Slashdot Mirror
Interview: John Vranesevich Doesn't Really Answer
Question #1
by manitee
Having read many accounts of your interactions with the staff of attrition.org, it seems to me that your claims against them are generally unproven and rash. Their rebuttals are always filled with detailed fact and systematic, step by step analysis of the topic at hand. Please clarify why you feel that attrition.org is such a dangerous force, yet you have never been able to present HARD EVIDENCE to that point.
Question #2
by davidu
Many of us in the hacker community (not cracker) used the Packet Storm security site for information and research. You had it shut down for some alleged things in the /jp directory. Explain to us why you called [Harvard] to shut it down rather than dealing with the maintainer. What did you accomplish by threatening to sue other than futher harm your image and remove any creditbilily you had?
Question #3
by Kintanon
What is the basis for your attacks on security Experts such as Attrition.org?
To Clarify the question: Why do you proclaim them to be 'dangerous hackers' while they do essentially the same thing you claim to do, except that they do so better, faster, and more professionally?
Question #4
by mattc
Why did you deliberately block links from Slashdot, HNN, and any other site who criticized you during the closure of Packetstorm?
#5
by WH
How do you respond to allegations that the FBI is
investigating your knowledge of attacks before they happened
and the accusations by some hackers who performed said
attacks that you paid them or otherwise coerced them to do
it in order to have coverage for your website?
#6
also by WH
Why do you feel that sites containing satirical humor based [on] antionline are not protected by law and therefore open to your threats of legal action?
#7
by Hard_Code
Are the rumors that you will be spinning off a sister site called Anti-Anti-Anti-Online to dispell the malicious accusations and deprecations of your obviously magnanimous professionalism and intellect and to further bolster the image of Anti-Online and your integrity as a computer- security- expert- guru- enthusiast, true?
#8 - #11
by Jeff -
(Heavily edited - RM)
I have several questions which I will ask within the narrative below. The narrative is important to understand the context of the questions, and to support my arguments.
Several months ago I was raided by FBI for supposed involvement with the "hacker" group gh. The extent of my involvement was participating, as a caller only, in illegally funded phone conferences. JP, who also participated in this conferences, labeled me as a hacker, and a member of gh on his "news" site. Neither of these accusations are true. He has many more ties to this and other hacker groups than I have ever had....
#8 - How can you pretend to be taking a stand against "hackers" while you are involved in the same activities?
#9 - My third question is in regards to your coverage of the situation. You posted unconfirmed information from an unreliable source in regards to the status of my employment at a prominent software development company. As a result of this I was contact by several news agencies, and immediately stereotyped as a hacker even though I have never illegally penetrated any computer system, nor had I been charged with, or accused of any crimes by the FBI. In response to this I granted one news agency an interview, which I thought went well, but also backfired. As a result of the negative press my former employer could not even consider allowing me to stay. My question being, Do you expect people to consider you as a reliable news source even though you report data which you receive through unreliable channels?
#10 - Did you ever stop to think what the impact of your coverage might be? It seems to me that in your rush for the big story you have failed to check for the correctness in your articles, and as a result of this you are hurting innocent people, such as myself. I'm sure this has gone on in other cases, but mine is the only one I have enough knowledge to comment on. I don't attribute these unfortunate events to you, but you certainly did not follow good news practices in reporting them. You have only served to injure my credibility and your own.
11 - Lastly, have you ever considered what legal action may be taken against you for your involvement with these criminals? Do you even recognize the hypocrisy of your stance on hackers being one yourself by your own definition?
Question #12
by sonoffreak
Why did you decide to let Slashdot interview you? How did the response you got compare to what you expected?
John Vranesevich's Response:
Greetings All
Well, I've seen many people say that I can't take criticism. Believe me, if
that were true, I surely never would have opened myself up to a SlashDot
inquisition. I knew before I even agreed to the interview, that things would
be ugly. Needless to say, I was right on the money. However, I will say
this. I was very disappointed in the downright lack of maturity that many of
the posts showed. I like to believe that most people who frequent this type of
forum are of an intellectual nature. I found it very disheartening to hear
nearly every rumor ever voiced about myself or my company being regurgitated as
if they were all fact. An educated bunch of people should understand that not
everything that they hear is true at all, and that almost nothing that they
hear is totally accurate. But, some of that could be my fault. Many posts
pointed out the fact that I have never "given explanations of" or provided
"blow-by-blow responses" to any of the things that have been written about me.
This is true. If I spent my life defending myself from every individual who
had a nasty thing to say about me, my life would end up pretty meaningless in
the end. I think that's true for most people. I decided a long time ago that
I wouldn't allow myself or my website to become dedicated to those who would
seek to bring me down. I have a lot of goals in my life, and I'm not about to
let nonsense get in their way. But, never the less, I saw this SlashDot
invitation as the perfect opportunity to talk about some of those very issues.
It's not that I feel that people who posted negative comments will read what I
have to say, and then decide that they were totally wrong about me. Those who
despise me for whatever reason will continue to do so no matter what I ever say
or do. Even SlashDot faced the wrath of dozens of people who are "no longer
going to visit this site" for one reason or another after reading the interview
bio on Monday. So much for loyalty in this day and age I suppose.
Yours In CyberSpace,
John Vranesevich
Founder, AntiOnline
Now, On To The Questions
I received a list of "questions" from Robin earlier this week, and to put it
bluntly, they were just stupid. I'm not going to waste my time writing up
ridiculous answers to ridiculous questions that no one really cares about. For
example, here is one of the questions posed to me
"Are the rumors that you will be spinning off a sister site
called Anti-Anti-Anti-Online to dispel the malicious
accusations and deprecations of your obviously magnanimous
professionalism and intellect and to further bolster the
image of Anti-Online and your integrity as a
computer-security-expect-guru-enthusiast, true?"
Now how stupid is that? What would my answer be, something like "Um, no". Not
a very stimulating Q&A if you ask me.
So, instead of wasting my time and yours, I decided that I'd simply cut to the
chase, and answer what appear to be some of the major allegations, accusations,
and other such tidbits that some people seem obsessed over.
AntiOnline & PacketStorm
First off, let me say that I didn't shut down PacketStorm, and neither did
Harvard. Ken Williams is the sole person responsible for that site being shut
down. He chose to take a popular forum which was designed to disseminate
information related to computer security, and abuse his own creation in order
to harass someone. Sure, post satire about myself or my website. I truly
don't care, and in many cases, I have even promoted such websites on
AntiOnline. One such satire site that I've linked to several times is
"AntiOffline.com". Personally, I consider satire as one of the greatest type
compliments one can get. However, what Ken did far surpassed simple satire.
By posting a photo of my younger sister (who was a minor at the time), along
with her full name and address, he successfully started a mass campaign of
harassment against her and my family. This I wouldn't tolerate. I don't care
how popular of a site it was, or how valuable of a resource it was. It was
abused by Ken Williams for his own perverse sense of amusement, at the cost of
my family.
As for all of this "threaten to sue" hype which soon followed. I never did any
such thing. I'm not sure which University Official ever told Ken Williams
that, if any, but he was certainly mistaken. I sent a simple one page e-mail
to the provost's office asking them to review the contents of the site against
their acceptable use policy. Despite Ken's claims that there wasn't any
"offending" material on the site, the university reviewed it, and chose to shut
it down. A major and prestigious university like Harvard wouldn't simply shut
down a site because some pissant like myself sent them an e-mail, unless there
was a very good reason to do so. Use your common sense people.
However, what Ken Williams did was a very successful campaign of pity
afterwards. I will admit that. "A poor college student who's website was shut
down by an evil corporation called AntiOnline. Who's college career has been
ruined, and all of his hard work lost". Truth of the matter is that Ken is in
his 30s, and isn't some naive little college freshmen. He got his site
shut-down by harassing a 17 year old girl, which shortly after being shutdown,
Ken sold for a reported $125,000 to Kroll.
Poor Ken.
AntiOnline & Attrition
This is even more stupid than Ken Williams. Despite all of the crap, and there
really isn't a better word for it, which has pored out of Brian Martin and his
Attrition.org site, I think I can sum up events in one small paragraph
AntiOnline was asked by the FBI to help investigate a group called "HFG" which
broke into the New York Times' Website. AntiOnline does some digging, and
turns over its findings. Shortly there after, Brian Martin, founder of
Attrition.org, and someone that no one at AntiOnline had ever had any contact
with before, was raided by the FBI. Ever since then, for some strange reason,
Brian Martin has attempted to do anything and everything he can to discredit
myself and AntiOnline. Wonder why? Is it because I'm an evil menace to
society that threatens the very existence of the internet and all that is
good? I wouldsubmit to you that Brian Martin's motivations are far more geared
towards protecting his own ass, than they are geared towards protecting
society's ass. Once again, use your common sense.
What exactly does AntiOnline Do?
That's something I see asked a lot on "underground" type webpages. To be
frank, we're not a public company, and it really isn't anybody's business
except those that we work with. I can, however, tell you this. The fact that
nearly every malicious hacker (or cracker if you prefer the term) dislikes
AntiOnline is actually good for us, and is the exact position I want to be in.
Some people even "joke" that I intentionally try to "piss off large groups of
people at a time". Well, it's not just a joke, it's the truth. I think I'm
pretty good at doing it too. We average between 200-500 intrusion attempts
against one of our systems AN HOUR, and every time I piss another segment of
the cyber-population off, that number skyrockets. We probably have one of the
most targeted networks on the internet today, and we take full advantage of
that. Do you think that we let the type of data that we're able to collect and
log just go to waste? I don't ;-)
Is AntiOnline Being Investigated By The FBI?
To tell you the truth, I doubt it, but I don't know for sure. But, there's a
reason why I don't know for sure. The FBI doesn't talk to anyone about who
they are/have investigated. Anyone that has ever worked with the FBI in any
manner, can tell you that they, as a rule, keep quite in order to protect any
investigation. If they were to deny reports about us being investigated, that
would confirm in the minds of others that they are being investigated, when the
FBI comes up with a "no comment" answer. Make sense?
Here's where things get funny. The person that "blew the lid off of the story"
that AntiOnline was being investigated by the FBI is none other than, you
guessed it, Brian Martin of Attrition. He told a reporter that an FBI agent
"informed him" about the active investigation.
Common sense time. Would the FBI raid someone (like Brian Martin was), and
then shortly there after begin telling that person about all of the other
investigations that they are doing so that they could spread the word all over
the Internet and ruin their case?
Personally, I would highly doubt that the FBI would consult with us if they
suspected, or were investigating the possibility, that AntiOnline was some evil
criminal empire that paid people off to break into high profile websites so
that we could post an interview.
Get real people.
Does it bother you that everyone hates you. Why or why not?
This is something that I actually saw posted on the message board. To be
honest, at this point in my life, my goal is not to become loved in the hearts
of the masses. I'm not running for political office, so popularity doesn't
count. I have goals in my life that I want to achieve. Some of these goals
are short-term, some of them are long-term. Right now, at the age of 21 (as of
October), I'm exactly where I want to be. My professional career is on track,
financially I'm in good shape, my personal life is where I want it to be, and I
can say that every day brings me closer to the goals that I have set for
myself. Who could ask for more? Sure, I have to put up with a lot more flack
and B.S. than the average 21 year old. But I'll tell you this, every minute is
worth it.
To learn more about John Vranesevich as he was seen through the eyes of at least one reporter for a respected news outlet, read this Forbes article. - RM
--------------
Next week a panel of antitrust experts headed by our friend Don Weightman will answer your questions about what might happen to Microsoft next. We've had many requests for this, but held off for a week to let all the "regular" media have their say first. This promises to be a hugely informative interview session!
He seems a politician.. he doesn't really answer the questions asked of him, simply says the same old things over and over and over again.. Reminds me of gates at the press conference MS held after being declared a monopoly.. his answer to every questions was something along the lines of "We are simply trying to make innovative software".
..then I'm truly sorry, it's just that I sometimes snort when I laugh. Maniacally.
Taking criticism by calling every single question you recieved 'stupid?' Some of those looked valid to me...
Yeah, whatever, I'm not wasting any more of my day on you.
Now compare that with last week's interview. Oh well, you win some, you lose some, I guess.
