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Interesting. Freedom Hosting had been a target of Anonymous' Operation Darknet from the beginning--they're well-known for refusing to take down exploitative si

Interesting. Freedom Hosting had been a target of Anonymous' Operation Darknet from the beginning--they're well-known for refusing to take down exploitative sites. Operation Darknet is, itself, a pretty interesting phenomenon: Anonymous hacks onion sites, then hands over user information to the FBI for investigation. Anonymous does what the FBI legally can't, and in exchange they're not prosecuted for it. I can't find the article now, but I recall reading an interview with an FBI agent in Wired or Ars or some such where he described the anons as "Internet Superheroes". (sic) That, in and of itself, is kind of curious. Curiouser? One of the original Op Darknet principals was Sabu. You may remember him as the hacker the FBI rolled and got to bust up LulzSec. Sabu was turned by the FBI on June 7th, 2011.[1] Operation Darknet began several months later, in October, 2011.[2] The obvious question, then, is this: Did the FBI use Sabu to entice Anons into attacking child porn networks, thereby evading the laws against them doing it themselves? Did they use the fact they turned a well-known hacktivist to help them deal with criminals they lacked the legal tools to go after? Is this arrest the culmination of those efforts? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabu_(hacktivist) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabu_(hacktivist) [2] http://www.informationweek.com/security/attacks/anonymous-attacks-child-pornography-webs/231901499 http://www.informationweek.com/security/attacks/anonymous-at...

