Anonymous Breaches Another US Defense Contractor 167
JohnBert sends this excerpt from and IDG report:
"The politically oriented hacking group Anonymous has released 1GB of what it says are private e-mails and documents from an executive of a U.S. defense company that sells unmanned aerial vehicles to police and the U.S. military. The documents were publicized in a post on Pastebin, with links leading to the actual material on another website. The material purportedly belongs to Richard Garcia, a senior vice president at Vanguard who was a U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent for 25 years. Anonymous took special delight in the breach, as Garcia is director of InfraGard, an organization that liaises between private sector companies and the FBI. A group affiliated with Anonymous called LulzSecurity, or LulzSec, breached and defaced one of InfraGard's websites belonging to its Atlanta chapter in June."
Why? (Score:3, Insightful)
One thing that I've increasingly lost track of is why people would put themselves in so much risk to attack these organizatoins. The pathos reminds me of suicide bombers, throwing their own lives away to attack a group they don't like. What anonymous doesn't have in common with those people is crippling poverty and religious conviction, that are given as the underlying cause. I don't understand the mentality involved here.
Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Ya know, George Washington wasn't really starving either...
Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, that's absolutely true, but washington was an aristocrat, who already had power, authority, and wealth. The founding fathers parallel doesn't work well either, beause that had some underlying similarity to a coup. There was a power structure in the colonies that was fuctionally(by way of distance) independent of the government, and thus ripe for rebellion. I honestly don't think there's ever been a non-fictional organization with the same nature as anonymous.
Re:Why? It's like tagging. (Score:2)
It doesn't seem too unusual to me. Look at the vandals who deface property, often at great physical risk to themselves, and also risk prosecution just so they can put their (often very ugly) tags on some buildings.
Anonymous is like a band of taggers.
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Re:Why? (Score:4, Funny)
AC is right! Here's the corrected statement:
So Anonymous == Founding Fathers?
You god damn idiot. (Score:2)
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Surely you've seen this before [penny-arcade.com].
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I'm thinking because of their focus and achievements they can hardly be the picture you paint, kindof inexperienced skript kiddies just doing it for lolz.
It seems to me its much more likely they are actually a well-educated group at least funded by, if not set up by a competitive government or terrorist organisation.
Jingoist (Score:2)
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Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Lulzsec, anonymous, etc. are all structured the same way. There's a huge group of extremely vocal script kiddies and a very small group of people who actually know what they're doing. The script kiddies are the ones running tools like LOIC to ddos websites and making statements to the press. This serves little purpose except to distract everyone from what the real hackers are doing. These are the ones that get arrested because even the most incompetent investigator can figure out who is sending a bajillion HTTP requests to a web server.
The people who actually know what they're doing don't get caught because, well, they know what they're doing. These people take the time to research their target, identify possible methods of attack, and then plan what they're going to do. They don't just attempt to break into random servers with whatever the vulnerability of the month happens to be and then somehow stumble across a metric shitload of confidential information.
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It seems to me its much more likely they are actually a well-educated group at least funded by, if not set up by a competitive government or terrorist organisation.
You're giving them more lulz!
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Saying Anonymous are funded by a government or organization to attack servers is like saying hippies were funded by a government or terrorists to get together and smoke pot.
Anon is a culture. It's people who stand for some principles and who are willing to defend these principles. They don't necessarily ALL share the same principles, just like all hippies did not smoke pot, but in general they have a lot in common, hence why they get together.
Anyone can opt in and out of Anon at any time. You don't need muc
Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Why bother arguing with someone like the GP? The people that go to the lengths necessary to justify hyperbole like "USA == NAZIs!, one in the same!" obviously have some other need or fulfillment being met by such statements, and have worked themselves into a corner that any example of authoritarian abuse proves the point. You can't win such an argument because anyone believing such a ridiculous statement can't possibly be reasoned with. The same goes for the other end of the political spectrum: there's
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Nazi Germany did things the old way. The old way means some government thug waves a gun in your face and demands that you shut up and obey. Most people can see what is wrong with being bullied and threatened and harassed and harmed bodily by thugs acting under color of law. Most people will look for ways to either resi
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There are no words to describe your posts.
