Linux Forcibly Installed On Congressman's Computer In Act of Terrorism

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Linux Forcibly Installed On Congressman's Computer In Act of Terrorism

Posted by Unknown on Wednesday September 26, 2012 @12:22AM from the rms-detained-on-hooliganism-charges dept.

fermion writes with news of Windows computers being forcefully liberated: "The campaign headquarters of Michael Grimm, a U.S. House of Representatives member from New York, were vandalized. What has not been reported everywhere is that Linux was installed on one of his computers, erasing data in the process. Is this a new attack on democracy by the open source radicals, or it is just a random occurrence?" From the article: "'In fact, one officer said to me today they see this as a crime against the government, because I am a sitting United States congressman and they take it very seriously. You know, especially in light of what happened with Gabby Giffords, we're not in the world today where we can shrug things off,' Grimm said. ... [GNU/]Linux, an open-source operating system, was installed on Grimm's computers, erasing the hard drive contents, which included polling and voter identification data. But staff had backed up the hard drive contents hours beforehand. Grimm and his staffers said the vandalism — cement blocks were thrown through the office's windows — is a cover-up for the attacks on the computers."

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Attack against Microsoft by Mkaks · 2012-09-26 00:22 · Score: 5, Funny

I see this as a radical open source movement. Some people hated to see that government was using Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X on their computers and decided to take the matter in to their own hands. Linux was forcibly installed on the computers and the suspect was caught seen masturbating in a dark corner as the progress meter went further and further.
1. Re:Attack against Microsoft by SJHillman · 2012-09-26 00:28 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Police say that they suspect a member of the radical Penguinite cult is behind it. Other devices belonging to government officials are being inspected for Linux installations. Suspected devices include laptops, tablets, automobiles, toasters and those sneakers with flashing lights in the heel.
2. Re:Attack against Microsoft by mellon · 2012-09-26 01:47 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Holy Crap, Batman! I think I see The Penguin's evil fingerprints on this computer!
3. Re:Attack against Microsoft by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 02:02 · Score: 2, Interesting
  
  mm no. The congressman is under investigation for campaign fundraisings. Someone throw bricks through his windows, that's vandalism, but I believe his staff install Linux intentionally for erase the data in their pc's.
4. Re:Attack against Microsoft by Walterk · 2012-09-26 02:10 · Score: 2
  
  [..] they suspect a member of the radical Penguinite cult [..]
  Not those splitters again!?
  
  -- The Penguin's Front of Linux
  
  --
  
  "If anyone needs me, I'm in the angry dome."
5. Re:Attack against Microsoft by hazah · 2012-09-26 03:20 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Are you sure it doesn't have anything to do with you posting shit like this?
6. Re:Attack against Microsoft by hairyfeet · 2012-09-26 03:59 · Score: 2
  
  Uhhh..they had backups which means that makes NO sense whatsoever. If they simply wanted to wipe data they could have zero'd the drives and then restored from a backup minus the data, but just slapping Linux on there when they had backups makes zero sense.
  
  --
  ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
7. Re:Attack against Microsoft by tqk · 2012-09-26 05:38 · Score: 2
  
  I see you're -1 Troll. Looks like it's working well to me.
  
  --
  "Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit ..." -- Pink Floyd.
8. Re:Attack against Microsoft by tqk · 2012-09-26 05:49 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  Also Who installs Linux while breaking and entering?
  We can't help it. It's a moral imperative. You see a box that isn't running FLOSS, and you've just got to do something about it. Feature! :-)
  
  --
  "Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit ..." -- Pink Floyd.
9. Re:Attack against Microsoft by martas · 2012-09-26 05:56 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  When caught, the suspect is reported to have said "Hey, her USB ports were clearly exposed, she was asking for it!"
  
  --
  weinersmith
10. Re:Attack against Microsoft by pixelpusher220 · 2012-09-26 06:39 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Why do I wonder if the 'Feds' couldn't figure out that there was simply a Linux CD in the computer that was auto-booting...
  
