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Tor Developer Jacob Appelbaum Allegedly Intimidated Victims Into Silence and Anonymity (dailydot.com)
blottsie quotes a report from The Daily Dot: In the wake of programmer Jacob Appelbaum's abrupt departure from the Tor Project, rumors and accusations about both sexual misconduct and bullying have surfaced that extend back years. Now, four witnesses -- including a current senior Tor employee -- are stepping forward into the public eye, adding valuable insight into how Appelbaum allegedly intimidated those around him to keep accusations of sexual misconduct secret and pressure those who are speaking out to remain anonymous. [Late last week, a website was launched in which alleged victims of Appelbaum's sexual misconduct joined together to post their stories in an effort to publicize them without a much-feared wave of personalized and professional backlash. The stories are graphic and describe the ways Appelbaum allegedly assaulted people in public and in private. Three current Tor employees -- two of which agreed to be named on the record -- have confirmed that they personally know the authors of the alleged victim statements on the site, JacobAppelbaum.net. Although they continue to maintain anonymity for the authors of the stories, these Tor employees are now publicly vouching for the site's authenticity, which Appelbaum has called into question. Appelbaum broke his silence on Monday, deriding the accounts of his former colleagues as "vague rumors." It was an "attack," he said, on his reputation, led by character-assassins spreading "vicious and spurious" allegations against him.] In May, one of Tor's core software developers dodged the FBI and left the U.S. for Germany to avoid testifying in a criminal hacking investigation.
Seriously, there is no way that this is anything other than an orchestrated take down of the TOR project since they can't eliminate it technically nor in the courts.
It's disgusting how obvious they are able to be about it, too.
Why are we posting nasty things like this with no effort to investigate their veracity? I'm sure we'll all just bandwagon onto whoever we believe is more credible, evidence be damned, whoever I identify with or whatever story I hear first is clearly right. I'm sure this will end up just as reasonably argued (with no evidence or investigation) as the case against Assange. Half the people will think he was set up by the NSA and the commies and the other half will say that he's some kind of pedoraper mysogynist.
Wake me when there's a court judgement and actual investigation has been done, not someone badmouthing people online and calling attention to rumors like some trashy tabloid.
There have been a number of serious issues with the Tor network recently. We've seen official government efforts to neutralize the network, then we've seen a number of exploits that has allowed government agencies like the FBI and NSA to spy on Tor networks. Then we see them going after Tor developers and finally we're supposed to believe that the lead Tor developer is 'dirty'?
Tor is dead, it's still too centralized to be sufficiently safe. We need alternatives.
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Neither am I It's a very effective tactic. It worked so well neutralizing Julian Assange. They (THEY) learn from their successes as well as their mistakes. //PUT ON TIN FOIL HAT NOW
I am not able to find any account of what has happened that does not come with a strong political agenda attached. That is the core problem with public accusations as opposed to filing a complaint: It immediately muddies the waters as people on both sides jump on the issue and try to exploit it for their own agendas. I honestly have no idea of what to think of this because all possibilities from him having done exactly what is claimed to this being an orchestrated smear-campaign seem now equally probable. I even consider it possible that he was a mole and what happens now is the desired outcome. Not good at all.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
So, apparently there are a solid number of people who are well aware of things this guy has been doing
that are supposedly solidly covered by normal criminal law, and they have known for some time, and yet
no charges have been pressed, no police have been involved, and no one has had a day in court?
Instead, we have people who can 'verify Anonymous victims' (no, really) and that makes a public and well
organised smeer campaign the correct path forward? With media release level publicity and professional
websites publicly collecting more anonymous accounts against this guy?
My god he really must have pissed in someones beer..
For all I know he is guilty as sin, however vigilante justice is now the socially accepted way of dealing with
what should be reasonably simple criminal complaints? I am not sure that he is the worse offender in
this particular circle of wrongness.
Just as he may well be guilty, he also has the right to face his accusers (in a court of law), have a legal defense,
all those trappings of a just society that we all would demand, dont we? And when, as it seems people are quite
certain, he is found guilty, he will be suitably punished.
But instead we have this - congratulations accusers, you have lowered yourselves to the level you claim he works on.
Snowden's already been labelled a traitor and everything else under the sun. Assange had to be discredited because he's more dangerous, he runs the actual organization people like snowden go to.
A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
I think we have two solid options here:
1) The alleged victims step forward and handle this responsibly in the court of law. This way there's an objective evaluation of facts around this case.
2) Applebaum sues the maintainers of the website for libel. This way there's also an objective evaluation of facts around this case.
If neither of the above scenarios happen, this kind of vigilante justice will gain a semi-official status as a tool to solve similar issues (not good).
Nice try but this is as overwritten and hollow sounding as the "heartfelt" stories on the campaign site.
Snowden is by definition a traitor. Deal with it. Doesn't mean that he was wrong for what he did, but thats separate.
Assange on the other hand is just a power hungry douche who manipulates the truth to further his own personal political agenda.
He's like the CIA, but REALLY FUCKING SHITTY at it, because most of us with more than 3 brain cells realizes that he's nothing more than a manipulative asshole rapist. And yes, he's a fucking rapist because he's hiding from fucking Sweden who would be one of the last fucking countries on the planet to give him to the US for some reason.
Snowden took the shit personally, fed it to the public media personally, came out and told the public he did it himself. Snowden is a traitor, but he's a man with honor.
Assange doesn't leak shit. He manipulates others into getting the data and giving it to him, and then only cares about them when it furthers his own personal political agenda. Assange didn't have to be discredited, the collateral murder video did it for him, with his intentional emotional manipulation for his own personal gain and fame.
Why do you idiots keep worshipping that fucking asshole?
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Going to the police around sexual harassment has a poor track record of going anywhere, even with witnesses. Most of the time it winds up around competing accusations. Evidence is often scarce, and with charismatic folks involved, people may not realize the extent they've been manipulated until later. Abusers often target people who are not in a position to speak up, where their career could be at risk. Conventions are also a giant issue - doing all of this hundreds of miles distant even further reduces the odds of success, and ratchets up the stress. And, of course, the stress of spending the next few years being literally forced to deal with your abuser by the legal system.
That's before you get into things like real cases where police gaslighted a rape victim into recanting, prosecuted them for reporting the rape, and only come around once they catch the rapist who kept the physical evidence of the rape exactly as reported. Or the public attacks against the credibility of people who report to police, have witnesses, photographic and video evidence and pursue a restraining order, exactly as people tell them to.
So you wind up not reporting, and maybe convince yourself it was a one time thing, or maybe you played too big a role in it, and he's too important... then someone else mentions something. And someone else. And a fourth person. And it snowballs, and you wind up in a situation where none of you can make effective claims in court, but something is obviously wrong. Remaining silent means that others are going to go into interactions with this person unprepared. So, you say something.
That is the hard thing. The allegations are not entirely unbelievable; yet.... its also not like infiltration and use of sexual allegations against people is unheard of. In fact, its pretty well acknowledged as a tried and true tactic of intelligence services around the world.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"