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Bradley Manning and the 'Hacker Madness' Scare Tactic
New submitter wabrandsma sends this excerpt from New Scientist:
"The Bradley Manning case continues a trend of government prosecutions that use familiarity with digital tools and knowledge of computers as a scare tactic and a basis for obtaining grossly disproportionate and unfair punishments, strategies enabled by broad, vague laws like the CFAA and the Espionage Act. Let's call this the 'hacker madness' strategy. Using it, the prosecution portrays actions taken by someone using a computer as more dangerous or scary than they actually are by highlighting the digital tools used to a nontechnical or even technophobic judge. ... We've seen this trick before. In a case that we at the Electronic Frontier Foundation handled in 2009, Boston College police used the fact that our client worked on a Linux operating system with "a black screen with white font" as part of a basis for a search warrant. Luckily the Massachusetts Supreme Court tossed out the warrant after EFF got involved, but who knows what would have happened had we not been there. And happily, Oracle got a big surprise when it tried a similar trick in Oracle v. Google and discovered that the judge was a programmer who sharply called them on it."
... the prosecution portrays actions taken by someone using a computer as more dangerous or scary than they actually are by highlighting the digital tools used to a nontechnical or even technophobic judge. ... We've seen this trick before. In a case that we at the Electronic Frontier Foundation handled in 2009 ...
I wonder what Kevin Mitnick would have to say about this revelation as news.
... simply to avoid admitting ignorance.
On a broad scale, people have always been scared by what they don't understand. On a more refined level, people are often willing to agree with a strongly-worded argument if they don't understand the premise
There are lots of new problems due to technology - but very few new avoidance tactics / reactions. Look at the opposition to nearly every major advance (in science) in the last 500 years. No need to go further back - you'll find enough examples in the last 50 that going back 500 will be difficult.
- Nec Impar Pluribus, or so I'm told.
Dunno, could it be referring to this bit previoulsy covered here? I imagine there may have been a few such incidents at that trial.
Oh no... it's the future.
What exactly is the relevance to the Manning case? He was convicted of releasing classified information, something it's pretty obvious he did. Regardless of what the information is or how he obtained it, the release of the information is what he was charged with and convicted of doing.
This sounds like someone trying to hitch their own free software wagon to the pro-Manning/Wikileaks train.
Original article on EFF blog.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Considering that Manning already had access to the networks he downloaded the material from I think it would be a stretch to call it hacking. But I agree that it is SOP to refer to the tools used in a crime in the most intimidating manner to strengthen the argument. Well no matter what the details of the vernacular used Manning will be a rather old man before he will be breathing free air again. He will not get life but the shear number of charges he is being convicted of will assure that his parole, if he is ever eligible, will be decided by our children or grandchildren.
Because lawyers view the law as some isolated specialization that needs no connection to any other aspect of the world, real or imagined. It is viewed by most lawyers as an amoral disconnected dance in which both sides usually jargon-heavy language to defeat each other, whilst simultaneously baffling laymen. The Law is a ritual that, unfortunately, has real world consequences but as little actual relation to the real world as its high priests can manage.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
In the Manning case, technology is relevant. There is no way he would've been able to photocopy that amount of information. The case shows the very real danger of switching to digital without considering the security implications. Furthermore, what Manning did had quite a big impact, the volume of the leak more than explains the harsh charges, there's no need to blame it on the 'hacker scare'.
The TSA thought my titanium solo cookset and matching titanium fork, stuffed into a mesh bag, looked like a bomb made out of "a razor blade and wires." So, they don't even have to be real electronics or wires.
.: Semper Absurda
Because lawyers view the law as some isolated specialization that needs no connection to any other aspect of the world, real or imagined. It is viewed by most lawyers as an amoral disconnected dance in which both sides usually jargon-heavy language to defeat each other, whilst simultaneously baffling laymen. The Law is a ritual that, unfortunately, has real world consequences but as little actual relation to the real world as its high priests can manage.
