Raisethefist.com Raided 883
mfb and others wrote in about a raid on the operator of raisethefist.com last week. It was first reported on Indymedia.org here and here, followed by an LA Weekly article. By far the best news piece so far is this one from Newsbytes.
Because of his *opinions*? (Score:5, Insightful)
OK, this guy says that he was busted because the government didn't like his opinions, but in fact he had been cracking web sites and putting in that troop.cgi thing. Somehow that doesn't sound like an opinion to me. There's also the question of bomb-making information which is potentially thornier, but also isn't really opinion (at least, not opinion about globalization - opinion about bomb policy I suppose might be a bit more debateable).
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:3, Insightful)
Dunno how this gets put on slashdot as "news for nerds, stuff that MATTERS".
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:5, Insightful)
I could see his arguement. He's going to jail because of his opinion that it was ok to crack into other people's pages, deface them and try to attack army computers. Since he acted on his opinion and violated various laws, he's pretty much screwed. The guy clearly is out of touch with reality if he expects the police to knock on the door of an anti-government type and nicely ask, "I'm sorry, but could we have your computer?"
Regarding what I assume will be a 1st amendment type of defense. You can speak freely so long as you don't trample of the rights of others. When you facilitate and encourage the use of weapons to hurt people or property you are outside of 1st amend. protection. Likewise when you deface a website to get your message across, your efforts to communicate have come at the expense of someone else's right to do the same and so aren't protected.
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:5, Insightful)
Your right to swing your fist ends at my face.
How can someone advocate violent overthrow of the government and expect the government to look the other way? There are better ways to affect change if you don't like the way things are going, and they're built into the Constitution! Being a punk myself, I used to hang out with a lot of anti-corporate anarchists and this has always been my main disagreement with them (second is the irony that the vast majority are smokers and thus enslaved to the tobacco industry, but that's a whole other issue).
Reading the Newsbytes article, I can't help but come to the conclusion that this kid is just another one of those moronic LA "Bring It All Down"(TM) punks, totally oblivious to the fact that The Man is the only thing keeping the skinheads from beating the crap out of him and stealing the oxblood 20-eye Doc Martins his mom bought him for his birthday.
Sorry, that turned into more of a rant than I thought it would.
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, regardless of what Sherman expects, for the past half century the Supreme Court has routinely expected the government to do just that. The phrase that applies here is "clear and present danger".
The phrase first came about in 1919 from the Schenck v. United States case. But it didn't really have any teeth until 1957 and Yates v. United States, when the Court ruled that, to quote my old book on the law of public communications, "a conspiracy to advocate the overthrow of the government was too far removed from immediate danger to be punished."
The real precedent used nowadays is Brandenburg v. Ohio, (1969) in which the Court overturned the conviction of some KKK members for advocating "unlawful methods of industrial or political reform", then a crime under Ohio state law. To be constitutional, the Court said, a statute can only ban speech that "is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to produce such actions."
The Court backed this precedent up in 1973 with Hess v. Indiana, in which an antiwar demonstrator had been convicted for shouting "We'll take the fucking street later." The Court ruled that this "amounted to nothing more than advocacy of illegal action at some indefinite future time".
So, unless what Sherman put up on the Web was really both meant and likely to produce immediate illegal action, or the current Supreme Court is ready to overturn this precedent (very possible, given its obvious partisanship and corruption), he hasn't broken the law by advocating overthrowing the federal government.
I'm sure these rulings are on the Web somewhere but I'm too tired to karma whore any further just now.
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:4, Insightful)
That is exactly my point. The kid advocates violence against the government, spreads his message through vandalism, and then whines about federal agents busting into his house with guns and confiscating the tools he used to commit said acts of vandalism. The fact that those tools were also used to host protected speach is totally irrelevant, and this whole thing about being silenced for his opinions is a strawman. He hacked and he got caught. It's that simple. He admits that he did it and that he knew it was illegal when he did it.
IMHO, his opinions only had 2 effects on the situation:
1. His web site drew attention to him, and probably helped link him to hacks he is being arrested for.
2. It raised the potential threat level in the eyes of those conducting the raid, thus the guns and armor. They had no way of knowing for certain that he wasn't better armed than they and ready to go out in a blaze of glory.
He got arrested for breaking the law. The fact that he broke the law in a misguided attempt to disseminate otherwise protected speech does not make this a Free Speech issue.
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:3, Funny)
I'm not a constitutional lawyer, but I believe the 2nd Amendment was driven by the authors' aversion to having a permanent standing army, then regarded as a tool of tyranny.
Jelque responded with:
Thank god your not a Constitutional lawyer. Maybe you should read it sometime. Having a standing army was the last thing The Framers of the Constitution wanted.
Which made me think, at first, that Jelque must not be a native English speaker. After all, the phrase "[the framers'] aversion to having a permenent standing army" means the same thing as "Having a standing army was the last thing The Framers of the Constitution wanted. Only in times of war, are there supposed to be a standing army." Jelque, however, seems to think that he (she?) has some disagreement with ktakki on this point, indicating a lack of familiarity with the English language. Also, there's Jelque's piss-poor use of English (your vs. you're, "are there supposed to be", etc.)
However, I then noticed Jelque's reference to Americans as "we" (I know not all Americans are native English speakers, but there's a pretty strong correlation). In addition, I know few non-native speakers to be as careless with their reading and writing as Jelque clearly is. I have concluded therefore, the Jelque is a poorly educated native English speaker.
Sorry for the snarkiness. I actually have moderator access right now, so I could have just moderated Jelque down. This was more fun, though.
it does matter (Score:5, Insightful)
There are lots of articles on Slash about different countries taking away their citizens' rights, based on the assumption that if some information's on the net it's far more dangerous than if it's simply in print.
