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Comment by cyberpunk | Hacker News Reader

I mean, this is some really low hanging fruit and I don't really expect a lot of shocking revelations to come from this.

Censorship? In Russia? Why, I never.

And it's just, OK now for us to be releasing stolen files from foreign governments ? We are not at war with Russia (yet).

I'm not really onboard with this kind of thing. Flip the switch and imagine some Russian hackers doing it to your country, you would be annoyed.

(I'm not pro-russian or anything; fuck Putin and the horse he rode in on -- I just think this is largely pointless, some script kiddie trying to show how j33t he is, and will just escalate things further for zero gain.)

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This war can be stopped by russia and russia only. Public opinion in russia is shaped and controlled by this organization. A large proportion of the population is believing the bs that this organization is providing. I think anything that can be done to undermine this organization inside of russia to shift public opinion can potentially help stop this war and I am all for it. Russia hacks other countries without regard to sovereignty of other countries, playing nice with them will do nothing but encourage them to keep being assholes.

> And it's just, OK now for us to be releasing stolen files from foreign governments ? We are not at war with Russia (yet).

There are plenty of discussions of stolen files originating from the American government (and others!) on Hacker News all the time. Wikileaks, NSA dumps etc.

https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

Why is it suddenly a bad thing when it's Russian documents?

wikileaks never publishes anything anti-russia

Wikileaks publishes everything that is material and verifiable. To claim otherwise is ridiculous - show me something that was material and verifiable, was denied publication by Wikileaks, and was later published somewhere else reputable. It would be pointless for Wikileaks to deny something because it's not like they have a monopoly on publishing.

> And it's just, OK now for us to be releasing stolen files from foreign governments ? We are not at war with Russia (yet).

Who are "us" in this context? This was released by individuals, not a entity acting for a foreign governments. Leaks happen when your security is poor. For all we know, this hack could have been done by a Ukrainian individual, who very much is at war with Russia now, would that make you feel better?

Actually it would.

> And it's just, OK now for us to be releasing stolen files from foreign governments ?

It's generally okay to release files stolen from our own government, though it is often illegal to steal them in the first place. But, yes, generally the main exceptions to that generality don't apply to foreign government files, so it's even more okay to release them.

> We are not at war with Russia (yet)

So? The New York Times wasn't at war with the United States when it published the Pentagon Papers, either.

War is 50% propaganda, regardless of how strongly we feel about our stance. This might be a historical first glimpse into how that part of the machine ticks.

With a strong emphasis on MIGHT.

> Censorship? In Russia? Why, I never.

This may be your personal reaction, and though valid according to your (and my) personal experiences, it is not necessarily the reaction of others. Some people might need direct, firsthand evidence to be swayed. And still others would never accept any evidence whatsoever.

Besides, this may reveal exactly how and where Russia censors, particularly in instances that may be unexpected. Perhaps it will even reveal their thought processes and goals.

Well, if we let our "leaders" run amok with the powers of warfare I'd expect some serious repercussions to the citizenry. "I didn't vote for him" won't get us much sympathy with our brothers and sisters elsewhere if our government is out killing people en masse.

I mean you never know unless you rifle through your enemy's dumpster, right?

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