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Anonymous Dumps Australian Telco Data Online
lukehopewell1 writes "After the threats, admissions and delays, hacktivists protesting a data retention scheme proposed by the Australian Government's National Security Inquiry have begun dumping data gleaned from an Australian telco — presumably AAPT. Anonymous is in the process of dumping government and business customer data onto Pastebin for the world to see under the guise of Operation Australia. This episode is far from over, however. We're likely to see more data trickle out over the coming days, considering that the group has promised 40GB worth of leaks."
These clowns at Anonymous give activism a bad name. They are nothing more than internet tough guys who can hide behind their anonymity and risk nothing.
Real activists put their name, reputation and possibly their lives on the line for the causes they so believe in.
These guys are nothing but dumb little kids.
Hello Slashdot editors!
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/07/27/0222254/hackers-release-aapt-data-to-protest-aussie-policies
OK, and what will this accomplish?
Did you seriously call them clowns!? You are so fucked, dude. Enjoy your butt love.
Every time things like these new data retention, privacy sacrificing laws are proposed, two things always happen. People exclaim doom and gloom about the theoretical problems associated with the behavior and the government assuring the public that no such abuses will occur. (Think: Social Security #s in the US and how they were never supposed to be for anything other than social security... now it's a requirement for just about any financial transaction, people have been serialized and we're all stuck with the results which were accurately predicted.) The same thing has happened again -- people saying "this is a bad idea" and government saying "nothing bad will happen, you have nothing to worry about." But now we have someone exposing the weakness and vulnerability and the potential harm that can befall the public as a result of such data collection requirements.
But I think it's not enough to demonstrate it. People have to get angry. They have to understand they shouldn't be angry at the "hacktivists" but at the laws which require data collection and retention which are otherwise needless... the government has only one goal in mind, which is to use the data against the people.
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in ratio of 5 to Used to. SHIT ON
... I fail to see how anonymous is the one to root for here.
Well then, let me explain it.
Government is doing bad things. Specifically, it is always doing things which are against the interests of the people, or society as a whole.
All attempts at changing this behaviour have failed.
Anonymous is trying new tactics. By making the data public, it's making the population aware of the dangers of this legislation. In effect, they are illustrating the danger by hurting the privacy of a large number of individuals. With enough popular support, maybe possibly the law will get changed.
Now, as I said, this is a new tactic. The damage to the public is minimal, and would be otherwise dwarfed by any real data breach by real hackers. In that case, the information would be used for criminal purposes so the damage would be much greater, and the company would naturally deny that a breach had happened.
Now, you might not see this as an effective strategy, and indeed it may not be.
But this brings us back to the first point, which is that government is doing bad things and is unresponsive to the needs of the people. Since all other avenues of influence have failed, what remains would appear to be armed revolt.
When the system gets bad enough to piss off a large portion of the population, that's what will happen.
So you can pooh-pooh the attempts by Anonymous to try alternate means, but with no alternative you're effectively saying that revolt is the only option.
I, for one, applaud their efforts. I hope they come up with many more creative ways to make the people's voice heard in the halls of government, before we have to use armed rebellion.
if they did this to prove a point, they could have just posted a sample of the data, but no, they reveal everyones data and show they have as little respect for people as the companies that they target.
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I have a 25GB monthly quota, you insensitive clods!
Anonymous harms the people who's data they publish, and they are not the good guys. They are criminals doing criminal harm.
However, they are *also* revealing just how vulnerable the system is to crime. If the data were not logged at all, then anonymous would not be able to publish it.
So, the government should protect me from anonymous by making this level of logging illegal, rather than mandatory.
Does it count as a release if it is uploaded to Letitbit.net, which proceeds to try and trick me into downloading an .exe file, then presents me with about 20 unreadable captchas in a row, then fails because it uses javascript on some IP address which got blocked by noscript, then after making an exception for that IP address it says I have reached my free limit of one download per day?
I like my coffee the way I like my women - roasted and ground up into little tiny pieces.
Ah, yes. Interesting how the "People's Liberation Army" seems to kill more than it liberates. Next time Anonymous wants to represent the people, ask the people first if they want Anonymous as their representative.
The TRUTH shall set us free.
So Anonymous is saying government is bad because they are telling the people what's good for them without asking them. Anonymous is telling the people what's good for them without asking too. What's the difference. Oh yeah, the people get the opportunity to ELECT the government (Really? So does that mean the people have already tacitly agreed to whatever the government has done and can fire them when the next election comes around? Yes Virginia, that is exactly what I'm saying). And in Australia, it is the law that everyone who can legally vote MUST vote. I don't like Big Brother either. In any form.
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What steps exactly protect me from terrorists? They only thing that is going to stop these "terrorists" is to give them what they want. They don't do compromise. Also, the chance that you die from a terrorist attack in Australia, The US, Canada or Europe is much smaller than dying from lightning. You stand a bigger chance winning the lottery than dying from terrorists. About the only cause of death that is less likely to occur is being struck by a meteor. Why is it then, that the entire population should give up it's freedom to prevent "dying from terrorists"? I doubt that is the real reason. What is the real reason? It's probably just stupidity, but you can come up with your own conspiracy theory if you don't believe that, or any of the existing theories.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
Oh dear, given the amount of time that has passed since Wikileaks first got started, looks like corporates are just not very good at preventing this sort of mass leak/breach! Hopefully AAPT will fire their security team, Telstra will be next no doubt! Theres a guide to preventing mass leaks over at the 360 blog, maybe AAPT missed it :-)
http://360is.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/wikileaks-lessons-for-uk-information.html
I think the point that a lot of people/hactivists miss when they focus on privacy and get their knickers in a twist is that data retention regulations aren't primarily intended as surveillance enabling mechanisms, they are intended as evidence preservers so that once a law enforcement officer has enough evidence to go before a judge and get a warrant there will be something there to seize. From a forensic perspective, they mandate the architecting of digital exchange into systems they target. In the physical world this isn't necessary, we leave fingerprints everywhere we go, we pick up carpet fibers on our shoes, and we leave trace evidence behind. When it comes to digital systems such as those run by ISPs, unless there is software and hardware explicitly designed and configured to log, retain user info, etc, it isn't going to happen; transfer evidence is not going to exist. A lot of this type of legislation has been enacted because countries, even non-European ones, are signatories of the European convention on cybercrime, and the convention directs countries to have this type of capacity in place. The International Telecommunications Union, part of the UN, is also pushing countries to enact similar legislation. The trick is to make sure that the legislation is enacted in a way that doesn't infringe on privacy or other rights. If you read the convention, it specifically mandates that privacy and human rights be respected. There is also a retention time and a secure deletion directive, at least insofar as the European convention is concerned (directive 2006/24/EC of the European Parliament). Having said that, user activity data certainly needs to be better protected. And to all those who will probably jump on me and point out that the legislation and the convention also requires ISPs to have surveillance capability, that surveillance can only to be started with the proper judicial authorization, otherwise it is a criminal offence. It's just like taping a phone conversation. In most countries we also have enough case law and constitutional protection to mitigate abuse (e.g. 4th amendment in the US, or Charter s.8 in Canada.)