11.0010010000111111011010101000100010000101101000
Is it just me, or does this seem like he lived up to everyone's expectation in the first discussion about the subject? Granted, many of the questions were nothing but flames....but he didn't seem to actually answer anything in those responses. I don't know J.P. from Adam, but it really seems to me like the /. crowd was on target, and the flames were (shudder) deserved....
Juiced? Or Not?
It looks like John is clinically paranoid.
This is not a bad thing if you are a systems manager, but given his position its a bad thing.
He definetly has something wrong in the head area.
Did we get what we expected or what?
jas
http://packetnexus.com
what a piss ant
crazy
Fabulous JP, dodge all the questions, use the one (mostly) humorous question posted at you as a launching point to call the slashdot community a bunch of babies, refuse to justify the removal of packetstorm (and claim that you didn't threaten legal action, even though your letter to harvard did ... promote misconception by refusing to explain what you do with your time (no, that little 'graph you gave us isn't an explanation of what you do), brag about how many hacks you withstand on an hourly basis, and generally behave like a dolt.
Eat shit, JP.
good. fast. cheap. (pick any two, you can't have all three)
Keep playing war games in your own little world, Johnny-boy. Nobody cares about you.
Well, you run only a minimal risk of being declared off topic, since the interviewé himself thought the questions were "stupid" and posted his credo rather than answering them.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
JP> He got his site shut-down by harassing a 17 year old girl, which shortly after being shutdown, Ken sold for a reported $125,000 to Kroll. Does this mean he sold the 17 year old girl? Isn't $125k a bit high-priced? ^_^
I know little about this topic, but from reading all of the content, it seeems to me that Vranesevich is avoiding certain statements that need to be made to defend his self. As for the Slashdot communitys' questions, they might have been about common rumors, but this should not matter to Vranesevich. If someone poses you with non-flamitory questions, why instantly avoid them? I do not see how ALL of the Slashdot questions were not worth. His example of the "bad question" was not that bad. It is simply a one line yes/no response which he gave. Thanks, John. Now move on. The more complicated the story gets, the more apparent there are secondary motives somewhere. So, let's just drop it. There will be another PackStorm and another Vranesevich in a few years anyway.
This is typical JP. Not answering the questions and shifting the blame.
So, to all the people in the question article who complained about those of us who chose not to ask questions or participate in this fiasco...
Is anyone really surprised at this? He doesn't answer serious accusations from people who are qualified to comment on his reputation. Is he going to answer ours?
Instead, he continues to be validated in his own mind. I feel sorry for those of you who thought he might honestly respond.
I'm not sure what to think of him and his belief (and judgement) that all of our inquiries are immature and stupid. I would say that the same could be said of him (which leads to a lot of childish "i know you are but what am i" type arguments). In any event, I haven't seen any decent example of skill on his part.
And that's what gets to the security community: lack of skill while professing to know it all. Skill is the only real currency infosec people know. Well, that and money.
Still and all, if he's getting attacked a lot (and he is), then even a complete moron could learn more *in that environment* than any of us could *in this cubicle I'm in* and that's important: he's under fire, and is probably learning modes and methods from it...including stuff we've never seen.
Now if he would just stop being so darned *smug* about it, I'd feel better. Personally. But that's not his job, or yours, or anyone else's...it's mine. And I don't need to hire or recommend him.
It was a mistake to ask him for an interview to begin with. It's rather obvious that this guy lives on seeing his name in print, so giving him any attention at all is just feeding him exactly what he craves.
Slashdot ain't me call, but I've got to recommend that Rob & Co. pick and choose their interviewees a bit more carefully. There are a ton of people out there who'd be an insightful read, even beyond the Three Initial Mafia (you know, RMS, ESR, JWZ, etc... what the hell is Linus' middle name?). JP is more of a thug than a creator -- he represents an awful lot that is contrary to /.'s principles: lawsuits, legal threats, shameless self-promotion, misinformation, collaborating with government hoods, etc.
In short, we ought to be ignoring this guy.
----
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
I had formed the impression, from interviews in the press, from his conduct over the PacketStorm affair, that JP was not a great deal more than a script kiddie with attitude.
This was an opportunity to rectify that perception.
Instead, he attacks as some form of defence. Sorry, but when I see someone getting *this* defensive, there's usually something to defend. Weakness and inadequacy.
A shame, really. Instead of defusing all those negative opinions, he's reinforced them.
Oh, well.
--
Peter
..I almost beleive him!
(insert twilight zone music here)
Maybe the Weekly World News or some such could hire them, then they'd be beleivable too..
I don't think he's that bad.. More or less he can take a joke (I pranked AO about being a southerner who was intrested in internet security for my Turkey Leg Farm and I cannot tell you HOW many times I was the pizza guy! ;-) In a nut shell, people will side where the largest amount of people are at (It's easier to hid that way) and no matter how logical John sounds, the masses will use talk with emotions, lies, and degrigations towards him. But in the long run, let's see who stands.. John or those who are attempted to down him..
"I was very disappointed in the downright lack of maturity that many of the posts showed. I like to believe that most people who frequent this type of forum are of an intellectual nature."
How about you show a some maturity and answer the questions you *agreed* to answer?? Dismissing them all as "stupid" is not only immature, it's downright rude.
-------
"Every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief."
Does anyone have an e-mail contact for ol' JP there? Since he refused to answer my question I'd like to ask him again through e-mail, over and over and over and over and over and over again until I get a response. I'm tired of him dodging EVERY question that he's asked that doesn't make him look like the god of network security.
JP = Total Ass hole.
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
John;
Next time, get some balls and tell the truth. You've spouted nothing but egocentric bullshit aimed at defaming other sites who expose you for the fraud you are. This 'response' was nothing more than a personal attack against others aimed at increasing your popularity or at least exposure. It is patently libelous and slanderous, making the same false claims you always do.
Get the clue and crawl back in the little hole you came from. You are an absolute disgrace to the security community as a whole, and a scar on the face of this earth.
your company here.
shelby != ford
#7 by Hard_Code
Are the rumors that you will be spinning off a sister site called Anti-Anti-Anti-Online to dispell the malicious accusations and deprecations of your obviously magnanimous professionalism and intellect and to further bolster the image of Anti-Online and your integrity as a computer- security-expert- guru- enthusiast, true?
Why was this question submitted? If slashdot is going to arrange an interview, the least it should do is submit serious questions. They can leave the jokes for others.
Hates people who have stupid little sigs
I don't know John V. like you cyber-geeks do, so just looking at this from a new-to-linux, newbie point of view, I really see John's side of events. Sure he sounds like a politician, but get real. The questions posed were the *best* of the bunch? No wonder he chose not to answer them, but instead give answers in a general sort of way.
I honestly go to know more about attrition.org and antionline by reading his comments than in several months of reading websites (particularly slashdot).
Why the animosity ppl? Most of the original posts did seem like they were written by crackers, and 13 year old ones at that.
Stuart
*there is as much honor in cracking as in avoiding income taxes*
This post brought to you by your friendly neighborhood MBA.
We probably have one of the most targeted networks
on the internet today, and we take full advantage of that. Do you think that we let the type of data that we're able to collect and log
just go to waste? I don't
It seems to me that if you hacker folk want this guy to fail you should just ignore him. Otherwise he'll be able to continue feeding off your anger. He can only benefit from being labeled, "the most hated figure in the hacker community."
"Why did you..." tends to piss people off, especially if it's not something they did. The question assumes the other person is "guilty" of the alleged offence, without being open to the possibility that they aren't.
Frankly, if I ever got a questionnaire like that, I'd probably feel disapointed by the quality and matuity of the questions, too.
I -would- like to know his version of events, for some of the more hotly-debated incidents which he was allegedly involved with, but the chances are that unless he ever writes an autobiography, the full accounts of events will never really be known.
All in all, I think it's unfair to say that John never really answered, because there were never really any questions.
As for what AntiOnline does, I think that that is probably more easily deduced than obtained from questions. It clearly has a security focus, with a confidential client-specialist relationship with it's customers. From that, it seems fairly clear that the exact nature of the operations are considered sensitive, by either AntiOnline or those who it works with. That's a lot of information, and you can deduce a lot more still.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
He first says that Harvard did not shut the site down, then later says that he sent a one page email to Harvard suggesting they review the site and that Harvard then shut it down. When you rant at a group you assume to be hostile to yourself you should at least proof read for consitancy.
JP's just loading the bull again.
If you believe any of his crap, I've got a good deal on this bridge in Brooklyn....
At least it is according to the Linus Torvalds FAQ
--
Peter
200-500 Attacks an hour huh? I wonder what would happen if everyone ignored him. 0 Attacks ever, then what would our boy do with his free time?
Essentailly, I've never heard of Mr. Vranesevich before, and with only this essay to go on, I'd guess that he is either very insecure, a liar, or both. His essay is a sophomoric flame, nothing more. I can only be insinuated 'stupid' a certain number of times before I start questioning someone's ability to participate in lively, intellectual discussion.
-Omar
You know, maybe everybody should set their comments threshold to find out what kind of lame comments get posted to Slashdot. The moderation is a nice system here (when it's not abused) and we have the option of seeing only highly rated comments. Maybe next time Slashdot decides to interview a controversial figure, the questions should not be POSTED, but rather SUBMITTED. And then and only then the moderators can go in and filter out all the bullshit. There's no reason why someone who has agreed to take the time to address a few questions should be harrassed by people who are supposed to be intelligent. Maybe we need a better filtering system, or a faction group for the lusers. Has anyone registered firstpost.org yet?- --------------
-------------------------------------------
So, pretty much, you had a chance to dispel some of the rumors and criticism going on about you, but instead chose to go off on a diatribe.
This did nothing but prove that the most of the things being said about you personally, if not professionally (which I believe as well) were true.
How is it that those from hackernews and attrition come across more coherently in interviews and writing than you.
Who are you to say that nobody cares about the questions that were asked? Obviously those of us here do, since most of the questions were along the same topic lines.
Everything I've ever read of you has come across as a spoiled brat displaying behavior we wouldn't accept from a five year old.
Another couple of displays like this and not even eMpTy Vee will be contacting you for interviews.
Have a nice life, it wouldn't hurt to go back to school and take some journalism and PR classes.
Did somebody really post photos and details of his underage sister in order to get her harrassed? Because if somebody did that to my daughter, I wouldn't sue, I'd kill. And I'd dynamite the building that housed the server. I think John showed restraint in only threatening to sue.
The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
Excuse me Mr. Vranesevich, but out on the Internet we prefer to call those hits. Just because someone goes to your web site doesn't mean they are trying to hack it :-)
I thought most of the questions were honest and, for its topic, were about well worded as you could make them but Mr. Vranesevich rejected them all as stupid and started to grandstand.
If 20/20, 60 Minutes, etc. ask him to do an interview, he showed up and acted like this they wouldn't take him serious and cast all sorts of doubt over his claims. Why should Slashdot be different?
JP, from all that I have read is a politician/script kiddie (scary combo) and is not respected by anyone here. We had our fun making him squirm under question that he could/would not answer, now we will all move on. We can look forward to a great interview next week. JP can return to his paranoid existance of convincing himself that he is a security expert and everyone else is a dangerous cracker. I can get back to work. Brain can continue planning to take over the world. Finkployd
You know what the perfect twist to this media driven saga would be?
To have JP, KW, and BM hold a press conference calling the media thier toys - proclaiming the whole ordeal a 'hoax'.
It truly is a shame to see (respectable?) publications like NYT, and Forbes even giving a shit about the pointless squables of a couple web site operators. Who gives a crap? The only thing that ever bothered me was the "computer security expert" moniker that JP ended up with, when I have seen no worthwhile work to back up such a title.
Such is life in the digital age I suppose. Just look at all the publications quoting Slashdot posts like this one.
http://windows.scares.us
*Yawns*
"I kiss you!"
I haven't really been following this story, but it seems to me that Vranesevich owes a lot of his infamy to the press.
;->
For some reason, I get the impression that the press love to raise snotty nosed techy kids up on to a pedestal, and make experts out of them. Who gives a damn about experience when you've got youth!
Unfortunately, most of these kids are not really wise enough to make best use of the opportunity that has been made available to them.
Vranesevich certainly appears to be quite quick to take advantage of his position to acquire new business. It is unfortunate that he is managing to alienate quite so many people. If one of my client's had a security problem, I know that I certainly would not recommend approaching anti-online, or any other organisation which Vranesevich may be associated with. For some reason, I just wouldn't trust him...
Lee
It's as if they weren't taking any of this seriously at all. It's no surprise he was digusted with the quality of questions. (I was too, but then again, I had nothing I wanted to ask at all.)
I don't know what depresses me more, the fact that so many people like this posted these questions in the first place, or that our MODERATORS (the people who are supposed to be good posters, unbiased and objective) chose to moderate up some of the dumber questions.
But then again the entire JP/Antionline/Attrition/Packetstorm thing is just stupid to begin with. I've never heard of any of these people until Slashdot started posting about it, and I suspect most of you hadn't either. I've never heard of an unbiased take on the entire situation. Everything that's posted is just one person's rant/attack on the other, (or one respected media outlet trying its best to cover a story with only these rants to use as sources) and I'm quite sick of it. This interview has done nothing in the minds of those that are already set in their ways of hate except to fuel that fire.
----
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
I find it interesting that out of the original questions, only really one (question #12) of them wasn't negative or antagonistic in nature or tone. And these were the BEST that surfaced. I'm surprised that there weren't more questions that were at framed in a less negative manner.
Of course, I'm also surprised that John chose to not answer some questions that were directly posed.
I'm saddened, however, that John chose to answer questions that were not asked. The questions that were sent were pre-selected to eliminate the REALLY stupid ones. (Although the Anti-Anti-Anti question wouldn't have been on my list, I trust that the moderators had a good reason for putting it in). The fact that John chose to answer 'Does it bother you that everyone hates you' thing is PR work on his part, and has no place in a moderated Q&A like this.
Unfortunately, I don't think John has done his image any good by answering a direct (if somewhat negative) set of questions in an indirect and incomplete manner.
A thousand pounds of wood moving at 300 feet per minute. Don't get in the way.
Yet again, you,
1. Fail to address any of the allegations against your conduct with a factual, or even coherent, argument.
2. Fail to show any remorse for the hypocritical life you lead and the people you have fscked over.
3. Skirt around the real issues like you're a Presidential candidate.
JP, I suggest you run for office. Lying and deception are your best skills, and it's a shame to let them go to waste on people who don't buy your bullshit.
If you need to point-and-click to administer a machine,
John... this is a technical community. We're generally not given to being childish. While it is true that many of the posts on slashdot were of that nature, the 15 or so we forwarded to you were not. We gave you the chance to clear up a rather dark and ominous cloud surrounding your reputation, and rather than taking advantage of that, you spit venom into the very people you claim to report on. In my book, you're selling snake oil. The only reason you're getting any attention at all is because the press likes to sensationalize. In short, you're a spoiled media brat. But it's not you I'm upset at - it's a system that ignores the fact that you are a completely untrustworthy source, and that the community you report on almost unanimiously hates you. I will have no pity on you when the day comes that you're busted down and exposed as the immature individual you are. Slashdot readers - don't bother with this person. It's proven, and I recall he's admitted, that he's not concerned about the truth. Take him for a wild ride. Let him sensationalize, make propaganda, and be an ass. Either ignore him, or have fun with him - but don't take him seriously!
--
This is really what I expected. There is no way that JP would ever answer the questions that people on /. really want to ask. In my opinion he knew this and just used /. and it's readers to create further controversy. He also seems to thrive on people hating or opposing him, which the members of /. did zealously.
Even the answers to the questions he asked himself were pathetic. Brian Martin (www.attrition.org) may be zealous, but he is nothing if not thorough, and though Ken Williams may have used bad judgement when posting information about JP's younger sister I can't believe that JP had the audacity to try and look down his nose at Ken for "reportedly" selling PacketStorm. Ken worked incredibly hard to make and maintain PacketStorm and I see absolutely nothing wrong with him selling it.
With JP, it seems, he isn't happy unless he is the focus of everyone in the IT communities attention. Have you noticed that not much has been said about him lately? At least the circles I travel in nothing has been said about good ol JP and AntiOnline recently. Perhaps that's why he agreed to a SlashDot interview. Perhaps he wanted to attract more attention.
If in fact his servers are the brunt of a lot of Hack Attempts, I am interested to know who he employs to secure them? It is certainly apparent that it isn't JP, at least I have never seen him post anything of ay technical detail, or even minor technical detail. I don't doubt he is the brunt of a lot of hack attempts, so I would really like to know the nitty gritty of how their network is secured. Although I am sure he would hide behind the mask of not wanting malicious hackers to know what he's got cooked up. Security through Obscurity and all that.
Now that JP has been interviewed I would be interested in giving Brian Martin and the attrition.org staff an interview spot, let them air out their side of the stories JP loves to refute/profess. That I think would be a very interesting interview.
forgey
To hell with all these tech people...- -----------------
Let's interview Mahir! Begin posting questions in this thread!
----------------------------------------
Who is JP? He's obviously not a "security professional," and he's obviously not a journalist.
I thought his response was pretty decent. And as for the people who said he dodged questions: He didn't. They were mostly the same thing. "Why did you shut down Packetstorm" and "Why are you a jerk".
If what JP says is true (about Packetstorm and Attrition) then I say he did get a bad wrap, and a lot of what he says makes sense. No one has a right to provoke harassement of someone's little sister - it's just wrong. The guy probably deserved to lose his site.
I'm not saying the JP is a completely misunderstood guy, but I think, given the questions that were asked, he responded well. After all, I think it's clear that no matter what he replied with, you guys were going to try to tear him a new one anyway.
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
Stop looking for nits to pick. He didn't mean "shut down" literally. Of course Harvard shut the site down, but the point he was trying to make was that they weren't *responsible* for it. He was trying to say that the guy had it coming, and had no one to blame but himself (thus not Vranesevich and not Harvard).
Listening to JP, all the /.ers who hate him and Ken Williams/Attrition/et al reminds me of the the kids I used to work with at a children's mental health center up here in Canada - lots of fighting but niether side is "right".
Its ironic that one of the things the internet has in abundance is information but one of the things it lacks are facts.
I don't know much about JP, atrition.org or Ken Williams. I am familiar with the some of the issues but I don't know the facts. Did JP hire people to hack sites so he could scoop the news? Maybe. Did Ken Williams post a picture of his 17 year old sister on his site, thus causing script kiddie idiots to harass her? Maybe. Is attrition.org using satire or personal atttacks? Maybe. I don't know.
I haven't seen a verifiable copy of any e-mails, police reports, alleged innapropriate web pages, confessions by those hired by JP (after they have been arrested, or if they use their real names so they can be checked out). I have only read one sides's propoganda or the other and frankly I don't believe anybody. Both sides appear to be lying to make themselves look good - nothing but mud-slinging, half-truth ad-homenem attacks from a couple of immature twits. What a waste of my time and energy.
Rob, Hemos, how about a follow up to this with actually documents and verifyable evidence on both sides so we can draw our own conclusions? Maybe get a neutral third party to investigate (don't ask me who though). Otherwise there is nothing here but a couple of kids yelling at each other in the school year and crying to their friends for help.
BTW, If either of my sisters had been treated like that, I wouldn't have fired off an e-mail to Harvard...I'd have driven to the maintainer's house and opened up a can of ass-wuppin'...But I digress (feel free to interpret this anyway you like it...suffice it to say somebody would have gone to jail). I guess that's what having the web and the impersonal internet does...it let's you say stuff online that you would never have the balls to say if the person was standing in front of you.
Never by hatred has hatred been appeased, only by kindness - the Buddha
I'm relatively new to Mr. Vranesevich's story. Here's what I think.
There seem so be allot of conflicting information about him and I wonder what is real. The story in the NYT seems awfully simple. It just seems allot like some two-bit movie script that any hack could come up with, and the type of story the media seems to publish frequently. "Bad guy" goes good, now "good guy" must defend himself against "bad guys." I take that article with a big salt lick of salt.
Reading Mr. Vranesevich's response pretty much ended my curiosity. I'm sure he's an intelligent young man and all, but simply put, he seems awfully immature. I've read flames on gaming message boards that read "your game sucks" that are more mature. While they are pointless, at least they don't ramble on forever and toss out dim witted threats right and left.
Simply put, my impression of Mr. Vranesevich is that he's a bitter young man who seems to enjoy provoking people and such. This one just seems to get a bit more attention and would seem to be fairly intelligent in certain areas. I do to Mr. Vranesevich, what I do with the kids who post "you suck" messages on the inet, I move on.
So, the people we have now aren't real? Damn, I've been fooled all this time!@ :)
from an earlier post...
He can only benefit from being labeled, "the most hated figure in the hacker community."
Why be nice when saying "Yea I'm an a$$hole and fsck you!" will make you more money. I wish we had followed my original suggestion, and just ignored him. Which is what I'll do with this thread now that I haven't.
+&x
Well, I've seen many people say that I can't take criticism. Believe me, if that were true, I surely never would have opened myself up to a SlashDot inquisition.
You didn't. As far as I can tell, the most insightful questions posed were ignored. And the fact that you wrote up this dissertation defending yourself clearly shows you CAN'T take criticism.
I knew before I even agreed to the interview, that things would be ugly. Needless to say, I was right on the money. However, I will say this. I was very disappointed in the downright lack of maturity that many of the posts showed.
If you knew "things would be ugly", why were you disappointed in the posts? You obviously knew they were coming, so clearly you expected them. (Oh, please use a colon or a comma occasionally, will you?)
I like to believe that most people who frequent this type of forum are of an intellectual nature.
They are. Take a look at some RELEVANT discussions.
I found it very disheartening to hear nearly every rumor ever voiced about myself or my company being regurgitated as if they were all fact. An educated bunch of people should understand that not everything that they hear is true at all, and that almost nothing that they hear is totally accurate.
Not one single post that I read (Blieve me, I read most of them) said that it was factual. As a matter of fact, much of the posts actually gave you an opportunity to dismiss these "facts" as untrue, AND to explain your position. But you didn't do that, did you?
But, some of that could be my fault. Many posts pointed out the fact that I have never "given explanations of" or provided "blow-by-blow responses" to any of the things that have been written about me. This is true. If I spent my life defending myself from every individual who had a nasty thing to say about me, my life would end up pretty meaningless in the end.
This doesn't lend much to your credibility. What you're saying is that both the petty shit, and the REAL allegations are both meaningless, and you shouldn't have to prove or disprove them at all?
But, never the less, I saw this SlashDot invitation as the perfect opportunity to talk about some of those very issues.
But you DIDN'T, Did you?
It's not that I feel that people who posted negative comments will read what I have to say, and then decide that they were totally wrong about me. Those who despise me for whatever reason will continue to do so no matter what I ever say or do. Even SlashDot faced the wrath of dozens of people who are "no longer going to visit this site" for one reason or another after reading the interview bio on Monday.
See, it's not that people despise you "whatever [you] say or do", they hate you BECAUSE of everything you say and do. None of the other people interviewed on Slashdot have had this problem. I wonder why.
So much for loyalty in this day and age I suppose.
Loyalty? What about all of the people you stabbed in the back to get a story? Loyalty is earned, and yet, you're shocked to find out nobody is loyal to you? Pffft.
Then, he continued by stating that the list of questions forwarded by roblimo were "stupid." I disagree. Many of them posed interesting subjects that many more would have liked an answer to. This opened up the perfect opportunity to clear up any (IF any) misconceptions about you, your website, and your position on those particular topics.
But you didn't do that.....DID you?
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon? :P)
(If you can't figure out how to E-Mail me, Don't.
For future reference JP, slashdot frowns on posting anonymously.
"There's so much left to know/ and I'm on the road to find out." -Cat Stevens
He is just not a grown-up yet. He acts like a child, because he *is* still a child. I mean, how old is he, anyhow?
good article here
Ugh. Double and triple ugh. But what were we to expect from a self proclaimed "pissant"?
JP, your story keeps changing on the packetstorm fiasco, first it was nuns covered in seminal fluids, then death threats, and now pictures of your sister? This is such a load of shit... im glad I have boots on. I've seen the packetstorm archives, and honestly, you're spouting off lies.
Congratulations, you made an even bigger idiot out of yourself. (and here i didnt think it possible) And to call out Ken Williams? You're a sad little ignorant media whore.
I feel dirty just having to talk about jp.
"and no, im not the spot working for Transmeta, although i wish i was..." -- ~spot "i'm the epitome of public enemy..."
And what, exactly, is your point? All you've demontrated is you're own ignorance.
