Slashdot Mirror
Ashley Madison Blackmail Letter Revealed (grahamcluley.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Security researcher Graham Cluley says he has been forwarded a blackmail letter, sent to a member of the controversial Ashley Madison adultery website. In the letter the blackmailer says that unless $2,000 worth of bitcoin is paid within 10 days, the recipient's wife, friends and colleagues will be informed of his misdemeanors. In a threatening twist, the letter goes on to give personal details of another victim who refused to pay the blackmailers, and how his personal life and work were targeted as a result. Cluley's advice to recipients is not to pay the blackmailers, but to tell the U.S. Postal Inspectors Service.
>unless $2000 worth of bitcoin is not paid
They will continue to blackmail you. Why wouldn't they when so successful the first time? It's not like they're trustworthy or anything. If you're stupid enough to get involved with Ashley Madison in the first place, then just fess up to your wife and family and deal with the consequences. But, in the end, most of us will have no sympathy for either the scumbags who use Ashley Madison or those who blackmail them.
It's interesting that in the letter, the blackmailer provides no information about the recipient apart from his name and address. He lists all of the information about his prior victim, but my guess is that it's all part of his ruse. I suspect that the websites are fake and the phone number is a line straight to the blackmailer, who will corroborate the story whenever any of the many recipients of his letters call.
This requires more money to set up than an email, but the blackmailer knows that ``The wicked flee when no man pursueth."
Most of the membership was closet gay people who didn't want to be outed. Especially since being gay is punishable by death in some countries and cultures.
So maybe you can get off your high horse and actually try to understand the different sides of the issue for once.
You don't send blackmail letters IN THE MAIL.
This is now a federal crime, and the post office inspectors office, and probably the FBI, gets involved. Since this is in the news, they will probably be very interested in this case, as well.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
Meh, people have been screwing around on one another for as long as they've had one another.
Putting aside the underlying puritanical bullshit, who broke the law here? Yes, that's right, the hackers and the extortionists. Wah wah wah, people have affairs and they'e evil people .. such moralizing bullshit. Neither Ashley Madison nor the people using the site broke any laws.
And I've long since stopped thinking the opinion of a bunch of hand-wringing church ladies is of any consequence. It's just people acting like they have authority over what others do. People who think infidelity will stop due to their own loud self-righteousness ... well, just as often those assholes find themselves getting caught doing the same fucking thing.
Let he who is without sin cast the first stone, otherwise shut the fuck up. It's disgusting that you feel your opinion about what people you don't know is worth a damn, or that it has anything to do with you.
Oh, wait, is your entire morality based on retribution against strangers because you feel they deserve it? That's not a fucking morality, that's being a self-righteous ass.
What next, wanting us stoned for idolatry? Go stone yourself.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You are saying this was primarily marketed to closet gays in sub-Saharan Africa?
I think he's confusing the terms "blackmail" and "black male".
especially if you do it only because of the blackmail money - cheapskate
Not paying up for blackmail is not being a cheapskate. It makes zero sense to pay blackmail money. So you pay the $2k today, what did that actually gain you? What's to stop them from coming back tomorrow and demanding another $2k or the week after and demanding $40k? What's to stop someone else from demanding $2k? Paying to keep information secret is a game you can't win. Old movies would try to pretend that you are paying for the originals or that they destroy all the other copies but in today's world it's impossible to prove that so it makes zero sense to ever pay blackmail. The only place it might make a little sense is if you get in a situation where it's either a continue flow of money and/or the identity of the blackmailer is known and has something to lose if they are found out as well. This occasionally happens where some politician pays support money for an illegitimate child or something like that but even this is a fool's game as the blackmailer can always increase the amount of money required at any time. Any time you're in a situation where there is one sided leverage then your best and only option is to figure out how to remove that leverage from being used.
You can have all that. Simply don't get married, instead offer your partner a contract, or just agree to live together and share stuff as long as it suits you.
Marriage is just a pre-packaged contract between two people, with standard terms. They are popular because they are cheaper than getting a custom contract drawn up, and if there is a dispute it's generally cheaper and easier to resolve because the courts are well versed in the terms. It's better for people who are not lawyers too, because the terms are well advertised and understood, unlike a contract full of legalese.
Unfortunately for you, many people are not willing to accept custom relationship contracts. Marriage is perceived as basically fair, and in most developed nations it more or less objectively is, so any desire to avoid those terms is seen as a desire for one side to benefit at the expense of the other.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I would wager that the kind of person who couldn't cheat without a web site couldn't cheat with Ashley Madison even if it wasn't a complete fraud, either.
They're probably not attractive or charismatic enough to attract a partner to begin with.
Marriage is just a pre-packaged contract between two people, with standard terms [...] the terms are well advertised and understood [...] in most developed nations it more or less objectively is [fair]
Oh, hell, no. It's a pre-packaged contract, but the terms are anything but well-advertised or understood, and it's blatantly unfair in many cases. You say an oath, which isn't binding, and sign a piece of paper, which is - despite the paper containing no description of the terms of the contract. The terms also change over time: divorces and marital disputes are judged by the family law of today, not what it was when the couple got married. In some jurisdictions you can even find yourself bound by the contract after cohabiting with a partner for a year, without even being aware that the contract exists.
If engaged couples were presented with a full description of the standard terms and conditions of marriage, including the clauses regarding division of assets on divorce, half of them wouldn't get married. Which is why this should happen, because those marriages are unfair to the people who aren't aware of the terms; and why it won't happen, because society likes people to be married.