Anonops #15: Last or not to Last

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Jake Davis: Freed hacker faces strict tech rules

A convicted hacker who was detained in a young offender institution has been released - but will now face strict limitations on his technology use.

Jake Davis, 20, was convicted of computer hacking for his role in the notorious group LulzSec.

He cannot contact anyone who associates themselves with the wider Anonymous hacktivist collective.

He told the BBC he planned to release a prison diary and to write a film about the internet.

Davis returned to Twitter on 22 June after finishing his 37-day term at Feltham young offender institution.

During that time he penned what he described as a "nerdy" diary, written using pen and paper, which he hopes to publish online once it has been subjected to legal checks.

He is forbidden from creating encrypted files, securely wiping any data or deleting his internet history.

In June 2012 he pleaded guilty to being part of LulzSec, an offshoot of Anonymous famed for attacking several high profile sites including Sony Pictures and the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency.

Shortly after being released, he tweeted: "654 days on curfew and 37 days in Feltham. Up next: Another 365 days on licence (parole) and 1,825 days of intense monitoring. Free though!"

He had been sentenced to 24 months - but he had been wearing an electronic tag for 21 months which counted against his term.
Licking elbows

Davis is now based in Islington, north London, where he said he was working on a number of projects.

He said he had begun an unspecified project with contemporary art firm Artangel - the company told the BBC it had had "several exploratory chats with Jake over the past six months", but would not go into further detail.

Longer term, he told the BBC he would write a fictional film about the internet, working with production company Fly Film, who could not be reached for comment on Monday.

Publically on Twitter, he has been sharing anecdotes about his time inside.

In one post, he wrote: "I was sacked as a prison cleaner for mopping too near a computer. Those deadly, soapy mops are a serious threat to GCHQ, make no mistake!"

As alter ego Topiary, Davis's last tweet before his arrest in July 2011 read: "You cannot arrest an idea."

On Sunday, in a nod to that sign off, Davis joked: "You can arrest an idea, you can imprison an idea, you can warp an idea, you can break an idea, but you still can't lick your own elbow."

While he wishes to distance himself from the hacking world, he has pledged support to Edward Snowden, the former US intelligence contractor who leaked secret documents regarding the monitoring of internet users.

At the time of Davis's sentencing, prosecutors said the actions of the LulzSec group had been "cowardly and vindictive".

"The harm they caused was foreseeable, extensive and intended," said Andrew Hadik, a lawyer for the Crown Prosecution Service. "Indeed, they boasted of how clever they were with a complete disregard for the impact their actions had on real people's lives."

He added: "This case should serve as a warning to other cybercriminals that they are not invincible."

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Anonymous North Korea

Anonymous North Korea

Greetings to our fellow Citizens of World.
To the tyrants of the North Korean Government... a notice.

We Are Anonymous. Previously we said we would penetrate the intranet and private networks of north korea. And we were successful.

. We are not a threat to the world peace like your government.
. We do not forcing ourselves like your government.
. We will no longer abide by your ways of ruling,
. We work toward world peace and for the Republic of Korea.

Thus, we have a Memorandum of June 25 to indicating our strength. Oh good people of North Korea, it is time to wake up. Soon you will experience a new culture, and your worthless leadership Will be recognised by everyone. Come and join us!

To the worthless tyrant kim jong Un and your puppet government body!
The only power you have are missiles and nuclear. We are more powerful than that. You cannot destroy ideas with missiles. You end talks by placing the blame on the Republic of Korea. And the price of your error will be costly and placed upon you. Your major missile documentation and residents, military documents show down is already in progress. Your attempt to cover this has been uncovered.

. We are partially sharing this information with the world.
. Expect us! and Wait for us!
. Anonymous are ready for this day!
. Kim Jong-un, now it is time for you to step down.

twitter:

soit_goes twitterde op zondag 30-06-2013 om 22:24:05 Folks are loving the #anonymous crew at the #Chicago Gay #Pride parade http://t.co/t5lRaFnsLm reageer retweet

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Anonymous Hackers Leak Customer Database of Relead

Hackers of the Anonymous movement have set their sights on Relead, a company that helps its customers identify anonymous web visitors and convert the information into sales leads.

Since Relead hasn’t been too keen on revealing who its customers are, the hacktivists have decided to find out for themselves. They’ve leaked the company’s entire customer database online.

“You see, if you are an enemy of anonymity, you are an enemy of Anonymous, and we love to know who our enemies are,” the hackers said in a statement published next to the leaked data.

“Who is paying Relead to help them snoop on their unsuspecting website visitors? Who is willing to provide cash to a company that is essentially taking the NSA surveillance program as a business model?” they added.

The hackers have told SecurityWeek that it hasn’t been too difficult to gain access to the company’s customer database.

Forbes has contacted some of the individuals and companies whose names appeared on the list leaked by Anonymous.

Some of them have argued that such practices are becoming commonplace, while others believe that if they don’t use such tools, their competitors might do it.

F-Secure’s Mikko Hypponen is also on the list of Relead’s customers. He says he had signed up for their free evaluation to see what type of information the service could provide.

“I was worried about Relead so I signed up for their free eval to see how much it would see. It saw almost nothing,” Hypponen said on Twitter.

He’s not the only one who found that the service couldn’t pinpoint individual visitors.

The CTO of IT security firm Rewterz.com, Muhammad Omar Khan, also said that Relead didn’t generate any useful results.

Relead representatives have not made any comments regarding the incident.

Bron: news.softpedia.com

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Anonymous Goes After America’s Biggest Private Prison Company - Business Insider



Companies like CCA currently profit from America's addiction to incarceration – converting a bloody trail of prison riots, deaths, and general human misery into black balance sheets. The conventional financial wisdom is that CCA will be reliably profitable in the future because of its strong history of growth over the past thirty years. But this growth has been fueled by a historical anomaly. Between 1970 and 2005, the U.S. prison population grew by 700 percent, far outpacing both population growth and crime. As a result, our country now has 5% of the world's population but 25% of the world's prisoners.

CCA did not exist before this massive expansion of incarceration – and the company depends on it to survive. But Anonymous' report shows us that as America weans itself from that addiction, CCA's ledgers will quickly turn red.

This is not Anonymous' first foray into corporate issues. Since 2011, it has published four reports digging into the financials and governance of publicly traded Chinese companies. Each report has seriously rattled the target company; in one case, the Financial Times reported that the company responded by suspending trading of its shares on the Hong Kong stock exchange. Today's report on CCA marks the first time, however, that Anonymous has trained its sights on a U.S. company. They have certainly found a deserving target.

Anonymous points outs that state governments are increasingly enacting policy reforms designed to reduce their reliance on incarceration – including top CCA "customers" like California and Colorado. Based on a state-by-state examination of these reforms, combined with a close look at CCA's falling occupancy rates and decreased spending on new construction, Anonymous identifies ongoing criminal justice reforms as posing a far more serious risk to CCA's business model than CCA's management is willing to admit. It concludes that CCA's management "has been caught up in its own hype" and that "winter is coming" for the company.

Recent events lend support to Anonymous' conclusions. In just the last few months, four state governments have announced the cancellation of five prison contracts with CCA: Idaho, Kentucky, Texas, and Mississippi. While the Idaho and Mississippi cancellations seem to have arisen from dissatisfaction with CCA's performance (the Mississippi prison was rocked by two riots in just twelve months, and CCA employees at the Idaho prison recently falsified nearly 4,800 hours of staffing records), the Texas and Kentucky cancellations were driven by falling state prison populations that rendered the CCA contracts unnecessary.

Of course, continuing this momentum requires the political will to further reduce the flow of people into prisons. The ACLU is working on a number of fronts to make this happen, and an increasing number of state legislators are realizing that current incarceration rates are unsustainable. And we will continue to emphasize that handing control of prisons over to for-profit prisons are a bad public investment: one that fails to offer a real solution to state or local fiscal problems, lets those companies engage in sharp tactics to garner more government contracts and avoid public accountability, and has resulted in a truly horrifying track record of abuse, neglect, and misconduct.

They're digging in now.

Bron: www.businessinsider.com

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RT's Ruptly team detained filming Anonymous 'United Stasi of America' action — RT News

United Stasi of America Extended Version Lightart Protest projection embassy in Berlin Anonymous

Staff of RT’s video agency Ruptly were detained for several hours by Berlin police while filming the Anonymous 'United Stasi of America' action. Despite the crew having official permission to work in the area, police attempted to confiscate the footage.

The reporters were searched and detained for two hours. Police released the Ruptly team without charges as they found no grounds to seize the memory card with the video.

On July 14, Anonymous activists protested government surveillance programs by beaming giant words reading 'United Stasi of America' across the US embassy wall near the Brandenburg Gate in central Berlin.

The projected note – up to three meters high – made reference to the former East German secret police, the Stasi.

The projection came from the car parked across the embassy and only lasted for two minutes. After that, three Anonymous activists packed up and left the scene.

However, a handful of police proceeded to detain the journalists filming on location.

“The police considered them first as suspects and then as Anonymous conspirators,” Ruptly said.

"Staffers of Ruptly video agency were shooting Anonymous actions and they had all the necessary work permits and accreditation. In this case, any fact of confiscation is illegal, so the Berlin police failed to remove our stuff," said Margarita Simonyan, RT’s editor-in-chief.



In June, German magazine Der Spiegel reported that the US combs through half a billion German phone calls, emails and text messages each month, and has classified Germany on the same target level as China.

Back then Markus Ferber, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Bavarian sister party and member of the European Parliament, accused Washington of using "American-style Stasi methods," thus comparing them to the communist East Germany’s much-dreaded Ministry for State Security (Stasi).

The Stasi secret police employed a network of informants that served as watchdogs against any forms of government dissent. Spies reported the actions of friends and relatives, drilled holes into apartments and hotel rooms to film citizens with hidden cameras, and infiltrated schools and universities. In some cases, spouses and family members spied on each other.

they picked most prominent place in Berlin for embassy as if democratically inviting open protests

their locations in Berlin and Amsterdam on biggest squares where often gatherings,protests, festivals

RT reported on Germany's lack of sovereignity after WW2 in the past, they should do it again.


Bron: rt.com

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Anonymous claims hack of US's Fema in retaliation for 'implied threats' | Technology | guardian.co.uk

Hacking collective posts contact information for agency employees but unconfirmed if servers have been compromised

The Anonymous hacking collective claims it has compromised US Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) servers and has posted the contact information of people connected to the agency online.

Anonymous said it released the information because recent events, including the NSA surveillance revelations, have brought "oblique and cowardly implied threats against Anonymous very much back into the forefront of the hive's consciousness".

The release includes the names, mailing addresses and email addresses of contractors, subcontractors and government employees linked to Fema, including private defense contractors, federal agents and local authorities.
Much of the information was already accessible online to someone determined to find it, though Anonymous said it redacted social security numbers and login information because its "intent is not to harm, merely to issue a firm warning".

However, the mailing addresses connected to some of the people listed on the release are not publicly affiliated with their employers and Anonymous referred to them as home addresses in an email. It did respond to a question asking why this does not fall under the banner of harmful information.

Anonymous said it targeted Fema because of a training exercise the agency used in 2012 to prepare employees for a cyberattack. In the scenario, a fictional group called "The Void" launches a cyberattack on US businesses and infrastructure.

Anonymous sees The Void as a stand-in for their organization and feels that the training exercise made some unfair implications about the collective. It said actions taken by The Void "implicitly link financial gain and fraud to activist hackers". Anonymous was also upset because it believes the exercise implies the collective is anti-American.

Fema did not respond to requests for confirmation on whether its servers were compromised.

The Fema exercise occurred in 2012, but Anonymous said in a statement that it believes the exercise was used "as part of the ongoing justifications for Prism and the other NSA spy programs". With these recent developments, Anonymous said it wanted to show it "does not wave the white flag".

We are not fighting any one government or corporation, we are fighting any enemy of freedom of speech and anyone compromising the right to remain anonymous online, without fear of reprisals from governments or corporations with the legal authority or financial resources to destroy the lives of anyone who dares express opinions contrary to their own official line.

Anonymous seemed to imply a threat of its own at the end of the release and said: "Also, please return to us Barrett Brown, we are asking nicely. Pretty please, with sugar on top."

Brown has been imprisoned since September after being accused of 17 offenses springing from his affiliation with Anonymous. Brown is not a hacker but had close ties to the collective and helped publicize some of their most renowned hacks including the Stratfor hack in 2011.

The Fema exercise was co-ordinated by homeland security consulting company Obsidian Analysis, who appointed former Fema chief of staff John McNamara to be company vice-president in May. The National Level Exercise: Cybertop Capabilities Tabletop Exercise, can be downloaded from the Fema site here.

Bron: www.guardian.co.uk

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Anonymous Plans Global Government Hacking Day For Fifth Of November

http://www.mintpressnews.(...)-of-november/165602/

“This video is an idea — a shared idea — so listen very carefully, and make sure you’re sitting down.”

Anonymous #NOV5TH 2013 - THE LION SLEEPS NO MORE.

The warning was given in activist coalition Anonymous’ most recent video declaration, a call for advocates around the world to rally on Nov. 5 and a warning to government officials that their facilities will be targeted and their secured websites will be hacked.

Anonymous is preparing for a Nov. 5 global day of hacking, global protests and acts of civil disobedience, calling on all people to prepare for what it is considering a day of widespread resilience in the face of global tyranny.

The video, “The Lion Sleeps No More,” warns officials that government buildings around the world will be targeted in acts of civil disobedience by free-thinking members of society who are rallying around the social and ecological issues facing not only the U.S., but every government throughout world.

“Governments of the world, take this message as your will and testament,” the video states. “The game is officially over. Social media has given birth to something new. Now it’s time to set the record straight. This video was intended as that spark that gets delivered straight into the hearts and minds of the world.”

This isn’t the first time Anonymous has capitalized on Nov. 5, a historically symbolic date of resistance based on the 1605 failed attempt to blow up London’s House of Lords. Last year, adorned in masks that depict the common interpretation of Fawkes, Anonymous called for a global day of hacking and resistance. They were successful, but not to the extent they desire for the upcoming day of action.

On Nov. 5, 2012, government and financial websites around the world were hacked, including Australian government sites and Argentina’s government bank. In the U.S., Trapwire, which produces security cameras, was the target of the hacktivist coalition, which chose the company based on its key role in practices that Anonymous claims violate Americans’ right to privacy.

