61–70 of 71 posts
The government says if you have nothing to hide then you have nothing to fear. We'll wtf governments?! Why you so scared? If I were to apply the same logic, I could get the impression you're hiding something.
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Don't Anonymous want to be treated as an existential threat? The whole "we are legion" rhetoric leaves little doubt on that.
Hardly. Do you know what "existential threat" means?
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Anonymous DDoS'd bits of the UK govt ( http://www.out-law.com/page-11476 ). Not critical bits but enough for them to take notice of the threat. Much of the (UK) law enforcement response to potential civil unrest is to try to prevent escalation, this would seem to be in line with that. Also the tactics and techniques used are frankly not something any of the other bits of UK govt outside the MOD would understand or be…
That is certainly a clear headed and reasonable explanation of why it might be tabled as an option... but I can't fathom who thought deploying a nation state level intelligence agency (in a western democracy) against the communications infrastructure of political dissidents was proportionate. Or even a good idea. I would love to see how the DDoS was argued as being "legal". Whose bandwidth was used? Where was the tar…
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> That is certainly a clear headed and reasonable explanation of why it might be tabled as an option... but I can't fathom who thought deploying a nation state level intelligence agency (in a western democracy) against the communications infrastructure of political dissidents was proportionate. Or even a good idea. Using special branch to infiltrate political groups is commonplace. So much so that there are recent sc…
I realize this sounds snarky, but I'm just a North American from the middle of that continent... Who is deemed capable of deciding which political groups to infiltrate? It seems to me that there's a narrow line between manipulating politics the way you want them to go and observing threats.
In theory all of them get scrutiny.
The UK has had considerable trouble with things like employers compiling blacklists of political activists and union activists in order to deny them employment.
Some of the police infiltration scandals have been bad - police either get converted and refuse to provide evidence (while still being paid to gather evidence) or they encourage law breaking amongst legal groups.
I can understand monitoring all political groups (although I don't agree with it) but the UK does this poorly.
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Anonymous DDoS'd bits of the UK govt ( http://www.out-law.com/page-11476 ). Not critical bits but enough for them to take notice of the threat. Much of the (UK) law enforcement response to potential civil unrest is to try to prevent escalation, this would seem to be in line with that. Also the tactics and techniques used are frankly not something any of the other bits of UK govt outside the MOD would understand or be…
Wait a minute. Intelligence agencies _are not_ law enforcement. This is a common misconception. Intelligence agencies do not engage in law enforcement, even though in some nation-states police have access to some intelligence agency information. My bet is they didn't really consider Anonymous a threat, but just experimented to see how much effort it is to clobber them if need should arise at some point in the future.
The delineation between military intel and law enforcement is very much an Anglo thing.
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Wait a minute. Intelligence agencies _are not_ law enforcement. This is a common misconception. Intelligence agencies do not engage in law enforcement, even though in some nation-states police have access to some intelligence agency information. My bet is they didn't really consider Anonymous a threat, but just experimented to see how much effort it is to clobber them if need should arise at some point in the future.
In most nations, intelligence agencies _are_ law enforcement. The delineation between military intel and law enforcement is very much an Anglo thing.
[1] http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=...
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In most nations, intelligence agencies _are_ law enforcement. The delineation between military intel and law enforcement is very much an Anglo thing.
Here in Germany, police and intelligence agencies are separated more clearly than in most other states[1]. The anglosphere tends to be rather sloppy with these things. [1] http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=...
Anonymous channels existed in IRC servers around the globe, on million-user-plus networks and tiny networks alike. It's chilling to think whole networks of people completely unrelated to Anonymous could get taken down just because a few morons were using a channel to organize attacks. (Also, am I missing something, or did they completely miss an opportunity to collect intel by taking them offline and making them move…
Has anyone ever done a kickstarter to bribe government employees to whistleblow on other government employees?
Bribery is illegal. That would be a very risky thing to contribute to. Has anyone done a kickstarter to buy cocaine in bulk?
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Hardly. Do you know what "existential threat" means?
I know what I think it means, maybe we should argue about semantics? Perhaps a better comparison would be witches or ghouls (legion means demon or devil in the Christian tradition).
"My name is Legion, for we are many." - A demon, in Mark 5:9
It's clear he (the demon) borrowed the word from the romans. And anonymous is using it the same way. "There are many of us" is not an existential threat. "We are demons" is silly and would make me think they're imaginary.
Your entire point is one of semantics, so don't be so dismissive. You made a claim based off what Anonymous says, picking apart the semantic meaing of "Legion". I'm well within my rights to call bullshit on "existential threat" as nothing more than a rhetorical flourish.