Anonops #10: Stop SOPA

quote:

Hacktivist Group: We Hacked New York Times Servers and Sent 8 Million E-mails

_{By Connor Adams Sheets | December 28, 2011 7:44 PM EST}

A hacktivist group claimed responsibility Wednesday for an e-mail snafu at the New York Times earlier that day in which the company sent an e-mail meant for 300 people to more than 8 million.

DestructiveSecurity (aka DestructiveSec), a hacktivist group that has worked with the Anonymous collective in the past, Tweeted the following on Wednesday evening: "New York Times Hacked - We gained access 'shortly' to there [sic] email server."

The claim could not be verified, but the Times has gone back on its initial claim that the company had fallen victim to spamming, putting the Gray Lady's account of what took place at odds with that of DestructiveSec.

DestructiveSec went on to explain via Twitter that "We hacked their email server & they're the Corporate media, spreading lies & hate" in response to Anonymous-affiliated Twitter users who were concerned that the group was attempting to censor free speech, adding in a later Tweet that " we're taking down any media that is related to a Corp."

The group asserted further in another Tweet that "I had the email server which runs the newsletter, that's how I was spamming lol."

The claim of responsibility went out from the group's Twitter account several hours after the New York Times stated that an internal error caused an e-mail to go out to millions of NYT.com users asking them to renew subscriptions the vast majority of them either never had or never canceled.

After initially stating that the e-mails were sent because the Times had fallen victim to hackers or a spam attack, the paper changed its tune later in the day and stated that the e-mail was sent out in error:

"The email was sent by the NYT," Times Co. spokeswoman Eileen Murphy stated. "We regret that the error was made, but no one's security has been compromised."

If DestructiveSec is actually behind the erroneous e-mails, then it looks like the Times itself may be the party whose security really was compromised. And it looks like more may be on the way as part of #OPFireSail, a hacktivist operation aimed at corporate-backed mainstream media outlets.

And DestructiveSec Tweeted out Wednesday morning that "we're...HiJacking Twitter accounts #ExpectUs in 12 hours."

Looks like there may be much more to come from the group.

quote:

Zut Alors! French Government Deny BitTorrent Piracy Allegations

Mid-December, data from YouHaveDownloaded was used to show that several illegal downloads had taken place in the palace of French President Sarkozy. These, however, were just the tip of the iceberg. More than 250 further IP addresses belonging to the French Ministry of Culture have now been linked to illegal downloads but the government, unsurprisingly, say they are completely innocent. OK, so prove it.

Last month, Nicolas Perrier of Nikopik told TorrentFreak that he had found infringing downloads at the Élysée Palace – the official residence of President Sarkozy.

Using the tools at YouHaveDownloaded, Perrier found six illegal downloads including a cam copy of the movie Tower Heist, a telesync copy of Arthur Christmas, and music from The Beach Boys.

But while six downloads are easily ignored, bigger things were around the corner for the French government. The country’s Ministry of Culture has quite an online presence and are allocated more than 65,000 IP addresses. Perrier and friends scanned them all and found 250 government IP addresses that were used to share the latest movies, music, video games and even adult titles during the last two months.

Instead of keeping their collective heads down, the government has now issued a press release refuting the allegations.

“The Management Information Systems Department ensures strict use of computers in its fleet,” the Ministry of Culture said in a statement quoted by Numerama.

“The configuration of the network prevents connections to peer-to-peer networks, which excludes any possibility of using such networks for illegal downloading,” the Ministry added, while offering assurances that “internal audits” are now underway.

The statements here appear somewhat conflicting. On the one hand illegal downloads are apparently impossible, but on the other the Ministry has seen fit to commission an audit. They don’t sound confident, that’s for sure.

Interestingly, thanks to YouHaveDownloaded the debate on the accuracy and usefulness of IP addresses evidence has been stimulated. Unsurprisingly, though, the French government doesn’t dismiss the usefulness of IP address evidence completely. When they’re the ones collecting it, it can be relied on. When others harvest it, the data loses its value.