  --
  People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people :-D
11. Re:Attack against Microsoft by sumdumass · 2012-09-26 06:40 · Score: 2
  
  Or someone who gained access to the offices illegally, couldn't get past the network security so dropped a live CD into the laptop or system and went through the install process instead of boot image process in an attempt to use some tools to access networked information that went awry. The smashing of the windows and such could very well be the idiot's frustration pressing the wrong buttons.
  But you are probably right about erasing evidence of crimes. Even if the evidence still exists, the fact that the offices were broken into and someone manipulated data on the systems shows potential for the reliability of that evidence. A judge might ask, well, according to this file and that file, you have been taking bribes how do you explain that. The politician responds, someone broke into our offices and messed with the computers, they installed an operating system on one of them commonly used by hackers. I have never seen those files in my life and suggest they were planted by the people who broke into my office.
12. Re:Attack against Microsoft by Urza9814 · 2012-09-26 07:19 · Score: 2
  
  You sure it wasn't the Penguin Liberation Front?
13. Re:Attack against Microsoft by CheeseTroll · 2012-09-26 07:59 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  After all, if it had been a legitimate forced-install, the computer has ways of shutting down those ports so the naughty bits can't take hold on the internal disk.
  
  --
  A post a day keeps productivity at bay.
14. Re:Attack against Microsoft by Anne+Thwacks · 2012-09-26 08:14 · Score: 2
  
  Power to the penguins!
  FTFY
  
  --
  Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
There's more to this story. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 00:26 · Score: 5, Interesting

Elsewhere it was revealed that it was a young kid who threw the rocks, and a staffer "accidentally" wiped the computers with a Linux disk.
I say accidentally because he was being investigated for illegal use of campaign funds, and some of the data that may have been of interest to the investigation was lost. And it's not exactly trivial to accidentally wipe your disks with a Linux disk. I can see someone doing it, but you do have to go through enough steps that you have to have been trying to do *something* with that disk even if it wasn't wiping the system.
1. Re:There's more to this story. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 00:36 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  To follow up, here's the link: http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2012/09/rep_michael_gri_1.php
2. Re:There's more to this story. by realxmp · 2012-09-26 00:37 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  Elsewhere it was revealed that it was a young kid who threw the rocks, and a staffer "accidentally" wiped the computers with a Linux disk.
  I say accidentally because he was being investigated for illegal use of campaign funds, and some of the data that may have been of interest to the investigation was lost. And it's not exactly trivial to accidentally wipe your disks with a Linux disk. I can see someone doing it, but you do have to go through enough steps that you have to have been trying to do *something* with that disk even if it wasn't wiping the system.
  Yep, New York Daily New has the story here. Apparently like the data wasn't deleted and whoever they had to do their IT didn't know enough about Linux and partitions to realise.
3. Re:There's more to this story. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 00:40 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  I'd also like to note that the only place the word "terrorism" appears is in the headline of the slashdot summary. The word is not used at all in either the summary nor in the linked article.
  captcha: distorts
4. Re:There's more to this story. by Mitchell314 · 2012-09-26 00:50 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Yeah, terrorism is supposed to inspire terror. It's kinda in the bloody name. While concerning, my imagination fails to give me goosebumps with this news.
  
  --
  I read TFA and all I got was this lousy cookie
5. Re:There's more to this story. by dkleinsc · 2012-09-26 00:59 · Score: 2
  
  So in other words, as accidentally as Rose Mary Woods erased 18.5 minutes of the Nixon tapes. Got it.
  
  --
  I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
6. Re:There's more to this story. by FoolishOwl · 2012-09-26 01:03 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Because 'dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda' is just so fucking difficult. Maybe it would have worked better to have the staffer throw rocks, and a young kid wipe the hard disk.
7. Re:There's more to this story. by interkin3tic · 2012-09-26 01:09 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  You just can't hire competent criminal IT staff these days.
8. Re:There's more to this story. by Rogerborg · 2012-09-26 02:00 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  Bingo. An ex-employer of mine suffered a "break in" where the only things stolen were some executive laptops - which had conveniently been left out on their desks - and some of the papers in the safe - which the burglars apparently managed to guess the combination to.
  This was after they'd stopped paying all the staff, but just before administrators were called in to go through the accounts and contracts. Say, can you guess what information went missing in the "break in"?
  The staff just sighed and asked which side of the window the broken glass was on. It was that kind of a place.
  