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I wouldn't take heed to what he (cavreader) says. He is not making any coherent arguments and he refuses to read a history book.
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While I agree they are of the well-educated variety, what makes you think they are setup or funded by a terrorist organization or government?
Their objectives don't seem consistent with those of terrorists and if funded by a government, I would think they'd be keeping a much lower profile. They seem to me to be exactly what they advertise to be, hacktivists.
Most of their targets (with any group that hides it's identity, you'll have rogues) have an easily identifiable reason/policy that would draw the ire of
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You don't actually have to be an impoverished nutjob clinging to the crudest flavors of some barbarous Abrahamic death-cult to take ideologically motivated risks.
Re:Why? (Score:4, Interesting)
That's the only way left so expect it to become "normal". Peaceful change won't happen so anyone wanting to fight must do so under less-traditional conditions using less-traditional methods.
When an opponent has overwhelming conventional forces, the only to negate that deterrence is to refuse to be deterred.
Food for thought:
This is the least expensive way to fight. The effort to PRESERVE ones troops can become a handicap.
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Anonymous as an agent for change?
That's a joke. They're nothing more than vandals.
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Anonymous as an agent for change?
That's a joke. They're nothing more than vandals.
Vandalism is change. Might not be progress, but it's change.
Sometimes, even a broken status quo is better than trying to fix things badly.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
What anonymous doesn't have in common with those people is crippling poverty and religious conviction, that are given as the underlying cause. I don't understand the mentality involved here.
Actually, many of the suicide bombers don't have crippling poverty. They are more likely to be literate and have college degrees than the general populations from which they spring. One fact that might be particularly interesting to Slashdot is that there's a disproportionate number of terrorists who are engineers. See e.g. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/12/magazine/12FOB-IdeaLab-t.html [nytimes.com] and http://spectrum.ieee.org/podcast/at-work/tech-careers/why-are-terrorists-often-engineers [ieee.org]. There's an associated idea known as the Salem Hypothesis which is the observation that in the US, anti-evolution proponents with advanced degrees are disproportionately engineers - http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Salem_Hypothesis [rationalwiki.org]). Engineers in the United States are also more politically conservative and religious than scientists. There's something weird going on here. But regardless, attributing "crippling poverty" as a major part of why people engage in suicide bombing seems to be off.
Yay! More engineer bashing! (Score:1)
And yet in 25 years involvement in an engineering career, IEEE and other professional organization activities, I can't find a creationist if my life depended on it. The whole thing on the wiki page seems based on Internet postings. SOLID SCIENCE, baby!
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And yet in 25 years involvement in an engineering career, IEEE and other professional organization activities, I can't find a creationist if my life depended on it.
You're not looking hard enough. Specifically, you're not asking them in a non-confrontational way or in a non-hostile setting. Ask to join your coworkers to their churches a few times. You'll get a feel for their convictions once you experience how they worship.
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In fairness, it was stated pretty clearly that the events of the New Testament trump the laws of the Old Testament. So, although some Christian sects do heavily promote a distinctly Old Testament worldview, they are really pushing a number of rules and ideas that were were officially deprecated by the issuing authority in the latest edition of the standard.
I'm surprised that more people don't take the fire and brimstone people to task over that.
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Congratulations on insulting both engineers and the average religious person.
Perhaps the reason for the disproportionate number of creationist engineers has to do with the fact that engineers spend their waking hours combating entropy. They understand better than just about anyone exactly how unlikely the spontaneous formation of life really is.
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"Unlikely"??? .... UNLIKELY?!
As opposed to a singular, supernatural (by definition, no less), omnipotent, omniscient entity which demonstrates the very epitome of conceited, megalomaniacal, obsessive-compulsive caprice and simultaneous apathy and hypocrisy?