Adam
http://www.thesynthesis.com/tech/antionline/index. html
Pretty decent history, fills in some gaps.
I don't get it. You all are making Slashdot sound like a community of people who support malicious hacking/cracking. From what I've read, all this guy ever did was turn in some malicious hackers. Hackers who are out to delete data and shut down sites give the entire hacking community a bad name anyway. What did this guy do that is so terrible?
Next time, act with some maturity people instead of wasting people's time.
P.S. For those of you who did ask the intelligent questions -- commendations. Even though some of the chosen questions were very BADLY worded.
---
-
ping -f 255.255.255.255 # if only
I have watched the whole JP and Anti-JP thing for some time, and although I have not really choosen sides, I will point a few things I noticed:
If I had a little sister, and someone posted her picture and address on the web, I wouldnot sue them, I would kill them. You dont mess around with family, not in this way.
Some of the questions posed for JP were just plain stupid. I can see why he choose not to answer some of them.
However, he did avoid ALL questions, some of which were professional, and non-inflamatory. He avoided and misdirected his answers with a skill worthy of a Romulan. Attrion's negation pages are well laid-out, factual and progress logical to make a point. JP uses smokes and mirrors, and as far as I can tell, never makes a point.
Summarize:
1. Dont mess with peoples family
2. Provide accurate, researched information, or shutup
3. Dont ask dumb questions just to piss someone off
4. Dont trust JP, hes a politican
- Y2K? Nyah, 10YK is the big one -
These "Why did you..." questions are of the same breed. "Here are some of the bad things said about you, now address them and make them go away." If JP *had* acted in a defensible way, he should have offered a good defense. Indeed, if he had acted in a genuinely valiant manner, he could have come off looking great from those questions. But by side-stepping them, he just looks like a wannabe.
Doctors amputate Turkish earthquake survivor's arm [This story contains video]
"Whatever happened to fair use?"
-- Duff-Man
I admit that I don't know a great deal about the situation, so I'm not going to judge what JP and others have done. However, I consider myself well-read and well-educated, and I object to several aspects of JP's reply.
First, I think it's cowardly and immature to agree to take questions, then refuse to answer any of them, whatever your reasons. If you want to refuse certain questions for specific reasons, fine, but at least a few of the submitted questions were perfectly valid, and should have been answered directly.
Also, I object to the tone of the essay. I am around JP's age, as are my friends, and I can clearly recognize the thin veil of civility JP tried to place over his words. He is just inches away from calling us all (including those of us who had nothing to do with this Q&A session) dirty names, and making rude comments about our mothers. I also have some experience in debate, and I believe his arguments are, for the most part, argumentative, unsubstantiated, and in one case inconsistant (unfortunate, since that was the only argument that I thought sounded valid).
Finally, I would like to point out that I find JP a great fool to agree to this Q&A session. The only reason I can see that would make him do so would be to defend himself. He claims no interest in that, and admits that opinions are not going to change about him because of this. So what's the point?
I don't write this merely to criticize JP. I couldn't care less about him or the arguments surrounding him. But I hate to see people posting childish, poorly planned arguments when they have ample opportunity to review them. It doesn't do anyone any good when we let our emotions get the better of us in a debate, aspecially when it's written correspondance. JP should have let this sit for a while, then come back and rewritten it after cooling off a little. And include some evidence! I hope if anyone who reads this and finds themselves in that situation will be a little more mature than JP has been.
Squawk squawk!
Here, have a cracker, Polly!
Can I stay your home?
P.S. I also like walk.
I am actually disappointed in JP's response. Yes, there were quite a few flames from fellow Slashdot members, but like JP pointed out, that's to be expected. But, the moderators chose the best questions out of the bunch that I felt that JP should have answered directly, so that I may better understand his position on things. Sorry, JP. I held no personal qualms with you before. Most of the "terrible" things I've heard and read about you, I dismissed as personal bias against you and not fact (as you point out yourself, most of everything you read is not fact). Now, I'm beginning to see why everyone is so up in arms about you. Your attitute with the Slashdot questions is along the lines "Oh, I don't have the time of day for you guys. I don't need to defend myself to the likes of you. If you don't ask the questions I want to hear, then go piss off." Nice attitute JP. Now that I look at it, based on what you _didn't_ say, I have a much better understanding of you.
How about answering the questions? You always try to meld the truth to you're little ideal world, in where you are the 1337357 h4x0r ever. How about actually thinking how stupid you are to everyone else but the people that are fooled by your facade of being an "expert" on computer security? Why is it whenever you personally respond to some issue that has to do with your malicious intents, you say everyone else is wrong and you are right? You immediately flip the issue to the accuser! How about just going back to the script kiddie life you used to live (and still do at times)?
-- There's only one replacement for displacement.....
I think that interview went rather well. ;-)
I had cookies disabled when I posted above and it didn't log me in. Sorry...
-PenguinDude
i just want to know how long it took him to come up with all this bs, correction, 'politcal/contradictory/i'm a rich little five-year old who knows nothing' bs. examples...
"let me say that I didn't shut down PacketStorm, and neither did Harvard. Ken Williams is the sole person responsible for that site being shut down"
"I sent a simple one page e-mail to the provost's office asking them to review the contents of the site -- the university reviewed it, and chose to shut it down"
uh...choose one. and the next one highly ammuses me.
"Ken sold [the site] for a reported $125,000 to Kroll."
first off, the only 'type' of site i see being sold for 'a reported' $125,000 is one that is grossing in excess of that amount. anyone think that Ken's site fits this description? i didn't think so. also, i don't see anyone by the name of Kroll to be able, and utterly stupid enough, to buy a slew of html code for $125,000. maybe thats just me.
all in all, i found this interview rather disappointing. mostly on JP's part, but not excluding one or two of the questions Rob & co. chose to use.
Now, before Monday, I largely had no idea about who JP was. I'd never heard of Anti-Online, had been to attrition.org a handful of times, and also never heard of PacketStorm. Reading his responses reminds me of a joke a comedian made about "The Incredible Hulk" tv show, where he talks about how David Banner gets into a fight in every town he goes to. He said,"If that were me, by like the thrid episode, I'd be thinking,'Maybe it isn't everbody else.'"
Basically, knowing nothing about JP, Ken Williams, or Brian Martin, or anyone else really involved in this, with the furvor that he attacks Ken and Brian, it seems to me pretty clear who the potential jerk is here. That's not to say he's technically right or wrong in some cases. But he's sure not going about this in the nicest of ways.
Why don't all you First Post ACs do something useful and put a 'first post' up at http://www.antionline.com
[I put a bit of thought into this, so I've crossposted my comment from Forbes.]
Like many professionals reading this (I think I can safely speak for many at this level), I'm disappointed both by JP's behavior and methods of operation, and by the community response. While it's pretty clear that JP is far less experienced and far more vindictive than he represents, you have to give the guy some credit for standing up to a wall of immature criticism. For example, the lack of intelligent questions in yesterday's Slashdot interview was very disappointing; I'd have liked to see something along the lines of "What do you see as the next few steps in the evolution of remote NT cracking" or "What would you recommend as a baseline security configuration for deployment of a small XYZ-based ecommerce site?"
Of course, I'm the only one to blame for not posting these questions. Why did I not post them? Because previous experience tells me that the responses would be ill-researched and of little use. JP does not have anything new or interesting to offer in this arena. Perhaps that's a little hypocritical of me -- criticising the community for lack of reasonable questions when I failed to contribute. But then again, it's clear that the feeling was common. What a waste of community brain-cycles.
For the sake of argument, how can JP become a respected individual in the security arena? It's clear he's got a talent -- just not in the mechanics of system or network security. He's an excellent consciousness-raiser, even if his methods need some cleanup. (The comparison to Howard Stern was excellent.) Perhaps he would be a good addition to a security consultancy that has a lot of introverted systems gurus with good leadership and financial backing, but needs someone with basic knowledge and a talent for verbal evangelism. With the proper organizational guidance and support from a technical research team that actually knows its stuff, he could actually do some good in this world. As it stands, however, he's overextended the boundaries of his knowledge and talent, and brings the whole security community down by inciting the online and legal equivalent of schoolyard fistfights.
I think not...(*poof*)
I am seriously starting to loose faith in the Slashdot community. When they rally against software patents, question where technology is going, and point out important science stories this place sounds great.
But all the biased Linux opinions and pro-hacking kiddie stuff is really starting to make me loose faith in the integrity of a lot of slashdot readers and writers.
He got his site shut-down by harassing a 17 year old girl, which shortly after being shutdown, Ken sold for a reported $125,000 to Kroll. Okay, it's a minor thing, but doesn't this sentence say that Ken sold a 17 year old girl?
If they did that's completely unexcusable. They likely exposed themselves to serious civil and criminal prosection for posting info about a minor. Harvard knows words like Defamation and conspiracy to encourage criminal conduct even if attrition.org didn't.
That said anything that promotes real investigation of security concerns is good for the industry. Let's all remember who are the real bad guys. People making nukes!
I guess this self moderation stuff has it's good and bad points ... this is obvious by the score of 3 this post received which is simply a tirade of violent tendencies and over zealous aggression.
Having a minimum threshold of 3 doesn't seem to cut it anymore.
Poor Ken.
Sounds like a pretty good price for a 17-year-old girl. Who is this Kroll guy? I have a younger sister I could make him a deal on.
This whole page is the same old flame war that characterizes much of usenet and has been a mainstay of the internet ever since I started to hang out there ten years ago. Get over it, people!
;-) )
You *will* always disagree strongly with someone, and you *will* likewise be disagreed with by that person. It always creates an endless flame war that does not turn up anything useful. Don't waste your time!
(As if I didn't waste mine once more
Did anyone honestly expect JP to be a "stand up guy" about this whole thing?
/. allowed him to use this site as more bait for his own financial gain.
He's proven time and time again what his motives are and what drives his actions, he even spells them out in his narrative above and people simply follow his carrot right into the trap.
I'm surprised to see that
Probably some of you have seen the years-long flamewar on comp.os.ibm.pc.games.strategic with Derek Smart. This fellow is eerily reminiscent.
.sig, is unaccredited.
He doesn't answer questions straight, is always 'under attack' by 'those who are out to get him', and implies that he is somehow noble for being hated.
Ol' Mister Smart turned out to be 99% bullshit. He threatened legal action on any number of occasions for things which were obviously inactionable. He repeatedly failed to deliver even 10% of what he promised. Even his PhD, which he so proudly proclaims at the bottom of every
Now, I don't know that John here is the same way, but I've seen this style of not really answering-questions and implying that questioners are part of the Grand Conspiracy Against Him before. Several times, in fact. And every time, that person has turned out to be 99% bullshit.
The worst thing you can do to Vranesevich is to ignore him -- I suggest you do so. He is most likely all flash, no substance.
I don't know all this mumbo jumbo he's talking about the FBI, but he doesn't seem to have experience with them.
Neither do I other than once that I know of.
When I was sixteen I had a friend who could get mushrooms(the fun kind) cheap from another state. We were breaking interstate drug laws, which are handled by the FBI. Somebody tipped off the cops or the feds or whatever. But the FBI was hot. The FBI bungled the whole thing. They had all of our names wrong and didn't actually 'know' where the packages were going to. There were four of us and the name they missed was the one who was actually getting the shrooms. Needless to say, we knew of their involvment ahead of time. Phone calls were made, shipments stopped. Everybody walked away from it. So if a bunch of tripped out stoned teenagers can find out that they're being investigated by the FBI, I find it kind of funny that Johnboy can't.
--
Anonymous Coward
"I had to smoke a bowl to understand Johnboy's essay."
Do any government agencies really take antionline seriously? I mean, I could see it happening, but I wouldn't expect it, because I happen to know that there are people at the FBI who have really killer computer skills, and considering all that I've read about antionline they wouldn't take it very seriously. On the other hand, like many skilled computer professionals these people work for people who have better people skills than technical skills (political types), so I guess it is possible.
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
JP is a plague to the security world. Without PacketStorm, there was no real central database of common advisories (CERT is a joke in comparison) for weeks. I really don't care if the JP's detractors are right or wrong. All that matters is that JP makes my job tougher and the internet would not miss him if he left. And by the way, hacks per hour proves nothing even if he isn't lying. Army.gov gets maybe 90 or so attacks per hour during peak hours and never learned about the huge Coldfusion exploit advisory made three months prior to their defacement by L0pht. In fact, they didn't even fix their servers after the defacement. For that matter, Antionline has been hacked before through a simple server-side include they used to steal content from someone else's site. If that isn't stupidity, I don't know what is.
