19 ms·

Anonymous message to NATO

184 points by d0ne 15y ago

nextparadigms 15y ago
I can't believe the Government is actually trying to defend HBGary after all that has been revealed about them. Are they doing it because they hired them to do all that? I suppose it wouldn't be much different than how they reacted in the Wikileaks case then. They'd do anything to protect themselves regardless of how ethical or unethical it is. EDIT: I also wonder if the way our democracy currently works has become obsolete. We vote for some people every 4 years and then they can basically do whatever they want, with the only repercussion being that their actions might be revealed to the press, and in some cases some scandals will be created, though rarely. If they're unlucky the people will vote for the other party on the next election. But does that truly matter if basically the parties are pretty much one and the same? I think we'll eventually need a "Liquid Democracy" (perhaps sooner than expected). A democracy where decisions can be influenced by the people a lot more often than they are now, and the people can have a much more immediate impact on a politician's career or a Government if they screw up.
- veb 15y ago
  I expected them to deny all ties with HBGary, and publicly shame them. Would've made things a lot easier...
- enra 15y ago
  > We vote for some people every 4 years and then they can basically do whatever they want That's the reason I have not voted for a while. Once I give my only vote, I cannot take it back but I'm indirectly responsible what they will do.
  - melvinram 15y ago
    By not voting, you're responsible for whoever gets elected. Silence is complicity.
    - bh42222 15y ago
      Silence is complicity. This is bad argument. What if neither candidate is remotely fit for your vote? What if due to a very ancient but rather simple system, third party candidates don't stand a chance? What if it would be far more effective to lobby than to vote if you want change? I could just as easily argue that voting legitimizes a broken system in need of radical reform.
      - nddrylliog 15y ago
        I don't know how it works in the USA, but in France, you can vote "blank". This is what you do when no candidate fits your view. It's better than abstention because it still counts in the stats (and might prevent a candidate from gaining absolute majority)
        phtrivier 15y ago
        Actually, in France, in most elections if you vote 'blank' (leaving the envelopp empty in the ballot), it will be considered the same as abstention (not showing up at all for the vote). There is a recurring debate about whether the two things should be counted differently (and if so - how). This is the kind of 'recurring debates' that we French people love - at least when discussing that we're not talking about serious issues :P
      - melvinram 15y ago
        neither candidate is remotely fit for your vote 2 part reply: 1) The neither candidate is remotely fit for your vote argument is valid but should be only be used on a rare instance. For example, in the last presidential election, the 2 final candidates may have not been perfect but it's hard to claim they were both not fit to be presidents, especially given they were both chosen among many others during the primaries, which brings me to my second point. 2) At least here in the US, there are the primaries. Usually the 2 candidates are the products of early voting. If you don't vote, they don't have to appeal to you. If you vote, they have to appeal to you. Over time, the political "market" steers towards those who vote. "People get the government they deserve" - Alexis de Toqueville
  - nicholas1987 15y ago
    Everyone should vote and participate. It's our nation's low political participation that allows politicians to be so unaccountable. If more people were politically active, involved, and educating themselves, we'd have much better politicians and laws. I blame our education system for not teaching people how important voting is.
    - sawyer 15y ago
      Negative, it's the fact that you maintain a two party system where both parties are beholden to lobbyists and financial backers. Edit: Hehe, no not you personally; I should have said "your nation." :)
      - nicholas1987 15y ago
        Me personally? I think the problems you cite are made much worse by our weak political participation. When people participate, they're forced to be somewhat aware of what's going on. By not participating they allow themselves to disconnect, which let's politicians get away with more and more. The root cause is education, if people were more educated they'd feel more empowered and more informed and be more likely to participate--with better results. I think the two party system allows people to be uninformed and just vote on a reflect. Edit: I know, I was only jesting.
    - mcphilip 15y ago
      Or maybe it's politicians' tendency toward accountability to the highest bidders' interests instead of constituents' that leads to low participation and feelings of disenfranchisement?
