The 'Fly' Has Been Swatted

The thing here that what was being exploited is irrationality of the system that uses these made up "Wars On ". Whatever this is, it will always be boon for psychopaths and will be a exploited.

War on Terrorism -- send tips about so and so is building bombs or talking about jihad.

War on Drugs -- plant or send someone a drug package and notify police. One worse, SWAT them. With good luck they will be shot by the cops.

War on Kids via Zero Tolerance -- plant a piece of toast looking like a gun in someone's bag and tell a teacher.

War on Electronic Crime (Hacking) -- plant a DoS tool pointed to a .mil website on enemy's machine or network.

The list goes on. Of course in this case we have a good ending so that is encouraging. But the scary part is not that someone would wish all this harm to another person and come up with scheme like this, but that knowing how prosecution works, how Wars On work, this seems like a very close call. It is the lack of faith in justice and the system to act rationally that is scary. Maybe the neighbor who is building bombs got a visit from FBI and they couldn't charge him. But they visited his work. Scared his kids. And ultimately put him on a watch list so from then on they get harassed every time they travel.

Re: The 'Fly' Has Been Swatted

#8

Post by comex » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 4:41 AM UTC

> According to a trusted source in the security community, that email account [belonging to 'Fly'] was somehow compromised last year.

Right... I'm sure it was just a source who themselves got the information legally secondhand, and that Krebs had nothing to do with it. ;)

Re: The 'Fly' Has Been Swatted

#9

Post by slapshot » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 4:58 AM UTC

rdtsc wrote: post #7

The thing here that what was being exploited is irrationality of the system that uses these made up "Wars On ". Whatever this is, it will always be boon for psychopaths and will be a exploited. War on Terrorism -- send tips about so and so is building bombs or talking about jihad. War on Drugs -- plant or send someone a drug package and notify police. One worse, SWAT them. With good luck they will be shot by the cops…

But one of the most effective tactics of The Fly was a traditional SWATting based on a false phone call that Kreb's wife had been murdered in the house. 13 police officers showed up, heavily armed, because of the War on What? Murder? Domestic Violence?

All of this long predates any War on ____. Your examples could just as easily be "send tips that so and so plans to rob a bank." There's no "War on Bank Robbers" but it'd be no less effective.

Re: The 'Fly' Has Been Swatted

#10

Post by enoch_r » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 5:04 AM UTC

rdtsc wrote: post #7

The thing here that what was being exploited is irrationality of the system that uses these made up "Wars On ". Whatever this is, it will always be boon for psychopaths and will be a exploited. War on Terrorism -- send tips about so and so is building bombs or talking about jihad. War on Drugs -- plant or send someone a drug package and notify police. One worse, SWAT them. With good luck they will be shot by the cops…

Most of the swatting incidents I've heard about have not involved drugs at all. The spoofed script I've always heard is: "I just shot my family and am planning to shoot any cops who try to get me." I'm no supporter of the "War on People Who Use Drugs," but I don't think swatting has much to do with it--even if you believe, as I do, that the WOD has led to a lot of the police militarization we've seen, such incidents would still be very dangerous with pretty much any police force.