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Comment by BorRagnarok | Hacker News Reader

Great article, but for the Iran smearing. Come on zdnet, you know better. Out of the thousands of ip addresses related to this attack, including a command and control center etc, whilst knowing that an attack from a VPN in Iran does in no way prove that the attacker is indeed from Iran or even Iranian, still you managed to insert a whole paragraph titled "Attacks carried out from Iranian server" in there, even though the researcher says the ip only "appears" to be from Iran, and he describes one (1!) attack from that ip. This wasn't even the command-and-control server.

And that 14-year old is living in Europe, not Iran.

Please leave the propaganda out of your tech news, zdnet.

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Hey,

I'm the ZDNet reporter who wrote the story.

What in God's green earth are you talking about?

The article says the hacker's server is rented from an Iranian company. And yes, despite your ignorant claims, the IP address is the C2 server.

What imagined propaganda are you talking about?

Regardless of the importance of the Iranian IP to the operation, it is of very little significance to the story. Mentioning it only really serves to act as clickbait for people who don’t understand that it’s possible to stand up a server anywhere in a few minutes, and who are predisposed to think that an Iranian IP makes everything extra ominous.

The Iranian IP is important because it means its unlikely that we'll ever get any data from the server. If it was in the US or EU, its much more likely we could subpoena it and figure out more about whats going on.

I read the article a few times and I don't think there is any anti-Iran sentiment in it at all.

Like I said, the 14 yo lives and originates in Europe. Cashdollar told so. Yet you fail to mention that and, despite the whole world knowing how explosive the political situation between the US (where YOU originate) and Iran is at the moment, you selective only mention Iran and no other country.

So yeah, factually correct maybe, but very biased by selective editing. That's textbook propaganda. If you don't see that you're part of it.

Interesting that you interrupted it in this way. Maybe that speaks more of your own biases than it does of those in the HN community? :)

Anyway, my immediate thought (before the article got to the teen) was that this attack might have be spillover from an attack by the US on Iranian systems. Or at least an hint at how exposed Iran's digital infrastructure might be to future attack from the US in light of recent events. Or maybe how this will get Iran to tighten up it's digital infrastructure before such an attack from the US could happen.

I also immediately didn't think that the origin of Cashdollar's attack had anything to do with the origin of the creator or perpetrator.

The article mentions it is a VPS server owned by a company operating out of Iran.

But maybe like me they turn on a VPN and are now operating out of "China" or "Turkey" or, gasp, "San Francisco".

I think SF would be a good look to potential investors.

> interrupted

Probably just a typo but in case not: interpreted.

We've always been at war with Eurasia!

Yes, always!

I thought we were always at war with Eastasia?

The Party would like a word with you.

Maybe so, but please don't post unsubstantive comments here.

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