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

Jacob Appelbaum’s response to accusations by the Tor community

twitlonger.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 192 posts

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

#91

Post by tptacek »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #78
Sacho wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Creating a site that alleges you are a rapist is an amazingly stressful process for the presumed innocent person, requiring him to respond to a torrent of media and social hate and shunning, being tried in the public eye, open to claims of being a "monster", etc. You could argue you're "helping" more people by believing rape claims, but that's both mob rule(the rights of the many trample the rights of the few) and no…

Exactly. Most of the problems they mention for police apply to other tactics. Only difference is that the police (a) might punish them if they're lying or (b) might protect people via locking the guy ip if they think they're telling the truth. Unsubstantiated claims in social media are so much safer. ;)

The idea that rape victims who don't report crimes to law enforcement are illegitimate is horse-shit, and people who suggest otherwise should be embarrassed.

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

#92

Post by yarou »

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.

By all means, let us take rape accusations seriously. But let us also be careful to do proper due diligence, instead of rushing to destroy a potentially innocent person's reputation.

Our forefathers envisioned a fair and impartial judicial branch, with the accuser and the accused on equal ground. The accused party should always be presumed innocent, instead of guilty.

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

#93

Post by tptacek »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #89
tptacek wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First: no, this is not plausible. Second, a question: exactly what is it that people think Jacob Appelbaum did to make him Public Enemy #1 of any government? He's not an especially important Tor contributor. Tor is not only funded by the US Government, but it began as a project at the Naval Research Lab. He's a spokesperson for Wikileaks, and Wikileaks has gotten itself engaged in serious legal issues with the US Gov…

Great analysis. He's seriously among the least likely people to be a sanctioned spy. Maybe potential to be a CI one day ratting on people to avoid time. Anybody is capable of that. Can't imagine anything more.

It's not a great analysis. It's a superficial recitation of details about Appelbaum from someone with just a casual acquaintance of who he is. That it would seem to anyone like a great analysis is extremely worrying.

It suggests to me that this particular cohort of Internet message board nerds shouldn't be trying to debate this particular topic.

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

#94

Post by nickpsecurity »

tptacek wrote: post #86
nickpsecurity wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google "rape conviction overturned DNA evidence." Happens too much.

There were 67,000+ sexual assault convictions in 2012, and 18 overturned convictions. Would you like that as a percentage? That's 0.02%.

Exactly. Convictions through the roof. That's why they should take it to court. Far as overturned, do you have data on how many got to prove something with DNA? Or conviction rate without it?

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

#95

Post by throwaway76543 »

hackuser wrote: post #75
Houshalter wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

With due respect, this is a politically charged issue so I'm dubious of trusting random people, such as the author of that article. Are there more established sources around on this issue?

Scott Alexander cited his sources. Perhaps read the article and follow up on them?

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

#96

Post by bcg1 »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #65
TazeTSchnitzel wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Unfortunately, neither of your statements is entirely true.

There are many cases where law enforcement and the legal system fail victims in a variety of ways (e.g., blaming the victim, improper handling of rape kits, police themselves might be predators looking for victims to target, etc). To put ones faith and protection entirely in the hands of 'the authorities' would be a dogmatic insistence on a single point of failure.

And an awareness campaign (or "tweets" and a "smear site" as you put it) can have merit. Consider predators such as Bill Cosby or Jerry Sandusky, who were powerful and had enough gravitas to cover up their crimes for decades. It was only when there was a public awareness campaign that numerous witnesses and victims had enough courage to come forward and actual charges could be filed.

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

#97

Post by tptacek »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #94
tptacek wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There were 67,000+ sexual assault convictions in 2012, and 18 overturned convictions. Would you like that as a percentage? That's 0.02%.

Exactly. Convictions through the roof. That's why they should take it to court. Far as overturned, do you have data on how many got to prove something with DNA? Or conviction rate without it?

You just suggested, in the comment I replied to, that there were significant numbers of overturned rape convictions. There are not. "Exactly"?

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

#98

Post by nickpsecurity »

tptacek wrote: post #83
nickpsecurity wrote: post #68

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 prete…

This ginned-up gender conflict is neither germane nor relevant to the discussion; comments like these are a big part of the reason these Appelbaum threads on HN are so awful.

It's not gendered up at all. You just cited 60,000+ rape convictions. They claim this guy is a rapist. The site wants to stop more rapes. Nobody wants to go to police though. Others instead talk like that's infeasible with multiple eyewitnesses to multiple rapes. Im calling out that BS.

This needs to be in court, not Twitter or HN.

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

#99

Post by hackuser »

nickpsecurity wrote: post #68

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 prete…

This is a pretty heated subject. Could you back any of these statements up in a substantial way?

> with enough female witnesses it's usually easy to get a conviction out of a jury

> men are regularly released when DNA evidence shows they were wrongly convicted based on one woman's word.

Finally, do you know more about this situation than what's in the articles? Otherwise, I have to question your ability to judge the alleged victims, their motives, or their actions. Based only on reading what's on the Internet, I'd feel I was far overstepping my bounds by judging anyone on anything.

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

#100

Post by nickpsecurity »

tptacek wrote: post #97
nickpsecurity wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. Convictions through the roof. That's why they should take it to court. Far as overturned, do you have data on how many got to prove something with DNA? Or conviction rate without it?

You just suggested, in the comment I replied to, that there were significant numbers of overturned rape convictions. There are not. "Exactly"?

Maybe I remembered wrong. I retract that one for now. I'll reinvestigate the topic later on.
Post reply on HN