Latvian "Robin Hood" Hacker Leaks Bank Details

eldavojohn writes "Move over Russell Crowe, an anonymous hacker in Latvia is being hailed as a real life modern Robin Hood. The hacker refers to himself as 'Neo,' claims allegiance with the Fourth Awakening People's Army, and is outing banks that are capitalizing off of the horrible economic status Latvia is currently suffering from. No word on how he is acquiring the information but it is slowly being leaked to TV sources via Twitter and the common people love him. The hacker is thought to be based in Britain but a TV reporter pointed out the fine line Neo is walking, 'On the one hand of course he has stolen confidential data ... and he actually has committed a crime. But at the same time there is value for the public in the sense that now a lot of information gets disclosed and the whole system maybe becomes a little more transparent.' An example of a juicy tidbit he revealed is that managers of a Latvian bank did not take the salary cuts they promised they would after the government bailed them out of economic trouble. You can imagine that taxpayers were upset and thankful they knew this information."

Comments

Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[sopssa]

Million Reasons Why Latvia Is The Best Country In The World

Be warned, you'll lose productivity for rest of the day.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[Anonymous Coward]

Every time someone posts anything about Latvia in international portal and somebody advertises this site instantly. Never enough ?

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[jayme0227]

I suppose it would be better if I could actually read what was written in the pictures, but really, I only lost about 38 seconds of productivity. Without a sense of context, the humor in most of those was lost on me.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[Anonymous Coward]

Reminds me of http://www.peopleofwalmart.com/

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[copponex]

Be warned, you'll lose productivity for rest of the day.

Sir, we are already reading slashdot.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[rhathar]

+1 Insightful Sad Truth

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[rtb61]

Consider the alternate, you could be watching adults playing games like children trying to remember your glory days as a high school jock strap or cheer leader, , you could be watching reality TV, you could be watching day time soaps, your could be watching TV adds, you could be watching Fox advertising as news, hmm, slashdot still way better than staring at the idiot box.

The story has an odd tilt, I wasn't aware they you could actually steal the truth, although I suppose you can rob lies of their effectiveness.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[Rufty]

Thanks for that!

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[Anonymous Coward]

How about the the kid blowing up the condom like a balloon? Too obscure?

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[luder]

Be warned, you'll lose productivity for rest of the day.

That's nothing, compared to English Russia.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[CharlyFoxtrot]

I'm afraid there's at least one reason neighbouring Estonia is better.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[ScruffyScrode]

This is in response to your signature, so OT mod here I come. The form of democracy that Chomsky agitates for is a thousand times more oppressive to an individual than any one Corporation has every been. You can always quit, you can always start your own corporation and run it differently, you can always purchase goods/services from another corporation, or even none at all. When you're sick of your democracy your only options are violence and moving to a foreign land.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[Anonymous Coward]

to think of the shitload of people that have died while USA stole their oil to so these fat motherfuckers can drive their asses around

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[copponex]

You can always quit, you can always start your own corporation and run it differently, you can always purchase goods/services from another corporation

And if the corporation owns the roads? Or the water supply? Or the health care system? Or the oil supply? Obviously this implies that there are multiple competitors in the same market, which 1) isn't always feasible, and 2) would require some corrective third party regulation to make sure monopolies didn't overtake the whole system, or businesses didn't collude to fix prices, or purposefully bail on their contracts with smaller organizations, etc. Chomsky in particular advocates for anarcho-syndicalism, which would involve many non-states providing shared services through federated, voluntary groups. It's a little too utopian for my taste. Let him speak for himself: (emphasis mine)

The greatest threat to democracy right now is the transfer of decision making into the hands of unaccountable private power. It's done by a lot of ways, but one of them is what they call "minimizing the state." This is kind of paradoxical for me. I'm an old-time anarchist from way back. I don't think the federal government is a legitimate institution. I think it ought to be dismantled, in principle; just as I don't think there ought to be cages -- I don't think people ought to live in cages. On the other hand, if I'm in a cage and there's a saber tooth tiger outside, I'd be happy to keep the bars of the cage in place -- even though I think the cage is illegitimate. I think that image is not inappropriate. There are plenty of good arguments, in my opinion, against centralized government authority. On the other hand, there's a much worse danger right outside. The centralized government authority is at least to some extent under popular influence, and in principle at least under popular control. The unaccountable private power outside is under no public control. What they call minimizing the state -- transferring the decision making to unaccountable private interests -- is not helpful to human beings or to democracy or, for that matter, to the markets. In this time when we are told there is "a triumph of the market," the markets are threatened themselves, aren't they? What's developing is a kind of corporate mercantilism with huge centralized, more or less command economies, integrated with one another, closely tied to state power -- relying very heavily on state power, in fact -- and enforcing social policies and a conception of social and political order that happen to be highly beneficial to the interests of the top sectors of the population, the richest sectors. -Chomsky, 1997

I can pretty much agree with that snippet. The best description of what I "agitate" for would be a well-regulated capitalist society that produced wealth in humane and environmentally sound ways, did not intervene in the sovereign affairs of other nations, and made the universal health care, food, shelter, and access to information fundamental human rights.

When you're sick of your democracy your only options are violence and moving to a foreign land.

Or you could vote, run for office, strike, protest... there are quite a few options. America is a bad example because we don't have a functioning democracy. The same entities pretty much run the government and the media, so it's game over until the system completely collapses and we start over.

Check out GDP per capita from any source you like. When the majority has real input into the way their society functions, their societies tend to do rather well over the long term. You just have to have a willing populace that can give their opinions through non-monetary means.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[ScruffyScrode]

1. ) Claiming competition isn't always feasible is a failure of imagination, nothing more.
2. ) Despite what people think monopolies only exist because the government is around to beat up their enemies. In the absence of government regulation monopolies are rare, and temporary, and of limited power. Business collusion is a rapidly deteriorating situation.

Imagine for a moment you can produce a widget at your company for $5 and your competitor can produce it for the same $5 as you, and you both currently collect $2 profit per widget, of course both of you being greedy, ignoble capitalists you collude to raise the price by $5 (to a total of $12). This will cause a decrease in demand, as people can afford fewer widgets now. Each of you will have excess capacity that could be used to produce widgets, one of you (or an upstart) will understand that if you lower the price back to the original price of $7, you will end up with a more profits than if you remained in collusion, simply by absorbing the demand of your competitor.

Bailing on contracts is a matter for courts, not regulations or regulators.

The bold parts of Chomsky's text actually highlights his misunderstanding of markets, and his near-religious belief in popular opinion.

"The best description of what I "agitate" for would be a well-regulated capitalist society that produced wealth in humane and environmentally sound ways, did not intervene in the sovereign affairs of other nations"

Sounds both desirable and agreeable.

"and made the universal health care, food, shelter, and access to information fundamental human rights"

I sense a deep misunderstanding of the nature of human rights in this sentence, but in a purely grammatical sense I agree with you. Access to these goods and services is a human right, in the same way that access to any other market is, through trade.

