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Prior to this Russian threat narrative, it was always China who was in the news doing the hacking. Our government banned some Chinese built computers for use i

Prior to this Russian threat narrative, it was always China who was in the news doing the hacking. Our government banned some Chinese built computers for use in government due to fears of builtin hardware spy devices. There is a long history of Chinese capturing and infiltrating top secret information. The state of the world didn't change. The Chinese didn't stop and Russia didn't just start. These types of things have been going on by multiple actors for a long time. Only the narrative changed due to opportunistic political advantages.

mistermann 8y ago
This is more or less my thinking on the matter as well. I'm also very skeptical (uninformed?) of the evidence that ties Russia to all of this. In this case: "Microsoft said its digital crimes unit (DCU) had acted on a court order to take control of six internet domains created by a group known variously as Strontium, Fancy Bear and APT28, which it said was associated with the Russian government. As well as the two think-tanks, other home pages had been set up to mimic the websites of the U.S. Senate and Microsoft’s own Office software suite, it added. " So, these sophisticated Hackers registered web pages under their own organization names? Is that not a bit like robbing a bank and leaving your business card behind? And in the case of the former Russian hackers in the news, I may be wrong but is it not ip addresses that were used as evidence? If so, I've always been under the impression that ip addresses can be spoofed, and so the rumor goes the CIA (at least) possesses a wide variety of cloaking techniques. https://www.eff.org/files/2016/09/22/2016.09.20_final_formatted_ip_address_white_paper.pdf https://www.eff.org/files/2016/09/22/2016.09.20_final_format... https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/ https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/ To be clear, I'm not claiming this proves (or disproves) anything one way or the other, what I am saying is that the "evidence", at least what I've seen, leaves me feeling rather skeptical. In it worries me that there aren't very many people in the skeptical centre here with me, most everyone seems to be out on the polar opposite ends of the spectrum on whether Russia did this or not. EDIT: Downvoter(s) - feel free, but if you are downvoting based on disagreement, would you mind posting a link to an article that explains the method(s) by which we can conclude definitively that all of the alleged Russian attacks were indeed committed by Russia, rather than a 3rd party posing as Russia? If my skepticism is "simply wrong", then it should be easy to simply demonstrate that. It's a pretty sad state of affairs if people can't address sincere, worthy questions, but "know" they are wrong.
- wu-ikkyu 8y ago
  I've found that any questioning of the technical details of the government narrative on this matter is met with a flood of downvotes but never an actual valid counter argument. You raise some valid points
  - mistermann 8y ago
    That makes you, me, and two other people on this site who've noticed it. There is no shortage of incredibly intelligent people on this website, far more intelligent than me no doubt, but this particular topic has quite the "elephant in the room" feel to it, no one will address it. I feel no shame in stating my biases up front - I am a small government advocate, history very clearly demonstrates that governments (including the US) have a tendency to bend the truth now and then to achieve a state in public opinion conducive to particular policy goals and actions, and because of that I am distrustful. But that said, above all I am interested in the truth. If this is in fact a simple open and shut case, as seems to be the general consensus, then so be it. But why such secrecy around the evidence demonstrating this fact? EDIT: Some good technical discussion in here for those who are interested: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16653671 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16653671
    - daxorid 8y ago
      > That makes you, me, and two other people on this site who've noticed it. No, there are plenty of people who notice it. We've learned to keep our mouths shut on the topic because the coordinated downvote attacks by FVEY sycophants on this site make attempting discussion pointless. Find a different site if you want to raise even the merest, slightest questions with CIA talking points.
      - mistermann 8y ago
        > make attempting discussion pointless. I have noticed this as well, here and elsewhere. The level of discourse on the internet, even among genuinely intelligent people, is becoming absolutely shameful imho. I used to thrash out like everyone else but am trying to learn a smarter approach: ask very specific questions, and as soon as an answerer shifts the conversation into a large, complicated narrative encompassing many additional ideas that are not part of the original question, calmly and respectfully call them on it and restate the original question. My guess on why this particular question gets only downvotes and never answers is that it is just this type of question: simple and precise. And on top of it, I suspect no one actually knows the answer - the story has been repeated ad naseum in the media for long enough that it doesn't even occur to people to ask any questions. Well surprise surprise: You're posting too fast. Please slow down. Thanks. Meanwhile, numerous other accounts have no such restriction. This error message seems incorrect.