- zipdog 15y ago
  I think it's because the people within government who hired HBGary are living in the same bubble as the people who wrote the NATO report.
- nodata 15y ago
  Mark Thomas' book "The People's Manifesto"* suggests making political promises prior to entering elected office legally binding. * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_People%27s_Manifesto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_People%27s_Manifesto
  - anamax 15y ago
    Specifically (according to wikipedia) "Party political manifestos should be legally binding." Obama promised that his stimulus package would reduce unemployment to 8% - who goes to jail? Obama promised to increase gasoline prices 4x - who goes to jail?
    - gaius 15y ago
      Obama.
  - ChuckMcM 15y ago
    However one of the challenges here is that the information that is available to someone 'in' the office and someone 'seeking' the office is often very different. As an exemplar Obama promised to 'shut down Guantanamo' but once in office he was no doubt made aware of what that would entail and perhaps agreements that were already in place with other countries with respect to people being held there which made 'keeping' his promise impossible. (or at least keeping it would do more harm than not keeping it) There is really only one solution, and most people give up on it before trying, that is an informed electorate. A good hacktivist system for informing the electorate would be to distill the gigabytes of data that is available in the public record for easy consumption. For example create a database of every single non-classified vote in congress and the senate, for each representative maintain how they voted and links to the bills as presented. Cross connect to every admendment they have offered or voted on, every committee vote they have participated in. Every person who has ever given them or their campaign money, every organization that has ever created an advertisement for them and where they got their money. Make location based connections between visitors and their representatives. There are lots and lots of databases which are now loosely connected and hard to search and manipulate. There is a UX problem as well since most of the data bases are weird or hard to talk to. Imagine if you could go to this website, enter your zip code, and get a summary of everything your representative or senator or county supervisor or mayor or school district board member has been involved in since they were elected. You could pull out a document, and pick out the top three, five, ten or twenty questions you would need to know answers to in order to decide if you felt they were 'good' at their job. If you wanted to run against them you would have a good start at understanding their positions and you could go out and talk to the voters and ask if they agreed or disagreed with that. You don't need 'term limits' you don't need 'manifestos' you just need people to vote and to care about what their vote means. Then you will get the government you deserve (and some of us will still want to relocate to the lunar base when it opens but that is a different rant)
- cjoh 15y ago
  The problem really is procurement. If there's any thing I wish this community would understand, it's that. See -- big government contractors have things locked up. They make campaign contributions to members of congress who create regulations that make it so that they're the only ones who can compete in an open competition. At the same time, Government has effectively replaced a substantial portion of its operational employees with contractors. I've met tech teams, for instance, for all major agencies, and have yet to meet an actual programmer that works for the government, with the exception of some but very few, in the defense community. Heck, even the armed guards who control access to our federal buildings are contractors rather than civil servants. A lot of our issues revolve around procurement. Why did whitehouse.gov cost 12 Million dollars when BarackObama cost $1.2? Procurement. Recovery.gov? 18Million. Why? Only a handful giant companies were allowed to bid. Why isn't congress talking about procurement reform when they're all about budget cuts? http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/5516ba695ba741ab9f6ff35627621297 http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/55... http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/5516ba695ba741ab9f6ff35627621297 http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/55... http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/general-dynamics/4438cca4c4ae4715b1bf348629b68cc0 http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/general-dynamics/4... http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/northrop-grumman/6a2f5a216da4454198a2265b4955ff5d http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/northrop-grumman/6... It's a messed up system that makes it so that government has to spend $93 Million Dollars a year on SharePoint when, for let's say 10% of those cases, they could be spending $200/mo on BaseCamp.