This is a tech-savvy activist, using the internet as his tool to get his message out to the world. Bravo.
However he crossed the line a number of times by hacking other machines, using a pretty lame-ass excuse: "I had to get my message out!" Sure, Charlie, I have a feeling you're preaching to the converted.
I had an argument with a coworker last summer during the WTO conference (or was it G8? I can't remember). An anti-corporate web site was giving out information and software to stage a "virtual sit-in" to protest against companies involved. Basically, they were advocating a gigantic DDOS against a certain few companies, including Cisco, one of our clients.
He thought it was cool, I thought the entire thing was 100% lame: WTF do they hope to accomplish my not letting me do my work? Are they somehow more important than me? Does their "message" get out by DDOSing a few companies? No. They'd be better off by actually writing letter to the companies they hate, but of course, that takes actual time and effort. It takes little to download someone else's work (the DDOS programs) and run it, then go back to whatever you were doing, thinking you've accomplished some great blow for democracy.
I don't buy it one bit: it's lame, far too easy and cowardly.
So I propsed that on the date and time they went to put up their links page to all the DDOS software, we hit THEM first, in a pre-emptive strike, just to give 'em a taste of their own medicine and see how much they like. But we didn't. I would have had a good laugh though, I just didn't want to sink to their chickenshit level.
Ah well. I'm glad this guy got arrested for his hacking crimes, I just hope they don't pull a Mitnick and give him his fair chance. Doubt it.
Yeah (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:2, Insightful)
Come back when they actually do something to him.
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally, from what i read in google's cache right after it went down, I think the guy's crazy.
On one page, he's got a headline that actually says the feds kill babies.
On another, he's got a page full of bomb making instructions.
Face it, you're either for killing people or against killing people. Throwing in political reasoning only makes you more similar to your adversary.
Legally, that just makes him a whacko. It's when you combine "whacko" with "attacks government websites" that you get "terrorist".
The guy's an idiot, frankly. He doesn't know what he's fighting for, and was stupid enough to get caught doing something illegal.
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:3, Insightful)
How, by going in with a lot of heavily armed agents? I grant you they probably didn't need all of the agents or half of the firepower they had -- but a show of force is almost guaranteed to prevent any resistance. From what we've been told via the news agencies and so forth, they didn't violate any of his rights or use excessive force -- they simply had a lot of heavily armed people there to arrest him or whatever.
One, it's probably SOP in a city like L.A. to go in with way more force than you need.
Two, they probably know that in the end that he'll probably end up with little more than a wrist-slap and they're trying to scare the crap out of him by peforming the raid.
From the response he gave, I think that's just what he needs -- to have the crap scared out of him and make him think.
I don't necessarily disagree with all of his opinions, but obviously he's overstepped his rights of free speech and so forth by committing criminal acts. And, if he wants to stand a chance of persuading anyone with an education beyond the third grade, he needs to learn to write and use a spell-checker. Jeez... He makes most of the Slashdot crowd look like literary giants...
Re:Because of his *opinions*? (Score:3, Insightful)
Precisely correct. Groups like SWAT teams don't want anyone, themselves or the suspects, to get shot. Now suppose they said "hmmm, there's just one guy, and he probably has a pistol, so we'll just send in one guy with a pistol". Ok, now perhaps the guy decides to surrender, but perhaps not. I mean it's just him against one cop. However when 20 guys in body armour with assult weapons come charging in any thoughts of being a hero tend to evaporate. In the end, noone gets hurt.
Re:Bombmaking (Score:2)
As you pointed out later in your post - he also defaced websites and distributed DDoS tools. That's what he's going down for. Americans are quite free to publish the Anarchist's Cookbook, Mein Kampf, or Das Kapital on their own websites.
The right to swing your fist ends at the nose of the guy you're swingin' it at. Similarly, this skript kiddie's right to raise his fist ends at the router separating his network from the rest of the world.
Hun? (Score:4, Funny)
Secret service? They ain't doing a good job if slashdot knows...
Not so Secret Service (Score:3, Interesting)
The first time I ever heard of them was when JFK was killed. The name was so incongruous, some people who hadn't heard of them before didn't realize that their role was bodyguard, not assasin.
They are the oldest federal law enforcement agency, dating back the 1870s. I've never researched it, but I've often suspected that their name is a kind of euphimism. States rights was the biggest issue in those days (you may have heard about the Civil War), so "Secret Service" may have been easier to sell than "Treasury Police".
This guy's a bit of a hypocrite (Score:4, Insightful)
In the interview, Austin acknowledged that he vandalized the Web sites and that he knew it was illegal to do so. But he defended the act by saying it was necessary to get his message out.
...
"If I go to jail, then I will go to jail not based on my actions, but based on what I think," he said.
No, you incredibly idiotic dipshit. You are going to be Bubba's bitch because you hacked government websites, and in fact admitted it. Please, don't try to defend him -- it's guys like this that give us a bad name and deserved to be ostracized from the community at large.
Overkill? (Score:3, Insightful)
"People can rant and rave on the Internet all they want, but when they cross the line of calling people to action to violently overthrow the Constitution of the United States, they have a problem," said McLaughlin.
So when just another lone hacker kid defaces five Web sites, it justifies "surrounding and raiding [the] house with machine guns, shotguns, bullet-proof vests." Being labeled a hacker (correctly, this time) is really getting to be as dangerous as being called a child molester.
The Gardener
Re:Overkill? (Score:2)
Re:Overkill? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Overkill? (Score:3, Insightful)
What if it turned out the kind had schitzophrenic and was armed with those bombs that he was publishing? Yeah he probably wasn't, but how did the police know that? Its not like they violated any rights. They served a warrant and tried to do so in as safe a manner as possible.