You see I don't have the right to defend myself, or to speak freely because the Constitution says so, I have thees rights because I am a living, thinking human being. You should re-read the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, if you look carefully those documents do not grant us rights, they simply acknowledge them. Healthcare, food, and shelter are not human rights, they are products/services. Someone has to build them, someone has to do the labor. If you are claiming they are a right, in essence you are claiming that it is your right to hold the doctor, the homebuilder and the grocer as your slaves.

Information, however, is a different subject. Information itself is not a scarce resource (If I know something, it doesn't exclude you from knowing that same thing), yet just because information is not scarce does not mean that you have a right to every bit of information ever thought up, ever discovered, ever created. If information has been given to you, you have every natural right to, in turn, give it away. But if it hasn't been given to you, you have no right to pry it out of another private individuals mind, or off of their property.

I suppose you could mean that everyone ought to have a right to computers/internet access. If you mean that computers and internet access ought to be free, again you are saying that computer manufacturers and telecom companies ought to be slaves.

"Or you could vote, run for office, strike, protest... there are quite a few options. America is a bad example because we don't have a functioning democracy. The same entities pretty much run the government and the media, so it's game over until the system completely collapses and we start over."

I think you misunderstood by my original statement. You see, you can't cure someone who is sick of democracy by giving them more of it. It so happens that I do all of the things listed, yet I only do them in a defensive manner. When someone wants to take the wealth I've earned, I vote for someone else (preferably one who will undue past harmful legislation), when someone wants to "grant" new rights, I vote for someone who understands what rights

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[ScruffyScrode]

Sorry, I haven't ran for office, or engaged in a strike (because my working conditions and wages are well within reason), I didn't mean to claim that I had.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[copponex]

Imagine for a moment you can produce a widget at your company...

Ahh, are we back to the Parker Brothers simplification of economics? I'm afraid you're suffering from the "widget fallacy," which assumes that for every product, that product is discrete, easily examined for quality and function, easily duplicated by competition, and doesn't affect the overall well-being of an economy. If your widget is the water supply to a city, what is the cost to the economy by the time everyone has dug their own wells, only to drain the water table to the point where none of the wells work, and they're back to paying you whatever you desire? Or, if you just jack up the rate enough to make a billion dollars, and then take your ignoble gains to the Bahamas? The Chicago School of Imagineering seems unable to deal in complexities, which is a slight problem in economics.

You should re-read the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, if you look carefully those documents do not grant us rights, they simply acknowledge them.

So, the freedom of the press is not backed and thus granted by law? This really is news to me.

Someone has to build them, someone has to do the labor. If you are claiming they are a right, in essence you are claiming that it is your right to hold the doctor, the homebuilder and the grocer as your slaves.

Are public lawyers slaves? Are soldiers slaves? How about road contractors? In essence, I think your argument is fundamentally flawed.

When someone wants to take the wealth I've earned

Here is the most fundamental misunderstanding of economics. Good economies require a reliable market. If there wasn't a regulatory body preventing the inherent inefficiencies of the market from destroying itself, you'd have no way to create your wealth. If there wasn't a consumer class, or a reliable and safe food supply, or a stable power grid, or an open and interconnected telecommunications infrastructure, or a police force, or court system, or emergency services, or federal highway system, your ability to create wealth would be severely diminished. If you think governments only get in the way, please enlighten me on the location of these magical countries. Otherwise, I'd say you just disagree on what parts of society should be socially funded, based on something ridiculous, like the dogmas of 18th century political philosophy.

By the way claiming that we don't have a functioning democracy is a "no true Scotsman" fallacy

A functioning democracy has several integral parts that America is missing. France, Switzerland, Germay, Norway, Sweden, Austria, Denmark, The Netherlands, Belgium, and Spain are examples of "truer Scotsman." Perhaps your argument is suffering from the fallacy of the strawman fallacy.

Finally, GDP numbers are garbage. They are such high-level aggregates that they say almost nothing about a given society.

Oh, I'm sure other economics professors would be interested in your superior measure of economic output. Please outline it for us so we can all benefit. Or wait, are you saying there are more important measures than productivity? That would imply, dare I say it, that there should be some non-monetary inputs in a given society...

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[ScruffyScrode]

http://mises.org/

The Chicago School is only slightly better than the bare Keynesians.

Both schools are based on the deeply flawed idea that human action can be represented accurately in a mathematical model, along with a few other deeply flawed ideas.

You're claiming I have utilized a "widget fallacy" (please provide a link because your explanation is useless to me), but have not described a true flaw in the logic, you are simply mad at a placeholder for real world goods in the logic. Maybe you ought to give me an example of a "widget" (or "widgets") that would show the flaw in the logic.

Just because something is backed by law does not mean it is granted by law.

"Are public lawyers slaves? Are soldiers slaves? How about road contractors? In essence, I think your argument is fundamentally flawed."

These people may not be slaves but their income was forcibly removed from the hands of someone(taxpayers). In essence they are funded by second-hand slavery.

"Here is the most fundamental misunderstanding of economics..."

The things that you listed are only barely provided adequately by government, and each and every one of them has been provided by private institutions at some point in history. Most of them right here in the U.S.

As for the 18th century comment, consider reading some Hans Hermann Hoppe, or Murray Rothbard.

A strawman fallacy means that I oversimplified your argument. I didn't, I simply pointed out that you are practicing a fallacy, and by responding the way you did (pointing out "truer Scotsmen") you confirmed my point.

"Oh, I'm sure other economics professors would be interested..."

Classic appeal to authority.

"That would imply, dare I say it, that there should be some non-monetary inputs in a given society..."

I never said otherwise.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[Anonymous Coward]

You're claiming I have utilized a "widget fallacy" (please provide a link because your explanation is useless to me), but have not described a true flaw in the logic, you are simply mad at a placeholder for real world goods in the logic. Maybe you ought to give me an example of a "widget" (or "widgets") that would show the flaw in the logic.

As an outside observer you lost the argument right here. You fail to understand that not all products have the same properties as a "widget". This failure shows you're either grossly out of your elements in this discussion or intentionally avoiding the point you know you can't win.

Your posts show that you might want to consider some dynamics coursework. Understanding high order dynamic systems and feedback mechanisms would make you a much more competent arguer in economics.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[copponex]

You're claiming I have utilized a "widget fallacy" (please provide a link because your explanation is useless to me)... Maybe you ought to give me an example of a "widget" (or "widgets") that would show the flaw in the logic.

The entire point is that very little in modern economies can be modeled by a widget, so it's a fine thought experiment, it just has one fundamental flaw: it isn't useful in reality. As thought experiments are the foundation of the Austrian school, this turns out to be a problem. In fact, it seems that the entire school of thought is that economics is too hard to model, so we should just give up, and let the market do whatever it wants. That seems like a rather pathetic solution to an important problem.

