind people making mistakes, everyone does, but seeing how Krebs has handled this whole episode has not inspired optimism in how he'll handle future mistakes. He was essentially used as an unwitting party in a cyber blackmail scheme, and he doesn't touch on that at all. There will continue to be nefarious parties trying to misuse his reputation, so…

Given that the target he "hurt" is a massive company that can absorb losses, I think this retraction is quite enough.

He also "hurt" his readers and those who had trust in him, damaging his own reputation.

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#193

Post by bombcar »

hot_gril wrote: post #180
happyopossum wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Biggest difference - Bloomberg still hasn't retracted that garbage story...

Yeah, that's why I'm reminded. Is the moral of the story that reputable, medium-sized reporters without huge legal resources are more trustworthy than something like Bloomberg?

Or Bloomberg is better at walking the fine line and never actually stating anything actionable.

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#194

Post by lolc »

karaterobot wrote: post #120
acoard wrote: post #6

An accurate but pretty lacklustre "mea culpa" and retraction. I don't mind people making mistakes, everyone does, but seeing how Krebs has handled this whole episode has not inspired optimism in how he'll handle future mistakes. He was essentially used as an unwitting party in a cyber blackmail scheme, and he doesn't touch on that at all. There will continue to be nefarious parties trying to misuse his reputation, so…

As a third party unaffected by the events in any direct way, I don't feel it's appropriate to give an opinion on whether the apology is satisfactory or not. If Ubiquiti has one, I suppose that's for them to express, or not, as they choose.

As a reporter, Krebs failed to promptly disclose or retract when the source turned out to be the leak. That means my understanding of events was left incomplete for longer than it should have been.

So he wronged Ubiquity, which I don't particularily care for. He also wronged his readers, which I am party to. This late retraction is underwhelming and doesn't give me trust. As he seems to only have retracted after being forced to by Ubiquity, now what do I make of his stories where his targets don't have a legal team in his jurisdiction?

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#195

Post by bombcar »

tonyarkles wrote: post #154
Arainach wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Not as polished" is an incredibly generous term. Unless something has radically changed, Mikrotik basically requires remoting in with a command line and understanding all the implementation details. It's like trying to run a FreeBSD box as a router. Ubiquiti's tooling for common workflows is generations ahead, not a coat of polish.

I felt the same way and still kind of do, but I was really impressed the other day. My rural neighbour and I decided to share an Internet connection and I set a Mikrotik WAP in "CPE" mode (basically what you'd use if you were connecting to a WISP) and it was incredibly smooth to get going. WiFi radio in the WAP connects to my network, Ethernet coming out of it goes to his home network. They're incredibly powerful dev…

Once you realize that Mikrotik is NOT a small business router company but started as a WISP supply company for Eastern Europe it becomes much more clear.

They've greatly enhanced the web interface in recent updates, but you still will probably need to find a recipe for what you want to do, but it can do it.

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#196

Post by bombcar »

duxup wrote: post #15
riffic wrote: post #3

this reads like he got out-lawyered here. context for the unaware: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/03/ubiquiti-sues-jo...

Out lawyered, because he was wrong?

A good journalist knows how to verify sources and check before writing.

A great journalist finds great sources that are unimpeachable.

But a wealthy journalist knows how to write articles from horrible or no sources at all that are not technical defamation.

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#197

Post by bombcar »

vel0city wrote: post #59
InTheArena wrote: post #21

Mad props to Brian on this. It's way overdue - and frankly, the Ubiquiti lawsuit was poor PR management - but it's good to put things right given some very poor journalistic choices. Journalists admitting when they are wrong is a key step in rebuilding trust in our institutions - not only news but many aspects of civil society here. Ubiquiti - as a fan of your products - please drop the lawsuit now. I get that this d…

Is it really props when you're being sued nearly half a million in damages to continue hosting the articles? If he wanted to take down the articles because he felt he was wrong, he had months to do so. He gets zero props from me for only taking down the articles after being sued.

Once sued his lawyer probably told him to shut the hell up and not touch anything.

The time to do the right thing was before the lawsuit was filed.

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#198

Post by IMTDb »

Jenk wrote: post #114
duxup wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a site that generally is there to give you the inside scoop on what is really going on / happened, interesting / disappointing that the choice is to not do so here. To me "sorry I was wrong" isn't enough.

That's a non-answer. What more do you want? What would be "enough"?

Compensation for the damages done to ubiquiti ?

He chose to relay false information from un trustworthy source, in a way that damaged the ubiquiti brand, and this took some time and energy from ubiquiti employees to fight those false accusations.

Here he is saying "Yeah, here is $0 for your troubles, I'll be doing the bare minimum so you can't drag me in front of a courthouse anymore". He is literally posting a 1 paragraph piece of text.

"Enough" would be : "I am going to fully compensate you for the damages I have done by lacking professional integrity, and making extraordinary claims while lacking the required extraordinary proofs that usually come with them. Please send me a bill for the salaires of the technical staff, marketers and lawyers that had to be pulled from more important projects to fight the fake news I relayed. I understand that you have had to pay these people so you are not going to profit from this and this only allows you to break even on this whole mess. I note that - going forward - this will be used as an additional compass for me as I understand that my words have real, tangible consequences for the people involved and I will avoid putting anyone in danger without putting myself on the hook as well."

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#199

Post by [deleted] »

dotBen wrote: post #143
neilv wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd guess he's been advised not to say too much, and the specific way to say what he did. Besides the ongoing criminal case for which he may be a witness, I'd guess there may be potential liability wrt the company, and I'd guess that he's being careful not to create new potential liability wrt the indicted person (see several different nuances in his "My sole source" sentence). And this sounds like a lawyer-approved…

Yes, this is exactly right - his post is clearly the product of legal negotiations with Ubiquity and probably cleared by both them and his own counsel. He's well advised not to say more than he needs to, even if people in this community would like him to fall on his sword more, that's just not how this stuff works.

[deleted]

Re: Final thoughts on Ubiquiti

#200

Post by InTheArena »

jandrusk wrote: post #145

Sure sounds like a response to the law suite: https://twitter.com/QuinnyPig/status/1508965090019577856?t=L...

It was, but it’s important to note that Quinnypig was reacting to the assertions made by extortionist claims made by Krebs. I think he’s acting in good faith here - if not somewhat melodramatically..
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