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Latvian "Robin Hood" Hacker Leaks Bank Details

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the too-many-hoods-in-the-forest dept.

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."

5 of 170 comments (clear)

  1. His service.... by rshol · · Score: 0, Troll

    ...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.

    1. Re:His service.... by Improv · · Score: 0, Troll

      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.

      --
      For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
  2. STOP THE PRESSES! by DarthVain · · Score: 0, Troll

    Latvia has banks? :) sry.

  3. Re:Some sympathy some not so by Rary · · Score: 0, Troll

    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.

    --

    "You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war." -- Albert Einstein

  4. Re:Latvia explained in pictures and comments by rtb61 · · Score: 0, Troll

    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.

    --
    Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen