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After Cell-Phone Switch-Off, Anonymous Promises BART Protest
According to the San Francisco Appeal, the cellphone service shut-down that the BART system imposed Thursday (by disabling transponders which allow cellphone communications in the underground portion of the system), besides drawing rebukes from various civil liberties groups, has generated plans for a protest Monday organized by Anonymous.
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People have the right to protest all they want, but:
1) BART has no obligation to assist them in doing so. BART had every right to turn off their equipment. Do these protesters expect to have the police drive them to the protest as well?
2) If the protesters are interfering with mass transit, they're just being assholes. Yes, it's sad that someone got killed. No, this doesn't mean that tens of thousands of people should have their schedules fucked around with.
The fact that this is such a big deal in the first place shows that these aren't real protesters anyway. They're just a bunch of spoiled SF kids thinking they're activists. Real activists wouldn't let something like not having internet access during the protest get in their way.
I condemn their DDOS, but I would surely support them if they were to call for a sit-in protest (just as in this case). Too bad, I live 200 miles from the nearest BART station. 'They' may be Anonymous, ?chans,or anybody, I would support them.
For some reason... on seeing 'Anonymous' doing so much... I begin to think there are more than one groups that call themselves anonymous... and possibly a bunch of hoaxes from attention-seekers
to the defense of the target of anonymous...but thats pretty hard to do here...
alot of people say BART was within its rights to shut down cell towers in an attempt to disrupt protests
but those protests are only happening because BARTs own police force has killed someone, and people want to bring attention to the fact that there still seems to be a fair amount of fallout and foul-play related to it...
some people in the thread also say its just a bunch of kids that want to disrupt mass transit and make everyone miserable, but
if the BART system i ride everyday and depend upon to get to and from my mediocre office job has done something so nefarious
its caused people to clog up the transit system, then i should probably pay attention to it and learn more about it. i mean if things get bad
enough and i cant get to the train then i'll VPN in, granted thats a luxury not everyone has... i just cant shake the aching feeling that
if the part of my local government that operates the rail transit system just killed someone then maybe these protests need to happen.
the worst thing i think that can happen is if BART kills someone and we all just go about thinking 'well, thats normal.' maybe it isnt...maybe
the only person to say when the right time for the protesting to end is the public, not the BART administrative authority.
Good people go to bed earlier.
I think that this is the right time to start mapping where and when mobile censorship happens. This can be done easily. Someone can make a mobile app to tell a server that it has connectivity every x time interval, and it's location (and/or tower used) and amount of signal (plus other useful data).
If enough people used it, the server could tell when a location suddenly went "dark". And it could have algorithms to map the "dark" areas, and to notify everyone of the dark areas. It'd need some refinements, to detect if you entered a place without signal, or to detect if you are underground (ie. no GPS there, but could tell which tower probably which might require mapping it in a different color, eg underground, and cases like that), and some processing to tell when an area is dark (eg. very few people with low signal and many or all without) vs something that was very bright, and suddenly very dark (many people just silenced).
It can also facilitate tracking and knowing immediately what's happening, as after an area is turned "dark", it could prompt the people just entering the "lit" perimeter (or leaving the dark area) if they saw anything unusual. So it would be very easy to automate reporting into suspicious areas.
This could be a great tool to track service disruptions and to quickly identify censorship abuse, natural disasters, power disruptions (long enough for UPS to exhaust), etc.
unfinished: (adj.)
There's two things going on that aren't the same thing at all. One is the protests over police using black people for target practice, the other is the looting that takes place during the "riots".
The government keeps making excuses for the actions of their police officers; he was just doing his job, too bad that black person got in his way. This will continue and we'll see more of these protests
The other thing is the looting - this is (to put it simply) those who are just barely getting by taking the opportunity to grab up some of those consumer goods they could never afford to buy.
