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Barrett Brown, Formerly of Anonymous, Sentenced To 63 Months
An anonymous reader writes with news that a journalist linked to Anonymous, Barret Brown, has been sentenced. "Barrett Brown, a journalist formerly linked to the hacking group Anonymous, was sentenced Thursday to over five years in prison, or a total of 63 months. Ahmed Ghappour, Brown's attorney, confirmed to Ars that Brown's 28 months already served will count toward the sentence. That leaves 34 months, or nearly three years, left for him to serve. In April 2014, Brown took a plea deal admitting guilt on three charges: "transmitting a threat in interstate commerce," for interfering with the execution of a search warrant, and to being "accessory after the fact in the unauthorized access to a protected computer." Brown originally was indicted in Texas federal court in December 2012 on several counts, including accusations that he posted a link from one Internet relay chat channel, called #Anonops, to another channel under his control, called #ProjectPM. The link led to private data that had been hijacked from intelligence firm Strategic Forecasting, or Statfor."
I've been on the scene since the '70s, and as much as I hope that my real identity to not be revealed to the world, I understand that once I post something online I take a risk (calculated or otherwise) of having my real identity exposed
There is no anonymity online or offline
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
And now... 3... 2... 1...
(1) Find a journalist you don't like who has linked to a vulnerable site they don't control
(2) Replace the content at the link target with illegally obtained material about someone powerful
(3) Sit back and watch how well the new SWATting works!
Journalistic shield laws anyone? The new first amendment-resistant law enforcement looks like we need something to replace the old antibiotics...
I'm not a fan of anonymous, but you should be very afraid when you look at these charges. This rather random assortment of charges that make you go "huh?" shows that the thinking went like this: 1) Get this guy 2) Charge this guy for things you don't charge all other people who do the same things. 3) Profit!!!
IMO he had a good case and could have won but I understand him taking the plea.
He didn't know the information was there in the link that led to this whole thing and the "threats" were hyperbole at the best. He probably couldn't afford a good attorney and he was looking at decades in prison. Typical FBI strategy is charge them with everything in the book so they plea to lessor charge you actually want.
It's a travesty what they did to him.
He was accused of hacking. We learned from the recent NSA Snowden leaks, that NSA hacks computers, but sends the data to scapegoat targets and collects the data as it crosses the public network.
So when you see a high anti-US person conveniently on a hacking charge, you have to immediately ask if he's been fitted up for the crime, if he's one of these scapegoat targets.
http://boingboing.net/2015/01/18/ecstatic-nsa-spooks-delight-in.html
"But the loot isn't delivered directly to ROC's IP address. Rather, it is routed to a so-called Scapegoat Target. That means that stolen information could end up on someone else's servers, making it look as though they were the perpetrators."
There's quite a few of these that have raise eyebrows, Pirate Bay founder hacks Sweden, supposedly to look for extradition warrants, and yet leaves a trail of evidence back to himself?? Handy, who gains most from that? Not him, there is no extradition treaty between Laos and Sweden. North Korea hacks Sony, NSA justifies its surveillance program. Who gains most?
I have my doubts.
This guy should have hit and actually killed somebody with his car, he would have faired better in court. These laws need some serious relooking.
the charges he's going down for are from his threats to law enforcement and their families, not even the hacking.
In addition to jailing whistle blowers as we have seen numerous times, Journalists who report what Whistle blowers tell them are now felons. The first amendment has officially been shredded, and now comes the icing on the cake.
CISPA is back on the fast track program, as well as other programs to jail anyone and everyone including White hats.
Since the TPP is being fast tracked too, and corporations have immunity from all prosecution, we may not know what happens since Chinese hackers will simply be handing names to US officials who will make people disappear. Who's gonna write an article when they are going to prison for doing so?
The thing is, I have not seen anyone screaming about CISPA like the last go around. Nobody seems to know anything at all about any of these other programs, and the news won't even mention TPP. If you are not nervous about the political happenings going on, you are a fool.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Exactly. Everyone seems to think he was a hacker. He's a __reporter__ .
Not hacker.
Writer.
It's his job to tell people the news. He's going to jail essentially (though not technically) for linking to data. That ain't hacking.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
He isn't even a hacker -- he's a reporter FFS. He's going down for reporting stuff the powers that be didn't want reported, the actual crime he is being punished under is just a technicality.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good