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Its hard to feel too bad for the victims of these attacks, given that their behavior hurts others. Oh wow I think I'm getting old.

by rjurney 11y ago

DarkTree 11y ago
Yeah, you certainly don't have to feel bad for the victims, but we should all question whether the hackers are producing an overall net positive effect.
- xlm1717 11y ago
  Well, if you believe the hackers' motivation for doing this, I don't think it's about producing an overall net positive effect at all, just righting some perceived wrongs. The perceived wrongs are not that AshleyMadison enabled married people to cheat on their spouses. What the hackers have said was their motivation is that AshleyMadison has lied to their users about the userbase, which is supposedly 90+% male, most of which have likely not engaged in an affair since most of the accounts they would interact with are supposedly fake. I don't think a net positive effect can come from this.
cli 11y ago
Note that about 40% of those accounts state that they are single. http://dadaviz.com/s/ashley-madison-revealed http://dadaviz.com/s/ashley-madison-revealed
- nfoz 11y ago
  Do you think it's ethically appropriate to look at the leaked data? Do you think it's ethically appropriate to analyze the leaked data, and publish those analyses for personal gain (which is what this site did afaict) Do you think it's ethically appropriate to read about analyses performed on the leaked data by the above? I honestly don't know how I feel myself! Very curious what other people think about this.
  - Kalium 11y ago
    In security, there's often no choice but to rely on leaked data. There is generally no other source of things like password hashes reflecting real-world user passwords. So the question then becomes "Is it ethically appropriate to perform security research that requires realistic data at all?". With the caveat that blackhats can and will do research and use the results privately no matter what the rest of us do. What do you think?
  - kinghajj 11y ago
    IMHO, the ethics are similar to the use of data obtained by German/Japanese scientists during WWII: the violation is on the persons who directly acquire the information; but, once obtained, those who receive it indirectly aren't ethically liable.
  - gordjw 11y ago
    While I won't be downloading the data to my own server, I have no issue with others analysing it nor with reading analyses by those folks. Especially ones like this one, which is essentially anonymous. As long as the action stops at analysis, and doesn't provide tools for others to easily go further, then that seems fine to me.
- biomechanica 11y ago
  I'm not so sure people really give a damn about that.
- rjurney 11y ago
  In that case, who cares if their email is leaked?
acqq 11y ago
There is an older discussion on HN on these topics. Think again what the site really was: probably 95% of visitors were men. That means that maybe 18 from 20 didn't find a "match"? Moreover, somebody mentioned that there were fake female profiles. Reduce the number of successful "matches." Most of the visitors probably didn't do anything. "But they intended!" can somebody say "and that is enough." Well then think again. How many weren't actually in relation but expected to get the "match" easier on the site where potential (not actual!) members aren't prepared to the long-term bind to the "matched" partner. Etc. Do you still consider all these poor dastards as the big "sinners?" Which percentage of the persons on the lists "deserve" anybody's "wrath"? Do you really want to condemn everyone? Does that match your moral values? You can even ask how many of these hopeful to "do something" actually didn't do anything exactly because they tried to use the given site instead of, like, approach somebody who they knew in the physical world and who would respond, so maybe even the site existence was a "net positive" considering the happened and "intended" number of "immoral" acts?
- brillenfux 11y ago
  sshhh! We want to feel morally superior!
- zajd 11y ago
  I think saying "it's hard to feel bad for" is a far cry from "condemning everyone". This is a lot of words to try to absolve the members of a site explicitly about cheating on your partner of any wrongdoing.
  - acqq 11y ago
    Do you have any proof that even more than 50% "cheated"? I gave you arguments that it can be estimated that maybe one in 30 actually did cheat? Why do you want to condemn (edit: the more correct word were "accuse," I agree, but you did write that the given arguments don't "absolve" them, which implies that you've already found them "guilty") 29 of 30 people for actually doing nothing, most of them, according to their own data, not even being in relation?
balls187 11y ago
A couple things: 1. Not all users of the site were married/in a relationship. 2. Signing up for a site like this isn't an admission of wanting to commit adultery. 3. There is/was no email verification, so anyone can sign up using any email address they choose. 4. Not all users of this site were in monogamous relationships i.e. swingers. I don't condone AM's business model, but there are many details that aren't known that simply having ones email in the database doesn't equate to actually hurting others.
meritt 11y ago
Individually attacking and shaming people for actions which simply conflict with your personal worldview is really fucked up.
- rjurney 11y ago
  Wait, who did that? Certainly not me. You mean the attackers?
untog 11y ago
You don't have to feel bad for the victims - what they did was immoral, after all. But it wasn't illegal. And if we start cheering for moral brigades to leak data about perfectly legal actions, things get dark quickly. Imagine a patient list for an abortion clinic. Now, I don't think abortion is immoral. But plenty of people do. And you can bet they'd absolutely leak that information, which could also ruin lives. Basically, this is not a great precedent to set.
- acqq 11y ago
  > victims - what they did was immoral, after all Can you really say that? See my other post here for questions.
  - untog 11y ago
    Well, perhaps. As you said in your other post: Do you still consider all these poor dastards as the big "sinners?" This is exactly the problem - maybe I think they are. Maybe you don't. Maybe someone else thinks anyone that did so much as load up the web site deserves to go to hell. But that's why making judgements about leaking based on your personal morals is bad, bad, bad.
- DangerousPie 11y ago
  This actually happened: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/13/bpas-hacker-james-jeffery-jailed http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/13/bpas-hacker-jam...
- skissane 11y ago
  Adultery is a crime and/or a tort in many jurisdictions worldwide. And I'm not just talking about places like Saudi Arabia - it's a crime in 21 US states, including New York and Massachusetts. Did Ashley Madison take any efforts to prevent access from jurisdictions where adultery is illegal? I doubt it. I'm not defending the data leak. It is criminal, and two wrongs don't make a right. But you can't compare an abortion clinic, operating in a jurisdiction in which abortion is completely legal, to an organisation seeking to facilitate what is criminal and/or tortious behaviour in many of the jurisdictions in which it chooses to operate.
jasonlotito 11y ago
> Its hard to feel too bad for the victims of these attacks That's only if you assume the victims are people with membership on the site. Think about the people that might have moved on, reconciled, or otherwise have already dealt with it. The people that might only be related. Imagine being the wife or husband of someone on this site, and having already dealt with this in private. Now suddenly it's out there for everyone to see. Your privacy has now been violated. Now you have to deal with this all over again. Imagine being the child of one of these members. Now you have to deal with the stigma of that hanging over your head. Being teased and mocked. I can't imagine not feeling bad for the victims of this attack, and I hope the perpetrators are caught. Their actions were reckless, and will hurt a lot of people who were not even involved.