I've read some of the work, and they've made a few important observations. The critical issue is that there is no country that has demonstrated that low-tax laissez faire economies with little social spending outperform high-tax regulated economies that have a lot of social spending. And the other critical issue is that there are no falsifiable theories to test from the Austrian school.

These people may not be slaves but their income was forcibly removed from the hands of someone(taxpayers). In essence they are funded by second-hand slavery.

In this sense, we're all second hand slaves, unless you suggest we dismantle all services that are funded with taxes.

The things that you listed are only barely provided adequately by government, and each and every one of them has been provided by private institutions at some point in history. Most of them right here in the U.S.

That's an opinion you haven't supported with evidence. What economy supports your opinions?

A strawman fallacy means that I oversimplified your argument. I didn't, I simply pointed out that you are practicing a fallacy, and by responding the way you did (pointing out "truer Scotsmen") you confirmed my point.

You don't understand the fallacy. If I had said "no democracies are doing poorly" that would be a cyclical argument where I redefine what a "true" democracy is. It's like describing a car, and I said, "this is a bad example of the performance of an Audi because it's missing wheels. Here are examples of other Audis who are performing well with wheels."

Classic appeal to authority.

Yes, why bring up medical terms that doctors use when you're talking about health care? Or numbers when discussing mathematics? Memorizing rhetorical fallacies and throwing them until they stick is a poor device for debate.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[jayme0227]

I was referring more to things like this and this. Perhaps some of this, this, and this. When about a third of the jokes are completely incomprehensible to me, then I'm wasting my time on the wrong website. As for the ones that I could get the joke on, I'm sure I could find something similar on failblog, where everything's written in my language.

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[ScruffyScrode]

Okay for now let me try this:

Which products aren't discrete? Which cannot be examined for quality? Which cannot be duplicated by competition? Which affect the overall well being of an economy?

If an example can't be offered, what am I supposed to do? Make one up for you?

The claim about a water monopoly is rubbish, unless you can find an instance where this happened that wasn't a direct result of the use of force (government or physical).

Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments

[easyTree]

http://miljons.com/im/lv_l_2008032504134740884.jpg

Neo?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, everything else aside, that's just lame.

ahh

[Anonymous Coward]

i saw a guy walking down the street just today - in a long black coat wearing sunglasses talking on his nokia. i thought "i bet that guys a leet hacker" probably him. he was scowling.

Re:ahh

[grcumb]

i saw a guy walking down the street just today - in a long black coat wearing sunglasses talking on his nokia. i thought "i bet that guys a leet hacker" probably him. he was scowling.

You're wrong. The person you saw:

• Was stylish;
• Outdoors;
• Had at least one friend.

If this was a real hacker, he was disguised as a n00b.

Re:ahh

[Idiomatick]

It was 4am so there was no sun and he's not stylish. And he's was sshing into his voice controlled server.

Re:ahh

[Anonymous Coward]

sshing into his voice controlled server.

Did anyone else read this as "shushing" his server?

Re:ahh

[CharlyFoxtrot]

Did anyone else read this as "shushing" his server?

ssh; unzip; touch; strip; finger; expand; head; find; mount; yes; more; yes; ping; halt; make clean; sleep

Re:ahh

[Anonymous Coward]

then he is an idiot.
really, who says passcodes over an unsecure line

Re:ahh

[L4t3r4lu5]

Neo was the Chuck Norris of hacking. While his brain was sending l33t commands to a r00ted server, the manifestation in the virtual round was roundhouse kicks all the way.

Oh, and some flying.

Re:ahh

[Random5]

People who can mentally hash their password with the salt the computer reads to them

Some sympathy some not so

[JoshuaZ]

Ok. Clearly the fact that the pay cuts for the executives didn't occur is something that this individual should have leaked and was the right thing to do. ( Why didn't the government insist on minimal transparency about the salaries in the first place? Because apparently corruption and lobbying is the same everywhere). Frankly, in TFA I don't see any information listed that shouldn't have become public. It doesn't look like they leaked anything that allowed people to take money from accounts or to steal identities or to create damage to the banks' computer networks. If there's any indication that Neo has done anything bad (other than choosing a really pretentious and unoriginal alias) I don't see it in TFA.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Danse]

I think it's a good thing that he's doing this. Of course if he gets caught he'll face at least some sort of punishment. He's not being malicious or destructive, so I'd consider it a form of civil disobedience. What I'd like to hear is what kind of punishment the bankers are going to get for essentially lying and stealing from the taxpayers. I bet they get a slap on the wrist at best.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Slap on the Wrist?

How dare you openly endorse such uncivil class warfare! It is everyone's obligation to understand that bankers are simply special. It would be an insult to apply rules made for common men to them.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Pete Venkman]

It seems to me that this could be the work of a whistleblower, but then I don't see why he/she would claim to be a hacker--unless Latvia does not protect against retaliation toward whistleblowers.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

Bad and illegal are different things. He has clearly violated laws by obtaining access to this information.

We may think that individual instances of criminal conduct are beneficial. Under U.S. law those individuals may be able to claim the affirmative defense of "necessity," claiming that they violated the law because the benefit of the violation outweighed the harm done. Here, it's unclear whether Neo knew, when he broke the law and accessed this information, that there would be a benefit to doing so.

Ultimately, this case illustrates the problems that arise when corruption puts law and morality at odds with one another. That doesn't mean Latvians should welcome and encourage vigilantism; it only means they have a corruption problem that needs to be addressed.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Rary]

If there's any indication that Neo has done anything bad (other than choosing a really pretentious and unoriginal alias) I don't see it in TFA.

Then you must not have read this sentence, found in both TFA and TFS: "On the one hand of course he has stolen confidential data... and he actually has committed a crime."

Just because some of the information in some of the stolen documents should be made public doesn't change the fact that he stole the documents. Having a good reason to commit a crime doesn't make it not a crime. It might, in some circumstances, get you leniency in sentencing, but it's still a crime.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[GoCoGi]

A "crime" is not necessarily "bad".

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Danse]

If there's any indication that Neo has done anything bad (other than choosing a really pretentious and unoriginal alias) I don't see it in TFA.

Then you must not have read this sentence, found in both TFA and TFS: "On the one hand of course he has stolen confidential data... and he actually has committed a crime."

Just because some of the information in some of the stolen documents should be made public doesn't change the fact that he stole the documents. Having a good reason to commit a crime doesn't make it not a crime. It might, in some circumstances, get you leniency in sentencing, but it's still a crime.

The fact that the crime was committed against those who were themselves engaged in criminal acts may cause the courts to consider it a justified act committed to prevent a much greater crime (i.e. the theft of large amounts of taxpayer money).

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

what kind of punishment the bankers are going to get for essentially lying and stealing from the taxpayers

A bonus?