“The processes used by the site youhavedownloaded.com can in no way be compared with the methodology employed by TMG,” says the Ministry. Trident Media Guard is the company that collects evidence for France’s 3-strikes ‘HADOPI’ law. In common with all similar companies, their systems are secret and not open for scrutiny.

“The findings of this process can not therefore call into question the process established by the HADOPI, particularly in regard to the reliability of the findings derived from an IP address. As a result, all of these allegations appear unfounded,” the Ministry concludes.

One of the main problems with IP address-based evidence is what happens when someone is wrongfully accused. There is no simple way of refuting the claims and it’s down to the defendant to prove their innocence.

It’s all well and good for the Ministry of Culture to say “it’s impossible to share files from our IP addresses” but will that standard of rebuttal be acceptable coming from the man in the street faced with an accusation from HADOPI? Hardly.

So, if the Ministry of Culture is completely innocent let’s see them held to their own standards. Let them show their citizens how proving a negative, that something didn’t happen, is done. They’re not going to find that easy, even with their limitless resources.

quote:

Op zondag 1 januari 2012 22:37 schreef Bakakame het volgende:

[..]

Wat is dit?

quote:

'PrivateX' hackers target more gov't websites

MANILA, Philippines - Hackers who defaced the website of Vice President Jejomar Binay and at least 5 other sites have warned that they will attack more government websites.

Posts made in the past few days on the Facebook page of the PrivateX hackers' group mentioned several other government agencies.

"Expect us," said a December 29 message, with an attached article from the Department of of Social Welfare and Development.

The hacker group's founder, in an email to abs-cbnNEWS.com, said one of their members identified as "Blackrain" will answer questions about the hacking incidents soon.

The group's latest post on Monday made fun of the Department of Health by creating a page with an ASCII art showing a large nuclear explosion.

"Anonymous #OccupyPhilippines ProjectX PrivateX Philker," the message below the image said. "We are Anonymous, We are legion, We don't forgive, We don't forget."

Other government websites mentioned by the group in the page are those belonging to the Optical Media Board, the Philippine National Radiation Institute, the Senate Electoral Tribunal, the Commission on Appointments, the Philippine Racing Commission, and sites owned by the local governments of Libon, Camiguin, and Manaoag.

Some of the websites remained defaced Monday afternoon.

OVP admits website hacked

Meanwhile, the Office of the Vice President's (OVP) website has been fixed.

Joselito Salgado, head of the OVP's media affairs division, said the website has hacked by the PrivateX group around 4 p.m. on Sunday and was down for more than 15 hours.

He said the OVP's website is being hosted by the Advanced Science and Techology Institute (ASTI), an agency under the Department of Science and Technology (DOST).

"We have been informed that ASTI is looking into the incident and will put in place the needed safeguards," Salgado said.

"The OVP website provides information on the programs, projects and services of the Office of the Vice President. It also provides the public the opportunity to bring their concerns to the attention of VP Binay. Unfortunately, the hacking incident has deprived the public, particularly our Overseas Filipino Workers with a channel to communicate with the Vice President," he said.

PrivateX, in a statement, said it does not seek to taunt the OVP website's administrator "but to point out that transferring to a paid hosting doesn't mean that you are secured."

"We did not delete any file on the server but we created an index.html and redirected the index.php to index.html (Deface page)," they added.

quote:

Op dinsdag 3 januari 2012 01:27 schreef robin007bond het volgende:
Papierversnipperaar, vind je deze acties niet een beetje te veel eigenrichting?

quote:

Leuk hoor die acties, maar ik vraag me af of er ook daadwerkelijk wat mee bereikt wordt.

quote:

http://pastebay.com/148920

Hi

It's 0xOmar from group-xp, largest Wahhabi hacker group of Saudi Arabia, the Saudi Arabia hackers of Anonymous hacking movement.

We have posted this message in pastebin, but it seems they have deleted the file. So I try to use this page.

We decided to relase first part of our data about Israel.

We have hacked a lot of Israeli servers and extracted a lot of information about Israeli people, their name, address, city, zipcode, Social Security Numbers (Israeli ID

numbers), mobile phone number, home phone number, credit card number (including exp year, month and CVV) and...

