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> They insisted I never talk to any LEO Nothing wrong with this ... >PTR records, Enabling Spam Doesn't say why that's illegal. At best it says they had cust

by ikeboy 7y ago

> They insisted I never talk to any LEO Nothing wrong with this ... >PTR records, Enabling Spam Doesn't say why that's illegal. At best it says they had customers that broke the law. >Often both the CEO and Vice President would talk openly about how one of our clients was violating the TOS of several companies. Not criminal even for the client, at least assuming the HiQ v Linkedin case is upheld. And not illegal for the company. Maybe civil liability under tortious interference? Pretty high bar there, though. And that's all assuming there's an actual ToS - the one example given is of Google search results. Manipulating your own website in the hopes Google treats it favorably can't be seen as violating any agreed ToS. The stuff Micfo was accused of in court, and the stuff OP is claiming are criminal acts, are disjoint.

ghostbrainalpha 7y ago
>At best it says they had customers that broke the law. Did you see the part at the top where the CEO admitted to being all of those "customers"? They were playing a shell game, and while this guy didn't do the criminal activities he definitely was working for the "legitimate front end" of a larger criminal organization.
- ikeboy 7y ago
  I read the entire post. Can you please quote the part you're referring to?
  - ghostbrainalpha 7y ago
    "Within a week I was convinced Micfo encompassed more than just Micfo, but a handful of shell companies: This was later proved to be true when the CEO(Amir), admitted in the ARIN(American Registry for Internet Numbers) trial, he was really behind these entities."
    - ikeboy 7y ago
      As far as I can tell, those shell companies were to get additional IP addresses out of ARIN. It's not been alleged that they were customers of Micfo running spamming etc services, by anyone except you.
      - ajross 7y ago
        And the author. But your claim was that this was unrelated to the trial. The response was that, no, it actually corroborated the core allegation in the Micfo case. It's true that it alleges other stuff. That doesn't make the IP fraud point somehow not corroboration.
        ikeboy 7y ago
        The author does not allege that. >But your claim was that this was unrelated to the trial. The response was that, no, it actually corroborated the core allegation in the Micfo case. Now you're misreading both OP and the response to my comment. ghostbrainalpha claimed that the OP says the CEO was the same as the customers that were allegedly committing crimes like spamming. The OP does not say this. >That doesn't make the IP fraud point somehow not corroboration. OP never mentions this as one of the crimes he's listing. He lists: 1. Mishandling of warrants 2. Child endangerment 3. Enabling spamming 4. Enabling ToS violations None of the things OP says are crimes are actually illegal, and none of them were at issue during the trial. That's what I pointed out.
        ajross 7y ago
        I'm sorry, you've completely lost me. The core allegation in the Micfo case is that the company fraudulently obtained 800k IP addresses from ARIN using fake companies. The author of this post corroborates handling large quantities of the the PTR record changes for these companies in exactly the manner described at trial. I mean, this is quite clearly related behavior. And yet you're all like "I can't believe anyone thinks this is related!" based on the fact that some other stuff alleged (which seems reasonably credible to me, and also plausibly illegal if you infer some context) wasn't part of the trial. But... so what? (Also: I don't understand why you're saying Child Endangerment isn't "actually illegal", it's literally a term of art in the field used in statutes all across the US! Obviously that's not proof of a crime here, but... no, you're wrong, "child endangerment" is an actual crime.)
- busterarm 7y ago
  Even if you take the OP at face value, they're an unreliable narrator at best. They have questionable character and moral standards by their own admission. That's before even considering the effects of their mental illness. I would never hire this "perpetually unemployed" person. Everything they say points to something being off.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - saber6 7y ago
    Flipside: This criminal enterprise spotted those same exact attributes, but the mitigating factor was technical competence and submissiveness. And if it came to be where they thought it would never end up (the situation today), someone would discredit them as crazy, given their background.
    - busterarm 7y ago
      Absolutely they did. I'm not discounting OP's story, I'm basically suggesting exactly what you're saying. I've seen a similar scenario play out before with another spammer and the kind of people he hired.
      - saber6 7y ago
        Gotcha. I misunderstood - I thought you were saying they were crazy and not to believe them etc.
- kevin_thibedeau 7y ago
  So 1%'ers can use shell companies to get what they want, but ordinary corporations can't use their free speech rights to spend money for the same?
blincoln 7y ago
>> They insisted I never talk to any LEO > Nothing wrong with this ... Depending on where they're located, failure to report certain types of crime to law enforcement may itself be a crime.
- hrktb 7y ago
  Reporting the issues to the legal department, which then deals with it could be a ways around this. For blatant issues (i.e. there's a dead body) you'd still be expected to act on your own, but on any greyer area you'd be covered.
- dannyw 7y ago
  In many, if not most companies, taking legal matters into your own hands without involving your company’s legal team will surely get you reprimanded if not fired. Just like how you would get fired if you sent out a legal demand letter to another company without legal being in the loop. Law enforcement is no different: they are not your friend.
  - n0rbwah 7y ago
    Your employer isn't your friend either and most of them will gladly throw you under the law enforcement bus if it comes to that.
    - kbenson 7y ago
      You employer isn't your friend, but there are aligned incentives when it comes to the business continuity and your continued employment as affected by general business health (even if not necessarily aligned when it comes to your benefits and salary). Law enforcement doesn't even have that aligned incentive. You might say you are aligned in that you want the law to be followed, but their incentive is more along the lines of making sure they bring in and prosecute cases. If the only way to make the case work is to throw the company that reported it (and by extension, its employees) into the grinder because that's all they think they can successfully do, then that's likely what they'll do.