Geeze.
Re:Overkill? (Score:2)
There is no such thing as overkill. (Score:3, Informative)
Dumbass. (Score:5, Insightful)
According to the FBI, Austin allegedly defaced at least five commercial Web sites since 1999 using the nickname "Ucaun." On three of the sites, Austin left behind a hacking program named troop.cgi that was designed to attempt to log in to a computer operated by the U.S. Army, the FBI affidavit stated. In the interview, Austin acknowledged that he vandalized the Web sites and that he knew it was illegal to do so. But he defended the act by saying it was necessary to get his message out.
Okay, so this guy was an admitted website defacer who posted denial of service tools on victim websites and knew it was illegal but did it anyway.. That he was doing it for some "anticorporate revolution" doesn't matter one iota.
But what I really loved was his comment, later in the article:
"But how many of us are really willing to engage in such an intense form of warfare through bauds and wires? Who's got the balls? Who's willing to sacrifice everything?" said the page.
Who indeed? Let's start with this numbskull. I say throw the book at him.
Re:Dumbass. (Score:5, Insightful)
when you want to mount successful political opposition, you start by keeping your nose squeaky clean so that no one can defame your character when the real work of change begins. this kid obviously didn't get that.
-w
Re:oooh .... (Score:2)
Why not? The government and big business are every bit the manipulation machines that the old church was.
As a whole, the population is every bit as naive and/or fearful of government and big companies as they were of the old church. The penalties for either action are on the same scale, and the motivations are both for the good of the common man.
I won't say he's a saint, but then again -- neither were Luther nor the US' founding fathers saints, and all were very much in his position.
Re:Dumbass. (Score:3, Informative)
Hey! Don't slashdot this site! (Score:5, Funny)
NEWSFLASH raisethefist.com is running out of current allocated bandwidth. In just two days we have used over 130MB of data transfer. The limit is 512MB per month. That means we will run out of bandwidth in less than a week. If we do, the site will be shut down indefinitely. We need to move to another web host in order to keep the site up and updated with official information for its visitors. If you would like to donate space, the e-mail contact information is on the bottom of this page.
I think it's a bad idea to link directly to his site.. We could end up costing him a lot of money in bandwidth terms.
Re:Hey! Don't slashdot this site! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Hey! Don't slashdot this site! (Score:5, Funny)
> I think it's a bad idea to link directly to his site.. We could end up costing him a lot of money in bandwidth terms.
1) L33t d00d defaces websites and acknowledges that he knew doing so was illegal.
2) L33t d00d posts denial-of-service tools on the defaced websites.
3) L33t d00d then whines about his bandwidth bills arising from the Slashdot effect.
Payback's a bitch, ain't it, skr1pt k1ddi3?
There's only one fist that needs to be raised here, and the FBI knows exactly where to raise it. And after the FBI's finished reaming out his bank account, I hope his bandwidth provider takes whatever's left.
Internet Wayback Machine (Score:5, Informative)
They're kidding, right? (Score:5, Funny)
woof.
Move along now, nothing to moderate here.
Jesus Christ (Score:5, Interesting)
Next person who whines that he's the victim of the fascist Ashcroftian regime gets beat over the head with a clue-by-four. I'd be pretty pissed if he was hacking my site "so he could get his message out." What a loser.
Re:Jesus Christ (Score:4, Insightful)
The real question is Will he be treated different then any other web site vandle because of his views?
if not, then fine. but if he gets a stricter sentance because of his anti-government views, then we have a problem.
Re:That was an "arrest"!? (Score:2)
I really really don't think it's worth the sacrifice of a couple lives to prove that the FBI is kind and gentle. They had no idea what they were getting into; the fact that in retrospect he's just a whiny momma's boy with no conviction to back up his bullshit doesn't mean the FBI should not have taken precatuions.
Re:That was an "arrest"!? (Score:2)
Fuck kind and gentle. The kid is a criminal. Gang leaders carry pistols. Militant psychos make bombs.
Deserved to be busted, (Score:3, Insightful)
As long as the go ahead and press charges in a timely manner the gov has done the right thing in this case.
Slant-Six Flashback... (Score:5, Interesting)
I wonder how the FBI would react to those kinds of sites...
Re:Slant-Six Flashback... (Score:3, Funny)
"The US army were embarased today in an attack on Afgan terrorists. They were quoted saying "Damn you leet-terror.com and your fake C4 recipies!" The scent of burning silly putty could be smelt for miles"
:\ Daz
violently overthrow the Constitution? (Score:5, Insightful)
That would be correct. The United States of America is all for free speech. It's also a democracy, where you can elect a new government to install new laws if you disagree with the current state of affairs. Elected officials (who presumably represent a majority of the populace) will eventually populate the group responsible for interpreting the Constitution, the Supreme Court. Therefore, in a theoretical sense (before you start screaming about corporate america owning the politicians), the people do control the government.
By ignoring the political route and espousing the virtues of a violent overthrow, you have now entered the realm of "terrorist" or "freedom fighter." In a country where the freedom of speech is guaranteed in the very Constitution you want to do away with, you are more than likely to be considered a terrorist. And frankly, I would agree with that assessment.
Here's a suggestion: if you don't like the system and don't feel like changing the system, take your bombs and move to Columbia or the middle east.
Re:violently overthrow the Constitution? (Score:3, Troll)
Middle East: Immeasurable amounts of money to support the ghettoification of a large number of Arabs. It's as if the Israeli government is taking all their cues from the third reich (who got their cues from our excellent eradication of Native Americans).
Here's a suggestion: if you don't like the system and don't feel like changing the system, take your bombs and move to Columbia or the middle east.