This year, preparing months in advance and utilizing social media to drum up support, Anonymous is calling for an event of epic proportions, one that will serve as a historic day of global solidarity among those who are fighting different, yet similar, battles in their own countries.

“The time for global civil disobedience is now. This time it seems unions around the world are also supporting this action,” the video states. “The lion sleeps no more. Ask yourself this: Where will you be when we make history? Nov. 5, 2013 — worldwide, now it’s a vendetta, now it’s personal. Now it’s time to occupy everywhere. It’s time to throw everything we have at Nov. 5. It’s time to relight the flame of protest until our demands are met.”

Twitter is largely being used as an organizational tool for Nov. 5 preparations. Using the hashtag #NOV5TH, users have already begun to spread the video message and information regarding local protests.

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Why Anonymous hacked the tiny island nation of Nauru

For most people, the hacktivist collective Anonymous’s attack on the website of the island nation of Nauru probably seems pretty random.

But the Republic of Nauru, whose government website and primary ISP, CenpacNet Inc., were brought down over the weekend, is one of the primary processing centers for refugee immigration to Australia, a policy based on the country’s “Pacific Solution.”

This policy holds immigration applicants on islands off Australia instead of on the mainland. This has become a controversial issue in Australia. The asylum seekers and their supporters had earlier protested peacefully for a change in the long holding times for immigrants, but to no avail.

On Friday, a riot broke out in the processing center on Nauru, nearly destroying it and causing an estimated AUS$60 in damages. Nauru’s president called on “strong and able men” to help corral the escaped refugees, raising Anonymous’s ire.

Nauru police have charged 150 of the center’s approximately 550 residents, who have been transferred to jail facilities.

Anonymous’s attack, according to the Guardian’s Oliver Laughland, “resulted in all official emails and government being shut down for over four hours. It was claimed that the Nauruan government had suspended all Internet access outside of official use preceding the Anonymous attack.”

Nauru’s economy was based on phosphate mining. In its wake, the island has experienced environmental degradation and economic turmoil as the phosphate ran out. One of its few hard currency avenues is aid from Australia.

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Anonymous hacks Christian extremists, fights for church state separation - National Anonymous | Examiner.com

Fighting for the separation of church and state, Anonymous hacks a Christian extremist website working towards an American theocracy.

According to a report dated July 24, hacktivists associated with the international collective known as Anonymous hacked and leaked close to 10,000 usernames and passwords from Intercessors For America, a group “of like-minded people who recognized the need for God to intervene in U.S. governmental and cultural issues."

Cyber War News reports the hack and leak as “a raw sql extraction which contains user accounts and administrator accounts as well as server accounts. Account details are mostly email addresses and clear text passwords with the administrator and server passwords being encrypted. All together there is 9,885 non duplicated email:password combos found.”

Speculating on the motivation of the Anonymous hacktivists, Eduard Kovacs at Softpedia writes: “As far as their motivation is concerned, it appears the attackers don’t like that the religious organization is interfering with the government.”

The Anonymous hacktivists responsible for posting the document containing the leaked material left a brief, terse statement, noting that “This leak is in the true spirit of Anonymous. Any individual trying to claim responsibility for it is not the hacker who did it.” And, perhaps more importantly, “Never should religion interfere with government.”

What do you think about Anonymous hacktivists targeting Christian extremists? Leave a comment - express yourself.

_{Michael Stone is a progressive freethinker and freelance writer residing in Portland, Oregon. Informed by science, inspired by art, and motivated by compassion, Michael’s task is to question the world in pursuit of the good. You can reach Michael at stonemichael@hotmail.com.}

.
Bron: www.examiner.com

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Nederland bij koplopers in 'censuur' op Google


De Nederlandse platen- en filmmaatschappijen behoren tot de grootste bestrijders van piraterij op internet. Afgelopen maand vroeg de entertainmentbranche Google ruim 175 duizend internetadressen onzichtbaar te maken in zijn zoekmachine.

De verzoeken werden ingediend door Brein, de stichting die overtredingen van het auteursrecht opspoort namens auteurs, uitvoerende kunstenaars, uitgevers, producenten en distributeurs van muziek, film, video, boeken, games en interactieve software.

Brein staat op de dertiende plaats van een lange lijst waarop Google laat zien welke bedrijven en organisaties hebben gevraagd om de verwijdering van links naar illegaal gekopieerde content. Is de klacht gegrond, dan verwijdert het Amerikaanse bedrijf die internetadressen uit de index van zijn zoekmachine.

Fox, Disney, NBC
De grootste 'piraterijbezems' onder de meer dan 3.200 klagers zijn de Britse (BPI) en Amerikaanse (RIAA) koepels van platenlabels, tv- en filmmaatschappijen als Fox, Disney en NBC Universal en softwareproducenten als Microsoft (dat Office uitgeeft) en Adobe (Photoshop). De Britse platenmaatschappijen, verenigd in het BPI, zijn met verwijderingsverzoeken voor ruim 2,7 miljoen links het fanatiekst in de bestrijding van wat zij zien als onlinemuziekdiefstal.

