Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

krebsonsecurity.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

261–270 of 308 posts

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#261

Post by scruple »

icelancer wrote: post #240
beachstartup wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

indeed, a common story. i get the feeling the fbi did a lot of before-school visits to teenagers dicking around on irc in the mid 90s. they showed up to my place once. the guy said to contact him after i graduated if i was looking for work, lol. for what it's worth, they had binders and binders full of efnet logs.

I got dinged as well. Similar story on efnet logs. No charges but they announced their presence with authority. Left me a business card too.

Yep, myself and a friend and they had logs from one of our Undernet channels. Interesting to hear that it was somewhat commonplace. I hadn't heard any similar stories until the mid 00s and ours happened around 97 or 98.

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#262

Post by Tloewald »

thret wrote: post #257
Tloewald wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once privacy disappears we can actually base our morality on data rather than wishful thinking. It's the transition period (i.e. now) where we have pretty arbitrary morals largely based on ancient religious texts, etc. and we're finally getting actual data on what people actually do that is the nasty part. E.g. we know that rich people have always obtained abortions, used illegal drugs, and had promiscuous sex, but p…

These aren't arbitrary just because they are enshrined in religion and custom. Before the pill, women couldn't sleep around without fear of getting pregnant. Before condoms, people couldn't sleep around without fear of STDs. Before DNA testing husbands couldn't be sure they were the father of their own children if their wife had an affair. Before modern medicine, abortion carried a significant risk of complications -…

Back when sex always entailed a chance of pregnancy, food was scarce, disease was a mystery, we lived in small tribes, etc. etc. many of these rules may well have made sense. Survival heuristics got encoded as religion, which was then horribly misinterpreted, and adhered to long past its point of utility. Now these rules aren't random, but they are pretty arbitrary.

Consider that our hangups about sex are tied to a sense of right and wrong that comes down to food scarcity (and other base needs, such as safety from predators) and reproductive rights. So we've got a bunch of people who treat sex as having moral significance owing to a survival/economic importance that no longer exists.

When sex first became disconnected from reproduction we had a "sexual revolution" where people tried to act as if the underlying rules and norms had changed overnight and there were horrible repercussions, but that's not because there's something intrinsically correct about our current (or recent past) sexual mores. Rape within marriage used to be just fine (indeed, it only became illegal throughout the US in 1993).

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#263

Post by task_queue »

nostrebored wrote: post #90
ori_b wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And if a ton of these people are non-monogamous, then perhaps we as a society should have a discussion about how our values are shifting and what new families look like Why should we have that discussion? If my spouse was cheating, I'd want to have that discussion in private , without gawkers, and without social pressure from the uninvolved.

If you had the option of knowing that your spouse was cheating via dox, or not knowing at all which would you choose? I would still contend that you do get to have the discussions surrounding all of this in private, if you choose, or in public amidst people who are going through the same thing that you are through discussions like these, the legal system, etc. What about the scores of people to whom cheating is a dea…

> What about the scores of people to whom cheating is a dealbreaker

What about the scores of people who have a blue car?

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#264

Post by humanrebar »

Absentinsomniac wrote: post #196
humanrebar wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. I think marriages actually affect people not involved in the marriage commitment itself. Especially when you consider populations and not just hypothetical individuals.

Yeah, but what does that have to do with random unassociated outside observers? Are you saying society at large has some kind of right to intimate details of personal relationships?

I'm saying it's impossible, especially across large populations, to assert that infidelity is wholly a private matter. It's a compelling notion that doesn't stand up to facts. Be sure to consider things like STD rates, unplanned pregnancy rates, rates of single parenthood, divorces resulting from infidelity, and so on.

I can assert that this data breach is immoral while also asserting that infidelity, especially organized infidelity, is not simply an intimate detail. I'm not sure why everyone feels compelled to square off into two camps on every issue.

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#265

Post by rubicon33 »

jasonlotito wrote: post #245
rubicon33 wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In life, you get to choose your actions, but you do not get to choose the consequences. Yes, some 'went through a rough patch' and 'already moved past this', and are now dealing with a world of pain. But ask yourself, what makes you the authority on how much pain they should have endured for their mistake? As fate would have it, whatever 'moving past' they did will now be really put to the test. This will give some c…

> Is this the fault of the hackers? Yes. > I'd argue not. Wouldn't be much of an argument as you'd be wrong. Rather than going about other means to release this information privately, they dumped it on the world. They made that choice. > It's the liars, and the cheaters who hurt their family, not the hackers. Who are you to speak on behalf of everyone who has to deal with the outcome of this? I know for a fact that y…

You've made some pretty significant assumptions, and in your childish rage, almost missed my point entirely. For starters, to say I don't give a damn about privacy, couldn't be more wrong.

My point is about who to blame, for the negative impact on family members, spouses, children, etc. We shouldn't miss the mark. Blame the correct party.

The "shame" that family members incur from this hack, is due to the NATURE OF THE WEBSITE. It's an AFFAIR website, not a gardening forum. If the public information of a garden information site was hacked, then nobody would be complaining about the harm to family members.

Do I think hacks like this, and exposing private information, is good? NO. I'm saying that the negative impact on the innocent people, is entirely due to the deplorable nature of the site, and the individuals who registered on it.

And frankly, I'm not even arguing whether or not I disagree with cheating/infidelity. I'm merely saying, IF someone feels shame/hurt that their spouse is cheating, they should BLAME THEIR SPOUSE FOR CHEATING.