This is a symptom of the extreme imbalance in income distribution in the US (and England). Explain it however you want, the black and brown folks know that they're getting the dirty end of the stick and they aren't accepting those stories. They're kept in their place most of the time, but when things get protesty they'll come out and get some of what the "rich folks" have.
Of course, the "authorities" says that every protester is a criminal and they're busily putting "those people" back in their place. They'll never admit that it's the actions of their enforcers that start these protests - and they'll never admit that it's the greed in the upper class that creates the tensions that drive the riots and looting.
Those "upper class" folks are very aware of this and they're busily building taller fences, hiring more guards, and loading up on weaponry. They lean on their government friends to "keep things under control" and they do their best. Did you think that monitoring phone and email traffic was to stop terrorists? Maybe it's to keep track of groups forming that might present a threat to the established order in this country?
You'll keep hearing stories about how this is all about bad people - and as long as you keep believing that and supporting those who benefit from keeping those people in their place - you'll just postpone the date and increase the intensity of the "correction".
Here's a tip for those in California - did you know that you white folks are in the minority there? Sleep well...
You can never be sure that "Anonymous" is the same group of people every time, it can be different groups with different and even conflicting interests.
And then there are professional rioters that rides on any suitable group just for the pleasure of destruction - those rioters should be brought to justice by their victims.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
Although I haven't lived in SF for a year, there was a group of Anonymous members that'd regularly hang around outside the Powell St BART station carrying anti-Scientology signs. So at least some of the members there do good things. (I'm in favor of the protests so long as they don't degenerate into violence, and after reading the BART's statement "No person shall... engage in other expressive activities in the paid areas of BART stations" I'm going to give the favor of the doubt to pretty much anyone who wants to protest.)
....destroying Facebook? Shouldn't they finish that project before starting another? Anonymous is turning into a combination of Duke Nukem Forever and John Romero of hackers. They now rarely deliver, and when they do it is a half-baked product. Toothless chihuahuas have more bite than these jokers.
..shuting off cell-phones to get rid of angry protesters?
It really won't stop anybody from organizing protests, it only affects the underground system, and makes things more chaotic.
But while BART isn't as effective as Muammar, they seem to work through the same PR firm. Real clever. That will teach those kids a lesson
What's the plan: "The beatings will continue until morale improves?"
ANONYMOUS seems to have a busy month planned with taking on Facebook and all. Glad to see that young people haven't lost the industrious spirit (/sarcasm)
Can't protesters setup their own cell stations and reroute cell traffic?
How about protesting outside station entrances? It is doubtful that the cellular providers would disable service at street level. Protesters also wouldn't disrupt physical transit service, though they can still make their point by disrupting individual commuters.
Most important of all: it doesn't endanger the lives of people, since platforms can be a dangerous place.
I remember hearing stories from a friend in a third world nation. When the government did something wrong they started destroying the trains in protest. The thing is, that destruction meant bugger all to the government (they don't use trains) so it really only made the lives of the protesters and the people who they claimed to represent worse. Which is exactly the sort of thing that Anonymous is doing. While it isn't quite that extreme yet, it could be within a few years if protesters keep upping the ante.
"hey, nice baseball bat laying there on your front yard... i'm going to use it later to break into your car and destroy your garden gnome".
Hearing that, you'll probably store the piece of wood somewhere out of reach. That would be a totally sane move.
Point is, they are not trying to prevent protests (that's a totally wrong headline). They want to avoid protesters to share real-time information on security personnel location and actions in order to optimize and maximize the disruption of the transit system. Once that has been said openly you simply _cannot_ allow the system to remain active.
By leaving the system active, if incidents occures and it does turn our that the network was used as proposed, you would be very negligent. I guess that in America, some people might go as far as bringing you to court over this.
