US State Department Hacks Al-Qaeda Websites In Yemen
shuttah writes "In the growing Al-Qaeda activity in Yemen, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton revealed today that 'cyber experts' had recently hacked into web sites being used by an Al-Qaeda affiliate, substituting the group's anti-American rhetoric with information about civilians killed in terrorist strikes. Also this week, a statement from the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs revealed the presence an Al-Qaeda video calling for 'Electronic Jihad.'"
They did it for the lulz.
Not to sound unpatriotic, but h4x1ng their bank accounts and those of their supporters would impress me more. Go Joe!!
The Admin and the Engineer
The feds hack a website, and they issue a triumphant press release. Anonymous does it, and they release the hounds.
These folk are usually extremely careful about the comments they make, so I wonder what the angle is here?
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Isn't it kinda illegal hacking into someone else's property? Oh wait, you call them terrorists possessing wmd's and do whatever you want...
for the lulz
Seems like a pretty hypocritical message, considering all the civilians we've killed over there. In a place where we shouldn't even have military.
for the lulz
... Yemen request the extradition of the US citizens responcible for this crime?
The feds hack a website, and they issue a triumphant press release. Anonymous does it, and they release the hounds.
The feds hacked the websites of an organization they are actively at war with, literally at war as in bullets and bombs. That is not quite the same as what Anonymous is doing.
Also this week, a statement from the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs revealed the presence an Al-Qaeda video calling for 'Electronic Jihad.'
In the video, they recommend fighting this in a traditional manner like suicide bombing. First you tape up with explosives, then sit at a computer, then log into a US website visited by millions of users daily and detonate your vest -- thereby sending all of those heathenish packets of Western information to hell.
My work here is dung.
if ($organization eq "Homeland Security" && $activity eq "hack"){ print "Good\n"; }
if ($organization ne "Homeland Security" && $activity eq "hack"){ print "Bad\n"; }
"State Department officials recently carried out a counter-propaganda campaign on Web sites being used by al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen, challenging the group’s anti-American rhetoric with information about civilians killed in terrorist strikes, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday" They posted responses on website forums for Tribal sites in Afghanistan. So, unless you believe that countering nonsense is hacking, then no, they didn't hack anything. If you do, though, that means that *this* post is hacking, which I'm pretty sure creates a paradox that destroys the cosmos as we know it.
Maybe they'd be okay with it if Anonymous hacked terrorist websites instead of the websites of Western governments and businesses?
It's great that the State Dept. is admitting that they do this because when - not if - they were discovered, they'd look like liars. They owning up to it make them look a little better.
But they still look sleazy.
If I were President, I would publically, quitely (don't try to hide it but don't make a press release) enlist Anonlymous' services in doing exactly what they did - and give them a deal on the side.
Why?
Because Anonynous doing it is a little more credible. They have proven themselves to be antognostic to the US Government and I would think that folks who are sympothetic to Al-Queda would believe them a little more than the US State Dept.
Frankly, if folks who are sympathetic to Al-Queda are as cynical as I am, they would think this anouncement is also some sort of ruse.
This is what they're wasting my tax money on today? Jesus. Why not ddos them, or post a hate blog while they're at it?
This signature intentionally left blank.
A redirect to whitehouse.com might be more effective.
Money - for "cyber experts". what else?
Okay, I understand why they did it but what a wasted opportunity. Why not quietly add a hidden pixel on the website and semi secretly track all the ip's and timestamps of visitors to their site. Lots of information to glean from that....
Why can't the government just say "American computer scientists are welcome to penetrate any computer system being used by Al-Qaeda or other organizations on the Terror Watch List. Please feel free to intercept or disrupt any of their method of communication. You will not be prosecuted for any actions taken against Terrorist groups."
Instead of playing Diablo III, my buddies and I could have "Hack North Korea" parties.
sudo make me a sandwich
They posted pictures of casualties of terrorist attacks. Why not post pictures of causalities of those famous drone attacks that have killed thousands of innocent people since the "war on terror" began? Oh, right, they're rich and more powerful, they must be in the moral right.
Twin killing machines joined at the hip.
More likely the CIA called the server owner and said, "give me root or I keeeeeel you!"
Got Code?
It's campaign season in the US.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
if you are a hacker, you are supporting al-qaeda!
I understand that it was used in a quote - but the word Jihad needs to go away, using their statements in their language only helps get their silliness out there (FREE advertising for them). A simple translation to holy war works and likely pisses them off, which I'm ok with.
Anyone called a "Cyber Expert" is more likely to mistake editing a wiki page as a "hack"
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Hung up by Al Quaeda.