mistermann 8y ago

This is more or less my thinking on the matter as well. I'm also very skeptical (uninformed?) of the evidence that ties Russia to all of this. In this case: "Microsoft said its digital crimes unit (DCU) had acted on a court order to take control of six internet domains created by a group known variously as Strontium, Fancy Bear and APT28, which it said was associated with the Russian government. As well as the two think-tanks, other home pages had been set up to mimic the websites of the U.S. Senate and Microsoft’s own Office software suite, it added. " So, these sophisticated Hackers registered web pages under their own organization names? Is that not a bit like robbing a bank and leaving your business card behind? And in the case of the former Russian hackers in the news, I may be wrong but is it not ip addresses that were used as evidence? If so, I've always been under the impression that ip addresses can be spoofed, and so the rumor goes the CIA (at least) possesses a wide variety of cloaking techniques. https://www.eff.org/files/2016/09/22/2016.09.20_final_formatted_ip_address_white_paper.pdf https://www.eff.org/files/2016/09/22/2016.09.20_final_format... https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/ https://wikileaks.org/ciav7p1/ To be clear, I'm not claiming this proves (or disproves) anything one way or the other, what I am saying is that the "evidence", at least what I've seen, leaves me feeling rather skeptical. In it worries me that there aren't very many people in the skeptical centre here with me, most everyone seems to be out on the polar opposite ends of the spectrum on whether Russia did this or not. EDIT: Downvoter(s) - feel free, but if you are downvoting based on disagreement, would you mind posting a link to an article that explains the method(s) by which we can conclude definitively that all of the alleged Russian attacks were indeed committed by Russia, rather than a 3rd party posing as Russia? If my skepticism is "simply wrong", then it should be easy to simply demonstrate that. It's a pretty sad state of affairs if people can't address sincere, worthy questions, but "know" they are wrong.

wu-ikkyu 8y ago
I've found that any questioning of the technical details of the government narrative on this matter is met with a flood of downvotes but never an actual valid counter argument. You raise some valid points
- mistermann 8y ago
  That makes you, me, and two other people on this site who've noticed it. There is no shortage of incredibly intelligent people on this website, far more intelligent than me no doubt, but this particular topic has quite the "elephant in the room" feel to it, no one will address it. I feel no shame in stating my biases up front - I am a small government advocate, history very clearly demonstrates that governments (including the US) have a tendency to bend the truth now and then to achieve a state in public opinion conducive to particular policy goals and actions, and because of that I am distrustful. But that said, above all I am interested in the truth. If this is in fact a simple open and shut case, as seems to be the general consensus, then so be it. But why such secrecy around the evidence demonstrating this fact? EDIT: Some good technical discussion in here for those who are interested: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16653671 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16653671
  - daxorid 8y ago
    > That makes you, me, and two other people on this site who've noticed it. No, there are plenty of people who notice it. We've learned to keep our mouths shut on the topic because the coordinated downvote attacks by FVEY sycophants on this site make attempting discussion pointless. Find a different site if you want to raise even the merest, slightest questions with CIA talking points.
    - mistermann 8y ago
      > make attempting discussion pointless. I have noticed this as well, here and elsewhere. The level of discourse on the internet, even among genuinely intelligent people, is becoming absolutely shameful imho. I used to thrash out like everyone else but am trying to learn a smarter approach: ask very specific questions, and as soon as an answerer shifts the conversation into a large, complicated narrative encompassing many additional ideas that are not part of the original question, calmly and respectfully call them on it and restate the original question. My guess on why this particular question gets only downvotes and never answers is that it is just this type of question: simple and precise. And on top of it, I suspect no one actually knows the answer - the story has been repeated ad naseum in the media for long enough that it doesn't even occur to people to ask any questions. Well surprise surprise: You're posting too fast. Please slow down. Thanks. Meanwhile, numerous other accounts have no such restriction. This error message seems incorrect.