We daily use these cards to solve our problems, purchasing VPNs, VPSes, softwares, renting GPU clusters, renting cloud servers and much more!

We decided to give the world a new year gift, about 400,000+ Israeli people information!!!

Here is list of data I leak:

** 4000.htm, it includes 4000+ credit cards and all needed information. All is Israeli.
** 27000.htm, it includes 27000+ credit cards and all needed information. All is Israeli.
** Cards1.mdb, it includes 260272 credit cards and all needed information. It includes address, emails and passwords of 260272 Israeli people.
** Cards2.mdb, it includes 120745 credit cards and all needed information. It includes address, emails and passwords of 120745 Israeli people.
** IsraCards1.txt, it includes 184 working fresh Israeli credit cards and all needed information.
** Business.mdb, it includes 22604 Israeli business people details, including, names, addresses, phone numbers, passwords, etc.
** Judaism.txt, it includes 65 Zionist people who purchased stuff from Judaism web site
** TblDonate.htm, it includes 500+ people who donated to Israeli Zionist Rabbis.

If you need to purchase something, you have to use Google Translate to convert hebrew letters to engish.

It's first part of our release, my goal is reacing 1 million non-duplicate people, which is 1/6 of Israel's population.

We have it already, including 1M Israeli social security numbers (ID numbers) and all of their details, we want to see reactions to first part, later we'll release rest!

Enjoy purchasing stuff for yourself in internet, like VPN, VPS, Software licenses, commercial emails, domains, etc.
We even purchased security scanners like Acunetix to hack more servers using these cards!

What's fun for us?
- Watching 400,000 people gathered in front of Israeli credit card companies and banks, complaining about cards and that they are stolen
- Watching Israeli banks shredding 400,000 credit cards and re-generate new cards (so costly, huh?)
- Watching people purchasing stuff for theirself using the cards and making Israeli credit cards untrustable in the world, like Nigerian credit cards
- and much more...

Enjoy our work and feel free to contact us.

Web Contact Form: http://www.alm3refh.com/v(...)84895a4b62321bb6a4ae

Our website: http://www.alm3refh.com/vb/

Saudi Arabian hacker rules!!!

Israeli Data Leak File:
http://www.multiupload.com/OM1S9YLZKV
(30 MB compressed, 210 MB uncompressed)

We are anonymous, we are legion, we do not forget, we do not forgive...
Enjoy and share it!

quote:

Anonymous imposters: hiding behind the AntiSec identity

Anyone can say they're part of Anonymous.

It's the perfect cover for hackers with motives more sinister than fun and propaganda.

Could that be why private intelligence firm Stratfor was just hacked?

The Operation AntiSec collaborators Anonymous and LulzSec dominated media coverage of online security through 2011, taking credit for hacks of Sony, AT&T, the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency and News International newspapers - even though the more serious cybercriminals continued working on the money-spinners.

The Stratfor hack looks like all the others. It was announced via Twitter accounts associated with Anonymous. Samples of the pilfered data were posted online as evidence. The hackers taunted the victim about its pathetic defences. And the data vandalism was dressed up as political action.

The victim - Stratfor - is based in Austin, Texas, and provides analysis of global security matters using open-source intelligence (OSINT) techniques - that is, they analyse publicly-available material. Anyone can subscribe to their newsletters, but their main business is providing secret, bespoke analysis to undisclosed corporate and government clients.

Over the Christmas weekend, AntiSec hackers posted data lifted from Stratfor's servers, including what they claimed to be the company's private client list, plus lists of passwords and credit card numbers.

The hackers told Wired that they'd penetrated Stratfor "several weeks ago" and obtained 200 gigabytes of data, including 2.7 million emails and various internal documents - the real target, according to Barrett Brown - more of which they intend to release soon.

There was also a surprise bonus: around 75,000 credit card numbers belonging to Stratfor subscribers. They've already been published.

They also claim to have wiped four of Stratfor's servers as well as the backups, and to have used some of the credit card numbers to donate between $500,000 and $1 million to charity.