  --
  If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
9. Re:There's more to this story. by unixisc · 2012-09-26 02:03 · Score: 2
  
  They didn't install X11, or KDE, or any other DE. Just the CLI and Emacs, and that's all the Congressman was left to work w/. He was probably targeted by FSF activists for being a part of an Open Source cabal, and not using GPL software, but instead, using either a Mac or FBSD.
10. Re:There's more to this story. by X0563511 · 2012-09-26 02:06 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  It's far easier to just boot dban and type AUTONUKE.
  
  --
  For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
11. Re:There's more to this story. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 02:09 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  or they could be like Hollywood trying to throw rocks to break the LCD to destroy the data...
12. Re:There's more to this story. by Hillgiant · 2012-09-26 02:14 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  It is, in part, about establishing a false equivalence. A Democratic Representative being shot in the face is just the same as a Republican Representative loosing a couple hours of computer uptime.
  
  --
  -
13. Re:There's more to this story. by nautsch · 2012-09-26 02:25 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  (preferred because somebody who really really tried could probably resurrect the old data through a mere zeroing, but it would be a lot harder if overwritten with random bytes, and way harder if you executed this command five or six times in a row).
  I have NEVER seen that done or even heard of it. Could you link me to a source, where it is shown, that a zeroed drive could be used to get anything meaningful back? The "overwrite 7 times to be sure" is a myth as far as I know.
  
  --
  If you find a typo, you may keep it.
14. Re:There's more to this story. by camperdave · 2012-09-26 03:15 · Score: 2
  
  Should fully wiping out all your data be as easy as pressing a button?
  In certain circumstances, yes.
  
  --
  When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
15. Re:There's more to this story. by 1u3hr · 2012-09-26 03:20 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Here's the real story:
  http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/2012/09/rep_michael_gri_1.php
  Rep. Michael Grimm's Office Break-In Not Quite Watergate; Just an 8th Grader Who Broke a Window
  By James King Tue., Sep. 25 2012 at 3:39 PM
  Congressman Michael Grimm's Staten Island campaign office was "broken into" over the weekend in what the congressman initially suspected to be a Watergate-esque scandal presumably perpetrated by the cronies of his opponent in this year's election.
  Not quite -- it was just an eighth-grader who broke a window.
  The NYPD says today that an eighth-grader at a Staten Island junior high school told a school counselor that he and a friend broke the window. The boy, who has not been identified, has been charged with criminal mischief.
  Grimm initially claimed thieves broke in using old keys and then smashed windows to make it appear like it was a just a case of random vandalism -- which it was. He suspected that the burglars installed software on the hard drives of computers in the office designed to delete files.
  Nope -- a "police source" tells the New York Daily News that it "appears that a campaign staffer wiped the hard drives accidentally after mistakenly inserting a Linux system disc into a Windows machine."
  They have hats for people like Grimm -- they're made of tinfoil.
  ====================
  So, no one "broke in" and it was a staffer who accidentally (?) installed Luinux.
  Another linkbait bullshit slashdot "story".
16. Re:There's more to this story. by camperdave · 2012-09-26 03:30 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  The theory is that the read/write head never follows exactly the same track, so there can be a thin sliver of old data beside the fresh zeros. Further, there may be statistical traces in the magnetic field of the platter (writing a zero over a zero might yield a strength of 0, but writing a zero over a 1 might yield a strength of 0.05, which the normal read/write head would interpret as a zero.) The "overwrite multiple times" procedure is supposed to nullify both of those effects. However, you'd only find equipment capable of detecting those anomalies in a high end data recovery lab.
  
  Having said that, I've never heard of it being done before either.
  
  --
  When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
17. Re:There's more to this story. by kimvette · 2012-09-26 04:23 · Score: 2
  
  Have you ever read legislation? It isn't just theoretically possible, but downright likely that copying /dev/random will result in an exact duplicate of the original data being written. /dev/zero would be just overwriting the drives with a document exhaustively describing the integrity of >99% of politicians.
  