Sinds begin dit jaar hebben rechthebbenden Google verzocht om meer dan 105 miljoen internetadressen te verwijderen, zo heeft de activistische website TorrentFreak uitgerekend. Dat is twee keer zoveel als in heel 2012. Volgens TorrentFreak is dat het bewijs dat de entertainmentbranche de strijd tegen piraterij van films, muziek en software aan het opvoeren is.

Emmer
Het Amerikaanse verbond van platenlabels (RIAA) klaagt dat het 'een oceaan aan illegale downloads probeert leeg te scheppen met een emmer. Elke dag komt er weer meer bij en het einde is niet in zicht.' De RIAA heeft er bij Google op aangedrongen volledige internetdomeinen te blokkeren in plaats van dat er duizenden individuele links worden aangemeld. Als er meerdere verzoeken komen voor het verwijderen van links naar hetzelfde liedje op een enkele website, moet dat voldoende zijn voor een volledige ban.

De Zweedse muziekdienst Spotify publiceerde vorige week een studie waaruit zou blijken dat legale alternatieven voor illegale downloads in Nederland de piraterij van muziek hebben teruggedrongen. Op het onderzoek waarmee Spotify schermde, kwam kritiek, omdat het maar één kanaal bekijkt waarlangs internetters illegaal verspreide muziek binnenhengelen. Volgens Spotify is 10 procent van de downloaders verantwoordelijk voor de helft van de liedjes die in Nederland van internet worden geplukt en waarvoor de artiest niet wordt betaald.

Bron: Volkskrant

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Key slams 'juvenile' hacking by Anonymous

The hacking of more than a dozen National Party websites by opponents of the GCSB spying bill has been branded juvenile by the Prime Minister, whose site was among those disabled.

The sites were targeted by the New Zealand wing of the powerful global hacking group Anonymous overnight. Several of the sites have now been restored, including John Key's.

The hacking followed protests at the weekend when thousands of people turned out to show their opposition to the bill. It gives the Government Communications Security Bureau power to spy on New Zealanders not just foreign targets as at present.

Anonymous uploaded a video on YouTube in which they claimed they hacked the websites because Mr Key refused to listen to protests and uproar over the ''despicable piece of legislation''.

"It's pretty juvenile behaviour in my view," Mr Key said.

"These people are obviously doing something that's both illegal and inappropriate. And they're trying to make their own political point. But their point's wrong."

The websites would remain offline until National patched its web servers or withdrew the bill and apologised to those it had affected, including Kim Dotcom, Anonymous said.

But Dotcom, one of the bill's harshest critics, called for the cyber attacks to stop.

The internet mogul tweeted a warning to the hackers that they were only adding to Mr Key's reasoning to pass the GCSB bill.

"Dear Anonymous NZ, hacking National Party websites is just giving John Key a new excuse to pass the GCSB bill (cybercrime). Please stop it," Dotcom tweeted.

It was disclosures that the GCSB had illegally spied on Dotcom, the founder of online storage company Megaupload, that prompted the bill. Dotcom is fighting attempts by the US government to extradite him on charges of internet piracy, copyright infringement, and money laundering.

'It's not a sophisticated attack'

Finance Minister Bill English, whose website was among those hacked, warns there could be worse to come.

"The fact that they've taken down a ministerial website doesn't matter that much. But if these people decided to take down the IRD website or the Work and Income website that would leave a lot of New Zealanders vulnerable," Mr English said.

His site was among the few restored by this evening.

Anonymous is a loose global network of online hackers. It gained international notoriety for hacking the likes of Mastercard and Sony in the US and last year made Time Magazine's list of the world's most influential people.

An internet security expert, Daniel Ayres, says the National Party sites were easy targets, with only basic security.

"It's not a sophisticated attack. It's roughly the equivalent of someone dumping a tonne of manure on your lawn," Mr Ayres told ONE News.

"It does mean that quite a lot of internet crime has happened behind the scenes because they have to take over a bunch of internet computers."

The bill widening the powers of the GCSB is currently before Parliament and likely to pass with United Future MP agreeing to support it, giving Key the numbers he needs to get it over the line.

To secure the support of Mr Dunne to be able to pass the law, the Government has made some concessions, increasing supervision of the GCSB and making provision for reviews of its operations.

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Meet the Hackers Who Want to Jailbreak the Internet | Wired Enterprise | Wired.com

Packed into a small conference room in Portland, Oregon, this rag-tag band of coders has quite the online pedigree, and their mission is far more ambitious than you might expect. They hope to jailbreak the internet.

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Government Wants Media To Stop Covering Barrett Brown

Barrett Brown has been sitting in prison, without trial, for almost a year. In case you haven’t followed his case, the 31-year-old journalist is facing a century of prison time for sharing a link that contained—within an archive of 5 million emails—credit-card information stolen from a hack of a security company called Stratfor (Jeremy Hammond, the actual hacker, is going to prison for ten years), threatening the family of an FBI officer who raided his mother’s home, and trying to hide his laptops from the Feds.