Nonono, tell them to move, but don't let them bring their bombs with them, they'll just end up getting pointed right back at us.
Re:violently overthrow the Constitution? (Score:4, Funny)
Gosh, I had no idea what conditions at that Ivy school in upper Manhattan was really like...!
Re:violently overthrow the Constitution? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's those damn British who forced us to violently overthrow them. Had they not been so insistent on keeping us as a colony, the whole matter could have been settled peacefully.
Re:violently overthrow the Constitution? (Score:5, Insightful)
The president just recently created a system of military tribunals where you can be arrested, tried, convicted, and executed without even being told the crime you were charged with, without the prosecution having shown probable cause before arrest, without hearing any evidence presented against you, without the ability to cross-examine witnesses, without your choice of counsel, without the crime specifically calling for a death sentence, without a presumption of innocence, without "beyond a shadow of a doubt" or even "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard of proof, without public scrutiny, and without a right of appeal.
This system makes a military court-martial look like a hippy love-in [hrw.org].
Now please re-read the Declaration of Independence [nara.gov] and tell me whether the guys that wrote it sound more like Bush or this punk "terrorist" kid.
The kid may have talked about overthrowing the constitution, but Bush has done it.
And if your response is that if you don't like it, you should change it by working your way up the corporate ladder until you are CEO of a large enough corporation so that you can buy yourself or a friend into office, spare me. Yeah, and if you don't like the U.S. government, why don't you go to some country the U.S. government is bombing or propping up some hellish dictator -- now that's a great idea!
Bush has made it perfectly clear -- you are either with him or against him. If you are against him, you are a terrorist and they intend to find you no matter what country you reside in. Clearly Bush is not quite that powerful, yet -- and one hopes that countries that care about human rights will be able to reign in some of his powers, but the point is that if you don't like the U.S. government you're only real options are to try to change it or keep your head down to avoid it's wrath.
And you won't change it by saving your pennies to work within the system -- with lobbyists, bribes, and the corporate media. The current system has evolved to make sure that we can't change it from within. At the same time, violence is only a successful tactic if you are already powerful -- if you are weak, it will only hasten your destruction (look at what happened to the U.S. militia movement after Oklahoma City). And advocating violence without the intention or the ability to carry it out is the height of stupidity.
The alternative is to organize where we have the most power (whether we realize it or not) -- with our coworkers or neighbors, in schools, professional associations, clubs, consumer groups, etc. And rather than organize for lofty meaningless phrases, organize for real gains that benefit us and those around us. Much of Bush's attack on Americans has taken the shape of less job security, longer hours, etc. at work. It is possible to resist these attacks, and it is much more effective if the resistance is organized and collective rather than disorganized and individual.
As passive voters and pleaders, we are powerless, but organized and actively fighting back where we have power can work -- that's how it has worked with every social improvement in the last 1000 years or so, at least.
Re:violently overthrow the Constitution? (Score:3, Insightful)
>military tribunals where you
"you", in this sense, means "people captured while using weapons to actively oppose U.S. military forces"
>can be arrested, tried, convicted, and executed
>without even being told the crime you were
>charged with,
Where did you pull this out of? That's utter nonsense.
>without the prosecution having shown probable
>cause before arrest,
Uhh, most of us will accept that being captured while resisting the military goes well past probable cause . . .
>without hearing any evidence presented against
>you,
??? I think you're confusing these tribunals, which don't yet exist, with something else.
>without the ability to cross-examine witnesses,
I'd *really* need to see a source before believing this.
>without your choice of counsel,
Yes, there are likely to be limits on counsel, both due to the need for security clearances and local availability. However, the right to counsel *cannot* be completely eliminated, as this would contravene the Rights of Englishmen as recognized at Common Law and protected by the U.S. Constitution. At this level, it is not a question of the U.S. rule, but that to completely refuse access to counsel would violate natural law.
> without the crime
>specifically calling for a death sentence,
only by a very twisted interpretation. In the U.S. and other Common Law nations, statutes with prescribed penalties were not commonplace until *very* recently (20th century for the most part).
>without a presumption of innocence,
It's likely that the presumption will be reduced or gone, yes.
>without "beyond a shadow of a doubt"
Which, as far as I know, is not the law anywhere for anything.
o
>r even "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard of proof,
Yes, the burden of proof is likely to be much lower, and a unanimous vote will probably not be required.
> without public scrutiny,
likely, yes. But there are practical matters getting that much public out there . . .
>and without a right of appeal.
Technically, yes. In reality, it is not politically possible that there will be no review.
These tribunals, if created and used, will be limited to those found in arms and captured while violating the Law of War. You are proposing to extend to them protections that exist in very few places outside the English speaking world.
Do I think that actually using these tribunals is a good idea? No, at least not at present, while our resources permit other responses.
Nonetheless, the picture being painted of them is grossly inaccurate. Look to how they were used in the past, and then pull *way* back to meet modern political reality.
hawk
Here you go (Score:4, Offtopic)
The Geneva Convention [unhchr.ch]
The Nuremburg Charter [umkc.edu].
Before you think anything about Sept. 11th being something entirely new and especially evil, requiring less due process than in the past, read the Nuremburg Charter. If presumption of innocence is ok for Nazis, it's hard to see when it shouldn't apply.
Also, keep in mind that all this "anti-terrorism" talk uses Bin Laden as their reason for enacting the laws, but the laws are not confined to the acts of Sept 11th, or even confined to "violent" terrorism. There has been much effort to make sure that illegal political acts that don't involve violence fall under the category of "terrorism". Even before Sept 11th, anti-terrorism laws were used to infiltrate and disrupt non-violent activist groups and labor unions.