by ikeboy 7y ago

ghostbrainalpha 7y ago

>At best it says they had customers that broke the law. Did you see the part at the top where the CEO admitted to being all of those "customers"? They were playing a shell game, and while this guy didn't do the criminal activities he definitely was working for the "legitimate front end" of a larger criminal organization.

ikeboy 7y ago
I read the entire post. Can you please quote the part you're referring to?
- ghostbrainalpha 7y ago
  "Within a week I was convinced Micfo encompassed more than just Micfo, but a handful of shell companies: This was later proved to be true when the CEO(Amir), admitted in the ARIN(American Registry for Internet Numbers) trial, he was really behind these entities."
  - ikeboy 7y ago
    As far as I can tell, those shell companies were to get additional IP addresses out of ARIN. It's not been alleged that they were customers of Micfo running spamming etc services, by anyone except you.
    - ajross 7y ago
      And the author. But your claim was that this was unrelated to the trial. The response was that, no, it actually corroborated the core allegation in the Micfo case. It's true that it alleges other stuff. That doesn't make the IP fraud point somehow not corroboration.
      - ikeboy 7y ago
        The author does not allege that. >But your claim was that this was unrelated to the trial. The response was that, no, it actually corroborated the core allegation in the Micfo case. Now you're misreading both OP and the response to my comment. ghostbrainalpha claimed that the OP says the CEO was the same as the customers that were allegedly committing crimes like spamming. The OP does not say this. >That doesn't make the IP fraud point somehow not corroboration. OP never mentions this as one of the crimes he's listing. He lists: 1. Mishandling of warrants 2. Child endangerment 3. Enabling spamming 4. Enabling ToS violations None of the things OP says are crimes are actually illegal, and none of them were at issue during the trial. That's what I pointed out.
        ajross 7y ago
        I'm sorry, you've completely lost me. The core allegation in the Micfo case is that the company fraudulently obtained 800k IP addresses from ARIN using fake companies. The author of this post corroborates handling large quantities of the the PTR record changes for these companies in exactly the manner described at trial. I mean, this is quite clearly related behavior. And yet you're all like "I can't believe anyone thinks this is related!" based on the fact that some other stuff alleged (which seems reasonably credible to me, and also plausibly illegal if you infer some context) wasn't part of the trial. But... so what? (Also: I don't understand why you're saying Child Endangerment isn't "actually illegal", it's literally a term of art in the field used in statutes all across the US! Obviously that's not proof of a crime here, but... no, you're wrong, "child endangerment" is an actual crime.)
busterarm 7y ago
Even if you take the OP at face value, they're an unreliable narrator at best. They have questionable character and moral standards by their own admission. That's before even considering the effects of their mental illness. I would never hire this "perpetually unemployed" person. Everything they say points to something being off.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- saber6 7y ago
  Flipside: This criminal enterprise spotted those same exact attributes, but the mitigating factor was technical competence and submissiveness. And if it came to be where they thought it would never end up (the situation today), someone would discredit them as crazy, given their background.
  - busterarm 7y ago
    Absolutely they did. I'm not discounting OP's story, I'm basically suggesting exactly what you're saying. I've seen a similar scenario play out before with another spammer and the kind of people he hired.
    - saber6 7y ago
      Gotcha. I misunderstood - I thought you were saying they were crazy and not to believe them etc.
kevin_thibedeau 7y ago
So 1%'ers can use shell companies to get what they want, but ordinary corporations can't use their free speech rights to spend money for the same?

blincoln 7y ago

>> They insisted I never talk to any LEO > Nothing wrong with this ... Depending on where they're located, failure to report certain types of crime to law enforcement may itself be a crime.

hrktb 7y ago
Reporting the issues to the legal department, which then deals with it could be a ways around this. For blatant issues (i.e. there's a dead body) you'd still be expected to act on your own, but on any greyer area you'd be covered.
dannyw 7y ago
In many, if not most companies, taking legal matters into your own hands without involving your company’s legal team will surely get you reprimanded if not fired. Just like how you would get fired if you sent out a legal demand letter to another company without legal being in the loop. Law enforcement is no different: they are not your friend.
- n0rbwah 7y ago
  Your employer isn't your friend either and most of them will gladly throw you under the law enforcement bus if it comes to that.
  - kbenson 7y ago
    You employer isn't your friend, but there are aligned incentives when it comes to the business continuity and your continued employment as affected by general business health (even if not necessarily aligned when it comes to your benefits and salary). Law enforcement doesn't even have that aligned incentive. You might say you are aligned in that you want the law to be followed, but their incentive is more along the lines of making sure they bring in and prosecute cases. If the only way to make the case work is to throw the company that reported it (and by extension, its employees) into the grinder because that's all they think they can successfully do, then that's likely what they'll do.