On the front page of /. there is right now a story about fossils possibly dating to -billions- of years of age, and you and I (forms of life) are here to discuss them. But you know who is conspicuously absent from this discussion about Life, the Universe
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*sigh* There's a reason I went to the effort of using the word unlikely instead of the word impossible. The trolls are thick lately and I fear I just fed one.
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Your choice of the word implies that the alternative is not unlikely; it's not trolling to point out that this is flawed.
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*sigh* There's a reason I went to the effort of using the word unlikely instead of the word impossible. The trolls are thick lately and I fear I just fed one.
With that you just dismissed a truly thoughtful and elegant post. It's too bad it was an AC. I would like to have at least known what the author calls themselves.
There's something in it I recognize. Whoever wrote that post respects the subject enough to have put a lot of thought into it. In all likelihood they have also invested time and energy into searching for real meaning and the view with which it could be interpreted and understood. You can also sense some hurt or some woundedness in it. Even
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Just throwing out a wild guess with no evidence behind it, but could it be because engineers are less able to hold simutainous contradictory beliefs?
It might also be because in their day to day jobs, engineers are actively pitted against the forces of evolution, which tend more to be destructive than creative in their sphere of experience. They use their hearts and minds to build stuff, and random undirected change does its best to knock it down. Perhaps that background makes one less likely to assume that random undirected change on its own could do better than what smarth humans are trained and employed to do - otherwise, why do engineers have a job?
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Hmm, reminds me of another study I saw. It's premise was that suicide bombs tended to be middle class. The poor were too busy "living" to get serious enough about their faith to actually die for it. The middle class had the time and money to sit around and become "serious" enough in their faith to see suicidal blaze of martyrdom as a good thing.
Query: How many engineers tend to be middle class and lacking wives/kids?
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Theyre the only ones who can get the bombs working...
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You don't understand that our government throws tons of money at these contractors and we don't get any results from all that money?
They're clearly showing how useless these defense contractors are at security.
It's called a check on how our tax dollars are being improperly spent on the incompetence of these security "specialists".
I hardly see this as a pathos, tunnelvision more please.
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I disagree. There are very important times where one should disobey the government. (Aka, break the law/comit a crime).
At the risk of a godwin, the nazi inquiries about jewish persons living in the neighborhood are a very strong example. (Note, that is all the further down that hole I want to go. I am NOT IMPLYING that any current government is nazi like, only that the historical existence of that government style sinks your argument. There *are* times when it is morally justified to comit crimes.)
Weather
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The law does not define what is right and what is wrong. Only people can do that. If you think a law is unjust -- and are prepared to live with the consequences (!) -- then it is morally imperative to defy and break the law.
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With Romas/COIN now Odyssey - peace group is joke on you.
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Is this the same idiot from up above who doesn't understand how comparison works?
One time, I walked across the street. I hear Martin Luther King also walked across the street once. OH SHIT I JUST SAID I'M EXACTLY THE SAME AS MARTIN LUTHER KING IN EVERY WAY
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Low hanging fruit.
I wish they'd take out that Red Light Camera scam company called Redflex and ATS. Do something useful, lulzkids.
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Actually, they are performing a service for the community: I'd much rather have security loopholes exposed in peacetime (well, relative peace) by Anonymous et seq. than exploited by more shadowy organizations and/or governments, especially by surprise during a serious war.
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One thing that I've increasingly lost track of is why people would put themselves in so much risk to attack these organizatoins.
Yeah, it's almost like they lack all common sense.
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I lose track of how strapping dynamite sticks around your torso to kill people and blow up stuff is the same as anonymously (i.e. NO intention of being caught I'm sure) and giddily hacking into a web site and releasing information -- which might or might not be of public interest.
Do you think suicide bombers have an intention of getting caught? While certainly the outcome is wildly different, that doesn't stop the mentality from being similar. Anon doesnt do anything for their own gain nor do they do anything that they intend to be "under the radar" so their entire mission (at least from the public's perspective) is to carry out visually stunning acts upon those that they have a disagreement with... In the end, they do face incredibly serious consequences (certainly not comparable
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Do you think suicide bombers have an intention of getting caught?
