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Celebrated Russian Hacker Now In Exile
An anonymous reader writes: VKontakte is a Russian social network, more popular there than even Facebook. Its founder, Pavel Durov, was a celebrity for his entrepreneurial skills, much like Mark Zuckerberg elsewhere. But as Russia has cracked down on internet freedoms, 30-year-old Durov had to relinquish control of the social network. He eventually fled the country when the government pressured him to release data on Ukrainian protest leaders. He's now a sort of roving hacker, showing up where he's welcome and not staying too long. "Mr. Durov, known for his subversive wit and an all-black wardrobe that evokes Neo from the Matrix movies, is now a little-seen nomad, moving from country to country every few weeks with a small band of computer programmers. One day he is in Paris, another in Singapore." Durov said, "I'm very happy right now without any property anywhere. I consider myself a legal citizen of the world."
With Putin giving the US a black eye by harbouring Edward Snowden, maybe this guy will find sanctuary in the US? :)
Oh, wait...
Hackers are criminals. Why am I supposed to feel sorry for a criminal?
Where he gonna git to? The Ukraine? Where can a commie critter run?
... America is a police state... Really? The Galaxies bless the U.S.
This post brought for a moment and dying. Everyone AMERICA) might be MAKES ME SICK JUST Don't be a sling And abroad for Join GNAA (GAY a change to for succeesful
One Ukrainian says to another:
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Durov should be getting the press that Snowden got for his traitorous, cowardly acts.
When your net-worth is 7 figures at a minimum, that's a bit easier to do.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Anyone who is free to travel and lives off Putin's money should be, at the least, considered Russian spy.
“Since I’m obviously a believer in free markets,” Mr. Durov
He's a raving TEABAGGER!!!!! He must be a racist and a sexist!
I consider myself a legal citizen of the world
I'm sure the Putinist nationalists are gaining a healthy, communist red glow to their faces from such offensive characterizations!
Joke is supposed to have *some* truth to it.
he is kgb administrator trying to show he is "different"
He may consider himself a citizen of the world, but the people with guns do not. I don't see this ending well.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
how is moving around the world on a Russian passport?
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
I'm not getting it, then. If the Kremlin now has its guy owning VKontakte, why would they give a shit about Durov? They wanted data on Ukrainian protest leaders, which they can now get from Mail.ru, so why would they care about him one way or another? The big reason to go after him would be that ostensibly, he has all that data, but if he doesn't and his (now ex) company has it, and would give it, then what's his value to Moscow?
Also, Ukrainian protest leaders means what? Pro-Russian separatists in the Donbass, right? If that's the case, it should be easy for Moscow to get their details, since they're supporting them. Why would they need a third party - Durov/VKontakte - to spill their guts for them?
If it means anti-Russian protesters in Ukraine, those guys are morons to put their data w/ a Russian organization, of all things. Doesn't FaceBook support Ukrainian, amongst other languages?
Durov is hacker? Come on. He's just a kid with rich parents who was placed as a figurehead for a stupid facebook clone. Vk was created by people from russian government in the first place.
Meanwhile, there's a more important news from Russia - the government blocked github, because there's a txt file with suicide methods in one of the repos.
He's mostly just an irrelevant player now making a few me-too products (Telegram) with little actual business knowledge.
All those 'businessmen' tend to dump all results of their incompetence and infighting on government. Always government at fault in Russia, even for things it's not remotely involved in. Local cultural flavor. Pretty much everyone has proven and detailed theory that the government is after him personally! It's easier to pretend to be Sakharov than getting actual work done.
Also Dunning - Kruger effect applies to selection of government officials too, especially elected ones. Anyone remotely skilled would stay out of government and procrastinate. Putin is a lot better than he could be(at least he's not near senile like Yeltsin), but mostly parroting western ideas of governance.
Still not a coward. Still performed a valuable civil service. Still deserves a whole lot better from us than what he got.
The NSA has direct access to Facebook so it doesn't need to resort to tactics like Russia does.
In USA if you have young girl you go to prison and are raped by homosexuals.
(Young girl fine for man in old testament: Deut 22 28-29 hebrew)
How is it in Russia?
Why are all countries actually cuntries?
... and not wipe out the servers when he left.
Yet another red herring from âoeanonymousâ/PsyOps. There are no such things as Internet âoefreedomsâ anywhere that Russia could have âoecracked downâ on.
So the guy's rich enough to fly himself to a different country every day, and the only downside is he can't go back to Russia?
Where do I sign up?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
That we heard rumours facebook in the bed with the government, and the russian equivalent fled because of life principles and getting a spine. Very telling.
Not just that, if oil was the overriding factor, then in 1991, when Saddam conquered Kuwait, the US could have simply recognized his annexation, and that would have opened up the oil of both Kuwait & Iraq to the US. Had Saddam gone on to overrun Saudi Arabia, Qatar & Emirates, then the US would have had to grease the palms (in a manner of speaking) of just one man - Saddam - to get all the oil it wanted at the price it wanted. And have a Damocles sword hanging over him threatening to remove him if he dared hike prices.
Its not the US vs Russia vs China vs Iran anymore
Its the collective people vs the state.