They won't stop until bankers get lynched in the streets.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[JoshuaZ]

Committed a crime and did something bad are not the same thing always. Sometimes the moral or ethical act is against the law. It doesn't take much effort to give historic or current examples. Just a few people off the top of my head who've committed crimes that are morally either ok or the right thing to do: off the top of my head: abolitionists in the pre-Civil War US, protestors in Iran, and whoever gave Wikileaks their leaked documents about Guantanamo.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[fulldecent]

>> the theft of large amounts of taxpayer money

I don't think that's officially a crime anywhere anymore

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[mandelbr0t]

Having a good reason to commit a crime doesn't make it not a crime. It might, in some circumstances, get you leniency in sentencing, but it's still a crime.

Not going to disagree with you there, but willingness to commit crime can sometimes be the moral action when the law protects the immoral. There are few people that are so brave, and their actions should be lauded regardless of their criminality. One man's villain is another man's hero. Of course, the only positive thing that can be said about moral, criminal acts is that you get to be self-righteous. If you get caught, you still go to jail. On the other hand, King Richard eventually pardoned Robin Hood. Good people are eventually vindicated.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Of course, "stealing confidential data" (from a non-government source), where the confidentiality is self-defined by the owner, is exactly the kind of DMCA type violation we regularly decry here. What you (and TFA) are suggesting is that the act of acquiring the data is a crime in and of itself, rather than the criminal use of the data.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Rary]

I agree, "criminal" doesn't necessarily mean "bad". I kind of took it from your comment that you were implying he hadn't done anything criminal, because the leaked information should be public anyway. I'm just saying that, while leaking the information may not necessarily be criminal, and certainly isn't bad, obtaining it was definitely criminal, and there's not enough information to determine whether or not it was bad.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Rary]

The DMCA is about copyright protection and reverse engineering. It has nothing to do with hacking into information systems to obtain data.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Rary]

The fact that the crime was committed against those who were themselves engaged in criminal acts may cause the courts to consider it a justified act committed to prevent a much greater crime (i.e. the theft of large amounts of taxpayer money).

I don't know about Latvia, but around here vigilantism isn't looked on too kindly by most courts.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Clandestine_Blaze]

The fact that the crime was committed against those who were themselves engaged in criminal acts may cause the courts to consider it a justified act committed to prevent a much greater crime (i.e. the theft of large amounts of taxpayer money).

I really hope so, but I don't have much faith in the court system anywhere after reading about what happened to the Google Executives in Italy.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[$RANDOMLUSER]

It was exactly the "act of attempting it is a crime itself" aspect of the reverse engineering provisions that I was referring to.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[cdrguru]

Let's see... the information that this guy is posting came from government tax documents. Meaning, pretty clearly that the government knew all about this and it is no surprise to anyone there.

Some bankers made promises that didn't come true. Boo-hoo. As far as I am aware, unless there is some sort of "contract" involved promises mean, well, nothing. No criminal act, no wrongdoing whatsoever. For example, Obama promised to close Guantanamo Bay within one year. Where is his comeuppance? See, promises don't mean much.

There was no lying and no stealing from anyone. Get over it. People make lots of promises every day and they are effectively meaningless.

Hope this guy didn't leave any personally identifiable tracks.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[westlake]

A "crime" is not necessarily "bad".

But a conviction still puts you behind bars.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Danse]

I don't know about Latvia, but around here vigilantism isn't looked on too kindly by most courts.

Depends on the circumstances I think. It's not like he stole the documents at gunpoint or something. This being a non-violent, non-destructive crime, I think they may be more lenient. That is, at least, if the courts aren't as corrupt as the banks.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Danse]

There was no lying and no stealing from anyone. Get over it. People make lots of promises every day and they are effectively meaningless.

Seriously? You don't see telling the government that you will take pay cuts in exchange for financial assistance and then not doing it as lying? This isn't even at all like Gitmo. At least there they've been making significant efforts even though they didn't meet their goal. The bankers just flat out lied because there's no effort involved in taking a pay cut. Lying in order to get money is generally considered fraud, yes?

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Rary]

But breaking into computer systems was a crime before the DMCA, and will continue to be a crime even if the DMCA disappears tomorrow.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[jellomizer]

Well do you want people poking around your accounts even if they are not giving information that will lead to identity thief.

Say for example the following...
They see a bunch of sales at a liquor store. Then they have an idea that you are a drinker/partier and give this information to your health insurance company so they can deny coverage.

Or How much porn you actually buy, say you were running for politics or put on the impression you are of strong moral values.

Or lets just say you are spending a little extra and not letting your wife know and that information is given to her and jump to a conclusion that you are cheating or doing something else.

Lets just access your EZ-Pass information and find out you have been speeding.

There are a lot of laws on the books. Most likely you have broken a few yourself. The reason for the unreasonable search laws and a attempt to protect privacy is because otherwise we will be drowning in fines and legal suits for our lives.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

In Italy, the state and (established, old) media are very closely linked, so it is no surprise that an unrealistic judgement has been made against a new media company.

It's all about the business and money.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Idiomatick]

You must be new here. Look at how most e-crimes have worked out. What seems sensible rarely ends up occurring.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Danse]

You must be new here. Look at how most e-crimes have worked out. What seems sensible rarely ends up occurring.

Yeah, I'm new here ;-P My thinking on this case is that they'll have to tread carefully if the public sees this guy as a hero for exposing corruption. To punish him too harshly could trigger bad things for the government. Even if the courts throw the book at him for some reason, there would likely be a lot of public pressure for a pardon.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Heck, America doesn't protect it's whistle blowers. Why should Latvia?

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Of course not- the courts are bought and paid for representatives of the financial class.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[xaxa]

Because Latvia is part of the EU, and wants to impress it's (relatively) new friends.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Derosian]

Don't forget about the whole bunch of founding father's of the USA, being traitors and committing great crimes, ect, ect.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[umghhh]

you had an excellent idea - I mean the lynching one. I guess at some point the only thing good men can do.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[umghhh]

Here in Germany stealing data from banks is ok.

At least as long as banks in question are in Switzerland and stolen data can help in 'fixing' the budget deficit or so their propaganda says.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

pr0n is tricky I admit. Even if you live by principles and openly talk about your 'habit' somebody may find that one of the movies you purchased is titled 'sweet teenies 19' so you are officially a pervert and your position is gone.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[xiong.chiamiov]

Heck, America doesn't protect it's whistle blowers. Why should Latvia?

Because they know the difference between its and it's.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[The Wild Norseman]

Because Latvia is part of the EU, and wants to impress it's (relatively) new friends.

Then they should legalize marijuana because all the cool countries are doing it.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[JAlexoi]

Let me correct you - This is not in the context of the American legal system we are talking about. It's not even a common legal system. So they may be held to account for their public promises.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[JAlexoi]

Breaking the law is not necessarily a crime.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[cduffy]

Of course, "stealing confidential data" (from a non-government source), where the confidentiality is self-defined by the owner, is exactly the kind of DMCA type violation we regularly decry here. What you (and TFA) are suggesting is that the act of acquiring the data is a crime in and of itself, rather than the criminal use of the data.

