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Comment by blhack | Hacker News Reader

They can't go back now.

Before this, mostly what they were doing was small time. DOSing a website, or leaking some emails is annoying, this could potentially get people killed.

This is max level from what I'm reading so far (others' reports, I'm not touching that torrent). Homeland security info, info on ongoing investigations, etc. etc.

This might actually make lulz more dangerous. They have nothing to lose now. Before this, I'm sure in the back of the heads of whoever was doing whatever, was the thought of getting caught, and that they might go to jail for a couple of years. It doesn't matter anymore, because nothing that they can do now can make things worse for them. If [when] they get caught, they're going to prison for the rest of their lives or worse.

Basically: consequences will never be the same.

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> (others' reports, I'm not touching that torrent)

This is ridiculous, thousands of people are downloading that right now and the details will be on the news anyway.

> If [when] they get caught, they're going to prison for the rest of their lives or worse.

Only if they're from the US. In most of western Europe, maximum is 20 to 30 years and only for murders or specific crimes. For that they'd probably just get a few years.

This is ridiculous

You begrudge someone the desire to not accidentally get caught up in something they could land in prison for?

This is not the first time a torrent containing breached information has been released. No one has ever been sued for downloading the torrent, not even with the wikileaks cable. Parent's post reads a tad alarmist and dramatic in my opinion but maybe that's just me.

Allow folks their small foibles and paranoia. You'll get along better with everyone that way :)

They sure have the rights to their small foibles and paranoia just like I have the rights to call them on that.

People who download illegal torrents might be profiled and the information used against them later.

Bingo. Brinqs to mind Columbia University advising some of its students not to discuss the wikileaks cables since it could hurt their employment prospects.

http://oudaily.com/news/2010/dec/06/our-view-dont-talk-about...

That advice is entirely to do with the fact that the information was classified and the federal government doesn't want to hire people whose treatment of classified information is to post links to it on Facebook. It is a reasonable suggestion to people seeking employment in government.

What about linking to the NYT articles, those weren't any less "classified".

That information was already public. They didn't put stuff on Facebook from their own work documents. It was a pretty ridiculous thing to ask for.

And there's two ways to respond to something like that, you can go along to get along like a sheep, even though you know it's wrong, or you can go out of your way to discuss it since, if everyone's discussed it, then you can't discriminate against people for it.

Most of their targets have been US based websites, and they have probably not made a lot of good will with European leaders. I would be very surprised if there was a European country that would not extradite them.

> In most of western Europe, maximum is 20 to 30 years

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Oury_Jalloh

"In 2007, two officers were charged with causing bodily harm with fatal consequences and with involuntary manslaughter, respectively, but were acquitted in December 2008 for want of evidence."

In Western Europe, the cops can still get away with killing you if they don't believe that the penal system will properly punish you. In the UK, they kill more than one person per month:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UK_Deaths_in_Custody

Those deaths in custody seem to be mostly suicides. The case of Oury Jalloh is truly horrific but it is only one case.

I cannot see any trend or evidence for systematic executions in the data you presented. There may well be a few cases, I don’t know, but to suggest that this is common seems absolutely laughable and ridiculous, given the data you presented.

They are recorded as suicides and the doctor and coroner are police appointed ones. There is a huge amount of corruption here in the UK but it's not often talked about because the people involved are very powerful (most of them are also Masons who serve others in their group rather than the public first).

I enjoy being critical of the government as much as the next man, but I think a comment like the one you just made really deserves a [citation needed]. I'm not saying I don't believe you (there is plenty of evidence of wrongdoing by UK security forces in the past, particularly abroad), just that I'd be interested to see your sources.

Most of the deaths are due to negligence on the part of the police. The concern is that this is intentional negligence which is never properly investigated. The IPCC rarely rule against the police however the legal system are less biased, if it gets that far.

30 seconds googling...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/may/18/ukcrime.prisonsandp...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/g20-police-assault-ian-tomlinso...

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/police-def...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-13297812

Hmm... I could go on.

I'm not doubting that the British police have a history of misconduct or that people die in prisons (and I'm not trying to justify it either - it's unequivocally wrong, in my opinion).

But your assertion that "they are recorded as suicides and the doctor and coroner are police appointed ones" suggests that there is a significant cover-up operation and that it heavily involves the Freemasons. I wasn't aware of the number of police who are masons (the article you linked to was interesting) but I don't see a verifiable connection between that and any alleged cover-ups.