I've never had any experience with the guy, And my only impressions were based on what others said about him.
.But in the long run, let's see who stands.. John or those who are attempted to down him..
Despite this, his responses were *exactly* what I would have expected, from the person described. I mean, *I* could have done a better job of defending myself, of course I never would have put myself in that position to begin with...
His whole attitude was basically "fuck off, idiots, I can do whatever the he hell I want." I don't know what AO does, but I suspect that they make much of there money from page-views, but if people don't have a good impression of him, he wont get many impressions.
This guy is an arrogant, childish moron. He had the opportunity to remove that perception, but instead he reinforced it.
I cannot see this man standing much longer...
--
"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Hey, this is funny... Type 'hacking' in Google, and the first thing you get is 'AntiOnline.com'. I thought google was a good search engine ;-)
I don't know, but its almost certanly JP@antionline.com
He seems like the kind of person who'll just block you.
--
"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Robin,
/. interview "Roblimo"?
Maybe next interview, you can send the reasons that the question was moderated up for.
Question #1 (Interesting) blah blah blah
Question #2 (Insightful) blah blah blah
Questoin #3 (Funny) Why doesn't
Just as an example.
Steven Rostedt
Steven Rostedt
-- Nevermind
I meant the L0pht Coldfusion advisory... You guys put out some great software and I'd hate to hurt your public image with poor grammar.
Mr Vranesevich,
it is rather improbable that you will actually read this message, [and I expect it to be moderated down as flamebait], but please take note of the following few problems:
All we wanted was the truth. I guess you think we just can't handle it.
Alex
--
"Your telnet is talking to itself. Welcome to the wacky world of TCP/IP."
"First off, let me say that I didn't shut down PacketStorm, and neither did Harvard..."
:-/
"I sent a simple one page e-mail to the provost's office asking them to review the contents of the site against their acceptable use policy. Despite Ken's claims that there wasn't any "offending" material on the site, the university reviewed it, and chose to shut it down."
"Use your common sense people."
I think people ARE using their common sense, which is why you're looking so bad, JP. And I'd personally like to thank you for doing all that you've done for Ken. You gave him the opportunity to sell Packet Storm for $125,000. Without you he wouldnt've had that happen, bless your generous soul, kid!
It was Packet Storm he sold, right? and not your sister? I couldn't tell, what with your college drop-out grammar and all. Anyhow, back to reality, where JP doesn't matter
love & moo's,
philth
He comes right out and says that he INTENTIONALLY pisses off AS MANY people as he can.
/. community than to issue a diatribe like this? Refusing to give clear, concise answers to questions, indeed outright ignoring the issues that were posed, is one of the best ways to piss off a group of intellectuals.
What better way to piss off the
So, if we bicker and bitch about this guy, all we do is fuel his fire, which is what he wants.
Put satirical humor about him up, we only give him free publicity.
Hell, saying anything about him at all gives him "airtime" - even if it's just telling people to ignore him.
So basically this guy has created a situation where no matter what we do, he wins
Ignore him completely, just let all of this nonsense die, and it'll be the best we can do to stop this kind of moronic behavior.
...when some student was asked a question they didn't have a clue about.
It's a shame that I have to make this post as an Anonymous Coward; however, JP's past pattern of behavior leads me to believe I can't have honest accountability for my opinion of him. First of all let me say I have so little respect for JP, I wish he were just another irrelevent human being. But since the media, the "hacking community," the "anti-hacking community," and everybody else pay so much attention to his hijinx, he has emerged- for worse and for worse yet- as a pivot point for controversy and discussion. This is a 20 year old kid. And he acts the same way most late-adolescents with little holistic self-awareness and maturity act- like a juvenile. Emotionally-high charged about asserting that he only values logic. Obviously he is somewhat clueful intellectually, but he lacks the emtional wearwithall to be considered a peer to anyone over the age of 30. I myself am in my early twenties, and have worked for a large corporation since I was 21. I count myself lucky to have earned the respect of my peers, most of whom are 30-50 years old, and be considered a credible, responsible person in their eyes. It took a lot of hard work to "prove myself." JP walked into the real world with a chip on his shoulder and enough intellect to be dangerous, and this is the result. "I want it all, and I want it now." JP obviously thinks he has all the answers. If someone else throws sand on him, he starts yelling "I'll sue! I'll sue!" And then dials up his "friends" in the h4x0r c0r3 to destroy whatever online resources they can relating to the instigator. JP - I hope you do get this message - Grow up. I can't and won't address any of the crap about blah blah FBI, blah blah attrition.org; it's all so pointless in the grand scheme of things. Get a couple books on philopohy, and concentrate on self-awareness. You are not entitled to anything, young man. I can't wait until you wake up and realize the tremendous lack of pertinence that your body represents in the Universe. Good luck.
I find it difficult to believe that anyone who wishes to be a respected professional would choose not to defend themselves against the mass criticism of the very community they claim to have insight into. Sure, lots of respected people have many critics, but it is by responding to them intelligently and with genuine insight that they maintain respect. Dismissing your detractors is not the way to fame and fortune, though I guess it could seem that way at 21 when your name has been in all the big papers. The article in Forbes just shows that it won't last, and I hope that John has a second line of work set up for when he's 22, nobody remembers his name except as an afterthought, and he can't get a security job to save his life.
I will say immediately, I only know about Mr. Vranesevich what I have read in this thread. And I don't take it all for gold. However, I am appaled by some posts, which seem to support gratuitous hatred, call the guy names and show a high level of guillability. The kind of guillability you would expect at a lynch.
/. question he was supposed to answer.
To prove this point, I would like to point out to an effect of distortion of the sentences. Even though V. states "However, what Ken did far surpassed simple satire. By posting a
photo of my younger sister (who was a minor at the time), along with her full name and address, he successfully
started a mass campaign of harassment against her and my family." so he talks about a photo (therefore ONE), many posters who were negative to V. said "the pictures of his sister" which misleads the reader to think of some kind of porno pictures. Humiliating.
Also, the questions that I read in the interview, would have certainly hurt me. I'm not saying that all were unanswerable (some of them were), but I can imagine that the guy felt hated. I don't know how I would have reacted in his place, but am actually surprised by the decorum and behaviour he managed toshow. It was certainly above the average
I could see, in some posts here, a good example of the herd mentality. I have studied a bit about it (it was called "Psychology of the group") and I am reminded how individuals that are otherwise anonymous cowards, became very vocal and "brave" in their acts. The acts I am talking about are the insults hurled at a person that they dont't know, they don't know what is the truth (because none of us still knows the exact facts), they only know that here is a guy whom everybody seems to hate, so let's cal him names, let's call his sister names.
Conclusion? No conclusion, but it seems to me that anyone could be Mr. Vranesevic.
Sigged!
I will say immediately, I only know about Mr. Vranesevich what I have read in this thread. And I don't take it all for gold. However, I am appaled by some posts, which seem to support gratuitous hatred, call the guy names and show a high level of guillability. The kind of guillability you would expect at a lynch.
/. question he was supposed to answer.
To prove this point, I would like to point out to an effect of distortion of the sentences. Even though V. states "However, what Ken did far surpassed simple satire. By posting a
photo of my younger sister (who was a minor at the time), along with her full name and address, he successfully
started a mass campaign of harassment against her and my family." so he talks about a photo (therefore ONE), many posters who were negative to V. said "the pictures of his sister" which misleads the reader to think of some kind of porno pictures. Humiliating.
Also, the questions that I read in the interview, would have certainly hurt me. I'm not saying that all were unanswerable (some of them were), but I can imagine that the guy felt hated. I don't know how I would have reacted in his place, but am actually surprised by the decorum and behaviour he managed toshow. It was certainly above the average
I could see, in some posts here, a good example of the herd mentality. I have studied a bit about it (it was called "Psychology of the group") and I am reminded how individuals that are otherwise anonymous cowards, became very vocal and "brave" in their acts. The acts I am talking about are the insults hurled at a person that they dont't know, they don't know what is the truth (because none of us still knows the exact facts), they only know that here is a guy whom everybody seems to hate, so let's cal him names, let's call his sister names.
Conclusion? No conclusion, but it seems to me that anyone could be Mr. Vranesevic.
Sigged!
Just some minor points:
/jp directory.
Not one single post that I read (Blieve me, I read most of them) said that it was factual.
I guess you didn't read the ones that were submitted by him:
Question#2:
Many of us in the hacker community (not cracker)
used the Packet Storm security site for
information and research. You had it shut down for some alleged things in the
Sounds like they're saying the rumor is factual to me. I read most of the posts as well, and I have to agree with him that most of the slashdotters have already judged him guilty (now, whether they did so with cause or not is a different story - but the general consensus is that every allegation against him is true.)
But, never the less, I saw this SlashDot invitation as the perfect opportunity to talk about some of those very issues.
But you DIDN'T, Did you?
Sounds like he did to me. While I agree that his response was immature (he should have answered the questions given,) I don't believe he's doing anything worse than you are with this post.
Sorry for being so harsh.
Was that actually the case? Was Packet storm actually displaying images of JP's little sister along with her full name, etc? I have absolutely no reason to believe anything that comes out of JPs mouth, but at the same time, I have a hard time believing that he would make up such a ridicules statement.
I remember at the time of the incident, JP posted an 'edited' version of Ken Williams statement (That didn't hash with the PGP signature...), I'd really be interested in finding out what the content *actually* was.
--
"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Personnally, I don't frequent the security and (h|cr)ackers circles, so I did'nt knew about this guys before he was featured on Slashdot. He could have convinced me he was right and correct. Thoughtful answer and insightful comment would have done the job.
Instead, he defend himself by attacking his detractor, not a strategy I find respectable. This interview was empty and leave me the feeling of an arrogant media whore washing his laundry in public. Sure, the guy is under attack, but his attitude does nothing to sooth his relation with the public.
Anyway, it's being said over and over but I think this interview should'nt have been done. They are hundred of worthwhile interview candidate, why choose this guys ? Slashdot should be after Larry Wall, Donald Knuth, Brian Kerniggan and other significant people of our community for an interview, not the controversial figure du jour.
:wq
so he's rude and hostile, and he avoided some serious questions, but why every /.er just ignores the valid part of his reply? -- i mean the part about PacketStorm and Attritton. Could somebody verify what he said is true or not?
since when in the f*ck do you capitalize the d in slashdot?
ERROR: Keyboard not attached. Press F-1 to continue.
This coming interview has been puffed all week by SlashDot--the promos hinting broadly that a real fight was brewing. There was a certain prize-fight atmosphere about the promos, and about RobLimo's introduction. In the one corner we have a tag team of really rude dudes trash-talking and waving; in the center of the ring we have Rob and RobLimo taunting the crowd to even-more-frenzied fits of outrage, and in the other corner, swaggering through the crowd, comes the Evil Villain, dressed in a black mask and cape, to do battle with the Rude D00dz.
It seems to me that, cast in the role of the Villain of this little drama, JP had the grace to enjoy the part.
He was calm, he was reasonably dispassionate, he was irenic, and he basically whupped the Rude D00dz. He thanked the promoters for inviting him, and he proceeded to out-rude the Rude D00dz by essentially blowing them off. He then proceeds to employ a brilliant bit of pro wrestling showmanship--he takes on the crowd. He insults them by calling them stupid, he taunts them by daring them to hack his site, he flaunts his Bad Boy bona fides by repeatedly emphasizing his FBI connections, and he flirts with them by suggesting that attempting to hack his site only makes him more successful. About the only thing he didn't do was sell "I Hate JP" t-shirts. Epic stuff.
The really good villains in pro wrestling know how to play the game. They know--and the promoters know--that the crowd doesn't pay to see the good guys. The crowd pays to see the bad guys. And Rob went and found a terrific bad guy for this week's Friday Night Fights. JP gets more notoriety (which only enhances his reputation with his clientele), JP gets tons of new attacks on his servers (which he sells to his clientele), and RobM gets hundreds of thousands of banner ad impressions. Each of 'em makes out like a bandit.
And the Rude D00dz? They're left standing there, in the corner, wondering what happened to them. Maybe JP will have some sympathy, and send each of 'em a t-shirt.
