Anonymous To Release Sun, News of the World Emails

siliconbits writes "After having hacked Rupert Murdoch's flagship news website, thesun.co.uk, and redirecting its readers to a spoof front page and pilfering its email servers, Anonymous' unofficial mouthpiece, Sabu, has revealed that the group is 'sitting on [the sun's & NOTW's] emails' with a press release from Anonymous & possibly more coming in a few hours. While that website has already been taken down, the email bounty is likely to be potentially more damaging with Sabu releasing details of two of the Sun's top three employees, Rebekah Wade and Bill Akass, the former editors of the Sun and News of the World respectively as well as Lee Wells & Danny Rogers, Editorial Support Manager at News International and Sun Online Editorial Manager respectively, as a taster of what's coming next."

Comments

I love this

[Ardeaem]

This scandal keeps getting worse; it's like the "penis pump" scene from Austin Powers....

Re:I love this

[dintech]

It's good to see them getting a taste of their own medicine.

Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[elrous0]

How could they do such a cruel thing to the good people at News of the World?!?!?

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[sycodon]

I wonder if Anon and Lulzlzlz (what the fuck ever) realize that they are and have been doing the very same thing they are pissed at The Sun for doing. They just have different targets that in their minds, deserve it.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[Senes]

A kind word for an eye will leave you blind and your attackers unharmed. Some people just deserve having their asses kicked.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[E IS mC(Square)]

Yep - releasing userid/passwords is the same thing as hacking into dead childern's voicemails for scoops.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[hansraj]

At the end of the game, The king and the pawn go back in the same box.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[tlhIngan]

The phone hackers destroyed no property, deprived no owners of any of its use. I don't think there is any real harm here. As far the policing thinking that little girl might still have been alive, come on if she was dialing into her voice mail they should be all over the phone records to find out where from, the real story there is BAD POLICE work. Information wants to be free any secret you keep you have to work against entropy to keep that information concentrated with you otherwise it will diffuse. If you don't put energy into doing that then it will diffuse. IMHO its not News of the Worlds fault people selected weak voice mail PINs, its their fault.

More like evidence was tampered.

First, listening to voicemail often clears the "new voicemail" flag, and unless you're really anal, no one listens to every voice mail they have daily.

Perhaps the bigger crime is the fact they destroyed evidence - the voice mailbox was full. They deleted voicemails to make room for more. Sure we can hope the reporters deleted the unimportant ones, but can you really be sure?

Lulzsec at least isn't tampering with these things - these emails exist, and they're releasing it. They haven't come in, deleted emails or read unread email (and fail to reset them so the recipient never notices they haven't actually read the email yet).

Yes, there were mistakes on all sides. But leaving my front door unlocked doesn't give anyone the right to enter my house, and especially not to go through my computer reading my email, answering machine/voice mail

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[VAElynx]

What you have stated above is the philosophy of the coward (perhaps an anonymous one like yourself?) and the slave - yielding to evil without resistance and considering it a virtue.
A world that is blind is still better than a world where only the wrongdoers keep their eyes, after all.
As a wise man has said, All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[tbannist]

What about:
1) Hacking the phones of the police officers investigating the phone hacking case?
2) Bribing police officers for information on those same officers.
3) Blackmailing some of those officers with information obtained by 1) and 2).
4) Bribing the officers they couldn't blackmail in 3 to drop the case.
5) Hacking the phones of politicians.
6) Bribing police (and doctors?) for information on politicians.
7) Using the information gained in 5) and 6) to dictate favorable legislation.
8) Using his control of diverse news media to interfere with elections.
9) Using the threat of interference to influence politicians

There's a lot more to this case than just the phone hacking. Picking on "regular people" is what outraged a lot of people, but now they might actually pay attention to the other, more important, stuff.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[Anonymous Coward]

Blind Crucifier: Let me just put a nail through your hand here...ok, did I get it?
One-eyed Victim: [with nail between two fingers] Yeah...err...ouch!
Blind Crucifier: And the other hand...did I get that one?
One-eyed Victim: Yeah...boy, that stings.
Blind Crucifier: And now onto the feet.
One-eyed Victim: But your partner already did them.
Blind Crucifier: But he didn't tell me.
One-eyed Victim: I'm looking right at them...I think I'd know if I had nails through my feet.
Blind Crucifier: Okay...well, let that be a lesson to you.
One-eyed Victim: Yeah...I've learned a lot [walks away]

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[Charliemopps]