znowi 13y ago
This is interesting. Isn't Anon supposed to be pro Tor and privacy? I suspect there's more to it than child pornography allegations.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- Shank 13y ago
  Anon can be any group of anonymous people, though. They aren't a singular collective - any "branch" so to speak can work on what they please. The fact that they're targeting child exploitation shows that there are really talented members of Anonymous who are willing to do the unthinkable for proper morals.
  - laumars 13y ago
    Or that there are talented members who are easily turned into government shills with a little arm twisting.
    - Shank 13y ago
      It could go either way, but the fact that FH did little to stop child exploitation being hosted on its services, and combined with what members of Anonymous said, I don't think it's being friendly to the government that's caused this.
jlgreco 13y ago
Consider the following: there is a masked hero who breaks into crackhouses and drug dens, obtains evidence that the authorities were unable to legally acquire, and then promptly hands this evidence over to authorities. The identity of the masked hero is unauditable. Can we spot the potential for abuse?
- runn1ng 13y ago
  You just described Batman.
  - AnthonyMouse 13y ago
    He also just described a team of mercenaries paid under the table by the police to break the law with impunity.
    - jlgaddis 13y ago
      > ... a team of mercenaries paid under the table by the police ... Or, you know, the police themselves.
  - trevelyan 13y ago
    Yes. Christopher Nolan made his character a villain for this very reason: http://popupchinese.com/the-dark-knight-rises.html http://popupchinese.com/the-dark-knight-rises.html No accident that the third film starts with a CIA rendition sequence (the state has devolved into a vigilante actor on the same moral level as Batman or Bane -- "no lawyers [and] no due process"). Meanwhile, we see politicians govern by lying on television ("theatricality and deception") while the justice system has become a monster under the Dent law ("a law with teeth", "based on a lie", etc.).
    - devindotcom 13y ago
      Batman being a "political liability" characterized as a villain and threat by the government and authorities is not exactly an invention of Nolan's... it's one of the central concepts to the Batman character, has been for decades.
nikcub 13y ago
I'm interested in knowing how evidence obtained via Anonymous can be submitted in a court of law. When I did evidence collecting work as part of infosec work there are very strict criteria if the evidence is going to be used in a police case[1]. We have to sign off on everything and record how we obtained the information and have been told by a number of lawyers that in no way are we allowed to break the law when collecting evidence that could be forwarded to police or prosecutors. Private detectives go through the same thing as well. If they are carrying out a private investigation for a corporate client they can't submit evidence that has been obtained illegally to be used at trial. For eg. you can submit evidence from public surveillance, but you can't submit anything that you obtain by hacking email accounts or placing a recording device on private property. From what I understand, there are very very strict rules about both gathering evidence and then chain of custody. The person who collects the evidence has to sign off on it and then be prepared to testify in a court to back up what they found. I know for certain that this applies in the USA, UK and Australia. I wonder how the FBI are able to use evidence collected by Anonymous, or if they just use that work as a basis for their own investigations which start from scratch. I can't imagine a judge would be impressed when told that key evidence was obtained via an illegal breakin perpetrated by a group of hackers. Re: Sabu. I've read everything there is on that case and don't recall a reference to his handlers prompting him on Operation Darknet. The timing also doesn't seem to work - Sabu was taken offline last March while this arrest is the culmination of a 12-month investigation, which would suggest it started around 5 months after Sabu's work with the FBI was completed. [1] Just a note - I was usually against prosecuting the defacement style hackers or guys who were just poking around for fun. In all my work i've only ever been involved in two cases where evidence I collected (IP addresses, email addresses etc.) ended up being used in an investigation and in both cases it was phishing attacks from Russia.
- DrJokepu 13y ago
  This might be a very naive question (I know nothing about these things) but is it possible that a piece of information obtained by such illegal means could be used to aid an investigation without using it as evidence in a court?
  - 13y ago
andrewfong 13y ago
If the FBI directed or encouraged Anon to illegally collect information, such information might run afoul of the Fourth Amendment if introduced as evidence in court.
- Amadou 13y ago
  Fruit of the poisonous tree. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruit_of_the_poisoned_tree https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruit_of_the_poisoned_tree
  - pseingatl 13y ago
    No. This thread refers to something different, called the "silver platter doctrine." It says that if law enforcement is the beneficiary of evidence received independently from third parties this evidence can be used in court against the perpetrator. Why? Because law enforcement did not violate any laws in gathering the evidence, though the third parties may have done so. Of course, law enforcement cannot act illegally through agents and those against whom such evidence is used claim that the third parties were not acting independently of law enforcement.
dobbsbob 13y ago
Sabu still works for the FBI I'm pretty sure. I doubt it was a grand scheme by the FBI/Snitchbu to convince them to go after Freedom Hosting in 2011 there were already plenty of moral police anons white knighting way before he showed up to rat the entire internet. Remember, anybody can call themselves anonymous and attempt to raise a personal electronic army to assist them in whatever causes they're promoting. Not difficult to create pastebins, spam your call to arms in the usual places and contact the media. There's no real info about the bust in the press, so I'm going to assume it was simple social engineering and payment tracking "Hey, I'll pay you $30k to set up private hosting <make up excuse not to use bitcoins> and I need it asap". I don't know the details but media making FH out ot be an illegal porn factory or something. All I know of it is that it was free hosting with no rules, and hosted hackbb plus dozens of other forums none of them kiddy diddler related. The one's that were got hacked and defaced repeatedly

znowi 13y ago

This is interesting. Isn't Anon supposed to be pro Tor and privacy? I suspect there's more to it than child pornography allegations.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
Shank 13y ago
Anon can be any group of anonymous people, though. They aren't a singular collective - any "branch" so to speak can work on what they please. The fact that they're targeting child exploitation shows that there are really talented members of Anonymous who are willing to do the unthinkable for proper morals.
- laumars 13y ago
  Or that there are talented members who are easily turned into government shills with a little arm twisting.
  - Shank 13y ago
    It could go either way, but the fact that FH did little to stop child exploitation being hosted on its services, and combined with what members of Anonymous said, I don't think it's being friendly to the government that's caused this.

jlgreco 13y ago

Consider the following: there is a masked hero who breaks into crackhouses and drug dens, obtains evidence that the authorities were unable to legally acquire, and then promptly hands this evidence over to authorities. The identity of the masked hero is unauditable. Can we spot the potential for abuse?

