Anonymous Austria leaks 2.8 GB Scientology Emails
pastebin.com
pastebin.com
Does anyone have any guesses about the string at the end of the announcement? Is that something Anonymous normally does?
6693b5c82009cdf9a2abf2fc80d0aeab25aa8a3a5d5d33ec24dd1c5a3038fee0b10a8460d4b3cf922ce77e2abda13ca6d3fd0c18081be3c7626587c767fb7d7bN.B.: I also updated my post to include using a tor hidden service. I thought I had included it originally.
From the responses I have read it seems that I should have been more clear that I was also taking censorship resistance into consideration.
Seeding via Tor? You need to configure Torrent client to use Tor, make sure it doesn’t leak anything (DNS lookups, publishing to DHT or tracker, some stuff on the protocol level was a problem as well). There’s nothing that comes working out of the box. Of course it’s not rocket science, it’s just a bit more work.
Hosting just via hidden service is actually worse than uploading to random locations on clearnet:
1) Still no way to do load balancing with hidden services
2) It’s usually slower anyway
3) If your server gets compromised you’re toasted, unless you use hacked servers, or buy your servers with Bitcoins or stolen CCs.
The best network for publishing that kind of leaks would be Freenet or I2P + Tahoe. But those are not nearly as popular (and secure) as Tor.
More importantly hosting via hidden service is not worse than uploading to depositfiles. Hidden services protects both the uploader's and the downloader's anonymity and it is much, much, much more resistant to censorship. I am not sure what "hosting gets breached" has to do with the discussion.
This is how some people running CP sites via Tor were caught.
This is completely tangential, but can you point me to the Tor investigations? The interaction of tor/law-enforcement is something I am extremely interested in.
Not necessarily, the CP sites were hacked using PHP vulnerabilities or something similar, not to mention your hosting provider could just get interested in your network activity for whatever reason.
> This is completely tangential, but can you point me to the Tor investigations?
Nothing I have bookmarked, sorry.
With bittorrent you need at least one seeder that is available long enough to feed the swarm (in decent time), during that time a lot of things can go wrong (if anything goes wrong when uploading to a free hosting service you just start over, nothing lost).
> With bittorrent you need at least one seeder that is available long enough to feed the swarm (in decent time), during that time a lot of things can go wrong (if anything goes wrong when uploading to a free hosting service you just start over, nothing lost).
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitTorrent_(protocol)#Web_seed...
I'm guessing that few hosting companies make that easy to do, since you often have to go through some form of queue to even get the ticket needed to download it.
Do you have to actually _wait_ for them to download?
Idk, am I alone here? Am I wrong? I'm open to contrary opinions.
Who cares? The question is whether it's wrong.
Good plan. What could possibly go wrong with it? After all, everyone capable of coercing us of anything must share our morals and ethics.
But in particular, I am especially wary of the "personal morals and ethics" of people making broad generalizations like you just did.
Fortunately, I know somebody who's perfectly entitled to enforce his personal morals right back at you. And yeah, I am aware that you could do the same thing, but you also appear to believe that to do so would make you a bad person. So it's your choice, really: Submit, Be Good, or Be Bad.
This kind of hacking is a serious felony in all OECD Annex-1 countries. That's a very different thing.
However I might change my tone if something really serious is uncovered here. I think whistle blowing is a good thing, and this seems like the next best equivalent. Of course, that is a ridiculous position to take, essentially giving any random hacker the license to read through random personal email and blow the whistle on demand.[0] So I guess that position isn't tenable, either. But I know it'd be hard to be critical of a hypothetical hack that revealed or delivered proof about illegal activities by certain groups, be it Scientology, large-scale financial stuff or neo-nazis.
A more responsible release would probably only include incriminating or otherwise extraordinary emails, preserving (sort of) the privacy of most people. But arguably that's so difficult and personally dangerous in case of large data hacks or leaks that it's equivalent of saying a responsible release isn't viable.
[0] As determined by them, but that problem applies to all kinds of whistle blowing.
Shedding a bit more light on the ethics of the action of leaking this data, the reason why a lot of people feel conflicted about the right- or wrongness of the action, is because it is perfectly acceptable from a Virtue Ethics point of view: The fact that leaking private data would be wrong in the vast majority of cases is inconsequential because the data being that of a (generally agreed upon to be) evil organisation ascertains the moral character of the actor (in some sense).