These are trivially distinguishable, even in concept.

In the case of hacking into an external system, one is (a) making false representations to a third party (via their computer systems), and/or (b) putting expense and/or damages onto a third party (ie. time spent by staff analyzing and responding to an attempted attack).

In the case of cracking a protection layer around a piece of software or data which an individual "owns", by contrast, there is no interaction with any third-party (presuming that the work is being done within an isolated sandbox); thus, no false representations, and no ability to incur 3rd-party expense.

While other points of distinction are certainly possible, I believe this is sufficient to explain why a reasonable individual can consider laws against hacking into 3rd-party systems just while simultaneously considering laws such as those aspects of the DMCA which can prohibit tinkering with one's own property unjust.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[martin-boundary]

But a conviction still puts you behind bars.

That's advice for all seasons, man!

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Arker]

That is a bald assertion however.

Just because someone *wrote* that he committed a crime, and someone else repeated it, does not mean it is true. I would like to see it explained exactly what crime he committed here. It appears all he did was increment and decrement urls. A system that calls that a crime would be criminally insane.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Arker]

Well do you want people poking around your accounts even if they are not giving information that will lead to identity thief.

Whether I want it to happen or not and whether it amounts to a crime or not are two entirely different questions. As also is, if a crime was committed, who specifically committed it?

From what I can tell this guy just decremented and/or incremented URLs and the server sent him the information. If there was a crime committed, it would seem to have been commmitted by whomever had responsibility for setting up that server and protecting the information on it.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

Not if they systems belong to you. The DCMA says its illegal to search for vulnerabilities in the software and hardware you already own.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[richlv]

for the record, from the currently publicly available information.

1. information was obtained from a very simple and (supposedly) obvious software vulnerability;

2. software in question was developed by exigen services latvia (http://www.exigenservices.lv/);

3. an audit was conducted on the local irs (vid) it systems by kmpg and ernst & young, totalling at 1 million lats (~ 2 million usd);

4. data leaked includes full wage information on majority of companies in latvia.

a lot of factors are being disputed (like auditors disclaiming any liability). as for (potential) damage to honest businesses :

1. full information on wages makes businesses more vulnerable to talent stealing, finding targets for bribes etc;

2. biggest message to take home is "you can't trust state organisations even a bit". the same organisation (local irs, vid) few years ago was illegally wiretapping calls of a local journalist (they have a branch with enforcing/investigating capabilities). now, of course, most people and businesses do not have much choice but to deal with oversized, ineffective and massively corrupted instances.

and recently they have started taking fingerprints from _everybody_ ("new order" to get a passport). we probably should have no illusions about who will get the fingerprint db first - random hackers or organised crime.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

His apostrophe was right, but he forgot a few other punctuation marks. What he meant was

Heck, America doesn't protect! It is whistle blowers (who are the real protectors). Why? Should Latvia?

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[ananthap]

I thought that a man should be presumed innocent until proven guilty. What I mean is that just because we - the general public - know of no means to acquire and publish without stealing it, that doesn't mean that there are no other ways. Could be something straight forward. Many countries have wonderful laws regarding information (that exist in theory) and are easy to exploit if you know the right persons.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

That has nothing to do with this. Are you suggesting that this "Neo" fellow owns the bank's systems? Nobody is saying that the DMCA is a good thing. It's just not relevant to this discussion.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Nyder]

Heck, America doesn't protect it's whistle blowers. Why should Latvia?

Dr. Doom will deal with it.

Re:Some sympathy some not so

[Anonymous Coward]

In his case he would be a martyr for the state.

See also: Rosa Parks

Dear Robin Hood

[Anonymous Coward]

After you have enlightened Goldman Sachs, please give some money to the U.S.A to pay the remaining balance of its lease of Alaska from Russia.

Yours In Riga,
K. Trout

Can't help myself

[msavory]

Bunch of Fapa's.

Latvia? Not USA?

[Andy Dodd]

" An example of a juicy tidbit he revealed is that managers of a Latvian bank did not take the salary cuts they promised they would after the government bailed them out of economic trouble."

Are you sure he's actually talking about Latvia and not the US?

Oh wait, AIG's execs had the balls to promise nothing and actually give themselves *bonuses* for running their company so far into the ground that it needed a bailout.

His service....

[rshol]

...was almost as valuable as that of the hacker(s) who brought us the Climategate files from East Anglia. The crime of the Latvian Bankers is small potatoes compared to the scam those capitalizing on feared but unproven anthropogenic climate change are running.

Re:His service....

[Improv]

Actually, the "climategate" stuff just shows us how nutty some strands of American conservativism have become - one gets a bunch of people who, not understanding the context of the mails or much of the science, jump on language that might naïvely seem to be evidence of fraud, but on closer examination by anyone willing to look, turn out to be completely innocuous. False crises arn't really a PR problem in the long run - they just go on the list of things certain people will be embarassed about in a few years.

Re:His service....

[wintercolby]

Mod parent as troll, please. Absolutely nothing to do with the current topic, and is persuing an agenda for a different arena.

Re:His service....

[Anonymous Coward]

Well shit, other than that minor little "detail", let's bash conservatives instead!

Robin the Hood...

[JackPepper]

stole from the government and gave to the overtaxed. This guy is copying from the government and pasting to the people. He's more like a "Neo the Document Liberator?"

Re:Robin the Hood...

[idontgno]

At least it wasn't lupins.

Re:Robin the Hood...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's never lupins.

Re:Robin the Hood...

[Old Man Kensey]

If he had read enough decent sci-fi, he'd call himself "Nick Haflinger". The similarity is striking.

STOP THE PRESSES!

[DarthVain]

Latvia has banks? :) sry.

Re:STOP THE PRESSES!

[godrik]

Every country has banks. The real news is that they have Internet ! :)

Re:STOP THE PRESSES!

[muntis]

Hah, any country would like to have Internet like we have here in Latvia. http://www.speedtest.net/global.php Don't underestimate developing countries, we don't have legacy infrastructure to rely on.

Re:STOP THE PRESSES!

[Anonymous Coward]

The real news is that they have Internet ! :)

- Big Lol to this.

Riga (capital of Latvia) is one of the first places in the world where one can get optical cable with 500mbs bandwidth in your apartment for very reasonable price.

Re:STOP THE PRESSES!

[miggyb]

Holy shit. That's reason enough to move to Latvia.

"Neo"

[Low Ranked Craig]

How original.

Re:"Neo"

[Anonymous Coward]

Well I guess its better than p33nGobbler, but what do I know I'm not a l33t h4x0r

Re:"Neo"

[Idiomatick]

Bet he'd be really pissed if he's had the name for a decade or so.

