The pseudonymous hacker [...] deleted the servers of WhiteDate, WhiteChild, and WhiteDeal in real time at the end of a talk at the annual Chaos Communication Congress in Hamburg, Germany.
As of this writing, WhiteDate, which Hoffmann described as a “Tinder for Nazis”; WhiteChild, a site that claimed to match white supremacists’ sperm and egg donors; and WhiteDeal, a sort-of Taskrabbit-esque labor marketplace for racists, are all offline.
Root, Hoffmann, and Fuchs claim to have identified the real identity of the websites’ administrator as a woman from Germany.
> I’d think if the sites are based in the US and the owners decided to take action, they could force this activist to be extradited and face punishment.
US based content owners have had mixed success forcing hackers to be extradited and face punishment in the US.
Many ransomware gangs are still operating, Anna's Archive is still up, ThePirateBay continues to defy Hollywood.
Sure, some hackers are caught and dragged through courts. Many are not. Enough to make your statement questionable.
The site, and the extended media presence are full of hardcore racist statements not protected under the German constitution, not considered legal expressions of free speech here. If you have seen the talk, you'd know the site/owner has been investigated by the German inland intelligence agency (Verfassungsschutz), but due to incompetence they only got the wrong person fired... In fact, the "Q&A" intro to the deletion bit, references the executive's inaction.
Some information disclosure is also evidently in the public interest. For example the AfD representatives found are additional evidence for anti-constitutional sentiments within the AfD. This is highly relevant for a possible party prohibition process (which has an extremely high legal threshold).
After all, the website security was hilariously bad. (I suspect the members' IQ scores may have been largely self-diagnosed...) From what I've gathered the publicized data has been somewhat anonymized. The victims of this hack should be rather happy the original data got nuked.
Also good luck extraditing the activist. It's pretty clear the pink power ranger on stage is a borrowed body, and/or, I presume, the voice heard is AI or borrowed recording, as well. OpSec seems alright. But you know, these days, the president of the United States may personally order the NSA and navy seals to snatch the Martha Root off the streets to uphold the holy rule of law and freedom of speech/expression...
Justice follows the law, not the whims of hacktivism.