A strict moral code like the C.I. is pretty dangerous when it forces you to disclose you're hiding Jews in your attic (sorry for the "Godwin", but that's the counterexample I was taught). It's even worse if done half-assed "well obviously you don't need to take it that strict if it leads to bad things" because then you can argue your way around everything--without even having to consider "does this make me a good person?".
And from that point of view, for me, the real question to ask: Would this person (or persons) have done the same thing if the emails did not belong to Scientology or neo-nazis or similar?
I think that calling them "private" is a bit misleading here. As far as I can see, they all seem to be about Scientology business / logistics. That by itself obviously does not excuse leaking them, but (again, as far as I can see) the emails do not contain much personal information.
> It'd be much easier to fight/debate against their public image, which is easy enough, without having to resort to intrusive attacks.
I would probably agree with you if this was about any other organisation, but the CoS has a long, long history of suppressing information about them by any means, both legally and illegally. People who leave the church are routinely harassed and threatened to prevent them from talking about it. Judging from the past, they also do a lot of dirty business that, in my opinion, needs be be widely known.
Considering this, I think this might be a good thing. At the very least, I find it hard to blame the person leaking this.
> We have the warrant system in the states for a reason, and if this were to happen in court the evidence would just get tossed right out.
Even though US law probably doesn't apply here, you're almost certainly right about the legality of this. But, honestly, I'm not sure why we should care, we're not the part of the Austrian judicial system. I'm still somewhat ambivalent about the ethical status of this, but I think we should not conflate legality and morality here.
That doesn't make them not-private. My email is private no matter what the subject is.
More to the point - you seem to be saying that it's okay to read someone's email, and then just release the parts that don't contain much personal information. That is clearly shady.
Maybe you can make the case that the CoS is so evil that the normal rules for what you should/shouldn't do with someone's email account don't apply here. But you certainly can't pretend that this is anything other than leaking private information.
I don't think that this is the result of someone reading all their emails and releasing the ones without personal information (which I don't think would be okay, I'm not sure how you got that impression), but a result of everyone using @scientology.co.at email addresses.
As I said above, I do not think that the lack of personal information by itself makes releasing them okay, but I do think that the combination of the CoS being secretive and "evil" gives this particular hack some (moral, not legal) legitimacy, because it is difficult to get this information using less dodgy methods.
On the other hand, in this particular case I'm inclined to say "Fuck it, they're Scientology". But I'm aware that I'm on pretty darn thin ice, ethically speaking.
What exactly is gained by targeting an organization already famously good at playing the victim game with pointlessly malicious Internet pranks? Nothing.
[1] http://pic.pwny.biz/x/ed_at_scientology.co.at/
[2] http://pic.pwny.biz/x/buchladen_at_scientology.co.at/
[3] http://blog.esowatch.com/?p=8247
(in German, of course)
http://pic.pwny.biz.nyud.net/x/buchladen_at_scientology.co.a...
That's what I would have assumed, but many of them are actually written in (mostly hilariously bad) English for some reason. They also seem to be using quite a lot of jargon, which seems to consist entirely of English words or phrases.
First time reading CoS material? Anything in particular? LRH was an american so it is not surprising that the domain specific jargon is english...
ಠ_ಠ
E.g. Jehovah’s witnesses call their religion “the Truth” in their everyday conversations. Any kind of critical thought is equivalent then to “rejecting the Truth,” which automatically substitutes critical thinking with an emotional response.
Furthermore as others have pointed out (as well as myself in another thread) CoS has deep pockets and I imagine that serves as a decent motivation for big media to not publish the incident.
You don't have to do everything yourself and find every data problem interesting to keep within the 'spirit of HN'.
And whats with the "we are free" language, its not a cable news show. When did I ever say that anyone lacked the liberty to do something?
up until they overthrow the government and appoint L. Ron's disembodied head as ruler for life.
Would you say that these decisions are "counter to the spirit of HN"?
Of course, Paul Graham started HN mainly to have intelligent, on topic discussions about technology and startup issues. And in that sense, apart from my aside about "data scoops", I am probably posting contrary to the spirit of HN, since the bulk of this message and the one before it are just simple opinion expression, rather than anything more susbtantive. Heck, now that I think about it I'm tempted to delete them both!
[1]http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic_Research_Unit_email_... And for the record, those emails are pretty disgusting and I'm surprised and disappointed at the reaction.
This is why you need to inform yourself about what's going on in the world. At least look at things with a critical eye, and not just throw up your hands and say "Oh well, the journalists will filter the important bits for me."
