Slashdot Mirror
Anonymous Posts Audio of Intercepted FBI Conference Call
DrDevil writes "A member of the computer hacking group Anonymous has hacked into a telephone conference between the FBI and Scotland Yard (London Police) and posted it on the internet. The Daily Telegraph has a comprehensive article on the hack. The audio of the call can be heard here." Reader eldavojohn snips as well from the AP's story as carried by Google: "Those on the call talk about what legal strategy to pursue in the cases of Ryan Cleary and Jake Davis — two British suspects linked to Anonymous — and discuss details of the evidence gathered against other suspects."
If Anonymous can listen to FBI calls then they'll certainly know when the FBI will be coming to kick down their door.
This will really piss off the FBI and it will be the political motivation for the FBI to pull out all the stops to find members of Anonymous.
Seems to me a clever FBI/Scotland Yard, could take advantage of that to find their listeners.
If nothing else I expect they'll be a bit more careful now, which could be a good thing. Anonymous likes to brag about accomplishments .. more insidious people have no desire to make it known they are tapping in.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
If the government can listen to our calls (without a warrant) then why can't we listen to theirs?
Anonymous aren't heroes. They're the worst type of vigilantes, who in their own minds are drunk with power. They're the internet equivalent of a mob of Molotov-cocktail tossing anarchists who burn things down because it's fun to do. They rationalize their behavior any way they can, and I imagine the replies to this comment will be to do the same. Now they're being apprehended and I'm supposed to feel sorry for them?
...as some idiot climbs the fence to the bear exhibit so they can cuddle with the huge teddy tear. You just know it's not going to end well.
Anon can't stay one step ahead forever.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
After all, if what amounts to a few script-kiddies can get this deep into confidential material, how much more material can a determined, knowledgeable, and well-funded adversary get?
And that's why I always insist that we use the cone of silence.
Based on the vague discussion details and how the FBI sent out an email with the conference call number and password, it sounds more likely to be a setup by the FBI to lure Anon into the call so they could glean more location data off of them.
Nah. Never expect cleverness where carelessness would as easily explain how it was achieved.
Some agent has been found and his mailbox is regularly visited for content of interest. Use some better security, send out a honeypot once in a while and see who connects, etc. This is a lesson for FBI and Scotland Yard not to take their security for granted. Could have been worse.
I'm certain anyone else who was privy to these conference calls is highly annoyed at the exposure, which will result in some changes.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
"Anonymous is a dangerous threat to national security. They can even listen in on phone calls on secure lines. We must have mandatory validated identification of all users of the Internet and an end to anonymity to protect our secret operations."
In public, government is angry, vengeful, and "determined" to "fix" the issue. Behind the curtains, they are celebrating a new justification for yet even more revenue and yet even more power over the people.
These situations are assets to the business of government, not liabilities.
You're not in the business of government, are you?
I don't know....I have a Model M.
This just shows what a bunch of clueless morons Anonymous is.
They perform a brilliant bit of counter-intel and gained an upper-hand by finding a way to exploit the FBI and eavesdrop on their conversations.
And what do they do with this victory? Do they send the FBI tripping over itself on an internal mole-hunt by going to the media with a tiny bit of this info explained as "information leaked by a source within the FBI?". Do they patiently sit and gather more intel, maybe useful information to help them evade arrest or gather bits of public interest in other cases for later use?
No, they broadcast it to the world with details on how they did it, all but going to the FBI and closing the weakness themselves.
These jerkoffs have shown once and for all that they are just a bunch of egotistical little shits who are indeed just in it for the lulz and "street cred".
I doubt we'll see anything come of Anonymous aside from more LOIC attacks, credit card thefts and web page vandalism.
They've shown all the intelligence and finesse of a group of anarchistic thugs.
Is Hooray. What a dump for the Hoover's and Peel's plonkers.
Secret policemen are the enemy of Democracy and Liberty. Freedom cannot be defended by means of surreptious authority.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
It's sure as hell not mightier than the public, though.
As long as double cheeseburgers are 99 cents, I don't think most of the public can be motivated to do much of anything.
They're apparently much smarter than you are.
The FBI is what it is because it outwardly appears to operate effectively. If you can demonstrate well enough that it is not effective it will be dismantled either through staffing changes or actual full-on dismantling.
You don't try to tie up the FBI's time, because it will just cost the tax payer more money. You throw egg in it's face as often as you possibly can until it's a laughing stock and must be replaced/removed in order to save face.
Again, clearly much smarter than you
It is poor tradecraft to reveal an adversary's weakness if you plan to continue to exploit it.
The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
Better anarchistic thugs than authoritarian thugs.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
It amuses me how conspiracy theorists and other anti-government figures claim that current governments are always just one step away from martial law or fascism (or, more often, how they've already been there for centuries), about how they're gleefully abusing our rights, mistreating us on an inhumane scale, or the usual overused go-to phrase, "raping us all in the ass". They always say that the government are bloodthirsty, amoral, self-indulging quasi-human entities that wouldn't think twice about "disappearing" us to further their own political goals and how they're getting more and more brash in their actions, like they don't care what we think at all.
And then they turn around and claim that "the public" saying mean things about them on a computer will somehow stop all this from happening. That a well-armed, apparently cartoonishly evil government would, for some as-yet-unexplained reason, suddenly give up if the public whines about them, and not, say, just start slaughtering all detractors and anyone else in their apartment complex/neighborhood as a means of controlling dissent. That writing strongly-worded (STRONGLY-worded, mind you) letters would stop the bombs and bullets headed towards the public and restore peace and tranquility and then Jesus would come back or something.
And people wonder why it's so fun to troll places like these. Carry on! Suuuuure, the gun is mightier than the public, buddy! Keep on believing that your evil evil evil government will arbitrarily stop exactly short of your passive-aggressive revolution ideas!
"You are anonymous"
I am not Anonymous.
I'm not even a squad, let alone a Legion.
It may look like I forgive.
But really I just forget.
Don't expect me because I'll probably oversleep.
Better anarchistic thugs than authoritarian thugs.
No, not really. That's a false choice. How about "Neither"?
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Or, it's brilliant.
Let's say Anon managed to through some one-time gap (ie a sympathetic insider, perhaps) managed to get the login details to this one conference. It's meaningless, because they can't repeat the success.
However, if they leak it:
- heads roll at the FBI
- everyone's walking on eggshells because of management fury
- everyone's required to use full-secure protocols and resources for the stupidest trivial conversations
- FBI still doesn't know who leaked it, so begins witchhunt which consumes resources, and makes everyone nervous.
I think it's probably a one-off, parlayed into a fairly clever bit of system-attack.
You know, like a single coordinated unrepeatable multiplane hijacking could theoretically cause an entire country to be consumed by paroxysms of paranoia for more than a decade, leading to absurd legislation, efficiency costs for hundreds of millions of people, as well as actual TRILLIONS of dollars of waste.
Right?
-Styopa
That's a poor comparison. When Anonymous becomes a publicly traded company that poses as a legitimate media player, then it would make sense. No shit Anonymous is breaking the law, that's what they do and they're doing so for a cause (whether it's justified or not is irrelevant, they seem to believe in it).
News Corp. eavesdropped on conversations for personal gain, oftentimes exploiting grieving families.
Selective outrage is certainly useful for the logical thinker who doesn't compare apples and oranges.
"From the depths of my skeptical and rationalist soul, I ask the Lord to protect me from California touchie-feeliedom."