Hacker Admits To Scientology DDoS Attack 275
lbwbl writes with news that a New Jersey man will plead guilty to one felony count of 'unauthorized impairment of a protected computer' for his distributed denial of service attacks on Scientology websites as part of 'Anonymous' earlier this year. From Wired:
"He faces a likely sentence of 12 to 18 months in prison based on stipulations in his plea agreement, which also obliges him to pay $37,500 in restitution. ... Friday's case, in US District Court in Los Angeles, marks the first prosecution of an Anonymous member for a series of attacks against the Church of Scientology that began in mid-January. The secretive religious group strayed into Anonymous' sights after trying to suppress the publication of a creepy Tom Cruise video produced for Scientology members."
Re:This anti-scientology campaign is well meant (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Unauthorized impairment of a protected computer (Score:1, Informative)
No, because DRM is installed by corporations, not a person.
Corporations are persons in the legal sense.
The difference is customers voluntarily buy the DRM'd goods.
It is pretty safe to say that the Scientologists didn't hire Anonymous as a tiger team.
Re:Link to creepy Tom Cruise video (Score:5, Informative)
Re:business practices (Score:3, Informative)
Alternate Methods (Score:4, Informative)
To the best of my knowledge, the DDOS attacks stopped in January. The people who are currently protesting are not using those methods.
You can check out what they are up to at
http://forums.scientology-exposed.com/ [scientology-exposed.com]
http://forums.whyweprotest.net/ [whyweprotest.net]
To find out why people are still protesting start reading the stories here
http://www.forum.exscn.net/forumdisplay.php?f=2 [exscn.net]
http://www.exscientologykids.com/voicesinunison.html [exscientologykids.com]
Former scientologists are finally starting to have the courage to speak out and need to be supported.
In my home town alone, a former scientologist's apartment has been broken into & had file boxes stolen (left the TV, DVDs & laptop), slashed her car tires, cut the wires in her car (including the brake lights), ran her off the road, stalked her at the neighborhood swimming pool & tried to intimidate her there with her kids, have been trying to mentally fuck with her by turning off her circuit breakers for her apartment, have had vans & PIs staking out her home & following her.
These are not nice people. They need to be exposed.
Re:Anonymous (Score:5, Informative)
You don't need to try and not get caught if you're not doing anything illegal to start with. If the CoS tries to get you arrested for peaceful protesting they'll be the ones that end up looking like assholes.
Keith Henson [wikipedia.org] wasn't that lucky.
Clarification (Score:1, Informative)
Prank calls and DDoS attacks "for teh lulz" > realization that Scientology is indeed creepy enough to legitimately oppose > legal protests
So the DDoS itself was probably not a part of the "Anonymous" coalition. It did, however, play a part in galvanizing the movement and generating media attention. But it was only after such events (shortly after) that the people watching who would become part of "Anonymous" started doing their research and getting interested. This guy may have had good intentions, but nothing can excuse such lawbreaking. After all, lawbreaking is the domain of the Church of Scientology, and we wouldn't want to step on their toes.
Re:scientology needs a worldwide campaign launched (Score:5, Informative)
This is happening. http://www.whyweprotest.net. DO IT NOW.
Re:scientology needs a worldwide campaign launched (Score:4, Informative)
Well, a few years ago, when the Scientology documents were exposed to the public, I perused them out of curiosity. Even though I knew about Xenu, I was still surprised to see it all there in print. Then I ran across the man's story of getting to some advanced Thetan level, and he described the self-auditing with the e-meter. Something in his narrative caused the neurons in my own brain to fire just so, and I realized that this was what was being described in the textbook.
I think it would be interesting to research how detectable electrical currents in the human body relate to physical, mental, even emotional processes.
The E-meter isn't about anything as weird as trying to pick up signal currents in the body (at least not the model I have from about 30 years ago). It's just a resistance bridge, a device with a meter that can show small changes in resistance (inverse of conductivity). One puts a juice can in each hand and tensing of the grip and/or changes in perspiration cause a measurable shift as one responds to questions etc. It's basically doing just one of the things a so-called lie-detector does.
I was never a member of the church. I guess I should dig out the various booklets that are with the E-meter to see just how they used it. It's probably helpful in telling if someone has been successfully brainwashed or is holding back during questioning LOL.
Re:Unauthorized impairment of a protected computer (Score:3, Informative)
Suffrage isn't intrinsic to legal personhood. Many people have been and are denied the right to vote. If you're in the United States, then corporations are extended many constitutional protections that "persons" enjoy. If you're in a different country, it varies. Generally, corporations can own property, be party to contracts, initiate lawsuits, and are required to pay taxes. All of these are common to your garden-variety person (except women, children, or minorities in various places and times.)