  - gaius 15y ago
    A lot of our issues revolve around procurement. Why did whitehouse.gov cost 12 Million dollars when BarackObama cost $1.2? Procurement. That's a simplistic analysis. whitehouse.gov went online at a time when everything Internet-related was a lot more expensive.
    - iwwr 15y ago
      Procurement is also a factor in standardization. If you're not Microsoft or Oracle, your best bet is a standards-compliant product.
shii 15y ago
ITT: more over-eager moralfags pumping out more MS Sam voiced vids to NATO draft paper. Slactivists everywhere rejoice and begin rehashing usual pedantic arguments.
ChuckMcM 15y ago
If this isn't a hoax (and it smells like one), then I expect some folks to learn an interesting lesson. I'm not sure if these folks understand the definition of the word 'sedition' or not but they should at least look up the legal consequences of being convicted of treason. It is one thing to joke about wishing harm to a government, but once you step outside the established process for instituting change legally in the government to one where you seek to force change you will find that the 'rules of engagement' with respect to the Government's response have changed in favor of the Government. Many of those new rules have specific exemptions carved out so that the folks in charge no longer are bound by protecting your 'rights' as specified by the Constitution. From the form [1] the Justice department fills out with respect to people it is trying for treason, reasons to ask for the death penalty include: Grave risk to national security -- In the commission of the offense, the defendant knowingly created a grave risk of substantial danger to national security. And we have the Pentagon recently saying that by policy a 'cyber attack' will be considered an act of war. Grave risk of death -- In the commission of the offense, the defendant knowingly created a grave risk of death to another person. And since the military depends on its network systems to prosecute warfare they will argue an attack on these systems puts warfighters (their word for soldiers) into grave risk of death. There are even this 'bonus' modifiers for treason like: Obstruction of justice. The victim was killed in an effort by the defendant to obstruct justice, tamper with a witness or juror, or in retaliation for cooperating with authorities. Where they will argue that if some punks DDoS DoD contractor's computers in retaliation, it might result in disrupting the computers that fly the predators over a battlefield for example. However, I suspect it's a hoax. Nobody would be so stupid as to set them selves up for the kind of response this would get if it was for 'real.' [1] http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/title9/crm00076.htm http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/tit...
- d0ne 15y ago
  When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
nodata 15y ago
I can't see an awful lot to argue with there. Unless you disagree with universality.
dreamdu5t 15y ago
NATO and the US military are the ones protecting the Internet's vital infrastructure. Unfortunately, the military and NATO play a crucial role in protecting the freedoms Anonymous waxes poetic about them usurping.
- sawyer 15y ago
  That doesn't mean they have carte blanche to do what they want with it. This is like implying the police should be allowed to break the law.
- ltamake 15y ago
  Protecting it with unfair domain seizures and prosecution of torrent site owners? The Internet does not belong to the government.
  - sorbus 15y ago
    That's not NATO and the Army, that's DHS/ICE. It is entirely possible for portions of the "government" (that mythical monolithic entity) to protect the internet while other portions attempt to destroy it.
- bh42222 15y ago
  Unfortunately, the military and NATO play a crucial role in protecting the freedoms Anonymous waxes poetic about them usurping. Really? No seriously, really? Is the USSR still a threat to democracy? Or do you consider the handful of terrorist a serious threat to the very nature of our democratic society? Frankly, I don't think the terrorists have a snowball's chance in hell against us. They may occasionally launch a successful attack, but so what? Did each bombing of London bring the IRA closer defeating the British? Nope! Terrorists can't win, they can only terrorize. I think our willingness to be terrorized, and curb our freedoms in the name of safety, is the real threat to democracy. Right at this very moment, and rather atypically, the military and NATO are playing a crucial role in fighting for Libyan democracy. This would be great if they weren't simultaneously providing Bahrain with tacit approval of the incredibly brutal and bloody crushing of their democratic movement. The world's a complicated place these days and the US military and NATO have not had a real enemy since the USSR collapsed.
Apocryphon 15y ago