One group did it for tabloid headlines and profit, the other did it to expose the truth and corruption in government. What they are doing seems quite a bit different to me.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[Alyred]

Also, don't forget one of the biggest accusations of illegal activity was that it appears that the police were bribed by representatives of Murdoch Corp. We'll see how that portion comes out in court, but it appears that it might have gone all the way to the top, hence the resignations of the chief of Scotland Yard. We may see even more as apparently, one of the editors of the News of the World during the time of the phone hacking/alleged bribery went to join the Prime Minister's cabinet.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[h4rr4r]

This is what happens when he law fails. Murdoch and his ilk cannot and will not be punished in our current system of law. Vigilante justice is wrong, but it is the only justice left to deal with these folks. If the law would do its job this would not happen.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[sumdumass]

Actually, I think it is more severe to hack and release the emails of a company/person facing both civil and criminal charges/actions.

Now all the internal email and communications that could be subpoenaed to discover the depth of this scandal and criminal or civil liability can be questioned for it's legitimacy. after all, their servers were hacked and some activist group had complete control over them for an unspecified period of time in which they covered their tracks making it difficult to know exactly what they did while in control of it.

So in court, it would go like this, well, MR CEO, did you tell the reporter to hack the voice mail as is stated in this document? You Honor, I have never ordered anyone to do anything of the sort, it was not a company policy and if it was know, the people responsible would have been reported to the authorities and terminated, that accusation is a fabrication created by an activist group calling itself anonymous who hacked our servers and planted evidence of what they wanted the case to become.

But the investigators have this email sent from your computer. Well, your honor, those documents were retrieved by investigators after the activist group had illegally accessed our servers and one of our IT staff showed us how these headers and identifying information can be fabricated like in this example that looks very realistic as if it was an email you sent under your court email account but from a Disney world resort 3000 miles away and 5 minute into the future from now. IF this was planted on the courts servers by an activist group, would it be evidence that you went to Orlando Florida instead of presiding over this hearing?

The judge would then order the evidence after the break in unreliable unless supported by something the activist group did not hack into. This would likely result in only low level employees who admitted to the deeds getting into trouble.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[blair1q]

Both groups do it for both those reasons (albeit Anonymous' system for turning the profit is far less well-developed); you just happen to agree politically with one of them.

Re:Hacking innocent people's email accounts?!?!?

[Bob the Super Hamste]

This is where the true issue is. Also for those of you who really like a good conspiracy the whistle blower was found dead and police ruled that it wasn't suspicious.

Compromising the investigation

[Mushdot]

While I'm quite enjoying what Anonymous/Lulzsec are doing, I hope it does not compromise the criminal investigations that are to follow.

Re:Compromising the investigation

[elrous0]

I hope it does not compromise the criminal investigations

You mean the investigations that Scotland Yard has already swept under the rug and tried to kill several times? Yeah, we wouldn't want to compromise those thorough investigations by competent, unbiased police officers. Shit, I heard they're going to put Sherlock Holmes on it, just the make sure that Scotland Yard's unblemished reputation in this matter is upheld.

Re:Compromising the investigation

[ScentCone]

Jurors who have been previously exposed to evidence, and who have encountered it in a context that isn't up to the non-prejudicial standards of the court, wouldn't be considered reasonably neutral. If certain messages are widely spread around in the public because Anonymous thinks their priorities and standards are more important than the prosecutors', then that could indeed make such evidence essentially unusable in court.

Re:Compromising the investigation

[Red Flayer]

That's not how it works in the US, I dunno about the UK (I assume you're from the US due to your spelling of defense).

If the authorities made no effort to induce the illegal acquisition of the evidence, then it would still be admissable in US court AFAIK. The evidence if only tainted if the authorities, or someone acting at their behest (not a third-party with no link to the authorities), performs an illegal source. Chain of custody would be an issue, I would think, because it would have to be proven (more or less) that the emails were not altered after being lifted from NOTW's servers.

*I know this from watching Perry Mason, Columbo, and Law & Order reruns; IANAL; YMMV; if you want legal advice consult a real lawyer; Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.

Re:Compromising the investigation

[Red Flayer]

You're mixing the issues here. The fact that a jury pool has been tainted does not in any way affect the admissability of evidence.