Now, you would say "how is this any different in the streets". That, I really don't. Where the line lies between security measures and rights is never clear and this subject is tackled daily here. In the end, I guess that the main difference between, lets say, Egypt and this (or on which side of the thin line you lay) is the intent of those shutting down the network in said areas.
you house your garden gnomes better than most of us over here!
break into your car and destroy your garden gnome
I condemn their DDOS, but I would surely support them if they were to call for a sit-in protest (just as in this case). Too bad, I live 200 miles from the nearest BART station. 'They' may be Anonymous, ?chans,or anybody, I would support them.
Agreed. I don't agree with most of the things they do but if I lived closer I would join them in this fight. This was a smart call by anon, I hope they stage more protests for this kind of thing, might make the public think more positively of them since it certainly improved my opinion.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
ya know the 25 million mexicans in your farms
Hey, look! It's a new incarnation of the Streisand Effect!
Barring access to emergency services on purpose.
that's the real effect of it. the first time I read about this was "what the fuck? open season on mugging?". I mean, public transports have been going just to the opposite direction in general in past years, like offering WIFI etc while in transit. so on purpose making cell service worse is.. eh, it's just a stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid show of power by some committee jockey in BART.
they better hope no-one had a stroke or something similar..
anyways - now the protests are known world wide.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
A few days ago, I had a really nasty virus that held my computer hostage (it wouldn't stop unless I paid them $50)! I was desperate for solutions, and no product seemed to work! Then I found my computer works better now...
Can we get Anon to go after this idiot?
Too late - they've already taken over his computer, maxed out his ISP account, got him kicked off the net for spamming, and drained his bank account of his affiliate commissions.
Agreed. The fact is, we have been in a pacified state of getting nothing done for decades now. We have arrived from the 80s and 90s, a time of "plenty" into the present days which are definitely not a time of plenty. These protests are over-due and so long as they can remain peaceful, there is a chance that positive change can happen without revolution. I just hope people in positions of leadership are old enough to remember the lessons of the 60s and 70s.
Protesting in public places, even public transit places, is about drawing attention to important matters. If the matters are big enough, the disruption would also be big and so people would have to pay attention to them.
The shutting down of communications itself was a dangerous act. I'm sure emergency people have radios that continue to work under those conditions, but are those the only people who respond to and report emergencies? No. They aren't.
I wonder how much of this pendulum swinging will get noticed. At the moment, I see this as the pendulum slowing as it has not yet reversed.
Their commercial is also informative and proves that they are as good as they claim!
Right, because conclusive proof as to the efficacy of a given firm's product is always offered by the firm's own advertising.
(And boy, did you pick the wrong site to spam...)
Suppose the protest gets out of hand and people start pushing passengers off the terminal onto the tracks. Then a train comes and kill them. It's speculative to say that leaving SMS enabled caused their deaths. But it is also speculative to say that the lack of signal caused their deaths due to the inability to dial 911. But that's not the point.
The point is to prevent the protest from happening in the first place. BART can't control that effectively, but they're doing their best to discourage this from happening near trains by disabling the cell signal. Their press release suggested designated areas for protest in the 'free' public areas.
Let's not forget what happened in London; one guy got killed and a whole town went apeshit (rightfully so). But I stopped supporting those dumbasses when they started trashing the city and looting; and especially when 3 pakistanis were run over to death by a car, almost igniting a new set of riots between blacks and south asians. What purpose did this riot achieve? More people would've died and fights would evolve from people vs. govt, to people vs. people. But of course, this is also speculative. But will the death of three passengers by rioters finally compare to the death of one guy by a security guy?
There are protests, and there are riots. Who can predict what can happen next? BART knew there would be an illegal assembly (not sanctioned by the police dept. or themselves), and are preparing accordingly. London rioters organized via Blackberry SMS. Should BART completely forgo this fact, and more deaths ensue under their watch, they could be liable for negligence.