What actually happened was that the State Department purchased some anti-Al-Qaeda ads to run when certain key terms were also on the screen, similar to how AdWords works. It's a pretty interesting concept, really - the necessity of displaying advertising on a site can open the door for alternative messages/realities to reach the viewer.
no one posted the Obligitory XKCD. http://xkcd.com/932/
Al-Queda Affiliate: Any group of two or more Muslims that express a dislike for the United States, a publicly traded corporation, the United Kingdom, Germany or France.
to rickroll an Al-Qaeda group? Forget it, it's worth it.
So, like FPS deathmatches ?.. Why not, that way you can infidels many times over and over.. surely better than the real thing.
waiting for ad.doubleclick.net
Nobody sane actually visits these crazy religidiot sites anyway, except people who already have brain damage, who are probably not exactly going to make any notable contribution to the world. If we are lucky, they will probably blow themselves up in their own bomb factory, in a terminal case of relgion, and we will hear no more of them. Most of them are so pathetically thick, that they will never have the capacity to actually commit any criminal act.
If someone did the same to US government web sites, listing all of the casualties of US attocities, then I'm sure the regime in Washington would find it quite objectionable. This list would also take many years of reading, from the murderous rampage in Indochina, the slaughter in Kosova/Yugoslavia, the assassination of democratically elected leaders (eg. Salvador Allende), the attack on Cuba, the No Gun Ri Massacre in Korea, the use of dangeous chemicals in Vietnam against a civilian population, the destruction of Iraq, to the Vietnam war. A history of decades of shame that continues to this day. The US has been a malignant influence on world stability for too long. It is a joke that they should preach to others about 'human rights', or 'democracy', particularly when their own regime is run by a corrupt political elite, completely dominated by corporate interests.
One only has to follow the trail of money from the United States, to some of the worst regimes in history. It should be easy to realise that the United States suffers from a severe case of double standards. Today, support continues for the regimes in Bahrain, Israel, and Saudi Arabia, despite these 'countries' being run by psychotic regimes, bent on the destruction of whole ethnic groups, or races.
1. Sanhedrin 59a: "Murdering Goyim is like killing a wild animal."
2. Abodah Zara 26b: "Even the best of the Gentiles should be killed."
3. Sanhedrin 59a: "A goy (Gentile) who pries into The Law (Talmud) is guilty of death."
4. Szaaloth-Utszabot, The Book of Jore Dia 17: "A Jew should and must make a false oath when the Goyim asks if our books contain anything against them."
5. Schabouth Hag. 6d: "Jews may swear falsely by use of subterfuge wording."
6. Libbre David 37: "To communicate anything to a Goy about our religious relations would be equal to the killing of all Jews, for if the Goyim knew what we teach about them, they would kill us openly."
7. Libbre David 37: "If a Jew be called upon to explain any part of the rabbinic books, he ought to give only a false explanation. Who ever will violate this order shall be put to death."
8. Yebhamoth 11b: "Sexual intercourse with a little girl is permitted if she is three years of age."
9. Hilkkoth Akum X1: "Do not save Goyim in danger of death."
10. Hilkkoth Akum X1: "Show no mercy to the Goyim."
11. Choschen Hamm 388, 15: "If it can be proven that someone has given the money of Israelites to the Goyim, a way must be found after prudent consideration to wipe him off the face of the earth."
12. Choschen Hamm 266,1: "A Jew may keep anything he finds which belongs to the Akum (Gentile). For he who returns lost property (to Gentiles) sins against the Law by increasing the power of the transgressors of the Law. It is praiseworthy, however, to return lost property if it is done to honor the name of God, namely, if by so doing, Christians will praise the Jews and look upon them as honorable people."
13. Baba Necia 114, 6: "The Jews are human beings, but the nations of the world are not human beings but beasts."
14. Simeon Haddarsen, fol. 56-D: "When the Messiah comes every Jew will have 2800 slaves."
15. Nidrasch Talpioth, p. 225-L: "Jehovah created the non-Jew in human form so that the Jew would not have to be served by beasts. The non-Jew is consequently an animal in human form, and condemned to serve the Jew day and night."
16. Aboda Sarah 37a: "A Gentile girl who is three years old can be violated."
17. Gad. Shas. 2:2: "A Jew may violate but not marry a non-Jewish girl."
18. Tosefta. Aboda Zara B, 5: "If a goy kills a goy or a Jew, he is responsible; but if a Jew kills a goy, he is NOT responsible."
19. Schulchan Aruch, Choszen Hamiszpat 388: "It is permitted to kill a Jewish denunciator everywhere. It is permitted to kill him even before he denounces."
20. Schulchan Aruch, Choszen Hamiszpat 348: "All property of other nations belongs to the Jewish nation, which, consequently, is entitled to seize upon it without any scruples."
