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Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

blog.achernya.com

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Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#121

Post by aaron695 »

danielweber wrote: post #28
latj wrote: post #14

I do not condone the attacks that may be occurring. However, if you are trying to get someone's attention- it makes more sense to get the attention of the students rather than the administration. Today's MIT students are tomorrow's death-ray designers, robot-maintainers, and policy makers. They are tomorrow's administration- and they may not have made up their minds yet about ethical issues of intellectual property o…

As a first guess, MIT students are very unlikely to react to someone causing them trouble by become more sympathetic with the people causing them trouble. Especially if the message of the attackers is "people who break into the network shouldn't have the cops called on them." (Although we should wait for Hal Abelson's report to find out what happened behind the scenes.)

I couldn't disagree more. These are MIT graduates, highly intelligent people, not some slack jaw locals.

They are fully capable to look at the issues and take moral responsibility for the University they are part of.

How can an intelligent person support a organisation by being part in it, then take no responsibility for what it does.

Yes I know the commoners do this all the time for their entire lives, but being better educated (However you do it) is about moving on from this simplistic me me me mentality and looking at the total issue.

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#122

Post by Jach »

pvg wrote: post #115
wavesounds wrote: post #55

To me this feels a bit like a lunch counter cook complaining all these black people showing up in his restaurant are causing him extra work. The whole point of a protest is to put pressure on the system your trying to change. Start a walkout/go on strike if you dont want to deal with the problems the organization you're working for caused. The school only gets power from its students. Without the students there is no…

You might be well in the running for stupidest thing ever said on HN.

Not even close. https://twitter.com/shit_hn_says

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#123

Post by sethist »

leepowers wrote: post #103
sethist wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There seems to be a common misunderstanding of what protest rights you have in the US. The first amendment does not give you the right to protest anything, at any point, in any manner that you want. In fact, the government has a duty to protect my rights if your protest in infringing on them. The Occupy movement is another group that completely failed to understand that fact. You are legally allowed to protest, but p…

Civil disobedience is illegal by definition. DDoS attacks are illegal. Marching down the middle of the street is illegal. But are these acts immoral?

If they seriously infringe on the rights of other individuals, then yes I think they are immoral. Putting your own political motivations (no matter how righteous) above the rights of others is a selfish act.

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#124

Post by BrokenPipe »

jeremyis wrote: post #72
armored_mammal wrote: post #38

If the students have failed to vehemently distance themselves and protest to the administration, or even quit MIT for somewhere else, then they are just as guilty. Their attendance abets the status quo. Especially since it's a private university. Quit whining.

Does this mean Americans that haven't protested or denounced their citizenship are just as guilty for the sometimes awful things the American government does?

Why the rhetorical question ?

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#125

Post by rprasad »

Yver wrote: post #105
gojomo wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the effect of a 'protest' is to prevent people from accessing online information that they'd like to access, it goes against Aaron's anti-censorship views. Every bully wants to 'discomfort' their opponents into changing. Those who use DDoS are more like the federal prosecutors -- making 'destructive' threats, expecting change through punishment -- than Aaron.

And how did that work out for him by the way? I head they've dropped their lawsuit? Also, if DDoS is "destructive" then copying a file is stealing.

Well, unlike most defendants he chose not to find out how well it would work out, so we'll never know.

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#126

Post by alecdbrooks »

ryguytilidie wrote: post #98

I feel like this guy could not miss the point by much more distance. How much of a shell do you have to live in to think "well sure, someone died after fighting for the rights of millions of people, but jesus, you people are going to inconvenience us for a few hours? this is just ridiculous!"

As I read it, the point of the post is that the student workers are the only ones being inconvenienced and that Anonymous should be targeting the administration directly.

In particular, note this part: "Scripts is MIT's largest web host but it's run entirely by student volunteers. Any and all attacks that are supposed to get the attention of the administration are instead being handled by SIPB members."

Presumably, the author would feel differently if the ones actually affected were those responsible for Aaron's death, even if the author was personally inconvenienced.

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#127

Post by mpyne »

kylec wrote: post #41
danielweber wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not supposed to be a hardened network that freaks out whenever anyone connects to it. Or is that the goal? To make MIT stop being so open?

I think that's a false dichotomy. It's possible to make the network and the attached services more resilient to a DoS without making it less open.

Maybe they could, I don't know, filter out requests from certain malicious MAC addresses? Start dropping packets from the wrong IP address? Surely that would suffice, right?

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#128

Post by btilly »

BrokenPipe wrote: post #118
FireBeyond wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So MIT should have had reasonable cause to believe that there was a risk of suicide should they decide to prosecute a case? And that makes them responsible? Is that a road we want to go down?

No the issue is that they decided to prosecute the case.

Correction. MIT did not prosecute the case.

They brought in the feds. There is evidence that they asked the prosecutor to go hard on Aaron. But the prosecutor is not directly affiliated with MIT.

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#129

Post by rprasad »

leepowers wrote: post #103
sethist wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There seems to be a common misunderstanding of what protest rights you have in the US. The first amendment does not give you the right to protest anything, at any point, in any manner that you want. In fact, the government has a duty to protect my rights if your protest in infringing on them. The Occupy movement is another group that completely failed to understand that fact. You are legally allowed to protest, but p…

Civil disobedience is illegal by definition. DDoS attacks are illegal. Marching down the middle of the street is illegal. But are these acts immoral?

Marching down the middle of the street is not illegal. Indeed, many fundamental cases of constitutional law note that the street is a "per se" public forum, i.e., the most public a forum can be, and is thus subject to the highest protections for speech.

Marching down a street and merely disrupting traffic is thus quite legal, however, if your marching causes dangerous disruptions to traffic (i.e., accidents), then it is not.

Re: Please Stop Attacking MIT's Network

#130

Post by BrokenPipe »

btilly wrote: post #128
BrokenPipe wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No the issue is that they decided to prosecute the case.

Correction. MIT did not prosecute the case. They brought in the feds. There is evidence that they asked the prosecutor to go hard on Aaron. But the prosecutor is not directly affiliated with MIT.

Do you have a link to the evidence? My current understanding is that MIT didn't want Aaron to avoid jail. Is that correct ?
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