The flood of NSA leaks from Edward Snowden has placed extra attention on Barrett, who focused on investigating a partnership that many people are incredibly uncomfortable with—the connections between private security, surveillance, intelligence firms, and the US government.

Barrett’s website, ProjectPM, used a small team of researchers to pore over leaked emails, news articles, and public corporate information to figure out what this industry does exactly, and how they serve the White House. It’s partly because of Barrett that we know about things like persona management, a technology used by the US government and its contractors to disseminate information online using fake personas, also known as sock puppets.

He also helped the world learn about TrapWire, a surveillance program that’s built into security cameras all over the world and “more accurate than facial recognition technology.” When it was made public in the pre-Snowden era, most media outlets played it off as not being a big deal. We still don’t know exactly how powerful TrapWire is, but, because of the Strafor hack and Barrett’s research, at least we know it exists.

Anyone interested in getting involved with ProjectPM is invited with this call to action: “If you care that the surveillance state is expanding in capabilities and intent without being effectively opposed by the population of the West, you can assist in making this an actionable resource for journalists, activists, and other interested parties,” which sums up the quest for information that is, in and of itself, on trial in Barrett’s case. As Glenn Greenwald wrote in the Guardian regarding the prosecution of Barrett Brown, “here we have the US government targeting someone they clearly loathe because of the work he is doing against their actions.”

Barrett is set to appear in court next month, but his defense attorneys are asking for an extension to sort through the prosecutors’ evidence. The defense insists they’re in the midst of having a forensics expert process the data. The US government’s evidence is stored on a 2 Terabyte hard drive and two DVDs, and the prosecutors are essentially arguing that a.) All of that does not account for much information, despite the forensic processing that is still ongoing, and b.) the defense has had enough time to get their shit together. But, beyond that, they’re trying to silence the media coverage surrounding Barrett Brown’s case.

Within the government’s “Opposition to Continuance,” written to oppose an extension of Barrett’s trial is a lengthy section about his supposed media strategy. In this section, the government prosecutors have claimed Barrett’s defense team is defying the judge’s warning to not “try the case in the media.” It also states “the government has reason to believe that Brown’s attorney coordinates and/or approves the use of media.”

After that is a list of occasions where Barrett communicated with members of the media, myself included. For what it’s worth, I did not arrange that interview through Barrett’s attorneys, nor did his current attorneys represent him at the time of our conversation. The government is asking for a complete ban on media statements from Barrett and his representatives. It appears to be a desperate strategy to silence criticism and dissent in a case that already deeply threatens the nature of journalism and freedom of information.

Also alluded to in the government’s outline of journalists who have covered Barrett Brown are Glenn Greenwald and the late Michael Hastings, who was a friend of Barrett’s. As Hastings himself said: “Barrett Brown is a journalist, plain and simple. He’s also a colleague and friend, and one of the brilliant, if highly unconventional, American writers of his generation. I offer my support to Barrett and his family, and respectfully ask for his immediate release from custody.”

While the judge waits to decide whether or not Barrett’s trial date should be extended, and if a media gag order should be allowed (his defense rightfully points out this request comes without citing any particularly offensive or justice-obstructing statement Barrett has made thus far), we have decided to publish an original article from Barrett Brown himself, which you can read right over here. It compares the Watergate era to the Wikileaks era, and does not deal with the specifics of Barrett’s trial.

Barrett Brown is an imprisoned author who deserves to be published while he navigates the harsh obstacles of today’s American justice system. The precedent that a guilty verdict—and a 100-year prison sentence—would set is troubling. But, as Barrett told me in March, he’s not “terribly worried” about the punishment he’s facing. While it’s hard to fully believe him, it’s certainly reassuring for someone like me who is in fact quite worried about what prison time, in this case, could mean for the future of investigative reporting, internet security, and journalism at large.

If Barrett goes to prison for digging into the pitch-black world of online surveillance, it will make figuring out what America’s massive intelligence firms are doing with their powerful, secret surveillance tools even more difficult and dangerous than it already is. With Edward Snowden stuck in Russia and Bradley Manning facing well over a century of hard time, the world simply can’t afford to lose Barrett as well.

Bron: www.cyberguerrilla.org

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Anonymous Hacks UK Government Site in Response to Detention of David Miranda

United Kingdom authorities have detained David Miranda, Glenn Greenwald's partner. Greenwald is the journalist responsible for publishing the information obtained by Edward Snowden from the NSA. Anonymous hackers have responded to the incident by hacking a UK government website.

The fact that UK authorities have detained Miranda has been heavily criticized – including by Amnesty International – despite the fact that he was released after nine hours of questioning.

For their part, the hacktivists have defaced the official website of the Mole Valley District Council (molevalley.gov.uk), which they've used to publish a statement.

