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Ashley Madison CEO Steps Down, Reporter Finds Clues To Hacker's Identity
Dave Knott writes: Following the recent hacks on the infidelity website Ashley Madison, Noel Biderman has stepped down as CEO of both AshleyMadison.com and its parent company. Avid Life Media Inc., the company that owns the site and many others, announced Biderman's move in a short press release on Friday: "Noel Biderman, in mutual agreement with the company, is stepping down as chief executive officer of Avid Life Media Inc. (ALM) and is no longer with the company. Until the appointment of a new CEO, the company will be led by the existing senior management team." Before the data hack, the company was planning an IPO in London that would have taken in as much as $200 million from investors. According to regulatory filings, the company had $115 million in revenue last year, more than four times the amount it obtained in 2009.
Meanwhile, in related news, Brian Krebs (the reporter who first uncovered the hack) says he has uncovered clues to the possible identity of the hacker. Krebs says he noticed the Twitter account operated by a known hacker recently posted a link to Ashley Madison's stolen proprietary source code before it was made public. Intrigued by the poster's apparent access, he examined the account's posting history and noticed a predilection for the music of Australian hard rock band AC/DC. This jibes with the behavior of the hacker(s), who had displayed threatening messages on the computers of Ashley Madison employees, accompanied by AC/DC song Thunderstruck. In a series of tweets, the owner of the account, one Thadeus Zu, appears to deny that he was behind the hack, and indeed makes several suggestions that the account itself isn't even run by one person, but is instead an amalgam of like-minded digital vigilantes. The NY Times also reports that people whose details were contained in the leak are beginning to face threats of blackmail.
Meanwhile, in related news, Brian Krebs (the reporter who first uncovered the hack) says he has uncovered clues to the possible identity of the hacker. Krebs says he noticed the Twitter account operated by a known hacker recently posted a link to Ashley Madison's stolen proprietary source code before it was made public. Intrigued by the poster's apparent access, he examined the account's posting history and noticed a predilection for the music of Australian hard rock band AC/DC. This jibes with the behavior of the hacker(s), who had displayed threatening messages on the computers of Ashley Madison employees, accompanied by AC/DC song Thunderstruck. In a series of tweets, the owner of the account, one Thadeus Zu, appears to deny that he was behind the hack, and indeed makes several suggestions that the account itself isn't even run by one person, but is instead an amalgam of like-minded digital vigilantes. The NY Times also reports that people whose details were contained in the leak are beginning to face threats of blackmail.
There must only be a handful of people that could match such a specific description: listens to AC/DC, uses twitter, and denies any culpability. AC/DC has only sold around 200 million albums, so that alone dramatically restricts the possible culprits. The intersection between AC/DC aficionados and Twittter's 300M active users must be minuscule, maybe only one or two possible people.
Than all of them, probably.
The guy who ran a website for cheaters was always open about that fact.
I'm less convinced in the transparency or honesty of pretty much any political candidate.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
He ran a fraud:
Almost None of the Women in the Ashley Madison Database Ever Used the Site
...
About two-thirds of the men, or 20.2 million of them, had checked the messages in their accounts at least once. But only 1,492 women had ever checked their messages.
...
... a member had last replied to a message from another person on Ashley Madison. 5.9 million men had done it, and only 9700 women had.
...
Out of 5.5 million female accounts, roughly zero percent had ever shown any kind of activity at all, after the day they were created.
...
Protip: The CEO stepping down after a public embarrassment has never been anything other than a publicity stunt to save face. It does not represent remorse or an intent to change policy. At most, it means "we want someone who will do continue to do the same things we've always done but, somehow, will magically make these revelations stop happening".
I would be shocked if Biderman wasn't receiving a nice golden parachute along with it. Or at least silver.
He'll find another place to lose control of people's data.
Make no mistake, I don't like what Ashley Madison did. They've been exposed for running a scam web site designed to sucker men out of lots of money quickly. However, that doesn't justify the hack - which is almost certainly a criminal offense at this level. Sure, the hackers took down the CEO of Ashley Madison, but we don't know what will happen next. They might just relaunch with the same aims and different window dressing. Meanwhile we seem to be celebrating the actions of the hackers, in spite of the fact that they did break the law.
Just because they used illegal techniques to attack a morally reprehensible company doesn't mean their techniques are magically vindicated. Celebrating the hack is immoral as well.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
He decided he 'wanted to spend more time with his mistress... err, wife.'
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
There are many analysts checking the massive data leak, this thing, the entire company & website could turn out to be scam of the century.
Don't speak too soon about integrity and the CEO.
I've often wondered what happens to people like this after the fact.
For example, recall Aaron Barr, the guy running HB Gary and who claimed he could "out" the Anonymous members by dubious correlation of social media accounts.
Or that guy Paul Christoforo who threw down with Penny Arcade founder Mike Krahulik (and got fired, banned from PAX, and his marketing company's client dropped them).
Do these people find jobs somewhere on this planet? Does Kevin Mitnick's security firm have a lot of customers?
