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Starting on page 24, 1) Located the first reference to "silk road" on the internet. You can find this yourself on Google: "silk road" site:shroomery.org Date r
by AJ007 13y ago
Starting on page 24,
1) Located the first reference to "silk road" on the internet. You can find this yourself on Google:
"silk road" site:shroomery.org Date range: Jan 1,2011 - Jan 31,2011 *
2) The same username, "altoid", showed up on a bitcointalk days later.
3) Later in 2011 "altoid" made a post on bitcointalk with his email address, containing his real name, in it:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=47811.msg568744#msg568744 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=47811.msg568744#msg5...
If you search the name on Google it doesn't show up, but if you look at the user's page you can see it in his posts.
That seems like more than enough for a warrant for this individual. Everything after that should be easy.
I've used Google before to locate when a particular word or phrase first appeared. Kind of surprising someone didn't figure this one out quicker.
* Obviously this is a common word, so either adding other keywords with it would be likely.
- leokun 13y agoThat's not enough for a warrant. No way, I don't believe it.
- bcrescimanno 13y agoAlone, no. Read the 10 pages of corroborating evidence following these initial steps and there's definitely enough for a warrant.
- nazgulnarsil 13y agoadorable.
- rollo_tommasi 13y agoIt is definitely enough to have CBP flag any packages crossing the border that are associated with that name, for which no warrant is required. After that, well, I'm no lawyer, but I think intercepting a package full of fake IDs is enough to justify a broader criminal investigation.
- mpyne 13y agoA warrant for search and seizure of his computers and everything in his apartment? Probably not. A warrant to keep "pulling the string", issuing subpoenas, and compelling production of evidence from those who might have it? Absolutely!
- AJ007 13y agoWhat is the cut off for using pseudonyms on obtaining a warrant? I assumed bitcointalk had a small member base when "altoid" joined. A quick look at their tables show 3,694 total new registered users through January 2011. "altoid" registered on shroomery on January 27th 2011 and the "altoid" who revealed his name publicly registered on bitcointalk on January 29th 2011.
- tedks 13y agoIt's definitely enough to ask Google, and possibly his bank or credit card company (to see if he bought any servers recently).
- mcosta 13y ago> 3) Later in 2011 "altoid" made a post on bitcointalk with his email address, containing his real name, in it: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=47811.msg568744#msg5.. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=47811.msg568744#msg5.... If you search the name on Google it doesn't show up, but if you look at the user's page you can see it in his posts. And a few post below someone says: > I'm interested Ross Spy film discretion here.
- zaroth 13y agoUmm... that reply was posted TODAY, not back in October 2011.
- pyre 13y agoTo be fair, someone back in October 2011 could have made that comment too, as his name was in the email address that he gave.
- fnordfnordfnord 13y ago>And a few post below someone says: >> I'm interested Ross >Spy film discretion here. That post was made today.
- rayiner 13y agoFrom the GP: "If that's the case, it betrays a level of capability that ought to be frightening for the operators of other anonymous Tor services." Google searches and reading some public forum threads... Staggering sophistication!
- davmre 13y agoThe Google searches give a hint at DPR's identity. They don't give you the location of the actual Silk Road server. Obviously there's lots of ways that guessing DPR's identity might allow someone with the FBI's resources to unmask the Silk Road server, though I don't know enough to know whether the forum post on its own would be considered sufficient evidence for a warrant to bug all of Ross Ulbricht's online activities. A lot of the more damning evidence for Ross Ulbricht as DPR (IP logs, the connection to the counterfeit documents, hostname of his personal machine, etc) seems to come from forensics on the captured server image. Analysis of Tor traffic doesn't seem like an implausible hypothesis, especially because that's a capability we'd be expecting the FBI/NSA to be developing anyway.
- zaroth 13y agoSeems likely to me that NSA found the server and imaged it. FBI's job was pretty easy after that. Someone asking for help on the bitcointalk forum for a new venture? Happens almost daily. Someone asking a question on SO about how to access Tor? Ditto. You don't discover who "Dread Pirate Roberts" is from this. But you do discover these types of things pretty easily AFTER the NSA tells you who DPR is.
- jawr 13y agoReminds me of the recent South Park episode on the NSA/public privacy.
- dlss 13y agoThis does seem plausible, so I almost don't think this is worth mentioning, but don't forget about "parallel construction". Having the world believe they can't reverse Tor would clearly be more valuable than having the world believe they can. Remember that Tor explicitly doesn't protect against a global passive adversary.
- pyre 13y agoWe don't know that any "parallel construction" is at work here. It seems like most of the information stemmed from the discovery of the Silk Road web server, and I haven't seen how they were able to determine that. If this goes to trial, then the FBI will have to say how it got that information (assuming he has a competent defense team).
- mculp 13y agoThe point of parallel construction is that we don't know that it's at work.
- pyre 13y agoIf they used parallel construction, then why didn't they list how they got the information about the location/IP of the Silk Road webserver? I would assume that they would have ParallelConstruction'd a reasonable way for them to have obtained that information, no?
- hisabness 13y agois there anyway to prove that the post in the forum occurred when alleged?