A data breach on that scale would be embarrassing for any organisation. It's doubly so for Stratfor. More embarrassing still is the hackers' claim that credit card details were stored in plain text rather than being encrypted - a clear breach of the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).

quote:

Richard Stallman Was Right All Along

Late last year, president Obama signed a law that makes it possible to indefinitely detain terrorist suspects without any form of trial or due process. Peaceful protesters in Occupy movements all over the world have been labelled as terrorists by the authorities. Initiatives like SOPA promote diligent monitoring of communication channels. Thirty years ago, when Richard Stallman launched the GNU project, and during the three decades that followed, his sometimes extreme views and peculiar antics were ridiculed and disregarded as paranoia - but here we are, 2012, and his once paranoid what-ifs have become reality.

Up until relatively recently, it's been easy to dismiss Richard Stallman as a paranoid fanatic, someone who lost touch with reality long ago. A sort of perpetual computer hippie, the perfect personification of the archetype of the unworldly basement-dwelling computer nerd. His beard, his hair, his outfits - in our visual world, it's simply too easy to dismiss him.

His views have always been extreme. His only computer is a Lemote Yeelong netbook, because it's the only computer which uses only Free software - no firmware blobs, no proprietary BIOS; it's all Free. He also refuses to own a mobile phone, because they're too easy to track; until there's a mobile phone equivalent of the Yeelong, Stallman doesn't want one. Generally, all software should be Free. Or, as the Free Software Foundation puts it:

quote:

Op dinsdag 3 januari 2012 10:47 schreef robin007bond het volgende:

[..]

Ja ach, het eist even wat aandacht op, maar dat valt mee. DDOS wordt over het algemeen beschouwd als een simpele ingreep en krijgt buiten dit topic ook niet zo heel veel publiciteit, met uitzondering van dat Mastercard gedoe.

quote:

Eigen rechter spelen gebeurt als je het recht in eigen hand neemt. Daar is hier bijna spraken van, want het zijn gewoon strafbare feiten die gepleegd worden, onder het mom van dat iets je niet aanstaat.

quote:

‘Wij, burgers van cyberspace, eisen onze broncodes’
^{zaterdag 24 december 2011 door Folkert Jensma}
Ik probeer altijd sceptisch te blijven over ICT-denkers die claimen dat de samenleving revolutionair verandert door de digitalisering van Alles. Zeker, zo is het, maar de krant wordt nog steeds bezorgd. En zolang ik op tijd alle updates installeer, ook in m’n eigen hoofd, hou ik de veranderingen wel bij.

Maar na de oratie van Mireille Hildebrandt donderdag in Nijmegen ben ik uit mijn comfort zone. Zij schetst hoe rechtsrelaties in cyberspace structureel veranderen. Vrijwel alles wat we zien, wat we weten en wat er beslist wordt, is de uitkomst van geheime algoritmes op de computer. Daarbij raken rechtsbeginselen als privacy, discriminatieverbod en gegevensbescherming uit het zicht. De beginvraag ‘mag dat wel’ wordt ingehaald door ‘het kan, het gebeurt, dus het is wel best zo’. En àls de burger al een akkoordje moet aanvinken op zijn scherm, gebeurt ook dat automatisch. Zij heeft het over de ‘computationele wending’ in de rechtsorde. Haar conclusie: in de nieuwe techniek moet rechtsbescherming standaard worden ingebouwd. Aan meer papieren wetten is hier geen behoefte.

Vorige maand zat ik op een studiemiddag over de ‘cookiewet’, die het automatisch verzamelen van informatie over surfgedrag aan banden moet leggen. Cookies zijn kleine peilbakens die worden geplaatst door websites die je bezoekt. Ze houden bij hoeveel en welke pagina’s je bezocht (zodat je terug kunt bladeren), ze personaliseren websites en houden je ingelogd.

Reuze handig, maar ze passen ook de advertenties aan op jouw zoekgedrag. Ze vertellen door waar je was en wie je bent. Dat ‘track and trace’ is een voorbeeld. Wie vandaag online een vliegticket zoekt, wordt nog dagen automatisch getrakteerd op hotel- en huurauto opties in de plaats van bestemming. Websurfen doe je tegenwoordig wadend door een veld vol luistervinken, geplaatst door advertentienetwerken, die zien hoe vaak u ‘like’ op Facebook aanklikt en wat u zocht en kocht.