The Ashley Madison guy - that's 'gotta be an awkward interview, you know.
"Why did you leave your previous place of employment?"
Wonder what his "last pay check" looked like.
The guy who ran a website for cheaters was always open about that fact.
On the other hand he was less than honest about how many actual women were on the site. (Fewer than 15,000 vs millions of clearly fake profiles) and also less than honest about what a "paid delete" actually paid for.
So men paid money to join a site to cheat with women that didn't exist, were then charged extra to send messages to women's accounts that were fake, and then when they paid even more to delete their accounts, well that didn't happen either.
If that's your idea of honesty and transparency, I don't know what you think counts as "dishonest".
Biderman has milked the fake cow for all it's worth. Time to move on.
This whole thing screams "inside job".
A lot of the information that has been released, most notably employee emails and internal company documents, couldn't possibly have also been on the servers that held the databases for the AM site. So either (1) the hackers thoroughly penetrated the company and got *everything*, or (2) the people running AM were stupider than I believe possible (actually you would have to *work* to put all of your eggs in one basket that way), or (3) someone swiped backup tapes when they were on their way out the door.
The last theory is the simplest.
Most places I worked at did offsite backups. The backups were left at the front desk for the courier to pick up each day. If some backups went missing there probably wouldn't be a freakout -- they'd just figure someone had thrown them in the trash or picked them up by mistake. Even if they did freak out they would do so very privately.
Thadeus Zu can't claim innocence while having an actual cyberpunk hacker name on his birth certificate :-P
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
"the company was planning an IPO in London that would have taken as much as $200 million from investors"
There...fixed that for ya.
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
They can't take his stock away from him, at least not the stock he owns already. That belongs to him personally like his house does.
Obviously, he might lose options or stock grants that he hasn't received yet as part of his compensation package, but not necessarily. It depends on the contract.
Of course, stock is pretty much moot at this point, although it may be interesting to see if ALM can dig out of this.
I wouldn't be surprised if they do, cockroaches are good at surviving things that would have killed any other organism.
So freelance blackmailers are encroaching on their paid delete quasi-blackmail-wink-wink.
> people whose details were contained in the leak are beginning to face threats of blackmail.
"I see you joined Ashley Madison, Mr. Slashdotter, but nobody cheated with you. I will reveal your pathos unless you pay me 400 quatloos in Bitcoin."
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Trump isn't remotely honest, but he does say the xenophobic things
Please keep making comments like this. Comments like this are what is fueling Trumps campaign.
We are so fucking sick of being called out as racists or mean or anti-woman or anti-science or whatever sanctimonious bullshit phrase you want to throw at us.
And yes, I'll get a flamebait mod with a few smug responses like "well then don't be conservative" or some variation of that but these comments are getting old.
Just look at this thread...
http://slashdot.org/comments.p...
For me to defend Bush makes me sick but these lies and name calling are getting ridiculous. And we are not really even into the primaries yet!
look at my user name.
Trump went on air and intentionally mocked Asians by using a stereotyped pinyin/coolie accent. he went on air another time and labeled latino immigrants as criminals and worse things.
that is racist in my book. and if you don't see it, consider that you might actually be a racist, too. racism isn't just wearing white hoods and going around burning crosses. it's ALSO staying silent or even applauding utter garbage like that uttered by Trump.
the most disgusting part of it: Trump knows EXACTLY what he's doing. he's riling up the ultra-conservative base to build primary support. that is solid proof of what powers the modern GOP.
Well actually, I would say he plays to a broad demographic of uneducated, mostly poor, white people. He is, and always has been, playing a public character. His public character started when he inherited his fortune and spent the next decade or two pretending to be a shrewd business man just because he is rich.
Like most politicians, his words have no meaning, and his real backers know that. They know what side he will be on when the decisions come, and, its the same side all the other candidates are on.
It really has nothing to do with conservatism or liberalism, these are just words in the current politics. There is no ideology in a big tent parties, you can't maintain a large tent and actually stand for anything at all.
Fact is, Trump plays to both Republican and Democrat interests because he helps force people into the big tents by increasing the percieved danger of defectors, because defectors from the big tents are the only people who pose any danger to them.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Like I said, I doubt we'll ever know the exact number, but the truth is probably somewhere between 12,000 and 2.1 million.
http://gizmodo.com/almost-none...
The truth is probably somewhere below 15,000 'real' members, and probably much lower, like 1000. After all, someone joining and responding to a couple messages and then never coming back is being counted as an "active" member here. I'm willing to bet of the 10k women who had replied to "at least 1 message", a majority of even them were gone within a week or two. And that 15,000 includes people who were active in the past but might not have used the site in 2 years... how many active women were there in the last 3 months? I think one could credibly suggest it was in the hundreds.
Only 1,492 women had ever checked their inbox. (20 million men had)
Only 9,700 women had ever replied to a single message. (Note the article explains how this number can be higher than the above number.) (6 million men did)
Only 2,400 women had engaged in chat. (11 million men did)
The higher portion of paid deletes for women also lines up with the large number of female accounts that basically existed for one day and never came back; a good number of those may have opted for the paid delete. Especially if they were only checking to see if their husband had an account.