Oh you! "Caught" as in "put oneself in harm's way". Hackers I am sure want to stay out of harm. Also, I see hackers who release creepy government or corporate secrets as working toward a freer society, where free flow of information is a requirement. I just can't see blowing random people and stuff as having such a higher purpose, and less so when it is done in the name of some dogmas with built-in censorship. So associating hackers with suicide bombers doesn't ring well to me. I even find the attempt at as
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I'm pretty sure that putting explosives on your person with the intent of detonating them (while still on your person) indicates that they expect to die*.
Anonymous doesn't even expect to get caught, let alone die for it.
* I'm not talking about those poor kids who are being tricked/coerced into doing it. They don't do it willingly (or are entirely mislead and don't expect to die).
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While certainly the outcome is wildly different, that doesn't stop the mentality from being similar.
You mean, not conforming to existing power structures? You would have done well in Nazi Germany. Very conformist.
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The similarity is they are striking a monolithic government in an illegal way. Just because one is brutal and violent doesn't removing the underlying similarity in the tactics. Individuals without organizational support enaging in private war against a government. The mentaility is similar, not identical.
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Because it's the only power they have to effect any kind of change.
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One thing that I've increasingly lost track of is why people would put themselves in so much risk to attack these organizatoins.
I suspect that is because you are doing it wrong. When you find some people's actions to be irrational, you can do one of two things: Form an opinion that they must be crazy, judging them by your perceptions and values, and start telling others they cannot be rational, pointing out the bits that you see as inconsistent. Or, you can operate on the assumption that for people to do so
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Poor people very rarely incite revolution if those in power are just as poor and have no ability to change things.
"Powerful" and "poor" are kind of opposites by definition, aren't they?
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Yeah, except most suicide bombers when these things start out are well educated, and affluent.
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They both share the core concept of being angry, disorganized young people (usually men) desperately searching for a purpose in life, who can be easily whipped up into a frenzy by someone charismatic. Attacking the "bad" people without regard to consequences is MUCH easier than actually building yourself up through hard work, study, etc. The actual leaders are often insulated by virtue of being better at hiding their tracks, or simply not taking a direct role in the attacks at all.
The main difference is t
I was under the impression (Score:2)
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Yeah some people insist on believing that anon is a "group."
ORLY? (Score:4, Funny)
"The politically oriented hacking group Anonymous"
Hey, guess how long it took me to realize TFA had zero credibility?
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The group is highly politically motivated and while you can spurt a bunch of ideological crap about legions and everybody acting separately in different directions according to their own interest, when you look at the group as a whole the actions line up pretty well in one direction and while not the only factor, political motivation seems to be an incredibly strong driving force for the selection of targets in the majority of cases.
That is one really long sentence that doesn't say anything at all.
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Allow me:
One can say they're a bunch of people acting as individuals.
The actions of Anonymous show a strong political motivation in the targets they select.
This makes the first sentence pedantry more than anything.
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The group is highly politically motivated...
Beyond that I'm trying to dispel the claim that Anonymous has no "direction" because of it's definition as a bunch of individuals with no central control. Clearly based on the majority of the targets selected, and the reasons for those selections, one can see a trend of political motivation that can be applied to the group as a whole.
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Anonymous is nothing more and nothing less than a mob. Just like a mob will have a general direction and general mood, so does Anonymous. In South Central after Rodney King, you'd probably be black and a resident of an impoverished area in LA and very pissed off in general about the way you were treated by the LAPD (and maybe life in general) if you were a mob member. That's not what you might call conventionally "politically motivated", but there are definitely some politics involved.
Obviously in a mob,
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When you don't have a central command and control structure the actions of anyone acting under your flag become the actions of the organization, so if someone hacks a political target for activism and says they are Anonymous, then Anonymous is a politically oriented hacking group.