21. Tosefta, Abda Zara VIII, 5: "How to interpret the word 'robbery.' A goy is forbidden to steal, rob, or take women slaves, etc., from a goy or from a Jew. But a Jew is NOT forbidden to do all this to a goy."
22. Seph. Jp., 92, 1: "God has given the Jews power over the possessions and blood of all nations."
23. Schulchan Aruch, Choszen Hamiszpat 156: "When a Jew has a Gentile in his clutches, another Jew may go to the same Gentile, lend him money and in turn deceive him, so that the Gentile shall be ruined. For the property of a Gentile, according to our law, belongs to no one, and the first Jew that passes has full right to seize it."
24. Schulchan Aruch, Johre Deah, 122: "A Jew is forbidden to drink from a glass of wine which a Gentile has touched, because the touch has made the wine unclean."
25. Nedarim 23b: "He who desires that none of his vows made during the year be valid, let him stand at the beginning of the year and declare, 'Every vow which I may make in the future shall be null'. His vows are then invalid."
Source http://www.waylanderskeep.com/2009/12/jewish-talmud-quotes/
It appears that jews are no better than their blood related brethren in the arabic world (and yes they are related in antiquity though being a jew is more of a religious sect\cult than a peoples).
another piece in the puzzle being built to bring #iPatriot http://www.boingboing.net/2008/08/05/lawrence-lessig-on-t.html
Dude, nice house. How'd you get it?
"I killed the man, raped the women, just took it".
Aren't you worried about the police?
"No. The authorities and the poseurs are off hacking eachother's web sites. Real jihad has never been easier".
Absolutely. The USA may have made mistakes (such as using atom bombs against Japanese men, women and children - see http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig2/denson7.html), but it is not even close to the level of evil seen in the Soviet Union, the PRC, or Al Qaeda.
Speaking of Islamic terrorism: do you know of any studies/argumentations about the likelihood of
Iran using atom bombs against Israel? There are 1,573,000 Israeli Arabs and 1,240,000 Israeli Muslims (many, but not all, of the Arabs are Muslims) - not counting the people in the Palestinian territories that are not Israel citizens.
Would Iran really kill countless innocent Muslim civilians, including women and children?
I mean, Ahmadinejad may be a buffoon, but AFAIK he is no Hitler and no Stalin.
I would like to see this debated.
Did they share that information as well?
Yes, the Al-Qaeda is evil. But from most of the world's standpoint, the US is even worse. (They killed hundrets of times as many people. Let alone all the meddling with foreign governments and secret prisons.)
So just as much as Al-Qaeda, backed by Pakistan's government, hacking US government websites, would be considered an act of war... ...this is also an act of war.
It's just that apparently, the ultra bully gets away with it...
Anyone familiar with what is going on knows that no hacking was involved. The State Department is paying people to post to the web sites in question to counter the Al-Qaeda propaganda.
Even NPR was smart enough to blatantly state this was not hacking. Why is slashdot so out of touch with such a basic technology story?
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
If the websites are hosted on servers in the US, then I concede all rights are essentially lost in regards into what "the man" can do do your stuff - anything goes in the name of homeland paranoia... err, security. But in the mid-90s, even though there were known to be broadcasting hate propaganda and encouraging genocide, countries were worried about the legal issues involved in treading on Rwanda's sovereignty and chose not to jam the transmissions of RTLM radio. These days, the same countries have no problems hacking foreign websites. I'm aware there are some differences (the Hutus weren't targeting Americans), but I guess now that a Patriot Act exists then anything goes... Hell, the US feds had to be taken to court so people could understand how they might choose interpret the laws they make - http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/10/11/2234233/nytimes-sues-us-govt-to-know-how-it-interprets-the-patriot-act
Its true. The Al-Qaeda web sites in Yemen are staffed by US Department of State personnel. On site are also US CIA personnel. And operational security personnel are US DoD Dept. of Army Green Beret units.
Duh !!
And the Doctor in Pakistan, CIA informant on, i.e. payed by, the US Dept. of Treasury payroll, is, under Pakistan Law, complicit to the international murder of Osama bin-Laden.
The order for murdering bin-Laden by President Obama is the greatest to date national security fiasco of the USA in its entire history to date. .n!m Obama xD
It's a world of three-dimensional grids, where random digits float around you in neon green,and you must find a representation of a door- a Backdoor- to hack the Gibson.
Srsly wtf is up with "cyber experts"?Did they study the cyber for long?
Defining Statistics and Social Research
yeah lets make it official, loose lips blow OPS, Way to go Hilary!
Leeroy Jenkins!