I'm not saying that there definitely aren't a significant number of cover-ups involving masons, just that I'm not aware of any credible evidence that suggests that it is the case. If you have some, I'd be interested in seeing it.

I have personally known two masons and they have said on many an occasion that they are obliged under their oath to do what their seniors request regardless of the law and they will be protected from prosecution in the course (which they found morally objectional). If you read up on masonic laws and history, this is normal. They're almost like the scientologists without the religious crazy stuff.

The same applies to "people's networks" such as the Oxford and Eton alumni which is ingrained in politics and the legal system in the UK.

The outcome of this is intentionally botched inquests such as the David Kelly one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_%28weapons_expert%2...

If you check the record of doctors and legal professionals involved, some of them are Oxford grads at the same time Blair was and were chosen on government recommendation. The others are professionally related to the Oxford alumni.

An independent enquiry with properly referenced sources rather than a government puppet show would do well here.

While I agree that there won't be 1000s of people prosecuted, you might not be aware of how strong the extradition agreements between the USA and most of Europe are.

If the hackers are in Europe and are caught, they'll end up in the US justice system, for example see Gary McKinnon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_McKinnon

Just change your MAC address and download it at starbucks. Problem solved.

And if they get caught in western europe they may as well have been caught in the US because of the strong extradition treaties in place.

For some reason I get the impression at least one of them is from the UK.

"DOSing a website, or leaking some emails is annoying, this could potentially get people killed."

Because the 39,000+ people already killed due to the laws the Arizona police are enforcing don't count.

Citation?

Your comment seems to imply that the police are responsible for causing the Mexican drug war, but I believe that if the Arizona police were to resign en masse and move to other states, it would probably make the situation worse, not better; the drug cartels would expand to fill the power vacuum, and they are less accountable than the police.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Drug_War

Honestly, having the mexican drug violence spill over into the border states is probably the best thing that could ever happen to this country.

> Honestly, having the mexican drug violence spill over into the border states is probably the best thing that could ever happen to this country.

I understand your point, but would tend to disagree until AZ gets a new governor. I vainly hope that the international drug war is ended in the next decade.

Only when some of the more restrictive governments (I'm looking mostly at you, US) lift the illegality of drugs.

The insane margins are not due to the fact that drugs are expensive to make, but that the product is illegal.

Prohibitions should taught us something. What we have now is Al Capone, but on a global scale.

If you left the laws in place and removed the police, that would be bad. If you reformed the laws and left the police in place, that would probably be less bad.

Speaking of adding energy to systems -- drug laws put energy... er money... into the illegal drug system. Clearly, simply making everything available from your supermarket impulse buying rack is going too far, but simply regulating drugs the way cigarettes and alcohol (including taxing them) seems like a happy medium. I know that folks smuggle cigarettes into New York to avoid taxes, but the prison system isn't overrun with them and they aren't overthrowing central-american governments.

That's an awfully specific number.

They are playing with the big boys. But really - does anyone think that direct action anarchist philosophy leads elsewhere?

They already claimed to have taken down a CIA website in June among other pretty high profile targets. I'm pretty sure they would have already been doing at least 20 years if they got caught and actually charged with everything they did even before this.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-13787229

I think that releasing actual documents rates higher than just taking down their website. Had they released internal CIA documents, you might have a point.

PSY-OP MOTHERFUCKER, CAN YOU HACK IT?!

This is NOT script kiddies going at it, this is bio-stux....

See the following:

Watch these in this order: http://vimeo.com/25118844 - brief overview great animation http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CS01Hmjv1pQ - ted talk on stux http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOwMW6agpTI&feature=youtu.... detailed analysis of stuxnet the last one is long and Bruce appears to be an arrogant prick, but it is clear - cyber war has been here for a while.

---

As I have mentioned, cyber war is here - and the legislation is lacking in its awareness - but becuase we have incompetant douches in charge of tech legislation, we will have physical war used as a metaphor to cyber warfare and thus have draconian influences from physical imprisonment being applied to digital situations.

Utterly broken.

The FBI probably already has their number and was waiting for something good to prosecute. They inject their filthy politics into their "lulz" and as far as I'm concerned they can go straight to damnation.

The press release wasn't written by them. [1] Also, "filthy politics"? Really? The best you can say of those who hold political views contrary to your own is that those views are "filthy"?

[1]http://twitter.com/#!/LulzSec/status/84075440024719361

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