Anonymous is composed to various factions, many of which are probably at cross purposes of each other. I can't see them putting as much enthusiasm at challenging NATO as they did attacking Westboro or even Libya; the risks and difficulty are probably exponentially higher. That said, LulzSec is attacking the FBI now, so I suppose for all of their hacktivism, these anarchists aren't known for their reason.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
3pt14159 15y ago
The video and the text are not fully the same content. I do not understand why someone would make it look like they typed up the voice over but changed the words.
fredoliveira 15y ago
I'm quite sure I'm not the only one seeing traces of The Mentor's manifesto [1] here. "Damn kids. They're all alike". [1] http://www.phrack.org/issues.html?issue=7&id=3&mode=txt http://www.phrack.org/issues.html?issue=7&id=3&mode=...
- siphr 15y ago
  Yes I agree. I was thinking the exact same thing when I was reading it.
- JonnieCache 15y ago
  Christ, I remember reading that when I was really young, and getting told off for it. I think my dad must've just read the first few lines and freaked out. Thanks for the flashbulb memory there.
- lolfaggotnerds 15y ago
  >"Damn kids. They're all propagandized with the same anti-authoritarian outlook." Fixed.
marcamillion 15y ago
I love their signature: We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.
- grimen 15y ago
  I'm all for their movement, but that signature is like...pathethic. Feels very immature, like they had to base the movement on a statement from a Hollywood movie (...that was lame too). I hope they can focus on cause instead of appearing as products of Hollywood.
JonnieCache 15y ago
You would've thought they could've pirated a better voice synth. TBH their video editing and their propagandizing are both weak when compared to the awesomeness of the Telecomix Crypto Munitions Bureau: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UNe6U9iFXI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UNe6U9iFXI In that video they specifically call out Iran, China and France. "States will fall, undermined by cipherspace... the laws of mathematics always prevail... the oppressive laws will be destroyed..." etc etc. Jokers. This one is fun too, and a bit more specific: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1e_FYy1qMc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1e_FYy1qMc And they're nice people as well, who actually know what they're doing. Go and hit up their IRC. http://telecomix.org/ http://telecomix.org/ http://werebuild.eu/ http://werebuild.eu/
donohoe 15y ago
So come at me bro Oh dear, Anonymous needs a copyeditor
- lwat 15y ago
  http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/come-at-me-bro http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/come-at-me-bro
  - donohoe 15y ago
    I know the source. Its still a lame phrase that knocks away at their credibility
sliverstorm 15y ago
Declaring they are not a threat to NATO and throwing down the gauntlet to NATO in the same message? I am more confused than anything else.
sadfdsdfsds 15y ago
Cyberattacks have been defined as an act of war. Are the cyber-fat-pizza-eating-slobs who populate Anonymous prepared for the results of declaring war against sovereign states ?
msie 15y ago
ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS EXCEPT EUROPA. ATTEMPT NO LANDING THERE.
Roritharr 15y ago
The best comment i would be able to write was already written below the article itself: " "a campaign of misinformation against Wikileaks and it’s supporters" No apostrophe in possessive "its". We are English teachers. We are reading what you write. Expect us.2 Proofread."
tomelders 15y ago
I'm tired of corruption... no, I'm sick to the back teeth of it, and I'm angry. I wish Anonymous every success because if it were left to me, If I were the one to choose what sort of justice was to be portioned out to the people abusing the privileges we the public bestow on them, it would look an awful lot like a stick with a nail in it. They should be thankful they're going up against Anonymous, because it's understudy looks a lot more violent.
officemonkey 15y ago
The original report was not from NATO, it was from the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. It's basically a place where lawmakers from NATO countries can go pontificate and bloviate over things. If I recall correctly, it's not a consensus body and it makes no decisions for the alliance. It doesn't even have a formal tie to the North Atlantic Council. It's not the North Atlantic Council, it's not the Military Committee, it's not even the Civil Communications Planning Committee. If the suggested report were from one of those committees, then I'd be just as concerned as Anonymous.
usedtolurk 15y ago
TLDR: You can't be above the law, but we can. It's ironic and a great pity that an "organisation" which demands transparency and accountability is completely lacking in both. The most respected revolutionaries walk the walk and lead from the front.

