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The NSA's logs will show exactly where it came from. I don't think they will let us know, as it could also be a False flag cyber attack to push a cyberwar again

The NSA's logs will show exactly where it came from. I don't think they will let us know, as it could also be a False flag cyber attack to push a cyberwar against NK, Russia or Iran. A strategy that is so common these days.

wybiral 8y ago
Or it could have been cyber criminals. There's no indication it's nation state APT or anything. Nice try with the spin there though ;)
tptacek 8y ago
So common that there is not one reliably documented case of it ever happening.
- alsetmusic 8y ago
  > So common that there is not one reliably documented case of it ever happening. Not exactly full of examples up to this very minute, but the history of false flag operations is long and well documented. I see no reason to think that it isn’t in the playbook for modern world powers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag
  - wybiral 8y ago
    But it's excessive to jump to that conclusion so early in situations like this without evidence that it's even a nation state or that it's not a foreign power if it is.
  - orf 8y ago
    Now here is an actual example of a very, very common strategy > Hyperbolic statement to push a narrative > "Please back that statement up" > Silence, or "Not exactly full of examples up to this very minute"
    - tedunangst 8y ago
      We know the conspiracy is real because all the evidence has been covered up.
    - fromthestart 8y ago
      https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Washtub_(Nicaragua) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Washtub_(Nicaragua... Why people continue to put such blind faith in government is beyond me.
      - tptacek 8y ago
        None of those are cyberattacks, which is what I was responding to. I'm not even a little interested in the debate about whether (for instance) Tonkin was a false flag.
      - wybiral 8y ago
        > Why people continue to put such blind faith in government is beyond me. This attitude seems really misanthropic to me. Government is people. Elected people here in the US. Yeah, there have been mistakes and there will continue to be mistakes, but this "burn it all down" response to that fact of reality isn't going to make anything better.
- rjf72 8y ago
  Just last week even the NYT [1] acknowledged a Russian false flag used for political purposes. In Roy Moore's election his opponent funded a campaign that did things such as create thousands of fake 'Russian linked' social media accounts, and then fed this 'Russian connection' to media sites, who dutifully then ran conspiracy stories against Moore. E.g. - this [2] Mother Jones article entitled, "Russian Propagandists Are Pushing for Roy Moore to Win". Roy Moore ended up losing by 2%. And to be clear this post is in no way an advocacy for Roy Moore, but's just a great extremely recent example of an unfortunately common practice that was exposed. [1] - https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jones-russia.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jon... [2] - https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/russian-propagandists-are-pushing-for-roy-moore-to-win/ https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/russian-propaga...
  - elmo2you 8y ago
    The USA has a long history of using Russia as the bogyman for its own internal/national agenda. A good question to always ask is: "cui bono". Regarding the many allegations that have been made against Russia over the years, there is a good chance that many of those have been falsified or even been made up. Particularly noteworthy is when these allegations against Russia were starting to excessively grow in number and severity. It was when Russia started to actively/openly oppose and counter the USA's plans in the Middle East, particularly in Syria. It was around the same time when American financial "advisers" and "businessmen", who have been at least instrumental in the "privatization" of Russia's state properties after the collapse of the USSR, were losing their influence (and profits) in Russia. This happened (in part) because many Russian oligarchs were given a choice by the Russian state (/Putin) to either cut their ties with their American associates and be left mostly untouched, or face persecution. Not long after this, the allegations against Russia started to snowball, with several of these American "businessmen" apparently playing key roles in them (but mostly hidden from public view). Of course, none of that proves or disproved any of the allegations made against Russia. But the timing of it all remains a peculiar coincidence at best. In the absence of hard and verifiable evidence regarding most of the allegations, it is possible that the majority of these allegations are nothing but bogyman stories, serving only the foul play withing US politics itself. I do not claim that it is, just that it is very well possible.
everdrive 8y ago
> A strategy that is so common these days. Yes, just this last month there have been multiple false flags which led to cyberwars. /s Are you a tinfoil, or a Russian?
- crocodiletears 8y ago
  Dismissing someone as a possible Russian agent has to be the laziest response to ever have become a meme online. Such paranoia prevents good-faith engagement over reconcilable differences of perspective while simultaneously allowing us to dismiss core ideological conflicts as being the result of deliberate misinformation campaigns. We live in an adversarial information environment, and in order to develop a realistic understanding of the world around us, we must be willing to begin with an assumption of good-faith, while not being naive enough to take every claim on its face. I believe they're tinfoiling. Nevertheless, false-flag operations represent a valid strategy that does not necessarily have to be attached to apocalyptic stakes, the government, or even cartoonishly shadowy cabals. Too many people too readily accuse inconvenient events or perspectives as malicious. I don't believe this was a false-flag attack. False-flag ops do exist, though we don't know exactly how common they are. The NYT recently ran a piece on a false-flag operation that was ran recently. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jones-russia.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jon...
- dang 8y ago
  We've banned this account for repeatedly violating the site guidelines. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

wybiral 8y ago

Or it could have been cyber criminals. There's no indication it's nation state APT or anything. Nice try with the spin there though ;)

tptacek 8y ago

So common that there is not one reliably documented case of it ever happening.

