Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks • Hacker News Board

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#11

Post by steveklabnik » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 5:32 PM UTC

coderdude wrote: post #2

Excellent. How dumb do you have to be to try and DDoS the homepage of a major credit card company from your personal computer using a downloaded tool? Script kiddies or not, the law is the law. I'm glad to see them get popped for this. I can't stand all that Anonymous crap -- they've redefined what it means to be lame. This should hopefully set an example for anyone else that decides to do some vigilante work of thei…

Political protest is always slightly dangerous. And I feel the sit-in analogy is pretty apt.

But seriously, "the law is the law" isn't a great argument. Sometimes laws are bad. They need to be changed. Yeah, you can expect to serve some jailtime for doing civil disobedience, but that doesn't mean that they're stupid, what they're doing is stupid, or anything else.

You can still hold that opinion for other reasons, of course.

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#12

Post by jarek » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 5:47 PM UTC

coderdude wrote: post #9

mycroftiv wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The anonymous DDOS attacks were obviously stupid and pointless. I think what you are missing is that these people are primarily teenagers who really don't know how to engage in social change in a productive way. In fact, I'm an adult, and I don't know how to engage in social change in a productive way. I'm smart enough to know that participating in a DDOS attack is counterproductive, but I'm also smart enough to know…

You're defending the wrong kind of people. I understand the empathy for misguided youth, but these kids (and adults) knew that what they were doing was illegal. They were proud to engage in these acts because it was "cool" for them and their little /b/ buddies. They aren't the repressed political activists you're making them out to be. Besides, look at where they're from. They're not citizens of some third world nati…

> Yes, let the trolls and fake accounts people are creating solely for this thread have their way with this comment. I can spare it.

You're losing it. You need a non-trivial amount of upvotes to downvote a comment. You're not being downvoted by fake accounts.

You also haven't provided any productive suggestions for human individuals wishing to exert pressure on the decision making processes of large corporations. Should we take this as a statement that you don't believe those exist, or that you don't believe those should exist?

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#13

Post by coderdude » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 6:00 PM UTC

jarek wrote: post #12

coderdude wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're defending the wrong kind of people. I understand the empathy for misguided youth, but these kids (and adults) knew that what they were doing was illegal. They were proud to engage in these acts because it was "cool" for them and their little /b/ buddies. They aren't the repressed political activists you're making them out to be. Besides, look at where they're from. They're not citizens of some third world nati…

> Yes, let the trolls and fake accounts people are creating solely for this thread have their way with this comment. I can spare it. You're losing it. You need a non-trivial amount of upvotes to downvote a comment. You're not being downvoted by fake accounts. You also haven't provided any productive suggestions for human individuals wishing to exert pressure on the decision making processes of large corporations. Sho…

You're right about the down votes. That's my bad. I know of no productive means by most people's definition of productive. I always say the same thing, and that's to write your senators or the equivilant in your government. What more can be done? Certainly not attacking and defacing private property based on what you read on the Web. People who defend these acts or play the devil's advocate are only fueling the attitude that is getting these people in trouble.

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#14

Post by steveklabnik » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 6:08 PM UTC

coderdude wrote: post #13

jarek wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, let the trolls and fake accounts people are creating solely for this thread have their way with this comment. I can spare it. You're losing it. You need a non-trivial amount of upvotes to downvote a comment. You're not being downvoted by fake accounts. You also haven't provided any productive suggestions for human individuals wishing to exert pressure on the decision making processes of large corporations. Sho…

You're right about the down votes. That's my bad. I know of no productive means by most people's definition of productive. I always say the same thing, and that's to write your senators or the equivilant in your government. What more can be done? Certainly not attacking and defacing private property based on what you read on the Web. People who defend these acts or play the devil's advocate are only fueling the attit…

> What more can be done?

That's the whole crux of this. If all of your legal recourses for changing the law don't work, sometimes, you have to move to illegal ones. morality != legality. This obviously requires a lot of thought, a preparation to deal with the consequences, and a serious commitment. But sometimes, it's worth it.

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#15

Post by coderdude » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 6:14 PM UTC

steveklabnik wrote: post #14

coderdude wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right about the down votes. That's my bad. I know of no productive means by most people's definition of productive. I always say the same thing, and that's to write your senators or the equivilant in your government. What more can be done? Certainly not attacking and defacing private property based on what you read on the Web. People who defend these acts or play the devil's advocate are only fueling the attit…

> What more can be done? That's the whole crux of this. If all of your legal recourses for changing the law don't work, sometimes, you have to move to illegal ones. morality != legality. This obviously requires a lot of thought, a preparation to deal with the consequences, and a serious commitment. But sometimes, it's worth it.

The issue at hand is people damaging private organizations that chose to not do business with another private organization. Not fixing messed up or unjust laws. Not fighting a faceless government. Simply attacking a business they don't like for not doing business with an organization they do like. That's what's being defended here by the people arguing against my points.

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#16

Post by steveklabnik » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 6:30 PM UTC

coderdude wrote: post #15

steveklabnik wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What more can be done? That's the whole crux of this. If all of your legal recourses for changing the law don't work, sometimes, you have to move to illegal ones. morality != legality. This obviously requires a lot of thought, a preparation to deal with the consequences, and a serious commitment. But sometimes, it's worth it.

The issue at hand is people damaging private organizations that chose to not do business with another private organization. Not fixing messed up or unjust laws. Not fighting a faceless government. Simply attacking a business they don't like for not doing business with an organization they do like. That's what's being defended here by the people arguing against my points.

It doesn't matter if they're private organizations or governments. It's about the power relationship. I won't get into 'corporate america blah blah blah,' but I'm sure that you can see that in this role, MasterCard plays the same role the government does. There's a certain level of responsibility that comes into play when you're a gigantic credit card company that's different then when you're a mom-and-pop grocery store.

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#17

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 7:09 PM UTC

coderdude wrote: post #2

Excellent. How dumb do you have to be to try and DDoS the homepage of a major credit card company from your personal computer using a downloaded tool? Script kiddies or not, the law is the law. I'm glad to see them get popped for this. I can't stand all that Anonymous crap -- they've redefined what it means to be lame. This should hopefully set an example for anyone else that decides to do some vigilante work of thei…

[deleted]

Re: Five arrested over 'Anonymous' web attacks

#18

Post by xorglorb » Thu, Jan 27, 2011, 9:24 PM UTC

saturdayplace wrote: post #3

Only five? I always assumed that there were hordes of folks taking part in the Anonymous shenanigans. Do they only arrest five people because that's all they could reliably identify, or because to go after more would expend disproportionate effort, and they just needed to make an example? > This investigation by the Central e-Crime Unit was carried out in conjunction with law enforcement agencies in Europe and the US…

This is a scare tactic. They know that "Anonymous" is really a bunch of basement dwelling geeks between the ages of 14 and 24 and are actually too scared to do anything once their companions start getting arrested.