Hildebrandt, nieuw hoogleraar ‘ICT en rechtsstaat’, beschrijft de ‘cognitieve economie’, de handel in informatie die met elkaar in verband is gebracht. Alles draait nu om ‘patroonherkenning’ – het voorspellen van gedrag op basis van digitale sporen. Die informatie is veel geld waard. In cyberspace staat behalve wat je er deed inmiddels ook vrijwel vast wat je straks gaat doen. Je gedrag wordt voortdurend opgeslagen en met gelijksoortige anderen vergeleken: „Om je preferenties te achterhalen, risicovol gedrag te voorzien, prijzen aan te passen, of problemen te voorspellen. En hoe meer cyberspace de toekomst weet te voorspellen, hoe meer het die toekomst ook lijkt te maken”, zegt zij.

Dankzij deze patroonkennis wordt de vrije handelingsruimte van de burger ongemerkt kleiner. Internet, ooit de gedroomde vrije anonieme ruimte waarin je een second life kon beginnen, desnoods als hond, is nu een gouden kooi waarin de gebruiker exact die prikkels krijgt die statistisch zijn afgeleid uit zijn voorkeuren. Ieder leeft in zijn eigen dorp met zichzelf als ijkpunt, met aanbiedingen op smaak, voorgesorteerde informatie en toezicht op maat.

Het recht moet de digitale burger volgens Hillebrandt weer greep geven op de juistheid, betrouwbaarheid en relevantie van de informatie die over hem wordt verzameld. Vooral de rechten op privacy, gegevensbescherming, gelijke behandeling en op tegenspraak worden geraakt door wat zij de nieuwe ‘IT-inkijkstructuur’ noemt. De burger moet weten welke risicoprofielen over hem bestaan en moet kunnen zien hoe die worden beïnvloed.

Er zou daarom een grondrecht op de betrouwbaarheid en doorzichtigheid van cyberspace moeten komen. De burger moet zicht krijgen op de manier waarop hij wordt ‘gelezen’ op internet. „De burger, consument, gebruiker kan dan veel beter inschatten welke machinaal leesbare gedragingen zij unplugged (onbespied) wil verrichten”. Zij stelt zich programmaatjes voor waarmee de burger op ieder moment ‘onder water kan kijken’ om te zien „wie er vanuit welke locatie meekijkt, wat voor profielen de ‘content’ bepalen die we te zien krijgen en hoe data-analyse de beslissingen beïnvloedt waarmee we worden geconfronteerd”. Zodat je kunt begrijpen waarom jouw zorgtoeslag wordt geweigerd, je aanbetaling zo hoog uitvalt en waarom je al dagen alleen maar advertenties voor damespumps te zien krijgt. (‘En wie is er weer via mijn pc online wezen shoppen?’) ‘Wij, burgers van cyberspace’ moeten dus toegang tot de broncodes bedingen, zegt zij. Argumenten als bedrijfsgeheimen, nationale veiligheid of auteursrecht waar bedrijven of overheden mee zullen komen, moeten daar voor wijken. Wie hecht aan een scheiding tussen de publieke en private versie van zijn leven moet dat verdedigen.

quote:

'Anonymous' declares 'Blitzkrieg' on neo-Nazis

“Anonymous” hackers have declared “Blitzkrieg” on neo-Nazis for the New Year, disabling a number of their websites and publishing lists of extreme-right supporters.

A Nazi-Leaks portal has appeared on the internet listing hundreds of names of people subscribed to various shops selling far-right clothing, as well as writers for the Junge Freiheit newspaper which carries contributions from far-right commentators.

The hackers say they have managed to close down 15 websites associated with the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD), the Frankfurter Rundschau reported on Monday. They have reportedly called their campaign "Operation Blitzkrieg".

The paper said that the German version of the neo-Nazi internet platform Altermedia was at times offline. A Twitter message addressed to those trying to get into the site wished all Nazis and in particular Altermedia a good start to the New Year.