Yes, BART is part of the govt. and all that, but so is the military. Are we allowed to protest inside their facilities? No. Does that mean the military is curbing our free speech? Absolutely not. There's an annual protest near Ft. Benning in GA, and it's well organized with no incidents of injuries or deaths. Should BART allow protests to occur near electrified rail where there's no fence or barrier of any kind to prevent passengers from being shoved down onto the tracks? Should BART just shut down the entire rail system on Monday instead?? Again, their press release states they have designated areas for gathering and protesting.
Besides, were they preventing free speech during the years prior to installing underground cell towers? Were they even obligated to install them in the first place? Can I blame them for curbing free speech if they don't have ethernet ports or N-band wifi? Instead of protesting inside the rail system, why not protest outside City Hall? Or the BART offices (away from the rail system)?
The way people throw statements like "Free Speech" here and everywhere else reminds me of the annoying kid in school who would stand in the middle of the class and starts shouting. Any reaction against this would be met with the asinine response, "this is America! I have free speech! I can do whatever I want!"
Free speech limits you from yelling "fire!" at a theater just for kicks, and other assholeness; or at least it doesn't guarantee you to go free without any negative repercussion.
I think they should go ahead and hold their BART protest, if they think it will mean anything.
Once they determine that they can get the cops to shut down the nearby cell towers just by planning a protest, they've won...
Maybe everyone in the US knows the backstory but i didn't so I googled it. Here is what I found:
On the 3 July 2011 a BART ( Bay Area Rapid Transport ) police officer shot dead Charles Hill ( 45 ). It appears Mr Hill was drunk but other than that stories vary wildly. No version of the story states Mr Hill had a gun, some versions say he was acting in a threatening manner with a bottle of drink. The controversy appears to be due to a police officer shooting an unarmed man when he had and should have used a taser.
Story:
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/07/charles_hill_identified_as_man.php
Video ( that misses the real action ):
http://blogs.sfweekly.com/thesnitch/2011/07/charles_hill_bart_shooting_vid.php
Thanks for this, now I know that MyCleanPC is run by spamming shitsacks, and to recommend against it if anyone brings it up.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Yeah... You're going to get a lot of sales from this group. Keep plugging away!
I'm not familiar with BART as I don't live out there, but was there an explicit promise that the fare for BART would also guarantee cellular service when on the BART system? If not, then I don't see how these people have grounds to complain. Someone else pointed out that the BART system has plenty of emergency phones available for actual emergencies, so what they are doing should not in any way be endangering public safety.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Anonymous is the new Westboro Baptist Church. Purposeless attention-whoring for the thrill of it, whether or not they actually bother to follow through.
"There are areas in the BART system that are designated free-speech areas. We support that," BART spokesman Jim Allison said.
The zones in which the Constitution is "officially" in effect are shrinking more and more. I don't seem to recall anything being in there about selective application of Constitutional protections at all (It's "officially" in effect 100% of the time in 100% of the country - it's not like a smoking zone), but ever since the idea started at political events - forcing those who want to express their views (even if it is just a t-shirt a candidate/office holder doesn't like) into a confined and invisible 'free speech zone' - the idea that people can declare where and how the Constitution can be applied has really taken root.
This may not be a case covered by Constitutional protections, but the fact that the spokesman framed it as 'we decide for your own good where your Constitution is in effect' shows how widespread and accepted this invalid idea has become.
This is the problem with vigilantism. It starts out with a target many agree with, and then just starts looking for targets.
Anonymous, you're now just another garden-variety thug. Proud of yourselves? Time for a new group to shut you down.
Is there a version for Linux?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
If some malware turns on your web cam and starts piping images out to some hacker somewhere are you going to leave it on?
That's the explicit intention and plan of Anonymous, to be anonymous even in the physical sense of being a bunch of different, unknown groups.
In an emergency you can use www.democri-c.com
for the iphone, Ipod and IPAD and
http://hackerdemia.com/auto-BAHN/android/current/autobahn.apk
For any Android device.
They are emergency mobile phone services apps that cannot be shut down by anybody.