Re:"Neo"

[Jade_Wayfarer]

And pretty creative at the same time - I think there are much more "Neos" in the Internet then even the "Anonymous", so being "Neo" is more anonymous than even "Anonymous" themselves. If not practical, it is still stylish in some way )

Angle-grinder man being supplanted?

[seniorcoder]

If he is from Britain, maybe it is angle-grinder man who has been reborn with new super-powers. http://www.zimbio.com/10+Real+Life+Superheroes+Who+Have+Actually+Made+a+Difference/articles/KK4rSsSTgOq/2+Angle+Grinder+Man

Re:Angle-grinder man being supplanted?

[Anonymous Coward]

Viva hombre de la Ángulo-amoladora!

el hombre de la Ángulo-amoladora es un campeón de la gente!

Re:Angle-grinder man being supplanted?

[CorporateSuit]

Whoever designs a website with a 10-part, ad-laden article which OPENS A NEW WINDOW EVERY TIME YOU CLICK ON THE " GO TO PART N+1" needs his head violently pressed against a cheese grater until he fixes it.

Re:Angle-grinder man being supplanted?

[Idiomatick]

#5 succcks, she basically stops stupid people that put themselves in bad situations from learning any lessons. Stopping drunk chicks from leaving with guys is stupid. To top it off she's sexist:
"I protect the single girl living in the big city," Terrifica told ABC in 2002. "I do this because women are weak. They are easily manipulated, and they need to be protected from themselves and most certainly from men and their ill intentions toward them."

twitter?

[Anonymous Coward]

What's the actual link or username for said twitter feed? No article states it.

Re:twitter?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://twitter.com/neo4ata

Not that much different...

[MoriT]

...than investigative reporters going through people's trash. Now, releasing those bank account numbers so individuals who so wished could withdraw what they like, that would be Robin Hood-style.

How about here in the states?

[greymond]

I'd like to see someone give out information on the financial businesses that received bailout funds, but rather than just hearing about executives at bankrupt companies getting paid millions in bonuses, how about we just be told their bank account numbers, routing numbers, and other personal information so we can bail ourselves out of their mess?

Re:Latvia? Not USA?

[BlueTrin]

I think it is an attribute of any category of people which have power within a country. You can find pretty much examples in every country ...

Latvia, isn't than near Detroit?

[Anonymous Coward]

That place really is third-world. Detroit Crap City is what KISS calls it now.

I find it hard to take seriously a group called...

[DigitalReverend]

FAP Army.

Don't fuck with the big banks

[Bloopie]

I don't know anything about Latvia. Here in the U.S., though, you don't fuck with the big banks. They have money and power--which they will throw at your political opponents if you become too much of a "problem."

From the article I just linked to:

Republicans are rushing to capitalize on what they call Wall Street's "buyer's remorse" with the Democrats. And industry executives and lobbyists are warning Democrats that if Mr. Obama keeps attacking Wall Street "fat cats," they may fight back by withholding their cash.

"If the president doesn't become a little more balanced and centrist in his approach, then he will likely lose that support," said Kelly S. King, the chairman and chief executive of BB&T.

Balanced and centrist? I guess that just about sums it up.

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[sricetx]

The solution is for everyone to pull money out of Chase bank and cancel their accounts. Granted, like any boycott is may not be very effective, but that's about all the individual can do. See the website move your money for more information http://moveyourmoney.info/

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[Grizzley9]

What a great way to show the public you're not easily swayed by [withheld] campaign contributions and will do what you say...

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[Lord Ender]

I can see those conversations:

Bank chairmen: "Mr. Obama and Congress, give us billions of dollars of the Public's money, no strings attached."

Politicians: "If we don't do this, your banks will close, the FDIC will go bankrupt, and we will have a terrible deflationary depression, is that right?"

Bank chairmen: "You are correct. Billions of dollars, please. Hand 'em over."

Politicians: "Well we must prevent a depression, but you don't exactly deserve billions of the Public's money. So here's the cash, but there will be strings attached..."

Bank chairmen: "Whatever; thanks for the cash! PS: buy these defaulting mortgages from us too, please. At twice their real value. Good! Bye!" ... one year later ...

Politicians: "Here are the strings we told you about..."

Bank chairmen: "What? Regulation? Penalties? You radicals! We thought you were balanced centrists, not commies! After all our payouts, we still have a few billion of the Public's money left. If you try to force any penalties on us, that money will be used to make sure you never get elected again. Checkmate."

Politicians: "Oh fuck--pwned."

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[sjames]

What really makes me wonder is that they cannot have put things more plainly. They are not only offering their cash to have the leaders of our nation act in their personal interest (and so against the best interests of the country) but they fully expect their offer to be accepted. All that and nobody even blinks.

Truly, they should be lined up and shot as traitors, and so should anybody who accepts their offer.

Perhaps it should be televised as an example to others.

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[Neoprofin]

What about all the people that have debt owed to Chase? Probably quite a large portion of people who do business with them actually.

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[JAlexoi]

In the Baltic states, the banks have less power than the retailers. But more money does not always result in victories in these countries. Let alone, companies are not allowed to contribute, only individuals are allowed. Last time I checked, there is a law prohibiting the type of funding that is usual in US. And all funding is 100% public - meaning anyone can check who contributed how much.

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[CharlyFoxtrot]

It's the same everywhere. Here in Belgium the boards of banks are loaded with past and current politicians just to make sure they know where their bread is buttered. The only exception may be China where even top officials are afraid of the partyvan (coincidentally the only place where banks are still lending money in significant amounts because politicians told them so.)

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[ImNotAtWork]

If they owe money and Chase isn't properly capitalized (by massive pull out of money as grand parent suggests) then Chase will have to sell that debt to another bank (similar to how people have their mortgages sold) and probably go bankrupt in the process through discounts in the buy out. Or another bail out could possibly save them - I'd like to see how well that goes over.

Re:Don't fuck with the big banks

[Nyder]

The solution is for everyone to pull money out of Chase bank and cancel their accounts. Granted, like any boycott is may not be very effective, but that's about all the individual can do. See the website move your money for more information http://moveyourmoney.info/

You do that and they'll blame it on piracy and ask for another bailout.

Danger

[Elektroschock]

I mean, when you think of international conferences, most ^evil^ lobbyists use the wi-fi in the conference hotel. The presentation is boring, so 60% of them read their mails during the conference. Of course a criminal could just monitor their traffic, read their mails and grab their access passwords, then sent their mails and stuff to wikileaks. It is a danger to our national security because it is technically feasible but no one does. So the protection against criminal action is actually ethics not technology. The real danger is that Robin Hack gets famous and popular, and these pratices get spread by kiddies who enjoy to "Hack the Banksters". Or maybe the Chinese do, no idea.

Who? Wha? Huh?

[ArcadeNut]

What does Russell Crowe have to do with this again? Maybe you mean Kevin Costner?

Re:Who? Wha? Huh?

[SOdhner]

He's playing Robin Hood in a new movie that's not out yet.