This was greeted by a message reported by left-wing websites as coming from Altermedia calling for information about the hackers, and offering to reward useful tips with the hackers' amputated fingers. The Frankfurter Rundschau said it could not check whether the comment was really from Altermedia as the site was offline.

Long lists of names, some with addresses, purporting to be customer registers of firms such as the infamous Thor Steinar clothing firm were posted on the Nazi-Leaks portal.

People listed on the portal as having written for the Junge Freiheit newspaper included Peter Scholl-Latour, according to the Frankfurter Rundschau. He is a respected journalist and Afghanistan expert who has written for, among other publications, the Stern magazines.

quote:

Sony and Nintendo drop SOPA support amid Anonymous threats

Sony and Nintendo have dropped support for the controversial SOPA bill, backtracking on what has been accused as a pro-censorship push by legislators amid threats of internet attack from groups like Anonymous. Both companies are now absent from the official list of supporters [pdf link] of the Stop Online Piracy Act, along with games publisher Electronic Arts, though it’s unclear how much of the decision – by Sony Computer Entertainment, at least – was swayed by Anonymous’ threats to target first the PlayStation Network and then individual executives at the firm.

Originally, threats against the PSN were made by Anonymous members as part of #OpSony, with the warning that Sonys support of the act is a signed death warrant and that yet again, we have decided to destroy your network. That was later amended to single out Sony executives, PlayStationLifestyle reports, rather than the PSN itself, with Anonymous declaring open season on the credit card details and other personal information.

Sony is yet to comment on the Anonymous issue, but its worth noting that, while SCE has withdrawn its SOPA support, Sony/ATV Music Publishing, Sony Music Entertainment and Sony Music Nashville are all still listed as in favor of the act. Meanwhile both SCE and Nintendo are members of the Entertainment Software Association, which also remains a supporter.

Earlier this week, it was revealed that Google, eBay, PayPal and others were considering an attention-grabbing blackout of their respective sites in the hope of prompting a mass uprising of public complaint about SOPA. The move would follow a similar call to arms by microblogging platform Tumblr, which motivated almost 90,000 users to contact their Representatives to discuss the act.

quote:

New York Police Circulating Mysterious Government Guide to Criminal Tactics of “Protest Extremists”

An email contained in the latest AntiSec release indicates that law enforcement agencies in New York have been circulating an out-of-date manual that was previously criticized by the ACLU to instruct officers about issues related to Occupy protests. The brief email from December 5, 2011 was circulated to a number of law enforcement agencies affiliated with the Mid Hudson Chiefs of Police Association and contains several document attachments that describe tactics used by protesters, including basic guides on how to conduct your own “Occupy” protest. One of the documents is a police manual titled “Civil Disturbance and Criminal Tactics of Protest Extremists” that describes “illegal” tactics used by protesters and so-called “protest extremists”. The document, which was last revised in 2003, does not list its originating agency or author and is marked with a number of unusual protective markings indicating that it is not intended for public release.

The existence of the document was first discussed in a 2003 article from the Colorado Springs Independent which quoted a representative of the local FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force discussing the manual:

. In a written statement recently obtained by the Colorado ACLU, an agent of the Denver Joint Terrorism Task Force describes how he has used the manual to instruct local law-enforcement officers.”Beginning in 2001, I began using a training manual created by the U.S. government, which identifies civil disturbance and criminal protest tactics and instructs on how to respond to those tactics,” states the agent, Tom Fisher. The manual, he states, is “part of a program offered by the United States government on criminal protest tactics.”

. According to the statement, the training manual is “law-enforcement sensitive” and not to be released to the public.

. Fisher also states that he has been teaching the Denver Police Department about “terrorist issues,” including “criminal tactics of protest extremists.”

The manual contained in the latest AntiSec release is further confirmed to be this document by a spokesman for the Colorado Springs Police Department who quotes from the document and refers to it by name:

. A spokesman for the Colorado Springs Police Department said he’s not sure whether the department received the Oct. 15 FBI memo. “We have no record of receiving that intelligence bulletin, although that’s not to say we didn’t,” said the spokesman, Lt. Skip Arms.Springs police have not received training from Fisher, though they do use a manual titled Civil Disturbance and Criminal Tactics of Protest Extremists, Arms said.