Jesus said it better. "And he said, Woe unto you also, ye lawyers! for ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers."
Free Martian Whores!
In the Manning case, the prosecution used Manning's use of a standard, more than 15-year-old Unix program called Wget to collect information, as if it were a dark and nefarious technique.
Maybe it's not quite that, but if it's used to download information that shouldn't be collected by an individual, it certainly bears watching.
Dude, what the fuck?
wget is a web client - you know, like the one you're using to read this comment. It bears watching just like any other web client bears watching.
Now, one could argue it might profit them more to pay attention to what data they make available to web clients.... But that would be all... I dunno, sensible.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
The EFF is to computer and internet rights as what the NRA is to run rights and the defense of the 2nd amendment.
I would love to see the EFF and NRA team up! *grin*
Life is not for the lazy.
It's called a "Threat Narrative". It's why there were no WMDs. There never was even suspicion of WMDs. There was only the need for a Threat Narrative to convince the people to let the armed forces off it's chain.
Vietnam? Threat Narrative. McCarthyism? Threat Narrative.... The Holocaust? Threat Narrative.
Require Evidence before belief -- That's rational. Always disbelieve the Threat Narrative.
Don't Fall For It, not even once.
I'm sorry, but you're implying the holocaust was a sham used to justify our entrance into WW2?
If so, you're a moron on several levels.
Pretty sure that he is implying the Nazi regime was able to bring about the Holocaust through the threat narrative used to paint the Jews and others as some sort of menacing threat to their state. The details of the concentration camps weren't discovered until lonnnnggg after the US joined the allies in the war, which obviously would have happened one way or the other once Pearl Harbour occurred heh.
My irony meter is pegged. Now the EFF is using the same logic that the government is using. If we hadn't been watching out for your interests, who knows what bad things might have happened.
Donations cheerfully accepted.
Other way around. He was implying the holocaust was justified using a threat narrative. Even the Nazis couldn't just declare time for a bit of genocide. They had to first build up some level of public support by spreading stories about the Jewish 'threat' - they told stories of how Jews sabotaged the first world war leading to Germany's humiliating defeat, accused Jewish bankers of deliberately crippling the economy with hyperinflation for their own profit, and warned that with the high birth rate in the Jewish population their inferior race of lower intelligence would take over all of Germany and hold the country back culturally, intellectually and economically. Thus they invented this threat narrative - one powerful enough that once the government began forcing Jews into ghettos and shipping them off to 'relocation' centers, public objection and protest was limited enough to contain with standard police-state measures.
If you want an American example, there is the Japanese American Internment, in which the US government placed more than a hundred thousand American citizens of Japanese ancestry into camps out of a fear that their ethnicity may cause them to remain loyal to the 'country of their people' and lead them to sabotage the war effort. The conditions in some camps were little better than the German concentration camps.
The incident is regarded as something of a awkward moment in history now - the standard narrative of the mighty US defeating the evil of the Nazis and their Japanese allies is lessened by the idea that the US at the time not only had active eugenics programs but a policy of rounding up citizens of undesireable ethnicity and locking them into poorly-built concentration camps. People really don't like to face a history that isn't made of good-vs-evil.
The "hacking" laws are written in terms of access, which is contextual. Manning had access to the systems to do the work for which he was employed by the DoD. He did not have access to copy off files and give them Wikileaks. So he did violate those laws.
Only if you redefine the word "access".
If I created an account for you on my system, and made you a super-user, you have access to all kinds of stuff... config files, creating users, installing software. This doesn't mean you have my approval, but I did give you access to them.
Redefining the word (in noun form) to mean something else is an exceptionally dangerous road to go down. If someone misreads an order (judicial or executive) and does something unintended, do we really want them becoming a sacrificial scapegoat? Do they not have "access" because they didn't have actual permission? Wouldn't we prefer to nail those who shouldn't have given them access or those who gave bad instructions? Do we just assume that because children aren't allowed in a bedroom that they don't have access to the gun under the pillow? Do we want that legal defense?