Unlike the conservative nutcases

[Anonymous Coward]

. . . who would never admit that they were lying and purposely manipulating the data to suit their political beliefs.

Re:Unlike the conservative nutcases

[Anonymous Coward]

. . . who would never admit that they were lying and purposely manipulating the data to suit their political beliefs.

Yeah, tu quoque is always so persuasive, and true too!

Someone Mentioned this a Few Days Back.

[BJ_Covert_Action]

I don't recall who, or on what thread, but someone posted a comment a couple days back that said something along the lines of, "People used to cheer for bank robbers. It will happen again." I figure this was a reference to John DIllinger and the like. It appears that whoever it was that said that has some decent predictive powers...or at least a good bit of luck every once in awhile.

Re:Someone Mentioned this a Few Days Back.

[tool462]

It appears that whoever it was that said that has some decent predictive powers...or at least a good bit of luck every once in awhile.

Or it's the guy who leaked the data ;)

Re:Someone Mentioned this a Few Days Back.

[CannonballHead]

Cheering for bank robbers depends on whether or not your money was in said bank... :P

Re:Someone Mentioned this a Few Days Back.

[mirix]

I always liked how Woody Guthrie put it in his song about "Pretty boy" Floyd (same era...)

"Some will rob you with a six-gun, and some with a fountain pen."

Re:Someone Mentioned this a Few Days Back.

[carp3_noct3m]

I would argue far more people get robbed daily worldwide with the fountain pen.

mod parent up

[Anonymous Coward]

++ Insightful

Wait, didn't I see this in a Nintendo DS game...?

[MindlessAutomata]

THE YATAGARASU STRIKES AGAIN!

If at first you don't succeed..

[pacbowl]

If the First, Second and Third Awakening People's Army didn't rattle enough cages effectively, what makes them think the Fourth will prevail?

Re:If at first you don't succeed..

[Anonymous Coward]

Because they have FAP power!

Re:If at first you don't succeed..

[Anonymous Coward]

They won't. We need the People's Front of Judea!

Re:If at first you don't succeed..

[muntis]

First and second proclaimed Republic of Latvia. Third gave independence from from USSR. I would say, it's quite of achievement.

Anonymous Coward

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet they have much faster internet than you have. Just check download speed in Latvia neighbours Lithuania etc..

Go Braliukas Go!

[Anonymous Coward]

Go Braliukas Go!

Hacker? Not really

[hammeraxe]

I think calling the guy a hacker is a bit over the top. Basically what he did was change the document id numbers in the URL. The information he was accessing was not secured in any sensible way: the login page could be bypassed by simply entering an address by hand. It's pretty much an epic fail of the company that made the system (unless the flaw was introduced intentionally for some reason). Source: http://translate.google.com/translate?js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=1&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.diena.lv%2Flat%2Fpolitics%2Fhot%2Fneo-no-4ata-mes-bijam-parsteigti-ka-mums-tik-ilgi-lava-datus-kopet&sl=auto&tl=en

Re:Hacker? Not really

[ACS Solver]

The BBC article doesn't entirely reflect the situation. I live in Latvia and do know better ;)

The main thing they're not mentioning is the origin of that data. It wasn't just "downloaded" from the State Revenue Service via a hack or somesuch. This part has made headlines here - it turned out that the Revenue Service's internal system that contains information on all tax payers had no security, at all. You could view the confidential info by accessing an unsecured URL. And just by changing the entry id parameter in the URL, you could get to information about different tax payers, as the parent says. Any moron could get that data and apparently the "hackers"/whistleblowers in question downloaded it over the course of a couple months.

Latvia is no US and of course the organizations here don't have the same kind of security experience that organizations from big countries. Still, this is an important governmental organization we're talking about and the security hole in question is blatant and obvious. As such, many here have doubts that it was accidental, it's quite possible that the Revenue Service was sabotaged.

This Neo guy and his organization are apparently planning now to release information about the financial activities of a bunch of organizations, including governmental ones, as allegedly they believe it will help the society here, create more responsibility, etc. They have, banks aside, so far released information about the salaries of police and public transportation employees. The bank is a separate story really, it got bailed out when the recession hit hard here, and this bailout has in itself been a subject of much contention.

Re:Hacker? Not really

[Anonymous Coward]

and this bailout has in itself been a subject of much contention

If it's anything like it's been here, then that's quite an understatement :)

It's funny, people don't complain when you spend close to a trillion USD in a Iraq (not to speak of two billion in tax cuts for the super-rich). But when you spend it on infrastructure, they start brandishing rifles.

Not a Hack

[MrTripps]

"The nation's security council discussed the breach and expressed concern that only 50 percent of the country's 175 state-run data systems have security oversight. President Valdis Zatlers called for immediate action to install proper security on all systems. Computer experts concluded that the breach did not constitute a cyber-attack and was the result of poorly developed software and systems management." http://www.kansascity.com/2010/02/24/1770170/cyber-whistleblower-stuns-latvia.html I'd hate to be that CIO.

Re:Not a Hack

[arose]

Pretty much any hack relies on exploits...

Re:Not a Hack

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd hate to be that CIO.

Totally incompetent? Yeah that would really suck...

Correction to the story

[karuna]

The summary is completely wrong. The actual history in short is as follows: Latvian Neo claims that the anonymous group 4ATA has downloaded about 7.4 million tax statements from the Latvian tax authority website that is used by businesses to submit their tax declarations electronically. It was done over 3 months period before the IT department realized that something is wrong. The stolen data includes practically full information about salaries and payments received by employees of all Latvian public and private enterprises.

4ATA is now periodically releasing the detailed pay information of certain public companies one at a time. He is careful to remove actual names of employees and for many this data seems trivial. But with this he is trying to prove that the claimed austerity measures undertaken by the government to fight the economic crisis is a big lie. However, the periodic release is annoying politicians who can't find a way to stop this leak.

As for Neo walking the fine line, he downloaded the data without circumventing any security measures as he claims that the website was open to everyone. The hole was one specific URL normally used by an authorized user to review his own statements. Each document in the total database is assigned an ID number and by sequentially changing the ID number in the said URL, everyone could download the whole database as no authorization was checked by the script on the server. After some time the tax department notice irregularities and noticed the developer of the system but they were rather slow to fix the breach. When they finally managed to get the act together, Neo had already downloaded about 98% of the database.

Re:Correction to the story

[atisss]

Funny that download triggered some errors. He's been downloading for several months, increasing parallel requests, and in several months IT stuff started to notice errors on missing documents (as probably they have some blanks).. So, it took a month for this report to get to actual developers who then realized it's a security breach (No way IT stuff could realize that :P).

Re:Correction to the story

[Anonymous Coward]

The company why made software EDS (Electronic Declaration System) for Latvian Revenue Service was Exigen Services Latvia, who made millions of lats on project, however left a very trivial security hole as stated above for about three months. About 120 GB of XML Formatted data was downloaded. Three diferent security companies auditeted Revenue service servers before with serious payments involved and obviously found nothing. As on interview on national television LTV1 Exigen Services Latvia CEO Ivars Puksts said: "If you want to hide something, put it in front of you".