“We expect there to be many pointed questions asked in the coming days, both domestically and internationally as to how and why an already ridiculously broad and draconian act of law was ripped of its last remaining shred of legitimacy in what cannot be described as anything other than an act of pure spite and intimidation, an act intended to exert a chilling effect on a stream of high-quality journalistic reporting whose historic importance cannot possibly be overstated,” the hackers said.

The statement is accompanied by a table comprised of the personal details of US government employees. The table includes information on their children, parents, spouses and friends.

The hacktivists say that if Miranda can be detained under terrorism legislation just because he’s related to Greenwald, based on the same theory, other possible terrorists might be related to people working in the US government and military.

“We encourage anyone who is interested in preventing terror attacks to fully investigate these spouses and siblings and mothers and fathers and son and daughters, before they too are embroidered in terrible terror plots of the most heinous variety,” Anonymous members said.

Finally, they conclude their statement with a threat. The hackers say they’re preparing something that’s “befitting the gravity of the crimes.”

“Oh, and before we go, we should probably mention that we have been very, very angry over the last few months -- and very, very busy. The only reason you have not heard from us before now is that we have been waiting and watching as the leaks come out and the spooks trip up over own lies and distortions,” the hacktivists noted.

At the time of writing, the Mole Valley Council website still hosts Anonymous’ statement.

Bron: news.softpedia.com

quote:

FBI Agent: We've Dismantled The Leaders Of Anonymous

Gerald.Smith@huffingtonpost.com

Posted: 08/21/2013 11:28 am EDT | Updated: 08/21/2013 1:30 pm EDT

The hacker collective Anonymous has not produced as many high-profile cyber attacks as it once did, a drop-off that can be directly attributed to the arrests of the group's core members, an FBI official told The Huffington Post this week.

Starting in late 2010, Anonymous captured worldwide attention through a series of attacks against U.S. companies and government agencies, stealing data and defacing or crashing websites.

But the arrests last year of five members of Lulz Security, an influential splinter group of hackers, had a "huge deterrent effect" on Anonymous by creating an "added layer of distrust" within the hacking group, according to Austin P. Berglas, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI's cyber division in New York.

“All of these guys [arrested] were major players in the Anonymous movement, and a lot of people looked to them just because of what they did,” Berglas said in an interview with HuffPost.

The 2012 arrests relied on the help of a key informant, Hector Monsegur, aka "Sabu," who was caught and then cooperated with the FBI. The fear that one of their own could turn them in has sowed distrust within the hacking collective, according to Berglas.

"The movement is still there, and they're still yacking on Twitter and posting things, but you don't hear about these guys coming forward with those large breaches," he said. "It's just not happening, and that's because of the dismantlement of the largest players."

Gabriella Coleman, a professor at McGill University who studies Anonymous, said there was "no doubt" the arrests dealt a major blow to "a central node of activity" within the group. But Anonymous is still very much alive, she said.

"They could easily emerge again as a force to contend with," she told HuffPost in an email.

The arrests of members of Anonymous last year were among several highlights to come out of the FBI's cyber division in New York. (The five core members of Lulz Security have pleaded guilty.) In another case, the FBI in New York led an investigation that resulted in the arrests earlier this year of three alleged operators of the Gozi virus, which infected at least 1 million computers and stole millions of dollars from banks around the world.

A former Army captain, 41-year-old Berglas leads the FBI's cyber division in New York, one of the busiest of the FBI's 56 field offices. His office overlooks the skyline of lower Manhattan, the center of the financial world and a frequent target of hackers. Last month, a Russian man was charged with breaking into the servers of the Nasdaq stock exchange and deleting, changing and stealing data.

Austin P. Berglas, FBI assistant special agent.
The cyber division in New York is divided into five teams of investigators. One unit is tasked with getting digital evidence off cell phones, cameras, computers and tablets to support investigations into a wide range cases, from organized crime to computer hacking to child pornography. Berglas said the investigators for the Computer Analysis Response Team have become increasingly adept at breaking encryption methods used by suspects to conceal the contents of computer files.

The other four teams divide their attention to cybercrime based on the hackers' country of origin. Since most hackers attack U.S. computers from overseas, the FBI often works with law enforcement in other countries, Berglas said. Sometimes, investigators find evidence of hackers from several different countries inside the network of a single U.S. company.

"We call it the dirty pond environment," he said. "You think it might just be one actor responsible for the intrusion, and once you get in and start looking at the company there's remnants of a whole host of actors -- from week-old activity to multiple years they've been inside some companies and they just don’t know about it."

Cybercriminals have a variety of motives, but their methods are often the same. Most break into computer systems by tricking people to click on malicious links in emails that appear to come from trusted sources, a technique known as "spear phishing," Berglas said.

"It’s the number one most common intrusion vector we see in any type of attack,” Berglas said. "Major financial companies spend millions and millions of dollars on security, and all [hackers] have to do is get someone with credentials to click on a spear-phishing site and that’s how they get in.”

