Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community • Hacker News Board

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#61

Post by geofft » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:46 PM UTC

captainmuon wrote: post #52

In cases like this where it is word against word, I think it is important as an outsider to hedge your bet. Act as if the allegations are true and false at the same time. Assuming they are true: make sure to create a safe space (virtually, in real live, and in discourse) for potential victims. Don't put the accused person on sensitive community functions. Take (this and further) accusations very seriously. If someone…

> Any scenario could be possible, from personal revenge to a smear campaign by an intelligence agency.

It's also worth being aware of the possibility that Jacob Appelbaum is himself an agent of an intelligence agency (either a plant, or someone turned informant once they realized they could blackmail him and that a creep is a useful informant), and his behavior is a way to maintain his power and in turn the intelligence agency's.

Argument 1: https://inciteblog.wordpress.com/2010/07/15/why-misogynists-...

Argument 2: https://medium.com/@nickf4rr/hi-im-nick-farr-nickf4rr-35c32f...

"But really, I thought, why would Jake be so defensive about some random [lightning talk] that might have otherwise gone completely unnoticed? If I were a government operative hell-bent on destroying the global hacker community, what would I do differently from what Jake is doing now?"

I don't think this is particularly likely over the simpler explanation that he's a non-government-affiliated creep, but if we're going to give credence to "A government agency that hates Tor was behind this," it's worth looking at all the possible ways a government agency might get an advantage out of the situation.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#62

Post by byoogle » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:49 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #33

elcapitan wrote: post #26

Why did this post disappear from the front page? Can't find it on the first 20 or so pages listed neither.

It was flagged by users and set off some software penalties. I'm not convinced that this story belongs on Hacker News. The mandate of the site is "stories that gratify intellectual curiosity", and it seems pretty clear that both the curiosity and gratification here are more voyeuristic than intellectual. Arguably the appropriate scope for the story would be the smaller online community of people who are personally an…

While I agree with your hesitancy, Daniel, I submitted this post because I’d seen two (but I was wrong – there were probably three: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11845351) submissions on the front page in which Jacob has been accused of crimes (outside any legal system) and I believe letting readers get his side of the story is only fair at this point.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#63

Post by SeanLuke » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:49 PM UTC

powera wrote: post #54

This Medium post summarizes my take on this statement better than I can. TLDR "I can’t directly say the allegations are false." https://medium.com/@frabyn/decoding-jake-appelbaum-9fa75d060...

I don't understand that one. Does @frabyn not know that spurious means false?

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#64

Post by sievebrain » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:51 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #16

chris_wot wrote: post #9

I guess I'm just trying to understand why police weren't involved. There a story on the blog he refers to of him taking advantage of a woman when they were completely intoxicated and allegations she was raped by him and his friends.

Look how how rape victims are treated by police and the courts. It's not surprising that people are reluctant to report rape and sexual assault. Here's one, where the perpetrator was seen by other people assaulting someone who was passed out drunk: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jun/06/stanford-sexu... He still said the sex was consensual, and his lawyers put that women through hell.

I guess you mean they're treated badly?

The legal system in western countries is very biased in favour of rape accusers. Shield laws are a concrete manifestation of that. Often police are told to automatically believe any rape accusation even if their common sense is telling them it's likely to be false. And so on.

Yes, if you make a serious accusation against someone, their defence lawyer is going to ask difficult questions. You're attempting to make their life literally hell, by jailing them for a long time. Being asked a few questions is in no way comparable.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#65

Post by nickpsecurity » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:54 PM UTC

TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #11

rdl wrote: post #10

So far, the only thing I'm fairly sure of is the "jacobappelbaum.net" and "@DieJakeDie" social media efforts are doing more harm than good, and were a horrible idea. They might make a not-extremely-guilty person look worse than he is, or make a horrible person somehow sympathetic to people who think he's "also a victim", but they don't help.

OK, what would you do, then? If the people he's exploited stay silent, then he can keep doing it! Going through the legal system isn't much help in a community which is distrustful of it. Complaining to the person in question, well, they've tried that, and it did nothing. And if they don't group their stories together, then it's harder for people to find the accusations against him. There is strength, and more import…

What a cop out. Actually, the legal system does help many rape victims when they have plenty of eyewitnesses backing up multiple accounts plus testimony from people like Nick Farr about character in general.

Tweets, a smear site... these dont stop rapists. Cops and courts regularly do. Not always but many times. This is a police matter but treated as an internet game.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#66

Post by Houshalter » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:57 PM UTC

Chris2048 wrote: post #58

> It's rarer than most people think that accusations of sexual abuse are falsely raised How do you determine this?

According to this essay, about 3% of men will get falsely accused of rape in their lifetime: http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/17/lies-damned-lies-and-so...

The real number is impossible to determine, but is uncomfortably high.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#67

Post by sievebrain » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:58 PM UTC

SeanLuke wrote: post #63

powera wrote: post #54

This Medium post summarizes my take on this statement better than I can. TLDR "I can’t directly say the allegations are false." https://medium.com/@frabyn/decoding-jake-appelbaum-9fa75d060...

I don't understand that one. Does @frabyn not know that spurious means false?

It's a dumb article. Applebaum's statement says quite clearly "the claims are false" but this so-called analysis tries to argue it's the opposite.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#68

Post by nickpsecurity » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 9:59 PM UTC

Actually, with enough female witnesses it's usually easy to get a conviction out of a jury. Matter of fact, it's easy enough that men are regularly released when DNA evidence shows they were wrongly convicted based on one woman's word.

This shouldve been sent to the police either with first event or once it became a trend. Instead, we have tweets, stylistic websites, and otherwise a full smear campaign going on pretending to protect people. If it's real, they need to take legal action to prove it. If proven, the guy is locked up. Only then is anyone protected. Suspicious they'll do anything but testify under oath.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#69

Post by Chris2048 » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 10:00 PM UTC

geofft wrote: post #61

captainmuon wrote: post #52

In cases like this where it is word against word, I think it is important as an outsider to hedge your bet. Act as if the allegations are true and false at the same time. Assuming they are true: make sure to create a safe space (virtually, in real live, and in discourse) for potential victims. Don't put the accused person on sensitive community functions. Take (this and further) accusations very seriously. If someone…

> Any scenario could be possible, from personal revenge to a smear campaign by an intelligence agency. It's also worth being aware of the possibility that Jacob Appelbaum is himself an agent of an intelligence agency (either a plant, or someone turned informant once they realized they could blackmail him and that a creep is a useful informant), and his behavior is a way to maintain his power and in turn the intellige…

While conspiracy theory is a risky proposition, in this case the agencies involved are known for such things. COINTELPRO, prism etc, so it's no entirely implausible to raise such concerns.

Re: Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

#70

Post by nickpsecurity » Mon, Jun 06, 2016, 10:02 PM UTC

moyix wrote: post #30

rdl wrote: post #10

So far, the only thing I'm fairly sure of is the "jacobappelbaum.net" and "@DieJakeDie" social media efforts are doing more harm than good, and were a horrible idea. They might make a not-extremely-guilty person look worse than he is, or make a horrible person somehow sympathetic to people who think he's "also a victim", but they don't help.

For what it's worth, the web site denies involvement with the twitter account: > I SAW SOME DIFFERENT TWITTER ACCOUNTS CLAIMING TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS SITE. IS THAT YOU? > No. Since it is no longer possible to create a Twitter acocunt without a phone number and because we believe anonymity is important, we opted to boycott direct Twitter presence for this site. We don't have a Twitter account. > We have seen the…

This is a claim by one member in a smear campaign saying they're not working with others despite everything happening in a day or so. Their claim isn't worth anything.