184 points by d0ne 15y ago

I can't believe the Government is actually trying to defend HBGary after all that has been revealed about them. Are they doing it because they hired them to do all that? I suppose it wouldn't be much different than how they reacted in the Wikileaks case then. They'd do anything to protect themselves regardless of how ethical or unethical it is. EDIT: I also wonder if the way our democracy currently works has become obsolete. We vote for some people every 4 years and then they can basically do whatever they want, with the only repercussion being that their actions might be revealed to the press, and in some cases some scandals will be created, though rarely. If they're unlucky the people will vote for the other party on the next election. But does that truly matter if basically the parties are pretty much one and the same? I think we'll eventually need a "Liquid Democracy" (perhaps sooner than expected). A democracy where decisions can be influenced by the people a lot more often than they are now, and the people can have a much more immediate impact on a politician's career or a Government if they screw up.

veb 15y ago
I expected them to deny all ties with HBGary, and publicly shame them. Would've made things a lot easier...
enra 15y ago
> We vote for some people every 4 years and then they can basically do whatever they want That's the reason I have not voted for a while. Once I give my only vote, I cannot take it back but I'm indirectly responsible what they will do.
- melvinram 15y ago
  By not voting, you're responsible for whoever gets elected. Silence is complicity.
  - bh42222 15y ago
    Silence is complicity. This is bad argument. What if neither candidate is remotely fit for your vote? What if due to a very ancient but rather simple system, third party candidates don't stand a chance? What if it would be far more effective to lobby than to vote if you want change? I could just as easily argue that voting legitimizes a broken system in need of radical reform.
    - nddrylliog 15y ago
      I don't know how it works in the USA, but in France, you can vote "blank". This is what you do when no candidate fits your view. It's better than abstention because it still counts in the stats (and might prevent a candidate from gaining absolute majority)
      - phtrivier 15y ago
        Actually, in France, in most elections if you vote 'blank' (leaving the envelopp empty in the ballot), it will be considered the same as abstention (not showing up at all for the vote). There is a recurring debate about whether the two things should be counted differently (and if so - how). This is the kind of 'recurring debates' that we French people love - at least when discussing that we're not talking about serious issues :P
    - melvinram 15y ago
      neither candidate is remotely fit for your vote 2 part reply: 1) The neither candidate is remotely fit for your vote argument is valid but should be only be used on a rare instance. For example, in the last presidential election, the 2 final candidates may have not been perfect but it's hard to claim they were both not fit to be presidents, especially given they were both chosen among many others during the primaries, which brings me to my second point. 2) At least here in the US, there are the primaries. Usually the 2 candidates are the products of early voting. If you don't vote, they don't have to appeal to you. If you vote, they have to appeal to you. Over time, the political "market" steers towards those who vote. "People get the government they deserve" - Alexis de Toqueville
- nicholas1987 15y ago
  Everyone should vote and participate. It's our nation's low political participation that allows politicians to be so unaccountable. If more people were politically active, involved, and educating themselves, we'd have much better politicians and laws. I blame our education system for not teaching people how important voting is.
  - sawyer 15y ago
    Negative, it's the fact that you maintain a two party system where both parties are beholden to lobbyists and financial backers. Edit: Hehe, no not you personally; I should have said "your nation." :)
    - nicholas1987 15y ago
      Me personally? I think the problems you cite are made much worse by our weak political participation. When people participate, they're forced to be somewhat aware of what's going on. By not participating they allow themselves to disconnect, which let's politicians get away with more and more. The root cause is education, if people were more educated they'd feel more empowered and more informed and be more likely to participate--with better results. I think the two party system allows people to be uninformed and just vote on a reflect. Edit: I know, I was only jesting.
  - mcphilip 15y ago
    Or maybe it's politicians' tendency toward accountability to the highest bidders' interests instead of constituents' that leads to low participation and feelings of disenfranchisement?
zipdog 15y ago
I think it's because the people within government who hired HBGary are living in the same bubble as the people who wrote the NATO report.
nodata 15y ago
Mark Thomas' book "The People's Manifesto"* suggests making political promises prior to entering elected office legally binding. * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_People%27s_Manifesto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_People%27s_Manifesto