The proportions don't line up 100% (although it makes sense that more men checked their inboxes; they weren't getting all the messages on login that women did. So women would answer their messages directly from login, and rarely check their inbox, while men would futilely check their inbox looking for messages that would never come.)
Frankly, as I said, based on what I see there. I don't think the site even credibly had even 1000 active women on it at any one time.
Hillary is evasive because if someone asks her what she had for dinner, and she says "chicken" the conservatives go to the media and talk about Hillary's anti-beef agenda, and then go to the beef lobby for money and support against the evil fascist anti-beef Hillary. So when asked about dinner, she says "food" and is attacked for being evasive.
It doesn't matter what her stance is. So many hate her as a person that her politics don't matter. To the conservatives, this is a personal issue, not a political or ideological one.
Learn to love Alaska
Yes, I know where and how you calculated based on paid deletes.
The paid delete functionality is the one good indication that an account was genuine,
a) First, no. I think "responded to at least one message" is FAR more telling. In theory they could have been faking reponses etc making that metric useless... but the fact that it is SO RIDICULOUSLY LOW tells us that they weren't, and it tells us that however many women joined only an insigifcant number deleted.
b) Also no. I think women may have been significantly more inclined to use the paid delete option then men for a variety of reasons. So your calculation is suspect. Further it evidently counts women who created an account only to lurk or see if their husband joined. Even if you want to count them as "members", the fact that they weren't responding to any messages at all is material evidence that even though they joined they simply weren't engaging in the site.
Look at "responded to at least one message" and "checked inbox".
Less than 10,000. You don't need to "correspond that with men" to come up with a number of women engaged in the site. It stands on its own. Less than 10000 accounts belonging to a female ever responded to a single message, fewer still ever checked there inbox. Half the men responded (to what exactly, I wonder?!!) and nearly all of them checked their inboxes.
You can't tell me there 2 million women on the site, when fewer than 10k ever responded to a single message or checked their inbox or enaged in chat. If they were "there" they may as well not have been as far as the men were concerned. And more likely than not, they weren't really there, or were signed up en-masse at A.M sponsored ladies night events. And they never used the site at all, beyond filling out a paper ballot with some info to get a free drink or something. (I admit I'm speculating here.) To count such accounts, where there is no evidence they logged in more than once, no evidence they logged in even once... is dishonest to say the least.
There is evidence 20,000,000+ men used the site. There is evidence fewer 10,000 women did. Whereas you call the paid deletes the "one good bit of data" I disagree... I suspect more women paid to remove there info from the site than actually used it, under a variety of scenarios.
I'm not talking about "at any one time".
I know. I brought that up after the fact to illustrate that not only was 10,000 the upper maximum of responsive women, but its extremely unlikely there were even that many women. 2 million simply lacks any credibility at all whatsoever.
OK then tell me which presidential candidate in the history of American politics, has ever admitted that some of his campaign promises might be for entertainment purposes only.
The president isn't the king. Anyone with basic civics knows that the president isn't really empowered to do all that much without the support of Congress; and is subject to the law and consitution, at least in theory :) and that even on something he can act on, may be challenged in court and tied up.
So an "election promise" by a presidential candidate amounts to little more than a policy statement.
That said, 45% kept, another 25% compromised isn't bad, and 7% more "in the works"...
http://www.politifact.com/trut...
http://www.politifact.com/trut...
And even the GOP leadership, fairs pretty well all things considered.
Really, if a politician really actually succeeded in doing everything they said they'd do, I'd be pretty worried that the entire democratic government system had collapsed. Putin maybe has the clout to do almost anything he says... not necessarily a good thing.
Donald Trump has filed for bankruptcy 4 times. More than any other candidate, from any party.
Donald Trump has had many employees of his come forward as illegal aliens. No other candidate has had any do the same.
Learn to love Alaska
And pointing out the truth when someone is being an idiot is a "political defense". I don't like Hillary. I won't be voting for Hillary. But I see her treatment by the conservatives (And the conservative media) as unfair and quite silly. But pointing that out apparently makes me a Hillary supporter, like her eating chicken makes her a beef-hater.
Learn to love Alaska
Businesses Trump has been involved with have filed for corporate bankruptcy 4 times
So he signed the paperwork on 4 bankruptcies, but never went bankrupt. That makes logical sense only to an insane fanboy.
He has been incredibly successful in business by any reasonable metric
And, like most rich people, was born rich and white. Yay white privilege. He worked hard to be born rich and white. Eminem has more "business" experience than Trump. Eminem's net worth is many more times greater than Trumps, comparing today to birth. Yes, trump did well with the millions he was born with, but he was born a multi-millionaire. If you want to talk success, try talking about someone who started with nothing and built on that. Perhaps even had hurdles, other than how best to be a slumlord. His business track record isn't impressive.
Learn to love Alaska