Police Arrest Five Over Anonymous Attacks

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Police Arrest Five Over Anonymous Attacks

Posted by CmdrTaco on Thursday January 27, 2011 @02:32AM from the ddos-is-bad-mmkay dept.

nk497 writes "Five people have been arrested in the UK, accused of taking part in Anonymous' DDOS attacks in support of WikiLeaks. The five men — aged from 15 to 26 — are still being held by police for questioning. Met Police said the investigation was a collaborative effort between forces in the UK, EU and the US."

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Re:5 people.., by YrWrstNtmr · 2011-01-27 02:38 · Score: 3, Insightful

1. If they run a botnet or two, yes it might
2. And where does it say these 5 were all of them?
Well Duh by abigsmurf · 2011-01-27 02:40 · Score: 4, Insightful

The protection this tool offered was designed around the fact that so many people were using it, it'd be impossible to arrest them all. This kinda falls down when there may be 500 Americans on it but just 10 Brits and you're one of the 10.

Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech.
1. Re:Well Duh by thePowerOfGrayskull · 2011-01-27 02:53 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech.
  The word for that isn't irony, it's hypocrisy.
2. Re:Well Duh by HungryHobo · 2011-01-27 02:57 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  "Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech."
  some people also protest against companies which help repressive governments with things like the censorship in iran and the great firewall of china.
  There's no particular irony here.
  It disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want no more than picketing the entrance to a store disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want.
3. Re:Well Duh by serviscope_minor · 2011-01-27 03:00 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  oh, yes, isn't it so "ironic" that they're attacking business who are complicit in the government's attempt to circumvent the first amendment by pressuring businesses to "voluntarily" do the censorship for them.
  Next, you'll be complaining it's kinda ironic that they're attaching the freedom of the government to ride roughshod over the consitition.
  My god, the freedom! Where will it ever end!
  
  --
  SJW n. One who posts facts.
4. Re:Well Duh by abigsmurf · 2011-01-27 03:12 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  The businesses did not perform censorship. They have the right to do business with who they want (except if they're covered by discrimination laws). Wikileaks haven't been prevented from saying anything by them.
  
  If I'm a shop keeper and I refuse to put a pro-life or a pro-abortion poster in my window am I engaging in censorship?
  
  Wikileaks can still leak all they want, Visa can come out and say they don't like wikileaks and/or refuse to deal with them.
5. Re:Well Duh by HungryHobo · 2011-01-27 03:56 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  Well the way they terminated the contract was shifty enough to get them hauled over the coals by the regulators in at least one country.
  http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/12/mastercard-visa-licenses-revoked-iceland-wikileaks/
6. Re:Well Duh by HungryHobo · 2011-01-27 04:04 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  oh absolutely.
  It's not a very effective form of protest unless it gets lots and lots of media attention.
  I just get sick of all the idiots in this thread comparing it to firebombing/ram raiding the store because they want to make it sound scary.
  it's a poor form of political protest but it is political protest non the less and an utterly non-violent form as no people or property are harmed in any way.
7. Re:Well Duh by ToasterMonkey · 2011-01-27 04:28 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  "Also kinda ironic attacking people's freedom to do business with who they want in the name of protecting free speech."
  some people also protest against companies which help repressive governments with things like the censorship in iran and the great firewall of china.
  There's no particular irony here.
  It disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want no more than picketing the entrance to a store disrupts their freedom to do buisness with who they want.
  Except it's illegal to block the entrance/exits.
  You've really got to have a screw loose to see DDoS as picketing.
Lame by MrL0G1C · 2011-01-27 02:42 · Score: 5, Insightful

So they sit on there arses while billions of pounds of financial cybercrimes are committed, trillions of spam sent, and then arrest some 15 year old for hurling a few packets in the name of free speech - fucking lame.