By hearing the cherry-picked quotes from those e-mails, you could get the impression that they're full of fraud, but now that the dust has settled and the investigations have been made, do you really think they're disgusting?
I think this example is counter to your point. The initial media reaction gave the complete wrong impression, and the later findings that the story is nonsense went completely unreported.
Actually, you're right! I read (some of) the original 'climategate' emails, and my opinion was quite contrary to virtually every independent committee. Those scientists were dirty. And clearly so.
I guess the real upshot is that "the spirit of HN" is to check original sources for stuff you really care about. It's important to do so, just in case the "experts" get it wrong.
If Scientology is important to you, then check those emails!
Extracting the MIME attachments is pretty straight forward:
ls *.txt |xargs -n1 munpackUnfortunately, as can be seen by the bloody awful mess they make of almost any scientific or medical or technical press release, it's unwise to rely on a journalist to provide sensible analysis.
Maybe there's some great crowd-sourcing website that could do this? (A bit like the "Human Flesh Search Engine" in China, but different.)
Or perhaps as a MVP someone could just write a script that turns many words into links to a wikipedia entry?
Two wrongs don't make a right. Grow the f*ck up - stand up instead of skulking in the shadows.
This is one strange email...
I am not defending religion or Scientology.
What does this have to do with HN? We'd flag off posts about Scientology as irrelevant. So basically, this is at the top of the page as a celebration of hacking organizations nerds don't like. It's how we nerds do bullying.
And I think Scientology is probably a criminal organization.
And I don't have any evidence that Scientology is "evil" nor do I have any interest in pursuing such knowledge.
EDIT: I was just looking at Scientology's (English) Wikipedia page and came across this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Scientology_warning_leafle... . I though it would illustrate my point. Those are three government-issued leaflets with the title "Protect Our Democracy". One is on organized crime, one on Islamic terrorism and one on Scientology.
Oh for pete's sake. Go read up on Lisa McPherson and Operation Snow White. There are plenty of legitimate and documented reasons to hate Scientology, not one of which is because they hoard money.
So what? There a lots of state recognized religions, and it doesn't mean much. (The state of CA recognizes weddings performed by folks who bought their "ministership" from an advert in Rolling Stone.)
> Hell, Tom Cruise is a Scientologist.
Again - so what?
To add some real data: Over there it seems that this organization is tax-exempt, but not recognized as a church or religion. [1, found as reference on Wikipedia]:
Sensitivity to and fears of Scientology in the country remains an issue.
The Church of Scientology reported problems obtaining credit cards,
and individual Scientologists experienced discrimination in hiring.
However, Scientology leaders also noted that the Vienna Provincial
Tax Authority granted them tax-exempt, non-profit status.
1: Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, Austria http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2003/27825.htm
Again, so what? The French like Jerry Lewis. The Germans like David Hasselhoff.
There are lots of facts, but few are actually "points".
I'm not defending Scientology, but the line between "cult" and "religion" seems a bit blurry.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociological_classifications_of...
You can also think of it in terms of 1 Corinthians 13:11. Maturity, and the turning of generations, does something to an organization. Christianity began as an apocalypse cult, after all, promising hope of the afterlife for the downtrodden; it wasn't until Constantine was converted that it started to learn how to be a state religion; and not until Martin Luther and Henry VII did it learn to be just a religion. (The exile into Babylon and the dissolution of the Caliphate had similar effects on Judaism and Islam.)
In other words, they were forced to let go of their control simply because of historical circumstance. Straight through World War 2, the Vatican continued to exert a very strong influence on European nations... because the Pope was everyone's ambassador, even if he could no longer threaten excommunication with meaningful clout.
Scientology has not had these experiences. It is young and not officially descended from any known religion, so "sect" would be an incorrect term except in cases where you consider the entire whole of Judaism or Christianity a sect. It is dominated by personality cults, from the original of L. Ron Hubbard to its scheme of hooking celebrities to be spokespersons.
With that said, there may be a feedback-theory reason why these things often connect. In the case of governments, for example, bureaucracy allows you to marshal much vaster quantities of resources, especially for your military: so as we look for a positive feedback loop, the most successful governments were probably bureaucracies. (Yes, I would also classify evolution by natural selection as a feedback theory.)
It may therefore be the case that there is a competition for a limited believership and the religions which control their believers most tend to grow themselves in this competition. If you want an interesting perspective on what Anonymous is doing, it is trying to increase the cost of religious control, to the point where the feedback goes from positive to negative. If each exertion of control (however that is defined) tends to lose believers rather than gain them, then religions will either have to adapt to a policy of less-control, or else will naturally die out due to negative feedback.