alsetmusic 8y ago
> So common that there is not one reliably documented case of it ever happening. Not exactly full of examples up to this very minute, but the history of false flag operations is long and well documented. I see no reason to think that it isn’t in the playbook for modern world powers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_flag
- wybiral 8y ago
  But it's excessive to jump to that conclusion so early in situations like this without evidence that it's even a nation state or that it's not a foreign power if it is.
- orf 8y ago
  Now here is an actual example of a very, very common strategy > Hyperbolic statement to push a narrative > "Please back that statement up" > Silence, or "Not exactly full of examples up to this very minute"
  - tedunangst 8y ago
    We know the conspiracy is real because all the evidence has been covered up.
  - fromthestart 8y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Washtub_(Nicaragua) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Washtub_(Nicaragua... Why people continue to put such blind faith in government is beyond me.
    - tptacek 8y ago
      None of those are cyberattacks, which is what I was responding to. I'm not even a little interested in the debate about whether (for instance) Tonkin was a false flag.
    - wybiral 8y ago
      > Why people continue to put such blind faith in government is beyond me. This attitude seems really misanthropic to me. Government is people. Elected people here in the US. Yeah, there have been mistakes and there will continue to be mistakes, but this "burn it all down" response to that fact of reality isn't going to make anything better.
rjf72 8y ago
Just last week even the NYT [1] acknowledged a Russian false flag used for political purposes. In Roy Moore's election his opponent funded a campaign that did things such as create thousands of fake 'Russian linked' social media accounts, and then fed this 'Russian connection' to media sites, who dutifully then ran conspiracy stories against Moore. E.g. - this [2] Mother Jones article entitled, "Russian Propagandists Are Pushing for Roy Moore to Win". Roy Moore ended up losing by 2%. And to be clear this post is in no way an advocacy for Roy Moore, but's just a great extremely recent example of an unfortunately common practice that was exposed. [1] - https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jones-russia.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jon... [2] - https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/russian-propagandists-are-pushing-for-roy-moore-to-win/ https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/russian-propaga...
- elmo2you 8y ago
  The USA has a long history of using Russia as the bogyman for its own internal/national agenda. A good question to always ask is: "cui bono". Regarding the many allegations that have been made against Russia over the years, there is a good chance that many of those have been falsified or even been made up. Particularly noteworthy is when these allegations against Russia were starting to excessively grow in number and severity. It was when Russia started to actively/openly oppose and counter the USA's plans in the Middle East, particularly in Syria. It was around the same time when American financial "advisers" and "businessmen", who have been at least instrumental in the "privatization" of Russia's state properties after the collapse of the USSR, were losing their influence (and profits) in Russia. This happened (in part) because many Russian oligarchs were given a choice by the Russian state (/Putin) to either cut their ties with their American associates and be left mostly untouched, or face persecution. Not long after this, the allegations against Russia started to snowball, with several of these American "businessmen" apparently playing key roles in them (but mostly hidden from public view). Of course, none of that proves or disproved any of the allegations made against Russia. But the timing of it all remains a peculiar coincidence at best. In the absence of hard and verifiable evidence regarding most of the allegations, it is possible that the majority of these allegations are nothing but bogyman stories, serving only the foul play withing US politics itself. I do not claim that it is, just that it is very well possible.

everdrive 8y ago

> A strategy that is so common these days. Yes, just this last month there have been multiple false flags which led to cyberwars. /s Are you a tinfoil, or a Russian?

crocodiletears 8y ago
Dismissing someone as a possible Russian agent has to be the laziest response to ever have become a meme online. Such paranoia prevents good-faith engagement over reconcilable differences of perspective while simultaneously allowing us to dismiss core ideological conflicts as being the result of deliberate misinformation campaigns. We live in an adversarial information environment, and in order to develop a realistic understanding of the world around us, we must be willing to begin with an assumption of good-faith, while not being naive enough to take every claim on its face. I believe they're tinfoiling. Nevertheless, false-flag operations represent a valid strategy that does not necessarily have to be attached to apocalyptic stakes, the government, or even cartoonishly shadowy cabals. Too many people too readily accuse inconvenient events or perspectives as malicious. I don't believe this was a false-flag attack. False-flag ops do exist, though we don't know exactly how common they are. The NYT recently ran a piece on a false-flag operation that was ran recently. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jones-russia.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/19/us/alabama-senate-roy-jon...
dang 8y ago
We've banned this account for repeatedly violating the site guidelines. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.