--
Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
1. Re:Lame by abigsmurf · 2011-01-27 02:47 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Using a tool designed to silence people you disagree with or dislike cannot be described as doing something 'in the name of free speech'.
2. Re:Lame by symes · 2011-01-27 03:19 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  It was a protest. Short lived, fairly effective (in that it raised awareness of their issue) and no one got hurt. If these same people took to the streets with megaphones, stood outside Barclays and shouted their message out as loudly as they could, most likely the police would turn up and ask them to move along and that would be that. We worry that kids are not engaging in politics and then arrest them when they voice concern - pffft, it is a crazy world.
Re:5 people.., by Chrisq · 2011-01-27 02:58 · Score: 3, Funny

Depends on how many machines they had in their control as well as the available bandwidth from each point of origin. Technically, it only takes one person to create a DDoS. And a very effective one at that.
Posting a link on slashdot often seems to do the job as well
Re:5 people.., by serviscope_minor · 2011-01-27 03:02 · Score: 3, Interesting

Tell the small mom and pop site that uses PayPal to do its business that losing a day or two of income is just a "prank" and not a serious crime.
Try telling wikileaks that the government pressuring businesses to censor because it would be illegal for them to do it directly is fine and not a serious breach of the constitution.
And there is more than one type of cop in the world. Some go after murderers, some go after embezzlers and some go after cybercriminals.
And yet none of them go after the real perpetrators, it would seem.

--
SJW n. One who posts facts.
A DDoS is not helpful by Sarten-X · 2011-01-27 03:04 · Score: 4, Insightful

Perhaps with enough publicity from this case, the "members" of Anonymous will realize that throwing a tantrum is not useful activism. Unfortunately, it's more likely that the various police involved will be targeted next, along with their supporters, families, and barbers.

--
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Re:Interesting by ledow · 2011-01-27 03:12 · Score: 3

Quoting from the section headed: "Unauthorised acts with intent to impair, or with recklessness as to impairing, operation of computer, etc."
(2) This subsection applies if the person intends by doing the actâ"
(a) to impair the operation of any computer;
(b) to prevent or hinder access to any program or data held in any computer;
(c) to impair the operation of any such program or the reliability of any such data; or
(d) to enable any of the things mentioned in paragraphs (a) to (c) above to be done.
Just intent to slow down a website, or prevent other people accessing it, or even ENABLING people to intend to impair it's operation (e.g. distributing click-and-point tools and encouraging people to aim them at websites).
Re:Interesting by Grumbleduke · 2011-01-27 03:43 · Score: 3, Informative

For those interested, the relevant part is Section 3 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990.
"(1) A person is guilty of an offence if... (a) he does any unauthorised act in relation to a computer, (b) at the time when he does the act he knows that it is unauthorised; and..." he intends "(2)(b) to prevent or hinder access to any program or data held in any computer;".
It doesn't need to be aimed at any particular data, computer etc. (4), "causing the acts to be done" is enough (5)(b) and the effects can be temporary (5)(c).
That sounds quite a bit like a DDoS attack to me (I am a law student, but not a real lawyer).
Oh, and if you plead guilty, you get at most 12 months in prison (6 months in Scotland - I guess because they don't have real computers up there). If you actually go to trial, that jumps up to 10 years. Bearing in mind that a jury system has at least an 83% uncertainty, it is actually better to plead guilty even if innocent.
Re:5 people.., by sumdumass · 2011-01-27 03:54 · Score: 3, Interesting

Try telling wikileaks that the government pressuring businesses to censor because it would be illegal for them to do it directly is fine and not a serious breach of the constitution.

Despite there being little to no evidence outside of innuendo wishful thinking of that ever happening, since when has it ever been a moral or legal right to commit a crime because someone that doesn't directly influence you committed one that didn't directly influence you?
Two wrongs don't make a Right. Three rights make a left however.

And yet none of them go after the real perpetrators, it would seem.

Maybe this is only perception and the level of stupidity associated with the crime. You see, most organized (or otherwise) criminals don't want their name associated with a crime nor do they want publicity about the crime. This is especially true if they want to repeat the offense.Some do, and they get caught. So they take steps to hide the entire fact that a crime has happened in the first place in order to be able to commit the crime again and again. What happened here is sort of a complete reversal. These idiots wanted the publicity because it served their purpose. So obviously, when you depart from the entire, I hope no one ever finds out about this line and go with the I hope everyone see this, you are going to attract more eyes to looking for who is behind it and hence more arrests and accusations to the more publicly known crimes.
Comment removed by account_deleted · 2011-01-27 04:09 · Score: 4, Insightful

Comment removed based on user account deletion