runn1ng 13y ago
You just described Batman.
- AnthonyMouse 13y ago
  He also just described a team of mercenaries paid under the table by the police to break the law with impunity.
  - jlgaddis 13y ago
    > ... a team of mercenaries paid under the table by the police ... Or, you know, the police themselves.
- trevelyan 13y ago
  Yes. Christopher Nolan made his character a villain for this very reason: http://popupchinese.com/the-dark-knight-rises.html http://popupchinese.com/the-dark-knight-rises.html No accident that the third film starts with a CIA rendition sequence (the state has devolved into a vigilante actor on the same moral level as Batman or Bane -- "no lawyers [and] no due process"). Meanwhile, we see politicians govern by lying on television ("theatricality and deception") while the justice system has become a monster under the Dent law ("a law with teeth", "based on a lie", etc.).
  - devindotcom 13y ago
    Batman being a "political liability" characterized as a villain and threat by the government and authorities is not exactly an invention of Nolan's... it's one of the central concepts to the Batman character, has been for decades.

nikcub 13y ago

I'm interested in knowing how evidence obtained via Anonymous can be submitted in a court of law. When I did evidence collecting work as part of infosec work there are very strict criteria if the evidence is going to be used in a police case[1]. We have to sign off on everything and record how we obtained the information and have been told by a number of lawyers that in no way are we allowed to break the law when collecting evidence that could be forwarded to police or prosecutors. Private detectives go through the same thing as well. If they are carrying out a private investigation for a corporate client they can't submit evidence that has been obtained illegally to be used at trial. For eg. you can submit evidence from public surveillance, but you can't submit anything that you obtain by hacking email accounts or placing a recording device on private property. From what I understand, there are very very strict rules about both gathering evidence and then chain of custody. The person who collects the evidence has to sign off on it and then be prepared to testify in a court to back up what they found. I know for certain that this applies in the USA, UK and Australia. I wonder how the FBI are able to use evidence collected by Anonymous, or if they just use that work as a basis for their own investigations which start from scratch. I can't imagine a judge would be impressed when told that key evidence was obtained via an illegal breakin perpetrated by a group of hackers. Re: Sabu. I've read everything there is on that case and don't recall a reference to his handlers prompting him on Operation Darknet. The timing also doesn't seem to work - Sabu was taken offline last March while this arrest is the culmination of a 12-month investigation, which would suggest it started around 5 months after Sabu's work with the FBI was completed. [1] Just a note - I was usually against prosecuting the defacement style hackers or guys who were just poking around for fun. In all my work i've only ever been involved in two cases where evidence I collected (IP addresses, email addresses etc.) ended up being used in an investigation and in both cases it was phishing attacks from Russia.

DrJokepu 13y ago
This might be a very naive question (I know nothing about these things) but is it possible that a piece of information obtained by such illegal means could be used to aid an investigation without using it as evidence in a court?
- 13y ago

andrewfong 13y ago

If the FBI directed or encouraged Anon to illegally collect information, such information might run afoul of the Fourth Amendment if introduced as evidence in court.

Amadou 13y ago
Fruit of the poisonous tree. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruit_of_the_poisoned_tree https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruit_of_the_poisoned_tree
- pseingatl 13y ago
  No. This thread refers to something different, called the "silver platter doctrine." It says that if law enforcement is the beneficiary of evidence received independently from third parties this evidence can be used in court against the perpetrator. Why? Because law enforcement did not violate any laws in gathering the evidence, though the third parties may have done so. Of course, law enforcement cannot act illegally through agents and those against whom such evidence is used claim that the third parties were not acting independently of law enforcement.

dobbsbob 13y ago

Sabu still works for the FBI I'm pretty sure. I doubt it was a grand scheme by the FBI/Snitchbu to convince them to go after Freedom Hosting in 2011 there were already plenty of moral police anons white knighting way before he showed up to rat the entire internet. Remember, anybody can call themselves anonymous and attempt to raise a personal electronic army to assist them in whatever causes they're promoting. Not difficult to create pastebins, spam your call to arms in the usual places and contact the media. There's no real info about the bust in the press, so I'm going to assume it was simple social engineering and payment tracking "Hey, I'll pay you $30k to set up private hosting <make up excuse not to use bitcoins> and I need it asap". I don't know the details but media making FH out ot be an illegal porn factory or something. All I know of it is that it was free hosting with no rules, and hosted hackbb plus dozens of other forums none of them kiddy diddler related. The one's that were got hacked and defaced repeatedly