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood_debate [wikipedia.org].
Re:Unauthorized impairment of a protected computer (Score:4, Informative)
Which wasn't the original idea behind a "Limited Liability Corporation" in the first place. That was that investors would have their financial liability limited to amount they had invested. Whilst they might end up with stock/share certificates which were effectivly worthless they would have no financial liability. Shareholders would be last on the list of creditors. Which whilst this might mean they would lose their money in the case of a failed business they could still get their money back (even make a profit) where one to cease trading whilst profitable.
The idea that a corporation must exist for a long period of time, together with the idea of a corporation protecting its executives from their actions are more recent "innovations".
Re:scientology needs a worldwide campaign launched (Score:5, Informative)
The major technical difference between the earlier models and later models is the introduction of the transistor vs the use of vacuum tubes.
Patents by Mathison
Patent number: 2684670
Filing date: Aug 1, 1951
http://www.google.com/patents?id=L7tDAAAAEBAJ [google.com]
Patent number: 2810383
Filing date: Sep 1, 1954
http://www.google.com/patents?id=mXVLAAAAEBAJ [google.com]
Patent number: 2799269
Filing date: Feb 7, 1956
http://www.google.com/patents?id=wxNbAAAAEBAJ [google.com]
Patents by Hubbard
Patent number: 3290589
Filing date: Jun 7, 1965
http://www.google.com/patents?id=OVpxAAAAEBAJ& [google.com]
Patent number: D264877
Filing date: Mar 8, 1979
http://www.google.com/patents?id=pAMqAAAAEBAJ [google.com]
Patent number: 4459995
Filing date: Sep 22, 1981
http://www.google.com/patents?id=YYsxAAAAEBAJ [google.com]
Re:Anonymous (Score:1, Informative)
You Found The Card [slashdot.org] is a decent starting point.
Your experience with the Oxford Capacity Analysis [wikipedia.org] (the cult's "free personality test") is consistent with reality. The test has very little real value at measuring the things it claims to measure, but it is useful at screening for people who are easily manipulated.
For a chilling time, print out this answer key [xenu.net] to the test. It supplies the "correct" (as far as the Scilon cult is concerned) answers to the personality test. The only person who would sincerely answer every question according to those answer keys is a gullible sociopath, and that's what the cult produces. Just for lulz, memorize the answers, get some fake ID, and try to ace the test. Their script has an interesting [factnet.org] way of handling that remote possibility. But it'll still freak out the drone giving the exam.)
If you get stuck, ask yourself what the most fanatically loyal Nazi would answer if the test were being administered by Adolf himself, and that he had a gun to your head. Or how Patrick Bateman of American Psycho would act.
31. Could you agree, to strict discipline ?
Of course, mein Fuehrer. I always follow orders!
129. Are you in favor of color bar and class distinction?
Of course not, mein Fuehrer. This test was written in late-60s America, and that kind of prejudice was something for other people, people dumber than us!
175. Would you rather "wait for something to happen" as opposed to you causing it?
Of course I'd rather cause it. I'm a walking God!
180. Do you make allowances for your friends where with others you might judge more severely?
Of course not. No allowances for personal friends. Obidence to authority first!
183. Are you embarrassed by a hearty greeting such as a kiss, hug, or pat on the back, if done in public?
Of course not. Gods walking among men are never embarassed!
187. Do your acquaintances seem to think more of your abilities than you do?
Of course not. You ever meet a sociopath who felt anything other than underappreciated? Me either.
etc. etc. etc.
Anyone who wonders why the cult is evil has only to review the answer key against all 200 questions. It's a chilling exercise, and I'd recommend everyone take it, if for no other reason than to understand that evil is a compiled form of software, and that this test is what the underlying assembly code looks like.
Our genome is a gigabyte or two in length (a billion-odd base pairs, 2 bits to represent A/C/G/T). 99.8% of our DNA is identical to that of the chimpanzee. About a megabyte.
But here we are in the human brain. 200 yes/no questions - 200 bits -- Twenty-five bytes -- is enough to differentiate a non-socipath from a sociopath.
Re:Unauthorized impairment of a protected computer (Score:3, Informative)
What's retarded is just how easy it is to show that your understanding of law is deficient. I clocked myself: a legal definition of what legally constitutes a person [thefreedictionary.com] took me almost exactly 14 seconds, including the time it took to launch a new tab in Firefox to do the searching in.
Not checking your information is idiotic in this age of freely available information; you'd do well to double-check yourself next time so you don't look like a pompous (but wrong) doofus.
And for those of you too lazy to click the above link, a corporation IS legally considered a "person" in a number of contexts, as defined by a LEGAL dictionary. Don't confuse "person" with Natural Person [thefreedictionary.com] which is more in line with your comments.