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Politically-oriented? WIthout a doubt, not that I disagree with their politics, rather their execution. They're using the Wikileaks formula, and using it to their advantage. They're fighting government, ranging from simple stuff like BART to embarrassing astroturfers like the USCoC. I'm guessing that they operate in a cellular-like structure that tends to isolate the group to keep it from being easily cracked. That said, at some point, even THEIR trail can be picked up. Small mistakes will eventually out th
Executive != contractor (Score:3)
It's one thing to breach the private emails and documents of an individual, even if he is an exec with a major defense contractor. Breaching an individual's computer is fairly easy, and it very much looks like that is what they did. It is totally another thing to breach the company itself. Assuming the company is somewhat competent, the exec might have a few sensitive but not classified documents. All classified material will be on company computers. Again, that looks from TFA like exactly what they got.
So no, Anonymous didn't breach another defense contractor. They breached an individual who helped run a defense contractor. The two are very, very different. Looks like the highest thing they got was a few documents marked "law enforcement sensitive." An embarrassment for the exec and somewhat his company, but not as bad as a breach of the company itself. Not to say the company couldn't be breached, of course, just that that isn't what seems to have happened.
Re:Executive != contractor (Score:4, Informative)
That's because unless someone fucks up, you can't get at classified documents from your mom's basement. Classified data is supposed to be kept only on separate systems and networks. They don't intersect with the public Internet. You can't hack in to them as normal, regardless of what security flaws they might as, because you just can't get at them.
Remember that the reason Wikileaks got classified data was because it was provided to them by someone who had access. Manning not only had Top Secret clearance, but was a communications guy. He had authorized access to the systems, which he was then able to use to make an unauthorized copy he gave to Wikileaks. There was no super-hacker who somehow 0wned SIPRNet and JWICS, it was a guy who had access.
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Bigger story here? (Score:5, Interesting)
Additionally we found evidence of a Merrill Lynch wealth management advisor giving private advance notice to Garcia about upcoming S&P US credit rating downgrades.
This could be big if S&P leaked their intention to downgrade US credit rating to other investment institutions in order to financially benefit from the news. I wonder if the mainstream press will follow up on this? Sure as hell won't expect Obama's SEC, or parent DOJ, to investigate.
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The news organizations should pick on that and carry out the blow as the legal system won't be able to prosecute using information that was gathered through illegal means.
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This was an e-mail from April 25 2011 and was based upon speculation, no real advanced knowledge:
"
Federal Reserve
* To: "Gloria Newport"
* Subject: Federal Reserve
* From:
* Date: Mon, 25 Apr 2011 14:08:54 -0700
* User-agent: Web-Based Email 5.4.06
Hola,
This is the person who provided me with information regarding the "Economic Threat" to the Federal Reserve.
Cindy Cook
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It's one thing to say to the press "We're likely to do X". It's another thing entirely to say privately "We're definitely going to do X, no question about it." In the first case, everybody knows at the same time, and it's a statement of likelihood, not fact. In the second case, insiders have information that is different from the world at large that gives them an unfair advantage in the markets. By comparison, imagine what would have happened if S&P had been screaming to the press that they'd be downgra
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So when do I get my own ShadowHawk drone? (Score:2)
obligatory xkcd (Score:2)
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Anonymous is a complex organism... (Score:1)
I see many posts trying to distill Anonymous into a single paradigm that can be judged authoritatively from an outside point of view; this is in error. Anonymous, in their construction, goals, and skills, has grown into a complex multi-celled organism that, without having a predicable growth cycle or direction, acts - sometimes in what appears to be indirect opposition to itself.
Take for instance the "Doing it for the lulz" element. There are those within who basically seek to undermine the exploi
What a crock of shit (Score:2)
Bullshit all the way around. Smear campaign against the very concept of Anonymous by associating it with specific politics and Lulzsec, its an attempt to paint Anonymous in a subtle light of a terrorist organization. Enough reporting in that style and folks will eventually look at Anonymous like another Al Qaeda (or was that El Queso) mishmash of random groups.
Tired of the BS (Score:1)