"Access" cannot be equated to verbal or paper permission. Access (noun) is the ability to access (verb) something, not the authority to do so.
He accessed something that he wasn't supposed to, but to which he had access. What he did with it was clearly illegal. He shouldn't have been given access, but that's a whole different ball of wax.
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
Except that Israel was a theocracy conquered by Rome. Within the bounds of Roman law, the Jews were permitted their own governance. The Sanhedrin did hear real trials based on Jewish religious law, brought before them by people who could be called lawyers. Even many of the secular laws were religiously colored in some way, much like Christianity sometimes does in our law today.
It's closer than you might think.
(Yes, "The Law" in most passages does refer to the Law of Moses, but interpretations of it were often the law of the land, as well.)
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
Seriously? So, we just assume that every word in any Bible you and I can read is false, because it isn't in the original language? How about some other translations? (picking them at random)
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
Yeah, but something akin to Javascript, where interpreter behavior or execution environment can vary wildly.
I won't join Slashcott. OTOH, If Beta goes live, I just won't be back until it's fixed. Sorry Dice.
And the fact that so many people believe that to be true is in the basis of the bad shape of your justice system.
No, prosecution is not there to find yuo guilty but to find the truth of a case. There's no simmetry between prosecution and defense.
Should actions which would violate the geneva convention were they carried out on a prisoner of war be considered acceptable when carried out on individuals otherwise detained? Should a government deal with it's own citizens more harshly than an enemy combatant (whom they would have killed had he not surrendered)?
It seems you consider your fellow man the enemy. Indeed, you believe he should be dealt with more harshly than a foreigner who has taken up arms against you. You should rethink your priorities.
The King James Version is written in Early Modern English, not a medieval variety (the differences between the KJV and the Middle English of, say, Chaucer or Old English which were spoken within the medieval era is significant).
These thoughts have been bouncing around in my head for a while now. I've been following a steady stream of stories and reports chronicling the continual demonization of stigmatization of "hackers" and generally technologically proficient people in general.
People misunderstand or refuse to understand at all. The negative perception caused partly by a few ne'er-do-wells and mostly by corporate propaganda paints us all with a thick coat of black. Misunderstanding transforms into mistrust, mistrust into fear, fear to indignant anger, anger to oppression; before you know it, we have a publically supported, government sanctioned witch hunt on our hands. We technology-savvy individuals are being singled out as the next great threat to the establishment.
The FBI threw Sklyarov in the slammer for giving a security talk on flaws in Adobe's DRM. Russia -- Russia, people, not exactly known for a track record of upholding civil rights -- issued a statement for security researchers to stay the hell out of the US because it had become illegal to do some math.
Auernheimer exposed a blatant security flaw, which only existed because of AT&T's utter laziness and indiscretion, and went to prison simply because the way he exposed it and pissed off AT&T.
Swartz hanged himself after the full force of the federal government hounded him and drove him over the edge by threatening a 35-year prison term for what should have been a slap-on-the-wrist misdemeanor.
An obviously technophobic judge ruled for an injunction against a UK security researcher to prevent him from publicizing an immobilizer security flaw that could be exploited by organized crime to steal millions of dollars worth of expensive sports cars. He is going ahead with it anyway because it's the responsable thing to do when affected parties refuse to address it, and I'm willing to bet the government is going to come down on him heavily for it.
The incidents of tech-savvy people being vilified are too numerous to list, but I'm sure we're all aware of them. The establishment wants their culture of liability, where ordinary individuals are dragged into the big leagues and expected to perform at the same level as corporate and government giants, while our perspective demands greater personal freedoms to offset the goliathan advantage held over us.
I think we're going to see a lot more of this until the societal shift is complete and the new generation becomes leadership, and that's a *very* optimistic view.