Its hard to feel too bad for the victims of these attacks, given that their behavior hurts others. Oh wow I think I'm getting old.

by rjurney 11y ago

Its hard to feel too bad for the victims of these attacks, given that their behavior hurts others. Oh wow I think I'm getting old.

DarkTree 11y ago

Yeah, you certainly don't have to feel bad for the victims, but we should all question whether the hackers are producing an overall net positive effect.

xlm1717 11y ago
Well, if you believe the hackers' motivation for doing this, I don't think it's about producing an overall net positive effect at all, just righting some perceived wrongs. The perceived wrongs are not that AshleyMadison enabled married people to cheat on their spouses. What the hackers have said was their motivation is that AshleyMadison has lied to their users about the userbase, which is supposedly 90+% male, most of which have likely not engaged in an affair since most of the accounts they would interact with are supposedly fake. I don't think a net positive effect can come from this.

cli 11y ago

Note that about 40% of those accounts state that they are single. http://dadaviz.com/s/ashley-madison-revealed http://dadaviz.com/s/ashley-madison-revealed

nfoz 11y ago
Do you think it's ethically appropriate to look at the leaked data? Do you think it's ethically appropriate to analyze the leaked data, and publish those analyses for personal gain (which is what this site did afaict) Do you think it's ethically appropriate to read about analyses performed on the leaked data by the above? I honestly don't know how I feel myself! Very curious what other people think about this.
- Kalium 11y ago
  In security, there's often no choice but to rely on leaked data. There is generally no other source of things like password hashes reflecting real-world user passwords. So the question then becomes "Is it ethically appropriate to perform security research that requires realistic data at all?". With the caveat that blackhats can and will do research and use the results privately no matter what the rest of us do. What do you think?
- kinghajj 11y ago
  IMHO, the ethics are similar to the use of data obtained by German/Japanese scientists during WWII: the violation is on the persons who directly acquire the information; but, once obtained, those who receive it indirectly aren't ethically liable.
- gordjw 11y ago
  While I won't be downloading the data to my own server, I have no issue with others analysing it nor with reading analyses by those folks. Especially ones like this one, which is essentially anonymous. As long as the action stops at analysis, and doesn't provide tools for others to easily go further, then that seems fine to me.
biomechanica 11y ago
I'm not so sure people really give a damn about that.
rjurney 11y ago
In that case, who cares if their email is leaked?