Re:I find it hard to take seriously a group called

[Xoltri]

Nice catch, but knowing the internet, it was probably on purpose.

Re:Latvia? Not USA?

[billybacs]

IIRC, AIG paid bonuses to the peons of the company that performed adequately, rather than the executives themselves. But I could be mis-remembering the details. At a normal worker's level, the bonuses really do help morale extensively, especially if they weren't aware of what exactly they were doing. It's the execs' responsibility to lead the company effectively. If they were actually giving themselves bonuses, then never mind anything I just said.

Quoque?

[Anonymous Coward]

Quoque? Doesn't that mean "also"?

The climate scientists in fact rarely lie, although they sometimes make mistakes. It's not politically fashionable to say that on Slashdot, though, even though it's true. But the partisan conservative creeps who "oppose" them only lie. They haven't made a single honest argument yet.

There is no "quoque."

Its the Batman defense.

[WarlockD]

"I can beat up anyone I want as long as I am doing it for the public good"

I am not saying Batman or this guy isn't doing good work, but he is steeping on allot of toes here. The banks are going to want to throw the book at him and the politician are going to be mad that their corruption/indifference is shown. Even if the "people" are on his side, its going to be hard to argue in a democracy he shouldn't be punished.

Also, he has to have some strong ethical guidelines here. Joker gets away with murder because he knows Batman cannot kill him. Batman goes to great lengths to make sure he doesn't kill anyone no matter what they have done. What does this guy have? Will he release these bankers home address? How about personal information about them? Lets say there IS outright bribery and he shows it by getting the bankers personal account number and information. Will he do the due diligence and, at the very least, blank out the personal account numbers/SS# etc before he releases it to the public?

Its quite probably hypocritical of me to be rooting for this guy, but in the end its why Batman is my favorite comic hero. Its not his inelegance or physical strength, its that he never breaks his rules under any circumstances. Hell, I want to say even stronger than Superman, as he has the power of a near god. Superman can afford to be infallible.

Neo??

[stonedcat]

How has this not been tagged "thematrix" yet?

"Pentagon Papers" is the cite you're looking for

[jeko]

The People have an absolute right to know what their government is doing. There's no other way for a democracy to function. Nefarious governments always try to hide behind "state security" laws. The Heroes who blow the whistle get charged with treason.

The Textbook US example from 1971 -- The Pentagon Papers

In brief, at the time the US Government was assuring the public we were about to get out of Vietnam, they were actually planning a massive expansion. Deep Blue Patriot Daniel Ellsburg, a RAND corporation military analyst and Marine officer, handed the evidence of the lie to the New York Times. He was tried for espionage.

It's too bad we didn't have another man of Ellsburg's character and conviction when Bush was parroting, "Yellowcake, yellowcake."

Whoever this goofy kid is, I think he might be one of the few geeks who deserve the name "Neo."

Post...

[Anonymous Coward]

Posting to this hacker thread

Re:I find it hard to take seriously a group called

[Ltap]

Which makes you wonder about what it would be like for people to cheer for them. "fap fap fap fap fap!"?

Von Doom

[Rathum]

I thought this was awesome until I realized it wasn't Latveria. I need a therapist...

Re:I find it hard to take seriously a group called

[hammeraxe]

To be fair they probably did not think of the organizations English name, they're Latvian after all. The name 4ATA though has some resemblance to the word "chat" in Latvian. Not sure how that's supposed to work though: "chat army"?

Forget this"Internet".

[Anonymous Coward]

They have ELECTRICITY?!?!?

Re:"Pentagon Papers" is the cite you're looking fo

[sixsixtysix]

what i liked about that link: "Article I, Section 6 of the United States Constitution provides that "for any Speech or Debate in either House, [a Senator or Representative] shall not be questioned in any other Place", thus the Senator could not be prosecuted for anything said on the Senate floor, and, by extension, for anything entered to the Congressional Record, allowing the Papers to be publicly read without threat of a treason trial and conviction."
so if a senator/representative read a copyrighted work, would the press (or anyone) be able to publish it?

Sure would put the next filibuster...

[jeko]

...to good use.

Re:I find it hard to take seriously a group called

[bioluminescence]

Latvian: Ceturts atmodas tautas armija (4ATA) English: The Fourth Awakening People's Army (4APA)

Too bad not Trinity

[szo]

Cracking the IRS d-base :)

Re:Latvia? Not USA?

[Danse]

IIRC, AIG paid bonuses to the peons of the company that performed adequately, rather than the executives themselves. But I could be mis-remembering the details. At a normal worker's level, the bonuses really do help morale extensively, especially if they weren't aware of what exactly they were doing. It's the execs' responsibility to lead the company effectively. If they were actually giving themselves bonuses, then never mind anything I just said.

I wouldn't call them "peons", that's for sure. These people had to be pretty high up. Apparently only the top 60 execs didn't get bonuses, but that only amounts to the top 0.05% percent (note that that's 5 hundredths of a percent). People under them got anywhere from tens of thousands to millions in bonuses, even those in the parts of the company where things were most disastrous. Whether there was good reason for this is debatable, but I find it difficult to believe that there were people so critical to this organization that they should get up to 6 million as an annual bonus. I also would love to know why they committed to keeping 2008 retention bonuses the same as 2007 when they knew that 2008 was going to be a horrible year for them. It's not like there's a shortage of people looking for jobs in the financial industry. They should be paying the money back to us with significant interest at the very least. Hell, the banks are jacking people's rates up to 30% for any reason or no reason at all. That must be a fair rate, right?

Re:Latvia? Not USA?

[billybacs]

I stand corrected, then. I heard originally the quotes of $6m and $10m and I thought that was total across the entire organization, not to any individuals. I would be ecstatic if Congress decided to charge banks 30% interest. It'd probably be terrible for the economy in the short-term, but would be awesome.

It wasn't me.

[neo]

I didn't do it.

so what....

[hesaigo999ca]

>You can imagine that taxpayers were upset and thankful they knew this information
As if the people have any way of forcing the banks to do what they are supposed to do. The governments have a hard enough time keeping them honest as it is, because of the importance the banks have on a global scale, what are a few hundred angry clients going to do.... close their bank accounts...who suffers more the banks or the clients. This is the problem with the way the CEOs manage the corporations, especially when they touch so many lives in such a deep way. Short of being pulled out in the middle of the street and shot in a public display of justice, there is no way any CEO will learn this lesson. They are never accountable for anything they do, they hide behind corporate red tape. Obama even has a hard time making them do the right thing, he is one of the most powerful people on earth....but a few hundred armed with machetes waiting outside the CEOs home, wow, what a message that would send....almost sounds like Africa....almost.