If a farm owner accuses non-citizen farm workers of illegal acts during a union organizing drive or strike, what is to stop these "anti-terrorism" laws and military tribunals from being used? Again, even before Sept 11th, many newspapers have referred to both violent and non-violent protestors in the U.S. as "terrorists", in many cases equating civil-disobedience (illegal acts intended to achieve a political agenda) with assassinations and mass murder.
And this is nothing new. Dissidents are often called terrorists by repressive governments. Never mind the fundamental differences between the people that destroyed the WTC and people like Martin Luther King.
More info here at (Score:2, Informative)
He's a Criminal. (Score:2)
Wrong. His actions include defacing websites and distributing information on how to make bombs. Either of those are crimes and punishable by law. He's not some little pacifist sitting in a corner getting picked on by The Man.
If you want to find a poster boy for "Thought Police Victim" find a better specimen.
Guy's final comment (Score:2, Interesting)
No offense, but hacking government sites in this post 9/11 era is pretty dumb. Doing so when you are a person who, like bin Laden, encourages people to violence against the United States, simply means you are nothing more than a terrorist tango.
Don't get me wrong. I think the government has overstepped itself in how it deals with hackers quite a bit. I support the EFF but this guy just ain't one I feel any sympathy for. Hell I downloaded the Anarchist's Cookbook and so forth back when I was his age too. But if he thinks anything ought to go, then he is got some serious mental illness.
Way to go Secret Service.
Nothing horribly new here (Score:3, Interesting)
Another non-news story (Score:2)
Computer cracking was illegal well before 9-11.
common sense? (Score:2, Insightful)
Raise the fist (Score:2, Insightful)
Publish bomb instructions, go to jail (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah, they're using more muscle than what they needed. They really didn't need to seize all of his political literature, unless maybe they consider it evidence of his highly anti-establishment attitude.
It all seems a bit extreme. But didn't he break the law? Isn't the law a good one? I mean, how many of us really want our neighbors and other assorted yokels having the knowledge to construct bombs out of legally available materials? I'm not so sure I want that available to everyone.
It's one thing to have and even construct guns. Bombs are a whole new level though. It may infringe on his free speech rights, but his free speech can easily lead to depriving someone else (or many others) of their lives.
Re:Publish bomb instructions, go to jail (Score:2)
A law against publishing instructions would clearly violate the first amendment.
I don't know... (Score:2)
BTW - There are other laws against publishing materials that clearly do not (according to the courts violate) the 1st amendment. How else do corporate trade secrets and national top-secret materials avoid getting published? Yeah, that's an obvious case, but it just points out that the 1st amendment is not an absolute, despite what every ignoramus who doesn't know any better will tell you.
Re:Publish bomb instructions, go to jail (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you'd better be careful on that there slippery slope, because the next step is "how many of us really want 'that hacker kid' down the street having the knowledge of how to reset my router or how to access my bank's poorly-secured web site?" A lot of the things that people on this site know and converse about freely could be just as dangerous to the public as bomb-making instructions.
I'm not defending hacking or blowing up people with bombs, and I'm not entirely defending this kid either. I'm just saying that we need to differentiate between the knowledge of how to do something, the tools for doing something, and the actual doing of the thing. Responsibility should be laid against those who actually commit crimes, not all of those who know how to. Providing bomb-making information (which is available on any number of other sites) does not seem to be such a major crime.
Although hacking a DoD site definitely was a big mistake. On those grounds alone he should go down.
Big Brother? (Score:2)
This is verging on redundant, but was any of this monitoring done with a warrant? Is the US Government allowed unfettered ability to monitor (or intercept!) network traffic? This doesn't seem right.
how to make bombs (Score:2)
This brings up a hard pill for me to swallow. On one hand, Freedom of Speech is protected. I agree with this. However, what happens when your freedoms are put in jeopardy because of information out there like this? Some information just shouldn't be out there. There is NO reason someone should be posting how to make a bomb on the web. If you can find a reason they should, please enlighten me. (Freedom of Speech aside, I am referring to real, honest to God reasons for this being out there)
thanks
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:how to make bombs (Score:2, Interesting)
I would like to mention that material on how to make bombs has been in circulation since before the internet, and it will be in circulation even if all the sites with HOW-TO's get taken down.
Also, how many Afghani terrorists have internet accounts? I mean other than John Katz's friend?
Whether or not I agree with the information being available on-line, I do not feel that it puts our freedom in any sort of jeopardy.
--xPhase
Darwinian logic. (Score:2)
Case is point:
'Austin acknowledged that he vandalized the Web sites and that he knew it was illegal to do so. But he defended the act by saying it was necessary to get his message out.'
and
'"If I go to jail, then I will go to jail not based on my actions, but based on what I think," he said. '
If he's smart enough to collect this kind of following, why is it that he ISN'T smart enough to figure out how to peacefully make his desires come about?
And why isn't he smart enough to realise that by calling attention to himself THIS way will just get him squashed.
America is a pretty cool place. Pretty big things have been changed in pretty peaceful ways. It also has the resources and desire to prevent folks like this from causing [much] damage.
It's one thing to get your way by trying to break a toy, it's another thing entirely to redesign the environment so that the toy works for you. (and all that 'reed bending in the breeze' Kung Fu crap.)
Perhaps I'm the only one... (Score:3, Insightful)
Then again, I'm pretty much in agreement with his comments about the current climate for those of thus dislike the actions of the United States. I think we're going to be seeing a lot more of this as days pass.
digital does not make it right (Score:2, Insightful)
If i put up a web site that tells people how to make bombs and encourage everyone to kill everyone that disagrees with me, suddenly i am a poster boy for free speech?
Response to terrorism (Score:2, Insightful)
"anyone actively disagreeing with policies of the U.S is now automatically rendered a 'terrorist' in the eyes of national security."