acqq 11y ago

There is an older discussion on HN on these topics. Think again what the site really was: probably 95% of visitors were men. That means that maybe 18 from 20 didn't find a "match"? Moreover, somebody mentioned that there were fake female profiles. Reduce the number of successful "matches." Most of the visitors probably didn't do anything. "But they intended!" can somebody say "and that is enough." Well then think again. How many weren't actually in relation but expected to get the "match" easier on the site where potential (not actual!) members aren't prepared to the long-term bind to the "matched" partner. Etc. Do you still consider all these poor dastards as the big "sinners?" Which percentage of the persons on the lists "deserve" anybody's "wrath"? Do you really want to condemn everyone? Does that match your moral values? You can even ask how many of these hopeful to "do something" actually didn't do anything exactly because they tried to use the given site instead of, like, approach somebody who they knew in the physical world and who would respond, so maybe even the site existence was a "net positive" considering the happened and "intended" number of "immoral" acts?

brillenfux 11y ago
sshhh! We want to feel morally superior!
zajd 11y ago
I think saying "it's hard to feel bad for" is a far cry from "condemning everyone". This is a lot of words to try to absolve the members of a site explicitly about cheating on your partner of any wrongdoing.
- acqq 11y ago
  Do you have any proof that even more than 50% "cheated"? I gave you arguments that it can be estimated that maybe one in 30 actually did cheat? Why do you want to condemn (edit: the more correct word were "accuse," I agree, but you did write that the given arguments don't "absolve" them, which implies that you've already found them "guilty") 29 of 30 people for actually doing nothing, most of them, according to their own data, not even being in relation?

balls187 11y ago

A couple things: 1. Not all users of the site were married/in a relationship. 2. Signing up for a site like this isn't an admission of wanting to commit adultery. 3. There is/was no email verification, so anyone can sign up using any email address they choose. 4. Not all users of this site were in monogamous relationships i.e. swingers. I don't condone AM's business model, but there are many details that aren't known that simply having ones email in the database doesn't equate to actually hurting others.

meritt 11y ago

Individually attacking and shaming people for actions which simply conflict with your personal worldview is really fucked up.

rjurney 11y ago
Wait, who did that? Certainly not me. You mean the attackers?

untog 11y ago

You don't have to feel bad for the victims - what they did was immoral, after all. But it wasn't illegal. And if we start cheering for moral brigades to leak data about perfectly legal actions, things get dark quickly. Imagine a patient list for an abortion clinic. Now, I don't think abortion is immoral. But plenty of people do. And you can bet they'd absolutely leak that information, which could also ruin lives. Basically, this is not a great precedent to set.

acqq 11y ago
> victims - what they did was immoral, after all Can you really say that? See my other post here for questions.
- untog 11y ago
  Well, perhaps. As you said in your other post: Do you still consider all these poor dastards as the big "sinners?" This is exactly the problem - maybe I think they are. Maybe you don't. Maybe someone else thinks anyone that did so much as load up the web site deserves to go to hell. But that's why making judgements about leaking based on your personal morals is bad, bad, bad.
DangerousPie 11y ago
This actually happened: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/13/bpas-hacker-james-jeffery-jailed http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/13/bpas-hacker-jam...
skissane 11y ago
Adultery is a crime and/or a tort in many jurisdictions worldwide. And I'm not just talking about places like Saudi Arabia - it's a crime in 21 US states, including New York and Massachusetts. Did Ashley Madison take any efforts to prevent access from jurisdictions where adultery is illegal? I doubt it. I'm not defending the data leak. It is criminal, and two wrongs don't make a right. But you can't compare an abortion clinic, operating in a jurisdiction in which abortion is completely legal, to an organisation seeking to facilitate what is criminal and/or tortious behaviour in many of the jurisdictions in which it chooses to operate.

jasonlotito 11y ago

> Its hard to feel too bad for the victims of these attacks That's only if you assume the victims are people with membership on the site. Think about the people that might have moved on, reconciled, or otherwise have already dealt with it. The people that might only be related. Imagine being the wife or husband of someone on this site, and having already dealt with this in private. Now suddenly it's out there for everyone to see. Your privacy has now been violated. Now you have to deal with this all over again. Imagine being the child of one of these members. Now you have to deal with the stigma of that hanging over your head. Being teased and mocked. I can't imagine not feeling bad for the victims of this attack, and I hope the perpetrators are caught. Their actions were reckless, and will hurt a lot of people who were not even involved.