Fellas--ya got played.
The man is quite obviously technically incompetent, but journalists don't know that. They see that he is hated by the community (because he's such an idiot) and assume he must be some master-anti-hacker. Prety clever way to make up for lack of any real skill. He's not quite as stupid as people make him out to be.
whether he's right or not, he's a freak and he's doing what Intel does to their competition.
Push and shove, and the nasty ones win.
The price we pay for immortality... is death. Narnia The Great Fall
--Quoted from "Internet Wars Episode One The Antionline Menace" at The Synthesis
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
ok, this is just redicilous..... I don't even have a clue who this guy is and I already dislike him. I mean seriously, I have caught bits ans pieces of info on this whole topic before now but I am just a poor windows kiddie who finds some of the slashdot content interesting. From my point of view I thought some of the questions were interesting and I expected some informative responses..... Instead what I got to read was some A**HOLE who agreed to answer some questions decide to turn his "interview" into a giant flame to all those who asked questions and succeed to do nothing more than irritate everyone who read the article by repeating all the things that have been said and done a dozen times before. Someone made the comment about his answers sounding like thay came from a politician.... I'd rather have talked to a politician because at least if they don't have an intelligent answer to a question they'll just say "no comment" and at least retain some level of mature dignity. Seriously people I think that everyone should do their best to ignore this little pissant, maby he'll just get bored from the lack of attention and go away. Maby he'll get bored and post retrospective answers to some of the questions as to what kind of person he is. This guy has just irritated me to no end with one twisted interview.... right now my opinion of him is slightly lower than the guy who turned me away from an interview for a computer job because he thought I was a "punk kid" since I was ONLY 19 years old.
Then you say:
Well, does the FBI talk to anyone about who they are investigating or not? Could it be that you contacted them and not the other way around?
At the risk of sounding like I'm name-dropping, John, I've known Brian for around 6 or 7 years now, on a personal (i.e., nightclubs, parties, hanging out) level as well as a professional (i.e., attrition and his zine) one. As such, I consider him a friend and I can guarantee you that he is, in fact, interested in the security community. He is attempting to discredit you and AO (and believe me, a page or two on a security site is not "going out of his way") because you are precisely what the security community does not need: a fake.
-Legion
=======================
User Info for adamk (67660)
Karma 1 (mostly the sum of moderation done to users comments)
adamk has posted 6 comments (this only counts the last few weeks)
1 Re:Typical slashdot intro... well written response posted on Friday November 12, @11:55AM CST (Score:1)
attached to Interview: John Vranesevich Doesn't Really Answer
2 Re:Slashdot Crew Must Hate This Guy Too posted on Friday November 12, @11:44AM CST (Score:1)
attached to Interview: John Vranesevich Doesn't Really Answer
3 Re:Read the Bruce Schneier interview posted on Friday November 12, @11:38AM CST (Score:1)
attached to Interview: John Vranesevich Doesn't Really Answer
4 Re:Typical slashdot intro... well written response posted on Friday November 12, @11:36AM CST (Score:1 Replies:1)
attached to Interview: John Vranesevich Doesn't Really Answer
5 Re:Be fair on the guy... posted on Friday November 12, @11:31AM CST (Score:1 Replies:1)
attached to Interview: John Vranesevich Doesn't Really Answer
6 So? posted on Friday November 12, @11:25AM CST (Score:1)
attached to Interview: John Vranesevich Doesn't Really Answer
=======================
intresting....
--
"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
Not being all that interested in hackers, I've never followed any of the controversies raised by V. and his detractors until today, so let me just give my opinion from that perspective: V.'s reply was very unprofessional and extremely evasive. The fact that he just blows off the opportunity to give a detailed reply to the charges against him is a pathetic attempt to shift the issues (in fact, as he points out, his main goal is simply to piss people off -- yeah, I'd really want to hire this guy to help secure my network0.
That this person has been featured and quoted widely by the press if further evidence of the gullibility of the American press.
If these were the best, then I can understand why this guy refused to reply directly. Those questions suck.
I quit reading JP's response once he said that most of the questions were "stupid". I find that highly unprofessional. This would normally be considered the opening volley in a flame war. He may think I, and other anonymous cowards, have the brain power of canned tuna, and that's his right. But anyone with any spark of common decency (or manners) would at least try to tell me why I'm wrong. Show me the errors of my evil way, maybe I'll change.
"Stupid"? With a good thesaurus he could converse at a 9th grade level.
I thank slashdot for this posting. It was very educational.
He writes: First off, let me say that I didn't shut down PacketStorm, and neither did Harvard.
But later, we have:I sent a simple one page e-mail to the provost's office asking them to review the contents of the site against their acceptable use policy. Despite Ken's claims that there wasn't any "offending" material on the site, the university reviewed it, and chose to shut it down.
Sure sounds like he and Harvard shut it down!
Did he answer ANY questions? I'm looking through this to see if he answered anything that was asked of him... Nope. Typical |JP|.
BurntAsh: No, |JP| has no pr0n.
He got his site shut-down by harassing a 17 year old girl, which shortly after being shutdown, Ken sold for a reported $125,000 to Kroll.
$125,000 sounds pretty steep for one 17 year-old girl. Who is this Kroll, anyways? Some kind of interstellar slave-trader?
--
perl -e '$_="06fde129ae54c1b4c8152374c00";
s/(.)/printf "%c",(10,32,65,67,69,72,
$_="06fde129ae54c1b4c8152374c00"; s/(.)/printf "%c",(10,32,65,67,69,72, (74..76),(78..80),(82..85))[hex $1]/eg;
No, they didnt, that was fabricated by none other then j.p. and his grandmother of all people, there *was* some stuff on attrition protected from normal users that both sides agree was there, as far as posting some picture, not a chance, and if so, id like to se a mirror of it.
Why do you peple keep the fun of me? I want lucky girl with hot bodily parts for friendly traffic. It is not two late! Send foto or move in!
-Legion
JP is close to 21 years of age.
--
"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
One thing I've noticed in the last two years as I do more and more "big corporate" type contracts, is that businesses are run on greed, on ego, on capitalistic hedonistic obsessions for money, and that there's no one to take care of except yourself. Not even "the bottom line", just yourself.
At least this guy is HONEST about it!! He's 21 (younger than I am) and he already knows that in order to survive in the bulls**t world of capitalism, all you have to do is scratch peoples back, and watch your own. I didn't know that so well at his age.
He answers the questions defensively, but the questions are reminiscent of a high-school shouting match. What do you expect?
And he's right... it's not a public company. It's NOT anyones business!!
If he in fact *does* spread bs on his own (I honestly don't know, I think the whole things too petty to bother following in detail), then that's his perogative. If he can make it work FOR him, and not let it *get* to him, GOOD! He's doing something clever for his own needs, which brings us back to the first comment I made on "what business runs on".
I suspect he'll end up as CEO of something big in 20 years.
The way I learned routers and switches was not so much by all the Cisco courses, but more by working in huge telco's labs, huge financial conglomerates network-war-rooms, and by *immersing* myself in it. This guy's doing the same thing... he's saying "Hit me, hard." and studying every move you make (or so he says). Clever boy.
I may not like the bs that he is or isn't spreading, but quite frankly, I admire his candor, and his determination, not to mention his blunt honesty about his feelings on whole thing. Are any of *us* that honest about what we think and feel in life? We should be.
As for his sister... If it were me, someone would be castrated by very large, angry, rabid dogs, and then left to bleed in the middle of a public square with a big sign explaining what he did to deserve it.
mindslip
If I spent my life defending myself from every individual who had a nasty thing to say about me -just cite inaccurate/unreliable sources as possibly inaccurate, and youve defended yourself a plenty (with an action that takes seconds not a life time) AntiOnline & Attrition -skip this section, as its inaccurate/incomplete We average between 200-500 intrusion attempts against one of our systems AN HOUR, and every time I piss another segment of the cyber-population off, that number skyrockets -not much more to log than /.. attacks and bruteforce break-in attempts (also speaks for the intelligence of the people commiting these attacks).
Ah yes, astroturf!
sister's picture? Is she even cute?
This might be a LONG shot, but maybe John will notice this question and find some way to respond...
We average between 200-500 intrusion attempts against one of our systems AN HOUR, and every time I piss another segment of the cyber-population off, that number skyrockets. We probably have one of the most targeted networks on the internet today, and we take full advantage of that.
So, for an actual question that might be worthwhile, what kind of system are you running that can take that kind of heat? Would you care about actually explaining how you can piss people off and yet still build a large enough shield to keep them off your backs?
Hi guys
A quick note -- I don't particularly care about the moderation; I rather wanted to make a few points (I assume others have made these, but I've got to add my two cents' worth).
This was informative. No, that's not a pisstake. Everyone here got to see for themselves what a prat this idiot really is. I don't see the need to comment on him any further, as others have readily deconstructed him pretty thoroughly. I was surprised you originally chose him, given the depth of feeling that seemed to arise from both you and the users here, but thought that it was at least worth checking the idea out.
However, now that this [worthy] experiment has been concluded, it would be appropriate for you lot to exercise a bit more judgement in who you interview.
To reiterate: this isn't an anti-cracker thing -- your work with the cDc people split my sides more than once, and managed to be effectively informative as well as entertaining.
Your Bruce Schneier and John Carmack interviews in particular set some extremely high standards. How about some other cool people? The 'Three-Initial Mafia', as someone else said? Or Avie Tevanian at Apple? Or Theo DeRaadt over at OpenBSD? There's got to be no shortage of eligible/interesting folk out there...
========================================
Death will come, and will have your eyes
-- Pavese
As I heard it (I haven't seen a mirror site yet), it was a picture of her out of a highschool yearbook that was grabbed from another site ran by a friend of JP's.
stuff that was available from the school's on-line yearbook. Nothing that any one of us would not have found with a search engine.
I am just curious why this question and answer session was ever conducted. Previous to this article, I hadn't head of JP, but after reading his comments as well most of the Slashdotter's comments it seems obvious that this guy is in the middle of a blood feud with the hacker community, his credentials are, at best, sketchy and to top it off after sorting through everything I can't find anything that this guy has done? Let's hear from somebody who is an asset to the computing world. (hint: Dennis Ritchie, Bakkus or one of the other language pioneers)
My only question really is... Why in gods name does anybody even bother to aknowledge this kid? I mean how many times does he have to prove himself a fledgling moron before you guys realize that anything he says is worthless anyway? I just don't get it.
I remember back when I was 21, many years ago, I thought the world knew nothing; that I was important. I lacked a maturity and esteem for others and was filled with self-importance. John! Bro! I'd like to think that I, almost 20 years later, have learned hard lessons that have taught me humility and respect. It took a long time to learn that even grudging respect has to be earned through respecting others. I don't doubt that he knows a little bit about what he preachs, but perhaps with time he will play well with the big boys. Right now he is surrounded by morons in his own estimation and it would seem that we are all confirming that for him. Leave him alone, he enjoys "reacting". If he wants to impress us, and it seems he really wants to, let's see him gain notoriety without a spotlight. Let's check back with the boy in a few years and let time judge him as a "Shock Jock" or otherwise.
Frankly, I know Ken Williams, and he's a pretty down-to-earth guy. I don't think he'd put up a set of pages like that unless someone really pissed him off. And with the Harvard site: don't you think he could have simply removed the offending material instead of the entire major security site? That was badly handled at the least, and something definitely smelt fishy about it. (as evinced by the groundswell of community support for good ol' Tattooman)
Who cares if this guy's sister is a minor? She wasn't naked, right? I've got pictures of me from elementary school. They aren't illegal.
Oh, and the "I'm just some guy running for office" story doesn't really hold up well with the "I'm just some guy who got raided by the FBI" angle. Even if all Slashdot readers *were* immature, they wouldn't be stupid enough to believe this drivel, as opposed to the man who posted it. (Either he's a moron for listening to himself, he's lying, or both)
---
pb Reply rather than vaguely moderate me.
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Am I the only one who, upon hearing the name "Ken Williams" over and over, can't help but think of the mustachioed Roberta-spouse who used to smile out from Sierra magazine?
Well, CM has of course defended JP. I like how she implies that 3 full time journalists were somehow taken in by Brian Martin. That the were all fooled into thinking JP is a lame-ass pariah. Someone truly nees to knock these losers down a peg or two.
