Earlier quoted context omitted.
The original idea of a "tinfoil hatter" was that the "hatter" wore a head garment made of tinfoil, to block the mind-control radio waves the [government|aliens] were using to take over people's brains. I don't think we have any particular indication that is likely, yet.
If the technology existed, you better believe they'd use it.
FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
101–110 of 280 posts
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#102Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The FBI used standard police techniques to infiltrate and eventually dismantle the those groups. Seriously, how do we know the FBI's story isn't "parallel construction"? It always seemed to me that tracking down Anonymous would be easy if you had NSA-scale monitoring. I don't want to sound like paranoid guy, but maybe the FBI's stories about tracking down clues from chat logs are all made up.
I don't think it sounds paranoid. I think it's at least plausible. I only recently learned about parallel construction: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction Basically, the NSA is suspected to cooperate with other arms of the government, such as the DEA. The NSA supposedly provides information about who is involved in what illegal activity. Apparently this information is provided illegally, without a war…
> 2600.com probably runs forums, and Sabu probably posted to those forums from his home IP address like an idiot.
sounds very plausible :)
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#103This is actually a pretty good attack. The only problem I see is the usefulness of the evidence that the attack gathers. Visiting an FBI warning over Tor isn't illegal, so appearing in some child-porn-user database because you were curious about how the exploit worked is a little disturbing, given the stigma child porn has. I'd also like to see the legal theory they used to seize control of someone's computer. Did a…
It was reported the exploit was inserted on all Freedomhosting sites. Freedomhosting hosted far more than just child pornography, so just because someone got dinged by their exploit DOES NOT mean that they were perusing child pornography sites.
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#104I don't even know anymore. We're gonna have to raise the bar on what it means to be a "tinfoil hatter"; the original definition has become reality. "Trust no one! Suspect EVERYTHING!" , I can say today without sounding crazy. Also, remember this? http://www.linuxfoundation.org/news-media/blogs/browse/2011/... ....hmm, I wonder if....
The original idea of a "tinfoil hatter" was that the "hatter" wore a head garment made of tinfoil, to block the mind-control radio waves the [government|aliens] were using to take over people's brains. I don't think we have any particular indication that is likely, yet.
Well, we're probably just a few short decades away from us being able to influence things around us (and possibly even animals) with mind control. At that point you'd have to believe the government would be already working on ways to get into people's heads.
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#105This would make the FBI guilty of a whole bunch of felonies, would it not? (Independent of whether what they were doing is morally right or wrong, isn't this exactly what they imprison hackers for?)
You cannot arrest the U.S. government for felonies.
Huh? Surely if they started killing innocent people you could arrest them.
The question is what gives them the authority to use these tactics? Wiretapping laws?
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
Please tell me more background about that. (I recall mention of this before on HN, but I'm not recalling many details.) What's our best information on how leadership of Anonymous has changed over time? AFTER EDIT: Thanks for your link, which I think came as an edit to your comment. Here is a link to follow-up news: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/feb/22/lulzsec-sa...
From your link: But his FBI handlers said he was "brilliant, but lazy": they discovered him selling stolen credit card details on Facebook, and traced him to his home when he used an unguarded internet connection to go on the 2600.com site, which is popular with young and old hackers. Is 2600.com a honeypot for the FBI? How'd Sabu expose himself by merely visiting that site?
>Is 2600.com a honeypot for the FBI? How'd Sabu expose himself by merely visiting that site?
i guess they just ran the query in the NSA's internet traffic meta-info database.
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#107I don't even know anymore. We're gonna have to raise the bar on what it means to be a "tinfoil hatter"; the original definition has become reality. "Trust no one! Suspect EVERYTHING!" , I can say today without sounding crazy. Also, remember this? http://www.linuxfoundation.org/news-media/blogs/browse/2011/... ....hmm, I wonder if....
> I don't even know anymore. We're gonna have to raise the bar on what it means to be a "tinfoil hatter"; the original definition has become reality. That's sort of where I've gotten to this summer. It's really frustrating and saddening. Although mind-control waves still aren't, TO THE BEST OF MY KNOWLEDGE, a thing.
Mainstream media bombardment and constant advertising harassment do a pretty good job of mind control, though.
Also, culture is the best mind control. Raise people with a mind set the way you want it and you never have to do anything directly, because they already are siding with you even through cognative dissonance.
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#108Oh, the malware!
What do they do about users who do not turn on Javascript?
Or users who do not use the popular browsers?
It seems like the malware authors here, government employees or contractors, are just like all the others that form the underbelly of the internet... they only focus on the least sophisticated users or the users who always follow the herd (not the Hurd): Windows and OSX/iOS users.
Assumptions, assumptions, ...
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#109This would make the FBI guilty of a whole bunch of felonies, would it not? (Independent of whether what they were doing is morally right or wrong, isn't this exactly what they imprison hackers for?)
you probably miss the point of a 2 caste system - one above the law and the other. USA has been significantly lagging (compare to many other countries) in development of such a system, yet it has made huge progress in that direction during the recent decade.
Re: FBI Admits It Controlled Tor Servers Behind Mass Malware Attack
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not just "once". Many conspiracy theorists still believe that it is some form of government plot or another. The theories range from it being a toxic waste disposal scheme that is poisoning people (and as far as I know, there is some basis for the claim that fluoridation came about as a way to cheaply get rid of a relatively toxic byproduct; that doesn't validate any other part of it though), to fluoride being used a…
> Of course, none of these "theories" manage to address the fact that there is fairly strong evidence that water fluoridation does in fact reduce tooth decay. Not agreeing with those theories, but this argument is flawed. Even if it does "reduce tooth decay", so what, in the context of their argument? Who said a substance can't do two things at one time?
The number of compounds that have significant and useful mind altering properties, are tasteless in water at their effective doses, don't cause severe adverse reactions in any large segment of the population, even at uncontrolled doses, and which also naturally occur in some water supplies to begin with is tiny.
If you narrow that search down further by adding the constraint of a simple and easily explained health benefit that has since been repeatedly validated by science, you should expect to find approximately zero compounds.
To look at it another way, suppose that studies had been done on fluoridation and found no benefit in terms of tooth decay. That would certainly be evidence in favor of the conspiracy theories. It is always the case that if E is evidence of H, then ¬E is evidence of ¬H, so the fact that fluoridation prevents tooth decay must be at least weak evidence that the conspiracy theories are false. The argument above gives one reason that it is not particularly weak evidence.