- anamax 15y ago
  Specifically (according to wikipedia) "Party political manifestos should be legally binding." Obama promised that his stimulus package would reduce unemployment to 8% - who goes to jail? Obama promised to increase gasoline prices 4x - who goes to jail?
  - gaius 15y ago
    Obama.
- ChuckMcM 15y ago
  However one of the challenges here is that the information that is available to someone 'in' the office and someone 'seeking' the office is often very different. As an exemplar Obama promised to 'shut down Guantanamo' but once in office he was no doubt made aware of what that would entail and perhaps agreements that were already in place with other countries with respect to people being held there which made 'keeping' his promise impossible. (or at least keeping it would do more harm than not keeping it) There is really only one solution, and most people give up on it before trying, that is an informed electorate. A good hacktivist system for informing the electorate would be to distill the gigabytes of data that is available in the public record for easy consumption. For example create a database of every single non-classified vote in congress and the senate, for each representative maintain how they voted and links to the bills as presented. Cross connect to every admendment they have offered or voted on, every committee vote they have participated in. Every person who has ever given them or their campaign money, every organization that has ever created an advertisement for them and where they got their money. Make location based connections between visitors and their representatives. There are lots and lots of databases which are now loosely connected and hard to search and manipulate. There is a UX problem as well since most of the data bases are weird or hard to talk to. Imagine if you could go to this website, enter your zip code, and get a summary of everything your representative or senator or county supervisor or mayor or school district board member has been involved in since they were elected. You could pull out a document, and pick out the top three, five, ten or twenty questions you would need to know answers to in order to decide if you felt they were 'good' at their job. If you wanted to run against them you would have a good start at understanding their positions and you could go out and talk to the voters and ask if they agreed or disagreed with that. You don't need 'term limits' you don't need 'manifestos' you just need people to vote and to care about what their vote means. Then you will get the government you deserve (and some of us will still want to relocate to the lunar base when it opens but that is a different rant)
cjoh 15y ago
The problem really is procurement. If there's any thing I wish this community would understand, it's that. See -- big government contractors have things locked up. They make campaign contributions to members of congress who create regulations that make it so that they're the only ones who can compete in an open competition. At the same time, Government has effectively replaced a substantial portion of its operational employees with contractors. I've met tech teams, for instance, for all major agencies, and have yet to meet an actual programmer that works for the government, with the exception of some but very few, in the defense community. Heck, even the armed guards who control access to our federal buildings are contractors rather than civil servants. A lot of our issues revolve around procurement. Why did whitehouse.gov cost 12 Million dollars when BarackObama cost $1.2? Procurement. Recovery.gov? 18Million. Why? Only a handful giant companies were allowed to bid. Why isn't congress talking about procurement reform when they're all about budget cuts? http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/5516ba695ba741ab9f6ff35627621297 http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/55... http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/5516ba695ba741ab9f6ff35627621297 http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/lockheed-martin/55... http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/general-dynamics/4438cca4c4ae4715b1bf348629b68cc0 http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/general-dynamics/4... http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/northrop-grumman/6a2f5a216da4454198a2265b4955ff5d http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/northrop-grumman/6... It's a messed up system that makes it so that government has to spend $93 Million Dollars a year on SharePoint when, for let's say 10% of those cases, they could be spending $200/mo on BaseCamp.
- gaius 15y ago
  A lot of our issues revolve around procurement. Why did whitehouse.gov cost 12 Million dollars when BarackObama cost $1.2? Procurement. That's a simplistic analysis. whitehouse.gov went online at a time when everything Internet-related was a lot more expensive.
  - iwwr 15y ago
    Procurement is also a factor in standardization. If you're not Microsoft or Oracle, your best bet is a standards-compliant product.

shii 15y ago

ITT: more over-eager moralfags pumping out more MS Sam voiced vids to NATO draft paper. Slactivists everywhere rejoice and begin rehashing usual pedantic arguments.