Whether or not the evidence is tainted depends on a few factors. First off, if the evidence is illegally obtained by a third party not under the influence of the authorities, the evidence is not automatically tainted. Chain of custody becomes an important issue, however, since the prosecution would have to pretty much prove that the evidence was not altered by the third party. However, the most important one to this example, I think, would be the exceptions to the "fruit of the poisonous tree" doctrine. Namely, whether the authorities would have inevitably discovered these documents in the course of their investigations (assuming full compliance with warrant issued by the court). I don't think there is any way the authoities would NOT serve a warrant for those emails.

There are of course other factors involved in whether the evidence is admissable. But a third party acting completely independently from the authorities acquiring evidence illegally does not make that evidence inadmissable, no matter whether or not it taints the jury pool.[1]

And for what it's worth... without public outcry, it's quite possible that the alleged guilty parties at NOTW would enter a plea bargain and have the evidence suppressed (legally or extra-legally, they have a ton of influence). It's why this is such a big scandal... that's exactly what they've been doing for years. Public access to the information is the foundation of the only weapons we have against the government-corporate-media complex[2] that subverts the US democracy.

[1] IANAL. If you want a real legal analysis, consult a real lawyer. YMMV. Half of what I know about law I learned from Perry Mason, Colombo, and Law and Order. The other half comes from researching topics relevant to slashdot discussion on the internet. Do not use my post as legal advice. Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.

[2] I don't think I'm a conspiracy theorist, no matter how much that line makes me sound like one. It's obvious to me that US Legislators are far more beholden to the companies that pay their election bills and hire them once they are out of office than they are to the public; especially so for media companies, who by-and-large control what information the public has.

Re:Compromising the investigation

[DriedClexler]

Good point, that's how Batman is able help win legit convictions: he's not acting on authorization of the police, so when he leaves the criminals at the crime scene bundled up with the evidence, Gotham City can use all they found in court.

I mean, if all that happened in real life.

It wasn't Anonymous...

[pcgfx805]

It was Lulzsec.

You know you have a PR problem

[Presto Vivace]

when your server is hacked and people are cheering. It is all part of the fall of the house of hubris.

Re:You know you have a PR problem

[beowulfcluster]

They were planning on doing it anyway and replace it with a sunday edition of The Sun. Acting like they're closing it down because it's the decent thing to do is just a convenient excuse.

Re:Anonymous cannot be trusted

[VortexCortex]

Civil Rights protesters can't be trusted -- If they're breaking the law by riding in the front of buses or participating in illegal protests speaking out the very laws that make such things illegal, or performing their "duty as a statesman" to overthrow an oppressive government (as mentioned in their original Declaration of Independence), then they can clearly NEVER be Trusted!

Are you now or have you ever been in violation of any law? Aha! Your vehicle exceeded the mandated speed limit! Your words are meaningless to me now!

Also: I do not abide by laws that are unjust, or logic that is flawed. Nor do I wait idly for the next blow from my assailant's fist.

Re:Something Fishy

[amicusNYCL]

Why is that hard to believe? It's not the case that it's suddenly become easier to hack servers, the issue is that more people have the knowledge required to do so (and that old vulnerabilities are left unpatched). I mean, some of the hacks have been basic SQL injection or URL vulnerabilities that any competent programmer would know how to avoid. Those crappy systems have been in place for a while, people are just now starting to exploit them for the hell of it. It could have been going on all this time by groups that weren't announcing that they were doing it, like the Chinese government.

I mean, consider this: when Citibank got "hacked" a while ago, and had account details stolen, do you know what the vulnerability was? The URL of the account page looked something like this:

www.citibank.com/my_account.asp?id=<your credit card number here>

All they did was change the number and, voila, it turns out that Citibank was not bothering to authorize the logged-in user to view the given account. Once you were logged in, you could view any account. That's not exactly world-class security, that's something that most kids on the w3schools forum could warn you about. It's an embarrassment that a financial company like Citibank would pay to have something like that built by someone who doesn't know what they're doing.

NO REAL HARM?!?!

[SoTerrified]

The phone hackers destroyed no property, deprived no owners of any of its use. I don't think there is any real harm here.

NO HARM?! In case you missed the details of the original case that started the whole firestorm...
In 2002, Milly Dowler was kidnapped, then murdered later. When she went missing, News of the World hacked her phone. Seeing her voice mailbox was full, they deleted some messages (deleting potential evidence) so they could maybe get some new information. Meanwhile, the police saw that 'Milly' accessed her phone mailbox, so they downgraded her case, treating her as a low priority runaway. That meant that critical time tracking her was lost that could've got the police to her sooner and potentially saved her life.

No harm indeed...