. “It’s something that our tactical people would look at and compare to their tactics,” he said.

Arms said he doesn’t know where the department obtained the manual or who authored it. The introduction states that it is “the result of an extensive interagency collaboration to address a surge of protest activity worldwide,” but nothing in it indicates specifically that it was developed by the U.S. government, he said.

Lt. Arms quotes from the introduction which states “‘Civil Disturbance and Criminal Tactics of Protest Extremists’, was prepared in response to the increase of protest activity worldwide and the escalation of violence and property destruction that has occurred in the past several years. Information regarding the unlawful operational and tactical activities was collected and interpreted by multiple agencies. The information presented is for law enforcement and public safety officials to assist in effectively managing civil disturbances and large-scale protests”.

quote:

Scientologist rallies followers against leader in leaked email

Debbie Cook says emphasis on fundraising under David Miscavige is betrayal of founder L Ron Hubbard's beliefs

A rare expression of internal dissent has broken out in the world of Scientology, with one of its most senior figures sending a mass email to 12,000 fellow members complaining that the self-styled church has become obsessed with fundraising and has amassed unused reserves of over $1bn (£640m).

Debbie Cook says she remains committed to the group, set up in the 1950s by the former science fiction writer L Ron Hubbard. She is critical, however, of David Miscavige, who has led the Church of Scientology since Hubbard's death, 26 years ago.

Miscavige, who has faced and vehemently denied accusations of a despotic leadership style and physical assaults on colleagues, has presided over a "new age of continuous fundraising", Cook claims.

In what appears to be a direct attempt to undermine Miscavige's leadership, Cook, who spent three decades inside the church's equivalent of a clergy, the so-called Sea Org, , urged people receiving the email to reject orders not directly backed up by Hubbard's teachings, and to encourage other members to do the same.

One recipient passed the email to New York's Village Voice, which posted it in a blog. While the email was later removed at the request of Cook – who has verified its authenticity – it has been republished elsewhere.

Under Miscavige's leadership, Scientology has expanded hugely, not least thanks to celebrity endorsements from the likes of Tom Cruise and John Travolta. However, the church has faced criticism for alleged pressure on members to donate regular and sometimes significant sums of money.

An obsession with money, said Cook, was both contrary to Hubbard's teachings and a distraction from efforts to disseminate the late writer's beliefs. These involve psychoanalysis-based self-help and counselling, and the supposed malign influence of alien spirits brought to Earth 76m years ago by a galactic emperor called Xenu.

In an email full of church jargon and Hubbard references, Cook quoted the church's founder as decreeing that the maximum sum people should pay to be a Scientologist was a lifetime membership of $75. Instead, under Miscavige, Scientology had acquired a vast and largely unused wealth, she said.

"Currently, membership monies are held as Int reserves and have grown to well in excess of a billion dollars. Only a tiny fraction has ever been spent, in violation of the policy above. Only the interest earned from the holdings have been used very sparingly to fund projects through grants."

Miscavige had also been dismantling the church's original management structures, Cook said, writing that she had spent time working at an otherwise empty headquarters building: "empty because everyone had been removed from post. When I first went up lines I was briefed extensively by David Miscavige about how bad all of them were and how they had done many things that were all very discreditable. This seemed to 'explain' the fact that the entirety of the Watchdog Committee no longer existed."

Miscavige had dismantled the "complete and brilliant organisational structure" put in place by Hubbard, she added. "There never was supposed to be a 'leader' other than LRH himself as the goal maker for our group."

Cook urged fellow members to refuse to make new donations unless church authorities could produce a Hubbard teaching to say they were required, adding: "No one will be able to produce any references because there aren't any." She went on: "The other thing you can do is to send this email to as many others as you can, even if you do it anonymously. Please keep this email among us, the Scientologists. The media have no place in this."

This is a deeply awkward moment for the Scientology organisation, which has been attempting to regain the initiative after a period that has seen the public defection of another Hollywood adherent, the Oscar-winning director Paul Haggis, as well as the allegations against Miscavige and judicial investigations in France and Australia.