Perhaps that's so, but I'd venture to say that those disagreeing with the policies of the US and publishing information on how to make bombs are more likely to get noticed than those who simply disagree. They claim that "The sysop of this site does not endorse nor use any method of violence" but bomb-making and anti-government rhetoric on the same site are at the very least an implicit threat.
IANAL, so I can't speak to the legalities of it. But I know that if I were a FBI agent, I too would have wanted armor when I went in there.
Good riddance to bad rubbish (Score:2)
Irony (Score:2)
So while he's against corporate globalization, he has no problem with violating my privacy by display a doubleclick.com advertising banner on his site along with one of the stupid pop-down X10 windows...
I would be the first to run to this guy's defense for posting bomb-making techniques or anything of that nature but since he broke into computer systems I just simply can't condone his actions.
It's funnny though because he justifies breaking into a computer system (and thereby, violating someone's rights) because he's spreading a message against a government who are violating peoples rights.
I think his mommy forgot to tell him that two wrongs don't make a right...
Non violent means (Score:2)
Play George Bush the fighter pilot trying to shoot Osama bin laden. There so many angles that would have done much better. So instead he thinks to do things like bombs and stuf like that.
Heck even stuff like WhiteHouse.ORG [whitehouse.org] is much more effective, even if in questionable taste. The opportunity is boundless if you have that talent. Which this kid probably did not.
A bit twisted. (Score:2, Insightful)
Regarding the FBI raid, they must be high on something themself. 2 officers with handguns and a solid kick on the door would probably have been more appropriate.
Guns are not safe wepons (Score:2, Insightful)
Its almost as if armed drug dealers run this country and try to control us with the things they do best. Anyone know if this years Afghan smack has made it to the US yet. I'll bet its gonna get real cheap soon.
Kuro5hin.org (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2002/1/26/112847/74
Cheers,
-Aaron.
Think they were well armed enough? (Score:4, Funny)
"This is Los Angeles after all. We always go in to protect ourselves. We don't go in with slingshots," said McLaughlin
Ok, so this guy is probably pretty clearly guilty of computer cracking - and yeah, that's definately criminal in this case. I don't think there's much question about that. What disturbs me here is thay they send out a damn batallion of armed-to-the-teeth FBI to pick this guy up! What's wrong with just sending down ONE pair FBI officers and a few squads? Here we still don't know who was sending antrhax letters all over the place, but the FBI needs to send the fscking infantry to bust a skript kiddie?!?
I'm not usually one to bitch about my "tax dollars", but I want my money back on this operation. Go solve a murder case, you assholes. Leave these relatively petty (and *non-violent*) crimes to the local cops or a rookie FBI agent.
Non violent? (Score:2)
In regards to the raid itself, they probably didn't know what this could have, or indeed who might also be in the house. Not to mention that the kid claims to know how to make bombs... all of these make for a potentially dangerous situation. Of course, we'd all like to sit and make hindsight observations, but going in it was probably a situation with a quite a few unknowns.
And, that is LA. You need an uzi to give a parking ticket.
Re:Think they were well armed enough? (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, all evidence shows it does the exact opposite, which is why the cops do it. TAke a hypothetical situation:
The police go to arrest someone like this, who has clearly expressed his displeasure for the government. Now this guy happens to have a few buddies over to have some drinks and talk shop. They have guns, as they are like to do. Now try to think about the following cases form the punk's perspective:
1) They send in two cops to try and arrest the kid. They knock on teh door and say "open up, police". Now the punks look, and see only two cops, and decide they aren't going to jail, and can take them. So one opens the door, and teh other two open fire. Stupid, yes, but something that seems do able.
2) The cops decide to go in Tommy Lee Jones style (like they did) send a heavily armed team fo 20+ people and bust in with no warning. Now the punks can see that they are cearly outnumbered and out gunned. Between teh shock and the odds, it seems wise to surrender, so they do.
Or how about another scenario:
I own a gun and while it's main purpose is target shooting, I wouldn't hesitate to use it in self defense. Now suppose someone desides to break into my house:
1) A single guy, as is common, is breaking in. He breaks down my door and comes in with a gun. I hear this, grab my gun and go to confront him. Just what would transpire would depend on many thigns, but I would confront him. 1 on 1, espically in surrounding I'm farmiliar with, is something I'll go for.
2) A whole group of 10 guys with automatic weapons break in. I see this, I'll drop my weapon and surrender. Why? Simple, resistance is futile. Even in on my home turn, there is no way I'm taking out 10 guys by myself, epsically if they have better weapons than me.
The cops have the same idea, they want to come in strong enough that people just decide to give up and noone gets hurt.
$300 Needed (Score:2, Insightful)
a) someone cached their "anti-globalization" site and
b) is holding it for ransom.
A couple of other anachronism: the "founder"'s email address is food_should_be_free@yahoo.com. Assuming this is a position he believes in, he's not an anarchist, he's a communist. Anarchy believes in everyone getting their own food, through work or theft or whatever.
Additionally, he uses the extremely creative spelling of "litature" for "literature."
Well, I remember... (Score:2)
GOOD -- the kid deserved it. (Score:2)
Motives or a wish to "get the message out" aside, it's against the law to do the site hacking and DoS stuff he did. To paraphrase a founding father, his right to hack stops where my server begins.
The charge against posting instructions on bombs, etc probably won't stick for 1st amendment reasons, but they've got plenty of stuff he's already admitted to to nail him on. He's a stupid 18 yr old kid with a warped notion of what his rights are in a free society. The vehemence of a teenagers feelings is never an excuse for breaking the law though.
He deserves it. Hope he rots for a while, then gets a good lawyer who can explain to him why it's NOT ok to do such stupid things.