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#266

Post by rubicon33 »

nkurz wrote: post #251
jasonlotito wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is this the fault of the hackers? Yes. > I'd argue not. Wouldn't be much of an argument as you'd be wrong. Rather than going about other means to release this information privately, they dumped it on the world. They made that choice. > It's the liars, and the cheaters who hurt their family, not the hackers. Who are you to speak on behalf of everyone who has to deal with the outcome of this? I know for a fact that y…

You are jumping to unfair conclusions about the person you are replying to. You clearly disagree with him, but this is offensive. You should delete it.

Agreed.

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#267

Post by task_queue »

nostrebored wrote: post #115
vezzy-fnord wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the same light, let's not pretend that the anonymity of the internet hasn't facilitated people comitting adultery. In the same light, let's not pretend that the anonymity of the Internet hasn't facilitated people engaging in terrorist activity and drug trade. When do we build the firewall, captain?

So you're going to let my intent argument stand? We build the firewall around prosocial behavior. I think that if the names of all of the coke dealers selling their wares through TSR came out today I would not be upset either, because it's a scummy, exploitative industry. If you're breaking a social contract, my expectation of other people upholding their social contracts with you, in that area, are very slim.

You wouldn't care if people who are not at all involved are implied to be coke dealers because they had their identity stolen?

Public exposure of individuals' private information is irresponsible, period.

Vigilantism is against the social contract, upholding it implies you gave up that power to the institutions that have the responsibility to judge and prosecute.

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#268

Post by humanrebar »

thret wrote: post #257
Tloewald wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once privacy disappears we can actually base our morality on data rather than wishful thinking. It's the transition period (i.e. now) where we have pretty arbitrary morals largely based on ancient religious texts, etc. and we're finally getting actual data on what people actually do that is the nasty part. E.g. we know that rich people have always obtained abortions, used illegal drugs, and had promiscuous sex, but p…

These aren't arbitrary just because they are enshrined in religion and custom. Before the pill, women couldn't sleep around without fear of getting pregnant. Before condoms, people couldn't sleep around without fear of STDs. Before DNA testing husbands couldn't be sure they were the father of their own children if their wife had an affair. Before modern medicine, abortion carried a significant risk of complications -…

> Before the pill, women couldn't sleep around without fear of getting pregnant. Before condoms, people couldn't sleep around without fear of STDs.

I'm going to push back on that assertion. There are still STDs in developed countries with plenty of access to condoms. Assuming that STD patients are not intentionally contracting diseases, it appears, at least on a social level, that condoms are not effective ways to prevent STDs in populations, at least not yet. Likewise for other forms of birth control and unplanned pregnancy rates.

I think our morals are outpacing our science and habits. And the disadvantaged disproportionately pay the consequences. Or the people who pay the consequences end up disadvantaged. Or both.

> We are adjusting our social values in response to advances in technology.

Are we? I'm not so sure. We take a very non-judgmental view of all sorts of risky behaviors. Scientifically speaking, anal sex has many more risk factors associated with it than other forms of sex. I haven't seen any studies about health risks associated with infidelity, but it's plausible (if not almost certain) that a person having unprotected sex with a secretly promiscuous spouse is exposed to STDs unwittingly.

I think you can argue for more personal freedom, but I'm going to disagree when you assert that we, as a society, have evolved past the consequences traditional morals were set up to protect against.

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#269

Post by kbenson »

nkurz wrote: post #217
kbenson wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think so, I think it's just a matter of us learning where our prior ideas of privacy and what should and can be expected are meeting with the new reality. We can not legislate away capabilities that are fundamentally the same as what's existed previously, but have a greater effect because of the digital age, and expect those to hold[1]. Additionally, I increasingly think our interpretation of privacy has been…

1: For example, if a government can legally place a person at a location to observe, I believe any actions to prevent their capability to automate this process (CCTV) will likely fail in outcome, if not legislation. Some recent US court cases have reached the opposite conclusion, and decided that a right to privacy from video surveillance exists: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/12/federal-court-agrees-e... Althoug…

Where I think this might cause problems, be likely to be appealed, or are ripe for legislation to change are cases like this where it would have been completely legal to have an undercover agent stake out the house and obtain the same footage of firearms use and thus obtain the same warrant. I don't know if that was the case here (but it sounds like it was). To be clear, I don't think it's impossible to create laws outlawing that situation, or find that current laws find it illegal, just that those cases will be where there is extreme friction between the law and those it applies to, and there will be a higher likelihood to ignore it.

> Although perhaps your standard holds, and the argument would that constant warrantless surveillance would be illegal even if done by a human.

That's possible. Then again, depending on what is outlawed it may run afoul of what I think is a related (and probably root) phenomenon, where something easily accomplished with little risk or cost by the average person is outlawed, and is often ignored. e.g. Jaywalking.

Re: Who Hacked Ashley Madison?

#270

Post by knob »

nkurz wrote: post #251
jasonlotito wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is this the fault of the hackers? Yes. > I'd argue not. Wouldn't be much of an argument as you'd be wrong. Rather than going about other means to release this information privately, they dumped it on the world. They made that choice. > It's the liars, and the cheaters who hurt their family, not the hackers. Who are you to speak on behalf of everyone who has to deal with the outcome of this? I know for a fact that y…

You are jumping to unfair conclusions about the person you are replying to. You clearly disagree with him, but this is offensive. You should delete it.

Offensive how?
Post reply on HN