In a statement sent to the Times, which followed up the Village Voice blog, the Church of Scientology dismissed the email, saying: "Ms Cook's opinions reflect a small, ignorant and unenlightened view of the world today. They are not shared by the thousands of Scientologists who are overjoyed by our 27 new churches and what they mean to the communities they serve."

quote:

Denmark, Germany and Italy Targeted by Anonymous in Op Europe

Since the Lulzmax operation was a “complete success,” hackers working under the Anonymous name revealed their new objectives purposed to unmask the corruption that takes place in European institutions.

Schools, universities and government institutions from European countries such as Greece, Switzerland, Germany, Denmark, Netherlands and Italy are about to become targets of the latest operation called Op Europe.

The hacktivist collective already released a teaser to show the world that they’re serious and promise that the first results “are coming in few hours.” An FTP backup and emails from an Austrian school were already obtained and posted online for the everyone to see.

Operation Europe will take place over the course of several months, period during which the institutions that feel they may be targeted should buff up their security measures to avoid any unfortunate incidents.

Anonymous - #opeurope - Expect us!

SPOILER

Om spoilers te kunnen lezen moet je zijn ingelogd. Je moet je daarvoor eerst gratis Registreren. Ook kun je spoilers niet lezen als je een ban hebt.

quote:

Something Rotten in Iowa? The “Hacktivist Threat” Timeline

As reported by The End Run yesterday, it turns out that Clarke Davidson, one of the protesters arrested for blocking the door to Ron Paul’s campaign office in Ankeny, Iowa, is the same guy responsible for uploading a video to YouTube calling on activists to “peacefully shut down” the Iowa caucuses this Tuesday, January 3.

The video, supposedly created by “Anonymous” and anonymously delivered to Davidson, is now being used in conjunction with these on-going “Occupy” protests (which have also targeted candidates like Mitt Romney and Barack Obama) as a pretext to move the vote counting for the Jan 3 primary to a secret location.

Given these facts, it behooves us to look more closely at Davidson, the origins of the “Anonymous” video that he uploaded, how it has being utilized by the media and GOP establishment, and how it may be used moving forward. We are going to do just that, right now. Let’s look at this chronologically:

quote:

America rejects anti-piracy rules

And disagrees with censoring the web

The Copy Culture Survey has finally been released and it is bad news for politicians hoping to pick up a few reactionary votes from pushing through anti-piracy rules.

Apparently the great unwashed think that piracy is okay and socially acceptable. If you announce at a party that you have just spent the entire evening ripping your Beatles collection your friends will not shun you.

You will not have a problem asking for the hand of the miller's daughter just because you downloaded a copy of "Sherlock" the night before and her dad found out. In short, piracy is as much a part of the fabric of modern society as that nasty stain is a part of your cream sofa.

The Copy Culture survey was sponsored by The American Assembly, with support from a research award from Google.

The results are based on interviews on landline and mobiles onducted in English with 2,303 adults aged 18 or older living in the continental United States from August 1-31, 2011. For results based on the entire sample, the margin of error is plus or minus two percentage points.

According to the survey; copyright infringement among family and friends is common. The survey reveals that 46 percent of adults and 75 percent of young people have bought, copied, or downloaded some copyright infringing material. More than 70 percent of those surveyed think it is reasonable to share music files with friends and family.

Solid majorities of American internet users oppose copyright enforcement when it is perceived to intrude on personal rights and freedoms. Support for internet blocking schemes was at 16 percent.

The survey will probably be taken one way by Big Content: that the plebians don't know what's good for them and a censorship project like SOPA is what the country really needs, if the studios are still going to churn out classics like 2011's Gnomeo and Juliet.

But it seems that rather than winning votes, SOPA could cost the politicians that support it. This could do more damage than votes generated by the bribe money, er, campaign contributions, from the music and film industry can buy you.

Nearly half of pirates claim that they pirate less since the emergence of streaming services.

Read more: http://news.techeye.net/s(...)-rules#ixzz1iVdCamCC