  --
  The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
18. Re:There's more to this story. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 05:00 · Score: 2, Insightful
  
  It was featured in the due diligence paranoia in Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon", and rates right up there with using 4096 bit keys and the like. The question isn't whether or not you can ship the disk off to a data recovery company and remount the platter in a drive with an extra-sensitive head and recover the data, it is whether or not the NSA could recover the data with an unlimited budget and state of the art equipment, including new equipment custom engineered for the purpose as needed.
  If your "crime" is covering up a bit of petty embezzlement (as postulated presumably humorously above), nobody will spend that kind of money or time on it and overwriting with zeros would probably suffice. If your "crime" was the hijacking of a nuclear submarine armed with a small stack of nuclear-tipped freely targetable tomahawks (and there was some chance that your recovered laptop had once contained a Google Maps entry for your secret underwater base) I would not assume that a simple overwrite of zeros in particular was enough to completely destroy all hysteretic trace of each bit's previous state, to the point where previous 1s were solidly within the statistical noise compared to previous 0s. And don't forget -- there could be other traces or tests that might be used to recover the former state besides a superconducting read head -- laser reflection, physically slicing the tracks and taking a spiral microphotograph of the actual magnetic material that once held the bits. If price was no object, the question would very much be "Is the data on the disk degraded beyond recovery from an information theoretic and physical point of view?"
  The government, at least, takes this possibility seriously, as do large corporations with secrets. See e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_erasure, where the list of government standards for data erasure include (as I noted in the original reply) overwriting of the data multiple times with random information, and where the smart money takes the entire disk including the firmware and controllers and chassis and melts it down to a puddle of slag at the end of the day no matter what methods are used outside of that.
  Sincerely Yours in conspiracy-theory paranoia,
  rgb
  P.S. -- Now it's time to return to my doomsday bunker and check up on the supply of fresh water and tinfoil for caps...;-)
  PPS -- Sorry about the AC reply; my browser/slashdot seems to have disconnected my login. Zounds, it must be the NSA, trying to discredit my comment so they can continue to read the poorly erased data of Islamic terrorists and stupid embezzlers! Sancho! My armor!
Inside job! by K.+S.+Kyosuke · 2012-09-26 00:27 · Score: 2, Funny

It was an inside job by Government's agents. They are trying to get Linux install media on the list of illicit substances. ("Citizen, you have a Debian media set in your handbag! That was used in the most recent attack on a Congressman's privacy! You're under arrest!")

--
Ezekiel 23:20
congressman=ruling class? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 00:32 · Score: 5, Insightful

because I am a sitting United States congressman

Does anyone else get an air of elitism when people say things like this? "I work for the government, I'm better than you, and these things should only happen to you plebs." I feel that as long as our politicians think like this, we're doomed as a democracy.
1. Re:congressman=ruling class? by SJHillman · 2012-09-26 00:36 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  I sensed an air of laziness. If he were useful, he would be a standing, running, jogging or working congressman, not just a sitting one.
2. Re:congressman=ruling class? by CodeheadUK · 2012-09-26 01:44 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Like this guy?
  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/conservative/9563847/Police-log-reveals-details-of-Andrew-Mitchells-pleb-rant.html
  Once elected to office, the snout goes in the trough and they take all they can while thet rest of us pay for it.
Re:Noob Hackers. by SJHillman · 2012-09-26 00:32 · Score: 3, Informative

And then selected the wrong keyboard and language settings, and then chose the wrong partitions to format and then selected the wrong packages to install...
Lack of perspective by oobayly · 2012-09-26 00:37 · Score: 3, Insightful

In light of a the attempted assassination of a congresswoman, throwing a lump of concrete through a window and flattening a computer definitely should be the highest priority for the police.
Uh... what? by kiriath · 2012-09-26 00:37 · Score: 2

I had to check the ol' calendar to ensure that I didn't sleep till April 1.
What kind of hooey is this?
Who would want to break and enter to install linux? Really?
Let me put it to you this way Mr Congressman: They did you a freaking favor, thank them and move on.
But the real question is... by gentryx · 2012-09-26 00:40 · Score: 4, Funny

Was he satisfied with his new Linux desktop? And did they install KDE or Gnome?

--
Computer simulation made easy -- LibGeoDecomp
What distro was it? by erikwestlund · 2012-09-26 00:41 · Score: 4, Funny

Tin Hat Linux by the looks of it.
Re:Noob Hackers. by Tx · 2012-09-26 00:46 · Score: 4, Insightful

You'd be amazed how clever some idiots are.

--
Oh no... it's the future.
So basically... by dargaud · 2012-09-26 00:46 · Score: 4, Funny

...does that mean that you can install Linux in the time it takes for a cement block to go through a Windows(tm) ? Guerrilla advertisement is getting worse and worse.