What a letdown.... (Score:2)
Well, this guy's no innocent: He's hacked websites and admitted to it. He claims it was the only way to get his word out. Here's a clue for the guy: If you're having that much trouble getting the word out, either you're not trying hard enough or people just aren't interested. Did he think that hacking sites would suddenly make people say "Gee, this vandel has a point"?
And sure his opinion may be unpopular in the current political climate, but resorting to threats of violence (and posting "how-to's" for violence) to achieve your aims is never acceptable. As jaded as some people have become, the political system *can* work. If you're getting fustrated that the country isn't bending to your will, get over it. There are a couple hundred million people living in the US with only about two hundred or so people representing them. If you can't get a big group of people to agree with you, don't expect US policy to change in your favor.
As far as the cops going in fully armed: This guy had instructions on how to make bombs and has a strong, violent, anti-government viewpoint. If I were the cop going in there I'd want a bullet-proof vest and as much ammo (and backup) as could be spared as well. I wouldn't knock on his door unarmed and say "Please, Mr. potential-psycho surrender or else I'll be forced to ask politely again."
Save our rights! (Score:3, Funny)
Let us march into a new age, and...
*knock, knock*
Yes?
"It's the FBI."
Oh, fuck! Hold on a minute...
^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H
rm / *.* -r
format c:
*crash* "Freeze!"
Amusing quote (Score:4, Troll)
Looks like the FBI will be raiding the federal government next, then.
HE HACKED OUR SITE! (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/12HOME.HTML [foreignpolicy.com]
I imagine that troop.cgi progam is sitting on more than 3 webservers out there.
Re:HE HACKED OUR SITE! (Score:3, Interesting)
His HTML's non-compliant, too (Score:3)
C'mon, either we believe in standards or we don't. Raise your fist against bad code....
The real reason they arrested him (Score:4, Funny)
Never mind incitement to violence - this guy's a copyright violator! Let him fry, I say.
Thoreau vs. this moron (Score:4, Funny)
Thoreau, in Civil Disobediance, explained that philosophically it's right to disobey what you honestly feel is an unjust law. In doing so though, one needs to be willing to accept society's punishment for its violation.
In comparison, doesn't this whiny punk who's spent too much time in the 2600/Mother Jones/High Times section of the magazine rack seem a little lacking? No matter though. I'm sure his bunkmates in Leavenworth will show him the meaning of passive resistance.
Why are we even discussing this? (Score:3, Insightful)
This guy is no Sklyarov, arrested in the US for actions he performed legally elsewhere (sort of like legally visiting a prostitute in Nevada, and getting arrested for it in New York). What he did was illegal, he knew it, he admitted it.
End of story, to my mind.
Lets not forget (Score:5, Troll)
1 - The right of the people to overthrow their government when it fails to meet their needs is written in the Declaration of Independence:
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government
It is expressly Patriotic according to our countries founding document to overthrow the government should it become tyrannical.
2 - we have this little thing called freedom of speech. There is no law prohibiting the dissemination of bomb making information. If that is a crime, I guess Amazon.com is a terrorist organization:
Poor Man's James Bond [amazon.com]
Anarchist's Cookbook [amazon.com]
Home Workshop Explosives [amazon.com]
I suggest we keep these things in mind as we continue to hunt down terrorists. Its important not to forget the freedoms that make this country worth fighting for.
Re:Lets not forget (Score:3, Insightful)
The right of the people to overthrow their government when it fails to meet their needs is written in the Declaration of Independence
and..
Its important not to forget the freedoms that make this country worth fighting for.
One of those important freedoms is the right to vote for who will represent us in the government. One of the most important causes of the American Revolution is that the American colonies had no representation in Parliament. We can't make that claim about the current American government.
As bad as our government might be, it is still composed of people who are chosen by a majority of Americans. Sure, we might be given some shitty options to choose from, and those of us who are intellectual might be outnumbered by the ignorant masses who fall in love with guys like George W. Bush, but the fact remains: The members of our government are there because a majority of the country chose them to be.
But who voted for all these militia groups and anarchist groups who want to violently overthrow the government? How many people want them to succeed? Which one should succeed, if any? How free would the country be if they succeeded? Would the leaders of these groups let the country vote on a new leader every few years? And what happens after the revolution, anyway? It's not like all the wannabe-revolutionary groups agree with each other, so there would just be more revolutions--and they'd all be justified, by your argument--as each group takes it's turn trying to establish its own ideology.
How free are people under that situation?
Anyway, I'm not even going to touch on the craziness of expecting a government to say "Yeah, people have the right to overthrow us. Go ahead." ;)
What bomb-making info? (Score:4, Troll)
-
Let's get this straight:
One may or may not agree, but that's a reasonable political statement.A president we did not elect, heading a government bought off by corporations, arrogantly and agressively pushes a pro-corporate domestic agenda and foreign policy. Now over 6,000 people are dead and he say's we're at "war", fighting secret battles against unknown enemies, and he wants everyone to be "patriots" by forsaking our civil liberties and going "shopping".
I don't see anything about bomb-making in the copies of his site at archive.org. [archive.org] The archive isn't complete, because some of his pages are generated by CGI scripts, and the archive system doesn't try to archive dynamic content. But the visible content is straight political material.
You can get bomb-making information from mainstream sources. Order Improvised Munitions [amazon.com] from Amazon.com. That book is popular with the Christian right [google.com] and the right-wing "militia" movement.
Best quality info from government sources! (Score:3, Funny)
No defense, and that guy's wacked. (Score:5, Insightful)
First, activists are not terrorists, and that kid's no activist. My brother-in-law is an activist {PETA} and his arguments are intelligent, well researched, more than reasonable, and effective. I haven't given up meat yet, but I've cut down on milk. Thus, someone is listening to him and he's effecting change. That is what activists do.