I for one loved PacketStorm like no other. JPs actions were petty and taken to make up for his own inadequacies. The fact that he sound like Nixon talking about how the actions he took for his family makes me loath him. I encourage everyone to post pictures, rumors, and contact information about JP and his family to every geocities and xoom site they can create. Mirror the ones out there. I would love to see him spend all of his free time threatening lawsuits to defend against a threat that he created himself.
Through all his venting, there are two basic points he made which I can actually agree with.
1) The questions given to him were not stellar.
2) Harvard is definitely not afraid of being sued by anybody. If anyone thinks that the way to make Harvard cave in is to threaten them with a law suit, think again. Harvard has more money than God (Harvard could buy several stealth bombers) and some of the best lawyers on the planet. Any individuals which sued them would either be bought off or ground into the dirt.
There were only two things in this response that I found plausibly factual or interesting. The first and obvious one is that the FBI will not discuss ongoing investigations. Particularly not with the party under investigation. Big deal.
The second is JV's apparent motivation for generating loathing and hatred among Net dwellers (not just crackers as he believes). His goal is to invite attacks on his (and perhaps other) systems in an effort to profile the crackers. This is likely particularly targeted at those who are just starting out and may make errors in covering their tracks. With this information, he no doubt believes that he will be able to track down the perpetrators of future malicious attacks on other systems. Thus he can market himself as a "security expert with the worlds largest database of cracker profiles".
However, if JV's computer security skills are anything like his rhetorical skills, the widespread criticism of his supposed expertise in the field may be justified. Perhaps it is a product of his youth or a sign of inexperience with mass communication, but he has resorted to a number of tactics used commonly by those who don't have a legitimate arguement to present. Here is a brief catalogue of his rhetorical misadventures (I'm certain you can find more):
Ad Hominem attack:
Can't dispute the facts? Attack your opponent
JV Example: Slashdot posts were "immature" and "stupid". Therefore, despite his expectation of a tough crowd, he will answer none directly.
Better yet, question the common sense of the reader...a lot.
Plausible Deniability:
Never admit fault. Deny, deny, deny no matter how thin your alibi.
JV Example:
"I didn't shut down PacketStorm, and neither did Harvard"
Regarding lawsuits: "I never did any such thing"
Diversionary Blame:
Can't defend your behavior? Point the finger at someone else's behavior.
JV Example: Ken Williams is responsible for that site being shut down.
Brian Martin was raided by the FBI
"Brian Martin's motives are geared towards protecting his hown ass..."
Self Victimiztion
Garner sympathy for your cause. Exagerate if necessary.
JV Example: He endured a "mass campaign of harassment" against his family.
It is left as an exercise for the reader to find more tactics and examples.
For comparison with someone who has more than two neurons to rub together, check out Bruce Schneier's interview.
Not surprisingly, some of the questions were stupid and hostile (no surprise, this IS Slashdot after all) but most seemed reasonable to me.
Jeez, if the guy didn't want to answer any questions he shouldn't have agreed to it in the first place. Personally, I'd like to see Q and A from less controversial characters (especially those who just seem to be media whores), because we would get better thought out questions and better thought out answers. Just my 2 cents.
I've enjoyed most of the Q and As up to now, but it shouldn't have been a surprise to anyone how this turned out given this guy's attitude. Let's not waste time on such people in the future.
This guy seems like the type of person whom got kicked off a BBS at age 10 and decided to get even ever since. Sounds like he's just out to bash the community and anyone even peripherally related.
You're reading Slashdot. Of course you like Linux and pc hardware
Two words, three f's
But in the long run, let's see who stands.. John or those who are attempted to down him..
I cannot see this man standing much longer...
Goddamn it, everyone will probably be left standing. There is no violence or war in this story. Just because he's still making some money from AO in a few years doesn't justify him, and if he goes out of business that doesn't automatically un-justify him either.
Actually, I just learned in European history that the notion of material success implying moral elevation got started with the Calvinist reformers in the 16-17th centuries...
Marc
This whole setup with Kevin Mitnick is strangely reminescent of what happend with Eddie Slovik. (This post might be a bit off topic but beer (sic) with me.)
Slovik was a private in WW2, just like many others. Like some he felt an incredible dread at the thought of someone shooting at him, and like some he deserted. In WW2 some 40 000 US armed forces personel were charged with deserting their post in one way or another. Most of these recieved disciplinary measures or lesser court-martials but 2864 were tried by general court-martial. Of these 49 were sentenced to death and one actualy executed, Eddie Slovik.
And here comes the relevant part, at least to Mitnicks case;
Slovik was executed as an example to other troops. The fact that very few even heard of his case is proof enough that the example part failed. Slovik was choosen, out of 49 approved for death, by two factors, he refused to return to duty and signed a piece of paper (a napkin in fact) stating that he would not fight and he was a nobody with a criminal record. Mitnick is also a nobody, he didn't have access to large sums of money and good lawyers, which would make him hard to prosecute. He had a record, stealing computer manuals, breaking into systems and similar. And he was avaliable as a public target, made famous by a cooperation between a reporter and a security specialist.
Slovik couldn't defend himself. He was dead before he even went to the court-martial. He was unable to say anything to his own defence, except the truth, that he didn't want to fight.
Mitnick couldn't defend himself either. He was convicted before his trial, and not by any legal force but by two men, a reporter and a buisnessman. Two men who earned $750 000 solely by putting Mitnick behind bars.
Thus comes the question; if Sloviks death and the following destruction of the lives of his family did nothing to affect the morale of the US troops abroad, will the imprisonment of Mitnick, and the de facto destruction of his life do anything for the morale and/or activities of the Hacker community?
I think not...
Yours Truly
The Crazy Polak
For further information on the Slovik case, and the numbers quoted in this article see William B. Huie - The Execution of Private Slovik. For an article about the Mitnick case see Forbes Magazine.
Phase 1: Where do you want to go today? Phase 2: This is where you want to go today. Phase 3: You're not going any
Not knowing anything about any of these guys I find one thing a bit odd though.
;-)"
/mill
"Do you think that we let the type of data that we're able to collect and log just go to waste? I don't
Does that sound like someone that wouldn't keep a copy of the proofs of the alleged harassment of his little sister? Like at least the picture(s) and assorted text?
1) This whole dispute centers around something that was tangental to packetstorm's overall thrust. This was a site that published the newest texts and tools for security, updating that info every day.
2) The contents of that directory were not public. There was no link to that directory from any of the other pages at packetstorm. I used to read packetstorm everyday (now I get the same info from securityfocus.com) and had no idea that the directory existed. As far as I know, the only people who were aware of the existance of that directory were:
3) THAT DIRECTORY WAS AN ARCHIVE OF SITES CRITICIZING JP'S LACK OF SKILLS. THESE SITES WERE ARCHIVED BECAUSE JP WAS THREATENING TO SUE THE MAINTAINERS. (HE DOES THAT TO *ANYONE* WHO RAISES QUESTIONS ABOUT HIS SKILLS.) THE ARCHIVE WAS AN ATTEMPT TO MAKE SURE THAT THE INFORMATION WOULD BE AVAILABLE EVEN IF THE OTHER SITES WERE SHUT DOWN. (Obviously, that backfired, and packetstorm got shut down, too.)
4) The reason harvard saw fit to take it down was that some of the archived sites contained photos similar to the palm pilot photos found at http://www.attrition.org/gallery/. It actually had some racier stuff, too, some with captions criticizing JP. Bad taste? Certainly. A threat to his family? No. So why complain to Harvard? He doesn't want to have people make fun of his skills.
5) The picture and information about JP's sister were information taken from the on-line edition of her school's yearbook. They were not offensive. If they were, he would have had grounds to sue the school, too. He didn't, and didn't threaten to, either. Why? The picture/info of his sister was not of consequence. JP only mentioned it in this interview (an others) in an attempt to disparage Ken's character.
He got his site shut-down by harassing a 17 year old girl, which shortly after being shutdown, Ken sold for a reported $125,000 to Kroll.
So he sold a 17 year old girl to Kroll for $125,000?
Was she cute?
What a loser. He says that Packetstorm shut themselves down, which is clearly ludicrous. It's usally the kind of statement associated with blaming the victim; "Hey, she practically raped herself in that dress!": "They commited suicide by clinging to their counter-revolutionary beliefs." This kind of dishonest speech drives me nuts.
Hey, pop quiz! This rhetorical tactic is used by:
Expanding a vast wasteland since 1996.
...someone digs out his sister's pic again, and puts her up for Ebay?
And how long will it take Ebay to notice? LOL
he used to have his router configuration available for review, but that was a around Feb. I just checked AO, and don't think it is available anymore
The interviewie answering questions that were posed by the interviewer...
I like this guy less and less and am now inclined to believe his detractors more than his own accounts. He mere has to answer the aligations against him with facts, which he fails to do so.
He seems to want to meet his goals without any concern as to those people whom he steps on.
I simply feel sorry for him. Maybe in a few years he will realize that the goals that he has set for himself are empty without friends to share them with.
For example, starting with the very first question:
"...it seems to me that your claims against them are generally unproven and rash."
Is this the least biased way that this question could have been posed?
How about question #3:
"Why do you proclaim them to be 'dangerous hackers' while they do essentially the same thing you claim to do, except that they do so better, faster, and more professionally? "
At this point I was expecting to see someone asking the old "When did you stop beating your wife?" question...
I understand that the people who were writing the questions possibly had their own agendas, and their own biases, but isn't that the point of having an editor? The job of an editor is not to just cut down on the size of a question (as seemed to happen with questions 8-11), but also edit for content (as apparently didn't happen with 8-11 either). Attempting to make the questions a little less pejorative would probably have resulted in a better interview, and maybe even the answering of the questions themselves. While John Vranesevich is to blame for not even making an attempt to answer any of the serious questions, it is hard to blame him for taking issue with the questions that were posed to him.
I think the picture of his parents should have been posted, that way someone could beat them for conceiving such an idiot for a child. The man is completely off his rocker! If the Slash-Dot community is so immature, what does he think of his script-kiddie cohorts? - sob
He had the opportunity to dispel each question/accusation but instead chose to send in a FORM LETTER. After the introduction this letter could have be sent to anyone, its called spin.
He wasn't hired to answer anyone's questions, he wasn't paid by Slashdot or it's readers, and frankly I wasn't impressed by the questions either
Its called an agreement, not all things are done for money, you might find that surprising. If slashdot DID pay him to answer this would be more of a farce than it already is.
Frankly, if I ever got a questionnaire like that, I'd probably feel disapointed by the quality and matuity of the questions, too.
If you are as notorious as JP is, then you'd probably expect non-softball questions. Or you could just send out a 'I'm a good guy' form letter.
Sensitive? No one asked him any specific questions on what clients have what servers running what. Most questions were of a non client-"specialist" nature.
Tell JP I said, 'hi!'
...so I can turn off such pointless things.
"It is better to keep silent and appear stupid, than to speak and remove all doubt."
-M.Twain-
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Oh for Christsakes grow up, and settle down your testosterone - you're making my stomach churn.
Believe it or not, there are some things more important than ub3r-k3wL security sites, like protecting your family.
Attacking JP's family due to an issue you have with JP is twisted and disgusting.
I was against JP until I read what he said on this particular issue. There is no excuse for attacking someone's family: No excuse.
Anyone who does what that wanker did to JP's sister is not worth shit. He's on the shallow end of the gene pool: Simply not a man, more of a geeky little (over 30 yo) boy with problems who's probably still a virgin. He seems to have issues with women. ie. he can't get one.
What would you do if I didn't like a comment you posted on Slashdot, so I put up on my homepage how your mother is a whore and gave her personal address and phone number? Makes your flesh creep and blood boil just thinking about it right? If it doesn't, it should.
Grow up. Be a freaking MAN for Christsakes. So many freaking little boys on this site...
Cheers
AndyM
why is this labeled flame bait? thats absurd. this person is exactly right. its totaly absurd for you to think its ok to pick on someones sister/brother/mother/daughter just because of their actions. i know i wouldnt want to be judged for some of the things others in my family have done, and i wouldnt want them to be judged/attacked for things i have done.
....................
He probably gets 200-500 mails a day, alot of them are personal attacks.