ChuckMcM 15y ago

If this isn't a hoax (and it smells like one), then I expect some folks to learn an interesting lesson. I'm not sure if these folks understand the definition of the word 'sedition' or not but they should at least look up the legal consequences of being convicted of treason. It is one thing to joke about wishing harm to a government, but once you step outside the established process for instituting change legally in the government to one where you seek to force change you will find that the 'rules of engagement' with respect to the Government's response have changed in favor of the Government. Many of those new rules have specific exemptions carved out so that the folks in charge no longer are bound by protecting your 'rights' as specified by the Constitution. From the form [1] the Justice department fills out with respect to people it is trying for treason, reasons to ask for the death penalty include: Grave risk to national security -- In the commission of the offense, the defendant knowingly created a grave risk of substantial danger to national security. And we have the Pentagon recently saying that by policy a 'cyber attack' will be considered an act of war. Grave risk of death -- In the commission of the offense, the defendant knowingly created a grave risk of death to another person. And since the military depends on its network systems to prosecute warfare they will argue an attack on these systems puts warfighters (their word for soldiers) into grave risk of death. There are even this 'bonus' modifiers for treason like: Obstruction of justice. The victim was killed in an effort by the defendant to obstruct justice, tamper with a witness or juror, or in retaliation for cooperating with authorities. Where they will argue that if some punks DDoS DoD contractor's computers in retaliation, it might result in disrupting the computers that fly the predators over a battlefield for example. However, I suspect it's a hoax. Nobody would be so stupid as to set them selves up for the kind of response this would get if it was for 'real.' [1] http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/title9/crm00076.htm http://www.justice.gov/usao/eousa/foia_reading_room/usam/tit...

d0ne 15y ago
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

nodata 15y ago

I can't see an awful lot to argue with there. Unless you disagree with universality.

dreamdu5t 15y ago

NATO and the US military are the ones protecting the Internet's vital infrastructure. Unfortunately, the military and NATO play a crucial role in protecting the freedoms Anonymous waxes poetic about them usurping.

sawyer 15y ago
That doesn't mean they have carte blanche to do what they want with it. This is like implying the police should be allowed to break the law.
ltamake 15y ago
Protecting it with unfair domain seizures and prosecution of torrent site owners? The Internet does not belong to the government.
- sorbus 15y ago
  That's not NATO and the Army, that's DHS/ICE. It is entirely possible for portions of the "government" (that mythical monolithic entity) to protect the internet while other portions attempt to destroy it.
bh42222 15y ago
Unfortunately, the military and NATO play a crucial role in protecting the freedoms Anonymous waxes poetic about them usurping. Really? No seriously, really? Is the USSR still a threat to democracy? Or do you consider the handful of terrorist a serious threat to the very nature of our democratic society? Frankly, I don't think the terrorists have a snowball's chance in hell against us. They may occasionally launch a successful attack, but so what? Did each bombing of London bring the IRA closer defeating the British? Nope! Terrorists can't win, they can only terrorize. I think our willingness to be terrorized, and curb our freedoms in the name of safety, is the real threat to democracy. Right at this very moment, and rather atypically, the military and NATO are playing a crucial role in fighting for Libyan democracy. This would be great if they weren't simultaneously providing Bahrain with tacit approval of the incredibly brutal and bloody crushing of their democratic movement. The world's a complicated place these days and the US military and NATO have not had a real enemy since the USSR collapsed.