RTF is nothing more than a dumb ass kid preaching to the disenfranchised (yeah, like that's tough). He has no real concept of anarchy, no understanding of WHY the world works the way it works (no matter how screwed up it gets), and no reasonable solution. So in effect, he's running his position on poor instinct and bad judgement. He effects no change because all he's trying to do is scare people into either buying his position or dying in the chaos of upheaval. I guess it never occured to him that most of the rest of us couldn't give a rats ass about what he thinks ("getting the message out"... what a load. Your message is out, and it sounds like a big steaming pile of crap. Now you're going to try and play the victim card & blame it on the government? Where do you come from?).
Then, he's got the balls, audacidity or insanity to claim the agencies involved used a lot of hardware - no shit sherlock. You ran a website that advocated voilence, vandalism, and had BOMB making instructions on your site. Gangs are dangerous and have guns. You have politicol motivation, half a brain (1/2 more than most local gangs), and a dangerous message with instructions on how others can perform those acts too. Plus, you broke the LAW... you... IDIOT! You bet they're coming heavily armed.
And by the way, the definition of terrorism is, and I quote "The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons". How 'bout that. You're a fledgling terrorist according to the very definition of the word. Good luck to him and for the FBI, keep up the good work.
If any of you feel any sympathy for this guy, you need to evaluate whether or not that's because you agree with him or just hate the feds, because that's one *'d up kid. And I'll bet the thousands of other sites that host the same kind of information (anarchists cookbook, etc.) don't advocate or act upon an idiological soapbox, which is why this kid was nabbed.
/rant. sorry.
Re:No defense, and that guy's wacked. (Score:3, Interesting)
Two things.
1) Apparently, distributing information on constructing weapons over the Internet is now illegal under the PATRIOT Act. You don't actually have to build them, or even advocate building them (although the Reclaim guide was neutral on this point). Just publishing the info is good for a charge should the feds decide you're worth taking down.
2) There was a "computer fraud and abuse" charge, and I think this is what the website defacement falls under. I can't defend attacks against sites or people; my aggressiveness ends at self-defense against an immediate attack.
What the FBI Doesn't Want You to See at RaisetheFi (Score:3, Informative)
My thoughts (Score:3, Interesting)
About his political views:
The kid isn't very smart. He also hasn't much interesting to say.
Lot's of things he is against, and almost nothing that he is for. That is always a sure sign of the wrong kind of punkers/leftist/idealists or whatever americans would call this type of people.
The "right" kind of leftist is harder to find and is usually doing hard work for their ideals.
About his methods:
He shouldn't have kept all those computers at home, he should have hosted his stuff offsite in the first place. Or at freenet or something equally elusive.
So as a revolutionist he isn't very effective. Basic survival of the fittest at work, I would say.
About him as a person:
I view this kid simply as a malcontent adolescent. He is only crying for attention, and now he got it. In fact, the people who raided his home did him a favour, if I think about it:
Look at all the attention he got!
Also, he already had the opinion that all police/secret service etc. are fascist bastards anyway, so now that they come raid him, he accuses them of overreacting and being meanies generally.
Well, duh!
Like I said, he is not very smart, like most of his kind
Re:Seems ok (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, it so happens that the founders of the US forgot to include "but not if it talks about violence" part when they were writing the First Amendment -- you know, the "free speech" one. Actually, it seems to me the were pretty violent guys themselves -- starting a war and all that.
And if that guy's site was the first one where the feds found the bomb-making informations on the 'net... [rolls his eyes]
This is not new (Score:2, Informative)
Misreading (Score:3, Interesting)
The rules of the Constitution do not apply to the Revolutionary War, since the Constitution did not exist at that time. Also, the Founding Fathers were considered terrorists and criminals by the then-in-power government, namely the English royalty. Lastly, neither the British monarchy nor the U.S. Constitution say it's okay to advocate violence, and both governments have criminalized it. It's just that there are parts of the Constitution that make it difficult for the U.S. government to eliminate the means for violent revolution so that if things got bad enough the people could revolt against the government again.
Still, all of this is tangential to the original charge, which is defacing web sites, which he admitted. And, the punishment he's undergone so far was confiscation of his computers and documents and questioning for six hours. This is not only not extreme, it's not even all that severe. As to the raid, there's nothing that says the FBI can't show up at your house with a dozen tanks to make an arrest. They're just not allowed to use more force than is necessary to make the arrest safely. Since there's no mention that they shot up his house or used explosives to crack the door, I don't see anything out of line legally.
Virg
Free speech verses private rights (Score:2)
We also have the right to pursue happiness, but if I'm only happy killing and raping people, I certainly can't do that.
Re:Seems ok (Score:2, Interesting)
The hypocritical sheep mentality on this site is really beginning to piss me off. We're up in arms about a software company abusing it's monopolistic status, we shout from the heavens about our so-called righte being taken away. But who does anything about it? Who says anything? Who does anything but bitch on this website?
This 18-year old kid got into some political literature and posted a website detailing his views on what the US government is doing both domestically and internationally to create to the best of their ability a global imperialism. Maybe you agree with his methods, maybe you don't. But it is his constitutional right to express his views in whatever way he deems appropriate. It is not the Government's right to say "Peaceful, organized protest is OK, but anything else (like posting a call to action website) is illegal and we will kick in your door with machine guns and drag you out of your house." Give me a break. To equate domestic political disagreement with terrorism sounds more like Communist China (Tienamen Square, anyone?) than the United States. I think all of us have forgotten why this country was founded in the first place:
"all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness...to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed....whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
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