--
Non-Linux Penguins ?
Consensual Install by Firemouth · 2012-09-26 00:48 · Score: 5, Funny

I'd say this was consensual install. Had it been legitimate non-consensual install, the computer has a way to prevent itself being impregnated with an open source operating system if the install was not consensual.
Choice of OS irrelevant... by ignavus · 2012-09-26 00:49 · Score: 2

If anyone accesses your PC without permission and destroys your data, that is a problem.
If they do it by installing some other OS, that is just the same problem. You weren't going to keep your compromised OS, were you?
If the other OS is Linux, that is no different to putting (say) MacOSX or BSD or MS-DOS even on the PC.
Heck, doing a clean install of an older version of WIndows would be just as bad.
Your data is gone. That is the news.

--
I am anarch of all I survey.
Re:Gabby Giffords? by cvtan · 2012-09-26 01:11 · Score: 2

Maybe his brain was on the hard drive.

--
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
This is a non-story. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 01:14 · Score: 5, Informative

This congressman is currently under investigation for misappropriation of funds. Here's a much more convincing story:

1. Congressman misappropriates campaign funds
2. Congressman comes under investigation
3. Congressman slips IT guy $50 to ransack the office at night and make some key financial data "disappear"
4. Congressman acts shocked and appalled, decries this act of "terrorism" and labels himself as a helpless victim.
5. Media gobbles it up because it contains the word "terrorism"
6. ...
7. Profit! (from misappropriating campaign funds)
Did they leave the source code? by Neil_Brown · 2012-09-26 01:39 · Score: 2

Or, at least, an offer to come back with the source code at any point in the next three years?
Should be easy to identify the culprit by TarPitt · 2012-09-26 01:48 · Score: 4, Funny

They left distinctive footprints walking across the yard in front of the office:
Actual Forensic Photo From Evidence File
Don't see shoes like that every day in New York

--
If your children ever found out how lame you are, they'd murder you in your sleep
Link doesn't mention anything about illegal funds by Anonymous Coward · 2012-09-26 01:49 · Score: 5, Informative

Your link doesn't mention anything about illegal funds, I was going to call you out for trying to mislead but then I Google'd it:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/04/michael-grimm_n_1853232.html
Wow, pretty murkey Eric Cantor (Republican head of the House!) in there too receiving the monies, so you can bet this one will be buried quick.
Re:Sounds like data theft by L4t3r4lu5 · 2012-09-26 01:58 · Score: 4, Insightful

Do you have any idea how long it would take or how much it would cost to retrieve the data from a zero-wiped magnetic storage platter? Scanning tunnelling microscopy of a current generation ultra-high density, high capacity, perpendicular recorded magnetic storage platters to pick up the difference between 1>0 and 0>0 is unfeasible. Yes, it makes a great techno-voodoo for CSI and the like, but as a reality it's just not a reasonable suggestion.

By the way, recovery of a data by this process has never even been attempted, let alone succeeded. There are images of HDD platter surfaces on the MFM Wikipedia page, but then again those aren't zero'd drives, and the current gen drives are approx 80x more densely packed.

--
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
Re:Next on FOX: Open source is now a crime by jamstar7 · 2012-09-26 02:02 · Score: 2

Thing that gets me is, they considered Palin to be the best choice for Veep. This after Romney and Ryan already had political carreers going.

It also gets me that some kid would put a Linux cd in, boot to it, and 'accidentaly' wipe a hard drive of a Congressman under investigation. If it was a CD, likely it was Ubuntu, which boots into 'test drive' mode by default. And aren't most computers set up to not boot from the cd drive as a default? What politigeek would have the brains and experience to change this?

I better shut up now, or they'll come arrest me for terrorrorrorrism because I run Linux here...

--
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
Comment removed by account_deleted · 2012-09-26 03:37 · Score: 2

Comment removed based on user account deletion
RMS by Drumpig · 2012-09-26 04:25 · Score: 2

A witness says they spotted a rather large and unkempt man with a parrot on his shoulder fleeing the scene, he stopped to pick at his feet followed by what appeared to be a quick snack before disappearing out of sight..
OMFG! They got our phones! by swschrad · 2012-09-26 04:50 · Score: 2

all our cellphones are compromised with this Finnish virus!

--
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?