Apocryphon 15y ago

Anonymous is composed to various factions, many of which are probably at cross purposes of each other. I can't see them putting as much enthusiasm at challenging NATO as they did attacking Westboro or even Libya; the risks and difficulty are probably exponentially higher. That said, LulzSec is attacking the FBI now, so I suppose for all of their hacktivism, these anarchists aren't known for their reason.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

3pt14159 15y ago

The video and the text are not fully the same content. I do not understand why someone would make it look like they typed up the voice over but changed the words.

fredoliveira 15y ago

I'm quite sure I'm not the only one seeing traces of The Mentor's manifesto [1] here. "Damn kids. They're all alike". [1] http://www.phrack.org/issues.html?issue=7&id=3&mode=txt http://www.phrack.org/issues.html?issue=7&id=3&mode=...

siphr 15y ago
Yes I agree. I was thinking the exact same thing when I was reading it.
JonnieCache 15y ago
Christ, I remember reading that when I was really young, and getting told off for it. I think my dad must've just read the first few lines and freaked out. Thanks for the flashbulb memory there.
lolfaggotnerds 15y ago
>"Damn kids. They're all propagandized with the same anti-authoritarian outlook." Fixed.

marcamillion 15y ago

I love their signature: We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us.

grimen 15y ago
I'm all for their movement, but that signature is like...pathethic. Feels very immature, like they had to base the movement on a statement from a Hollywood movie (...that was lame too). I hope they can focus on cause instead of appearing as products of Hollywood.

JonnieCache 15y ago

You would've thought they could've pirated a better voice synth. TBH their video editing and their propagandizing are both weak when compared to the awesomeness of the Telecomix Crypto Munitions Bureau: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UNe6U9iFXI http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UNe6U9iFXI In that video they specifically call out Iran, China and France. "States will fall, undermined by cipherspace... the laws of mathematics always prevail... the oppressive laws will be destroyed..." etc etc. Jokers. This one is fun too, and a bit more specific: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1e_FYy1qMc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1e_FYy1qMc And they're nice people as well, who actually know what they're doing. Go and hit up their IRC. http://telecomix.org/ http://telecomix.org/ http://werebuild.eu/ http://werebuild.eu/

donohoe 15y ago

So come at me bro Oh dear, Anonymous needs a copyeditor

lwat 15y ago
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/come-at-me-bro http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/come-at-me-bro
- donohoe 15y ago
  I know the source. Its still a lame phrase that knocks away at their credibility

sliverstorm 15y ago

Declaring they are not a threat to NATO and throwing down the gauntlet to NATO in the same message? I am more confused than anything else.

sadfdsdfsds 15y ago

Cyberattacks have been defined as an act of war. Are the cyber-fat-pizza-eating-slobs who populate Anonymous prepared for the results of declaring war against sovereign states ?

msie 15y ago

ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS EXCEPT EUROPA. ATTEMPT NO LANDING THERE.

Roritharr 15y ago

The best comment i would be able to write was already written below the article itself: " "a campaign of misinformation against Wikileaks and it’s supporters" No apostrophe in possessive "its". We are English teachers. We are reading what you write. Expect us.2 Proofread."

tomelders 15y ago

I'm tired of corruption... no, I'm sick to the back teeth of it, and I'm angry. I wish Anonymous every success because if it were left to me, If I were the one to choose what sort of justice was to be portioned out to the people abusing the privileges we the public bestow on them, it would look an awful lot like a stick with a nail in it. They should be thankful they're going up against Anonymous, because it's understudy looks a lot more violent.

officemonkey 15y ago

The original report was not from NATO, it was from the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. It's basically a place where lawmakers from NATO countries can go pontificate and bloviate over things. If I recall correctly, it's not a consensus body and it makes no decisions for the alliance. It doesn't even have a formal tie to the North Atlantic Council. It's not the North Atlantic Council, it's not the Military Committee, it's not even the Civil Communications Planning Committee. If the suggested report were from one of those committees, then I'd be just as concerned as Anonymous.

usedtolurk 15y ago

TLDR: You can't be above the law, but we can. It's ironic and a great pity that an "organisation" which demands transparency and accountability is completely lacking in both. The most respected revolutionaries walk the walk and lead from the front.