Judge for yourself.. http://www.attrition.org/negation/image/ The picture was of his sister and him, taken from a public web site, from their yearbook. No address of his sister was ever posted. This is blatant lies created by Vranesevich/Meinel to further their own ends. Like someone else pointed out, why didn't JP save a copy? Why couldn't Meinel or JP ever prove their accusations? This image has been on Attrition since it appeared on Packetstorm. Attrition's ISP looked at it and laughed at JP's threats. But enough of that, view it for yourself. I apologize for not posting from my regular account. I am over seas and return next week. If anyone has any questions about Attrition or myself, please feel free to mail me at jericho@attrition.org .. I will reply to them as soon as possible (likely when I return to the US). Brian Martin
To be perfectly honest i read this entire article and every reply posted to it and the only intelligent part of it was the stuff JP wrote. I've always tried to stay impartial on this whole issue because every single issue relating to this guy is totally built on rumours. I think only JP and Ken and Brian and a few select individuals know what's actually going on and the rest of you simply go with the popular beleif. These questions were stupid, but after reading slashdot replies for quite a while I've come to expect very little. Most of you consider yourselves the intellectually elite of our society, yet such basic things like not believing rumours as fact seem to just be way above you. Anyways, just my two cents. JP, I doubt you'll read this, but if so I think you responded in a mature fashion instead of lowering yourself to the level of mudslinging that is present in each and every question (and not to mention any document ever written by that carolyn meinel chick) which is quite respectable. I still can't beleive that slashdot has turned into the posting ground for the socially inept, egotistical, self-declared nerds of today. Just my thoughts on the matter. If you don't know who i am, it don't matter.
You're absolutely right
>>I would really like to see slashot interview the people from attrition and/or k. williams.
/. into his personal soapbox instead of answering the questions that slashdotters posed.
/. who undoubtably spent a great deal of effort culling them from the chaff. It is even more apalling to refuse to answer any of the questions at all directly.
/. interview is that the questions people are most interested in (whatever they may be) would hopefully rise to the top.
Indeed! Sounds like an excellant idea to me. I feel that JP has turned
I can understand the notion that he might find some of these questions offensive, and even wasteful of his time. However, it seems to me that to flat out call them "stupid" et al is just plain disrespectful to the staff and moderators of
Therefore, it seems that since attrition.org has been the focus of a lot of JP counterpoint and investigation, why not interview them? I feel that their viewpoint would be the next best thing to getting answers from JP, and giving them a forum has a sense of balance. (JP having refused the honor)
I think this would also be interesting, because attrition (as opposed to antionline) has gone to great length to prove its points, which would allow a savvy question-writer to be very focused.
~Tiroth
Final note: I don't mean to imply that an attrition interview would need to be confined merely to antionline and its founder; the great thing about a
is the info anywhere ?
his site is pure shit there are so many better ones so why do people use it ?
Is she shaggable??
JP posts a reply as an AC? HAHAHAHA
JP will do himself in. Did anyone catch that MTV hacker crap? JP looks like the biggiest gimp I aint ever seen, he looked pathetic, like a frail deer caught in headlights.
According to the DNS info AntiOnline is in Beaver and I was born in the town Beaver and happen to live 20 mins away in Beaver Falls Anyone want me to deliver a message to this moron ? email me I don't reread posts much jason.salopek@usa.net
Alot of fuss has been made about the inflammatory nature of these questions and whether this excuses John's extremly poor answers.
Compare this to what clinton did when pressed about much more personal issues with tougher questions when a large segment of the population despised him.
Did Clinton call his enemies (justified or not) stupid immature losers? No, he did tactfully deny to answer some questions but this is far from what JV's responses were (JV not only was insulting but ignored all questions not only a select few with deep personal answers.)
Add to this the fact that he agreed to be interviewed on slashdot and only a complete moron would really believe no tough or accusatory questions would come out of this community...especially for JV.
This looks like nothing but a coordinated attempt to get people to dislike the man. This is probably exactly what he is doing...he is not a stupid man this gains him publicity and as he mentioned valuable information. So stop trying to fucking hack his site and ignore him.
Marriage is the "pseudo-ethics" that cloaks the messy truth of sexuality in the raiment of propriety -- it's "Don't Ask,
Perhaps you are correct, and JP didn't intend for us to interpret "shut down" quite so literally. What does that mean, though? It means that he phrased things in a manner that left ambiguity as to the exact specifics of the situation, yet still conveyed his overall intent and meaning. That is the very essence of JP's writing style, and something that I have observed time and time again.
Each profession has a set of descriptive terms that provide a means of very precise differentiation between similar things. Lawyers don't use the terms murder, manslaughter and homocide interchangably. Likewise, security practitioners don't confuse datagrams with packets, or worms with virii. JP may actually have a much better grasp of networking and security than a total neophyte. JP's writing does not, however, demonstrate such a comprehension, and his writing about technical subjects is the only evidence the security community can examine to determine the depth of his understanding.
Slashdot gave JP an opportunity to demonstrate his aptitude for security, and he chose to squander that opportunity by disputing the moral and ethical characteristics of people who question his abilities. Those people may or may not have weak morals, but the discussion of that topic is a complete red herring; the questions addressed *JP's* abilities, and he failed to respond to those questions. If you are familiar with JP's history, you know that two things are clear:
1) his discussion of technical issues creates questions about his understanding and skill set
2) instead of having their questions answered, people who doubt JP's skills are accused of unethical behavior
Personally, I feel that JP's writings do not demonstrate the level of technical understanding that is required to work in information security. It would be nice to use some other metrics to measure his abilites, but, alas, he won't give us a list of clients to contact, or even a general discussion of the ten techniques he uses most frequently to secure machines. Actually, I've never seen him explain if he specializes in policy auditing, penetration testing, forensics, or some other area of security. Without some knowledge of what he does, I cannot evaluate the skill he has. How, then, can I accept JP as a "security professional"?
Come on. Everybody knows that it's fun to slag a pariah like JP.
But seriously...don't worry about it too much. He really isn't any better than just your typical punk ass barely-out-of-his-teens fool who happened to be at the right place at the right time.
You could look at it as a case of a large number of people going on a witchhunt for an innocent person ala McCarthy, or you could look at it as what it probably more likely is, which is openly rebelling and letting a total asshole know what you think of him.
JP Is the "National Enquirer" of computer security. Think about it.
-- Truth goes out the door when rumor comes innuendo. -- Groucho Marx
n0 muTh4 fuCk1N tR0lLz aLl0w3D!!!!1!!!
blow it out yer ass!!!!!Q!!!!!!
What exactly would you expect from someone after they are sent these kind of questions. I mean, there wasn't even an attempt to sound diplomatic in them. Almost every single one (even the joke one kind of fits this) was of the format: "You did wrong. You are prick. How do you respond?" Frankly I'm surprised he even answered.
And to make things even worse the entire interview is posted as JP DOESN'T REALLY ANSWER. I'd say he addressed the vast majority of the issues brought up in the questions, and he did it in a way that allowed him to ignore the thinly vailed (or openly shouted) insults that were thrown at him.
And for those who weren't satisfied with his answers, what did you expect? Him to say: "Yeah, well I've been jerk. Everything I did was wrong and I'm sorry." Oh please. He basically defended himself and gave us some insight into his side of the story. You really couldn't ask for much more than that (well except for maybe a slightly better layout).
Anyways, don't get me wrong, from everything I've read about the guy it seems like he REALLY is a complete prick. But thats pretty much irrelevant, since if you want to get reasonable and insightful answers to you're questions, you have to show at least a little bit of respect.
-- Point? None! Cob.
Ok, so he won't answer any questions about accuasations that have been made about him, and he's incapable of answering any sort of technical questions... so what will he answer? What was the point of even asking any questions in the first place?
I suppose if we actually wanted answers, we should have asked questions like: "D00d y0ur s0 1337 h0w c@n ! 13@rn 70 b3 @s 1337 @s y00???"
I was wondering if any of the /. community would acknowledge JP's statement about his sister's picture. I agree completely with AndyM -- if the guy who runs PacketStorm did what JP accuses him of, then he completely deserved to be shut down.
http://www.antionline.com/Ne tworkOperations/hacks.html is supposed to show the attacks on his network, which RealSecure detected. it comes out to about an average of 9 attacks a day. on the side, what kind of questions did he expect? He's never really accomplished anything or written any security tools or anything like that. The only thing there was TO ask him was to clear up the rumors.
This comment first appeared here...
;-)
Now as I've publicly said before, I will always back jericho on the facts about AntiOnline, but one thing JP said was interesting...
The fact that nearly every malicious hacker (or cracker if you prefer the term) dislikes AntiOnline is actually good for us, and is the exact position I want to be in. Some people even "joke" that I intentionally try to "piss off large groups of people at a time". Well, it's not just a joke, it's the truth. I think I'm pretty good at doing it too. We average between 200-500 intrusion attempts against one of our systems AN HOUR, and every time I piss another segment of the cyber-population off, that number skyrockets. We probably have one of the most targeted networks on the internet today, and we take full advantage of that. Do you think that we let the type of data that we're able to collect and log just go to waste? I don't
It's pretty simple to see through JP's claims here as to what is really making him money. He has purposely set up AntiOnline to be a target for hackers. It's a smart move, albeit probably not one he actually thought up but received, ironically, as a gift from the hacking community.
Say you've got a security product and you want to know how secure it really is. You want to test it in the wild. Well, you can't really do it thoroughly by yourself. You have to attack it in as many ways as you can think of, but you're just one person or group of people so you're not going to think of everything. So, what better than contacting JP and having him run your product as his site's protection and then seeing if it can hold up. That way you get many random attacks from anti-JP people and if you're really lucky some of those attacks will be very sophisticated and you will learn, before you go to market, how secure your security really is...
It is important to realize that by attempting to attack JP's site, you do, in effect allow him and whomever has paid him for his attack details, to better his reputation as THE place to go if you really want to test the security of your product.
So the best thing the hacker communtiy could do is NOT to attack his site. Because that's how he's making his money off of you.
This really is not a new idea. Government and military sites of a certain nature have spent countless hours attacking their own boxes. The only difference is that you, the hacker, are allowing JP's site to be even more successful off of the labor of the creative hacks that you have designed. Your work makes him money, not you.
Just a thought...
diva Pasty Drone NewsTrolls, Inc.
Despite what people may think or feel about JP's character, personality, or competence; Anti-online *is* one of the most highly-targeted websites. And it *is* pretty secure.
I only know of one defacement of the site, mirrored at http://www.projectgamma.com/defaced/1999/august/an tionline.com.html; which, despite its own claims, was one of the most clever hacks I have seen. And it would not have happened if Anti-online had not indiscriminately copied the contents of other websites; a practice that is both uncommon and unethical.
I think that I am not the only one that would be interested in seeing the variety and nature of attacks against Anti-online. If JP is not actually using the information now, I might just put up my own box and piss people off. At least it would be more fun than reading bugtraq. Maybe I can even get some venture capital to buy me a T-1.
Courtesy of and from www.attrition.org, decide for yourself if this image-pic is anyway bad. www.attrition.org/negation/image/vran.jpg These are the other images in there: www.attrition.org/negation/image Contact www.attrition.org for more info since they had this images way before PacketStorm.
Courtesy of and from www.attrition.org, decide for yourself if this image-pic is anyway bad. http://www.attrition.org/negation/image/vran.jpg These are the other images in there: http://www.attrition.org/negation/image Contact http://www.attrition.org for more info since they had this images way before PacketStorm.
Dunno about its origin, but a BLT is a Bacon-Lettuce-Tomato sandwich over here (UK).
From the sound of it, LBT is probably lower on calories.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
What the Internet needs is Fair Witnesses, a la Robert Heinlein's 'Stranger in a Strange Land'.
There is no solution to problems like those highlighted on this thread unless a single person looks at all the issues dispassionately and is then questioned about the facts.
Questioning the actual parties concerned is pointless: you always get 50% bullshit, but you never know from which of the two sides it's coming.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
I had lunch with a couple FBI agents a little while ago and one of the items of discussion was JP & AntiOnline. Apparently they had heard "somewhere" that he wasa under investigation, but couldn't officially confirm or deny his status as an investigatee. I had the very strong feeling that they were telling me yes, without telling me yes. Read about the lunch. -- Mike Hudack Editor: Aviary-mag.com 203-335-7100
------- Mike "Ender Wiggin" Hudack Editor: Aviary-mag.com