Cybercriminals have become adept at hiding their IP addresses -- the string of numbers assigned to individual computers -- to disguise their locations from law enforcement. But eventually, even the most skilled hackers get sloppy, Berglas said.

Hector Monsegur, aka "Sabu," the FBI informant whose cooperation led to the arrests of LulzSec last year, left his IP address exposed. The error allowed investigators to track his location to an apartment in Manhattan's Lower East Side and eventually led to his arrest.

It's that type of misstep that the FBI is looking for.

"It’s easy to sit behind a computer and think you're anonymous and do these illegal types of activity, whether it’s hacking into a company or trading child pornography or buying and selling stolen identities," he said. "But it’s just a matter of time before these criminals make mistakes and we capture them. All it takes is just one time."


Bron: www.huffingtonpost.com

quote:

Anonymous' Secret Presence In The U.S. Army

An active-duty Army captain and member of Anonymous describes how the organization operates, his own involvement in the Arab Spring, how the crackdown on Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden has affected soldiers, and how more leaks are on the way. He has agreed to speak with BuzzFeed on the condition of anonymity.


How do you know who is in Anonymous?
Initially we have the handshaking phase. The lingo is still relatively unknown. In conversation, you drop in jokes. If you are with someone on a mission, you’re like, “Man, there are over 9,000 reasons that this is a bad idea.” That initially establishes friendship. Once you feel comfortable with the person and they aren’t just posing as part of the culture, then you talk about what they’ve done and how much a part of it they are. It gets to the point where you are discussing individual operations.

What are the most popular operations amongst soldiers?
Anonymous is so distributed and leaderless that everyone has operations they love and hate. Operation Cartel, especially at Fort Bliss. Operation Dark Net was universally loved. And Operation Payback was pretty well received.

What about you?
I was involved in the Arab Spring opening up internet communications. I was a facilitator for a lot of people who have more skills than me in the cyber world. I knew people who I met through 4chan, 9Chan, and 7Chan and then a lot of AnonOps IRCs and who they needed to talk to — the organizations that would help them, and people in government would give them resources and access — and was able to convince them to talk to people in Anonymous. I got people in the right [internet relay chat] rooms at the right time.

Would the military consider you a white or black hat?
The military sees me as black hat.

Is that a fair assessment?
All hats are gray. Every white hacker I know has a night job that is very much a black-hat job.

What were the results of what you did for the Arab Spring?
From what I heard they were able to establish ways to assist the activists to have a method where they could get information out of Egypt and have certain Twitter accounts tweet that information on their behalf. But I don’t know for sure. As soon as I was like, “Hey, this is this person,” and vice versa, they did tweet confirmation to make sure that certain Twitter accounts were controlled by certain people, and then I headed out of the room so there would be no “taint” of having a fed there.

What specific actions have other soldiers taken?
There are several [soldiers] I know that probably did things, but I don’t know know that they did. I can legally say, probably under a [lie] detector, I have no proof that they did it. We keep our activities totally separate because at any point in time I can be put in the chair that I can’t lie in. You have to keep the /b/ [4chan’s “Random” board] brotherhood strong.

Does the military know about the Anonymous presence?
Pre-Manning, there were several academic papers put out trying to analyze it and school the leadership. Because the Army is a very top-down organization, they assume that [Anonymous] is too. Leadership wasn’t concerned with it until Manning happened. Then they read everything under the [lens] of what Manning did and it just scared them — scared them blind. They know we are in there and they assume that we are all going to do a Manning or a Snowden.

How have they addressed it?
Every six months you are mandated to get a Threat Awareness and Reporting Procedures Brief. It used to be very much like how to … spot the Iraqi contractor who is pacing off your base. Now it is, “Look at the person at your left and right. Are they espousing social beliefs that don’t line up with Army values? What websites do they go to at work?” With the caveat that it is OK to have political beliefs that are different. You get a heavy-handed feeling.

I have had more than a few officers come up to me and as we are trying to talk about [Anonymous] they are worried, like, “Are you CID [working undercover for the Central Investigative Division]?” Because you always worry about that.

Are the retaliations against Manning and Snowden discouraging Anonymous activity and the desire to leak information?
A lot [of Anonymous members] have been in long enough and are jaded. They are watching as the government comes down harder and harder. There is a growing sense of disdain and hatred because we are complicit in it. There are some secrets that need to be secrets but the stuff [the military] keeps secret just to protect the bottom line — you just feel like you are selling your soul every day. That is a lot of the motivation. Especially for people of the generation that believe that information should be free.

Are we going to see more leaks?
Yes. A lot [of Anonymous members] are mid- to high-rank NCOs. They are well-respected, have connections, and overly large security clearances. A lot of people who are part of the [Anonymous] culture are just dying at this point for something to come across their table that isn’t already out there. It is so easy to leak information that if you want to, you can do it.

Bron: www.buzzfeed.com