In general, the Intarwebs regard Scientology as an organization that invests substantial financial and legal resources in limiting free speech on the internet. This is generally unpopular, regardless of who is doing it. The Church's status as a religious institution is largely immaterial to this perception.
[1] Very similar, actually. They claim copyright on their religious writings, and use that to sue people who release them.
curious, why aren't the testimonials of ex-members adequate substantiation ? While it was extremely difficult to get access to information critical to Scientology prior to the late 1990s, there is a tremendous amount of critical information and ex-member testimonials available today.
http://www.xenu.net/, http://www.freedomofmind.com/Info/infoDet.php?id=230, are good places to start.
http://www.forum.exscn.net/showwiki.php?title=Gerry+Armstron...
So while the hackers release the data in an anonymus manner, we can easily create a torrent. I would be surprised if one didnt already exist, actually.
He also write her with his work mail account, which should be another reason to fire him.
All the weirdness -- the bogus science, the alien mythology, the extreme secrecy and protectiveness, the level hierarchy, etc. -- is merely a side effect of that goal. The mythology, for example, is the carrot, and the secrecy is the stick; they need the mythology because they need to feed some new knowledge (even if bogus) at each level, and they need the secrecy to make that knowledge desirable in the first place, both to members and to non-members.
Sure, all religions are "weird". But most religious organizations -- generally speaking -- genuinely have their members' best interests at heart. Scientology has no such concerns.
I think that's highly dependent on whether you believe what's being preached. There's countless examples of mainstream religions exploiting their power for financial and organizational gain at the expense of individual followers. From a financial standpoint, just take a look at the Vatican City as an example of how much money has been funneled from their followers.
Look, I realize debating religion online is pretty futile, and I'm no fan of Scientology or any other religion for that matter. I do get what your saying. I also have no idea what your religious views are ... but I've had a ton of debates where people seem to be blinded by how they were brought up and can only see outward from the religious views they hold as the truth. I suppose somebody could probably make that same case for my perspective on things. Personally, I think religion is introduced way before most people have the mental capacity to comprehend what's being thrust upon them, and I wonder what the religious landscape would look like if it were the kind of thing people first-experienced later on in life.
but it's not -knowingly- fraudulent, which is the major test for culpability.
There's no way to tell if most religious leaders truly believe, unless you catch one in an incontrovertible statement of disbelief. Even someone like the Pope could be going along with it for the prestige, or simply not knowing what he'd do with his life outside of the Church.
From a non-religious perspective, either someone is brainwashed, or they are fraudulent. That distinction matters in law, but it doesn't have any bearing on the value of the religious institution.
I very much do not believe that is the case at all. I find it fairly absurd to believe it possible to accurately generalize about the members of any large organization in that manner. There are doubtless some very good people and some very bad people who are members of nearly any group, including religions.
How can you assert something like that? It's really quite preposterous.
All religious organizations have a strong need to fundraise in order to continue to exist. Many churches I've visited are lined around the entire periphery with money receptacles that have candles on top. You pay a donation and then you may light a candle and access God, etc.
The idea that faith motivates anyone (from clergy members to suicide bombers) is absurd. No matter how religious a person is, it's well known that faith is a goal and not a reality. Humans suffer from tremendous doubt. Angels, on the other hand, are faith robots which do not doubt... which is a consequence of their lack of free will.
Humans are mostly the same. A sampling of San Francisco residents is likely to be just as prejudiced as a sampling of Alabama residents. Similarly, a sampling of Scientologists are just as likely to be corrupt as Catholics or Buddhists.
As an even more general rule, all organizations tend toward corruption. What prevents corruption is not the virtue of individual members but things like transparency, competition, accountability, focus on results, etc.
Religious organizations (and to a lesser extent political and corporate ones) have evolved and continue to evolve clever ways to avoid accountability, to avoid transparency, etc. Secular organizations suffer a big comparative disadvantage in that the results they claim to have delivered are typically expected to be observable by humans.
That argument kinda breaks down when you take a look at one of the oldest and largest existing religions: Catholicism. Should anyone be surprised that powerful Catholic countries in Europe are totally against Scientology? It's not so much that Scientology is significantly worse (even if it is), it's because they don't like competition.
http://www.bnd.bund.de/EN/__Home/Startseite/startseite__node...
http://www.verfassungsschutz.de/en/index_en.html
A least one country takes the threat seriously.