Anonymous Posts Audio of Intercepted FBI Conference Call 336
DrDevil writes "A member of the computer hacking group Anonymous has hacked into a telephone conference between the FBI and Scotland Yard (London Police) and posted it on the internet. The Daily Telegraph has a comprehensive article on the hack. The audio of the call can be heard here." Reader eldavojohn snips as well from the AP's story as carried by Google: "Those on the call talk about what legal strategy to pursue in the cases of Ryan Cleary and Jake Davis — two British suspects linked to Anonymous — and discuss details of the evidence gathered against other suspects."
I Guess This Means ... (Score:5, Insightful)
This will really piss off the FBI and it will be the political motivation for the FBI to pull out all the stops to find members of Anonymous.
Question (Score:5, Insightful)
If the government can listen to our calls (without a warrant) then why can't we listen to theirs?
Dragnet (Score:2, Insightful)
Based on the vague discussion details and how the FBI sent out an email with the conference call number and password, it sounds more likely to be a setup by the FBI to lure Anon into the call so they could glean more location data off of them.
They aren't heroes (Score:3, Insightful)
Anonymous is the least of their worries... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Question (Score:5, Insightful)
Obama DID promise much greater transparency in government. Of course, he completely broke that promise, so Anonymous is just holding him to it.
Re:Dragnet (Score:5, Insightful)
Based on the vague discussion details and how the FBI sent out an email with the conference call number and password, it sounds more likely to be a setup by the FBI to lure Anon into the call so they could glean more location data off of them.
Nah. Never expect cleverness where carelessness would as easily explain how it was achieved.
Some agent has been found and his mailbox is regularly visited for content of interest. Use some better security, send out a honeypot once in a while and see who connects, etc. This is a lesson for FBI and Scotland Yard not to take their security for granted. Could have been worse.
I'm certain anyone else who was privy to these conference calls is highly annoyed at the exposure, which will result in some changes.
Re:Anonymous is the least of their worries... (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps the lesson is rather that Anon isn't ONLY made up of scriptkiddies. I know, goes against the talking points, but at some point they do get a bit tired.
Re:I Guess This Means ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I Guess This Means ... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm a law abiding person, and I'd rather see some civil disobedience than government officials corrupt with power doing whatever they want.
I'm pretty sure the FBI routinely breaks more laws than Anonymous, so this just restores the natural checks and balances our government has gotten rid of over the years.
Re:They aren't heroes (Score:5, Insightful)
They're the worst type of vigilantes, who in their own minds are drunk with power. They're the internet equivalent of a mob of Molotov-cocktail tossing anarchists who burn things down because it's fun to do. They rationalize their behavior any way they can
The problem is this same statement pretty well applies to the FBI and CIA and insert Gov agency here since 9/11.
Anonymous is just a bunch of lulz-seeking idiots (Score:4, Insightful)
This just shows what a bunch of clueless morons Anonymous is.
They perform a brilliant bit of counter-intel and gained an upper-hand by finding a way to exploit the FBI and eavesdrop on their conversations.
And what do they do with this victory? Do they send the FBI tripping over itself on an internal mole-hunt by going to the media with a tiny bit of this info explained as "information leaked by a source within the FBI?". Do they patiently sit and gather more intel, maybe useful information to help them evade arrest or gather bits of public interest in other cases for later use?
No, they broadcast it to the world with details on how they did it, all but going to the FBI and closing the weakness themselves.
These jerkoffs have shown once and for all that they are just a bunch of egotistical little shits who are indeed just in it for the lulz and "street cred".
I doubt we'll see anything come of Anonymous aside from more LOIC attacks, credit card thefts and web page vandalism.
They've shown all the intelligence and finesse of a group of anarchistic thugs.
Re:They aren't heroes (Score:5, Insightful)
If you can't make an argument without making some stupid stereotypical nazi comment, you probably shouldn't be making the argument.
It's not that it's wrong to watch the government, it's wrong how they do it.
Re:They aren't heroes (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, if the FBI and the Yard does not have anything to hide, then why are they so upset about being listened in on? They LOVE to live in a surveillance society so much that they're the primary force in bringing it to be!
You should ALWAYS listen to what the police say.
Re:They aren't heroes (Score:5, Insightful)
Believe it or not, there are shades of grey between "I don't want 4chan dabbling in national security" and "I am a genocidal totalitarian".
All I Can Say (Score:4, Insightful)
Is Hooray. What a dump for the Hoover's and Peel's plonkers.
Secret policemen are the enemy of Democracy and Liberty. Freedom cannot be defended by means of surreptious authority.
Re:Wouldn't it be a pity... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's sure as hell not mightier than the public, though.
As long as double cheeseburgers are 99 cents, I don't think most of the public can be motivated to do much of anything.
Re:They aren't heroes (Score:4, Insightful)
So it's wrong to make sure the government isn't up to no good? You sound like you would have been a loyal Nazi sympathizer back in the 30s.
Didn't waste any time getting to Godwin, did we?
There's a big difference between being an active citizen and doing common sense things to hold your government accountable, and undertaking what is essentially an intelligence op not too different from what a hostile foreign spy agency would have done against your own government. You need to put away the silly V for Vendetta mask and realize that this is way out of bounds. This isn't protesting, this isn't marching, this isn't a hunger strike. This is a direct attack on law enforcement, and that's only going to end in one way.
Re:Eavesdropping on phone calls: good or bad? (Score:2, Insightful)
It's not about who's doing the eavesdropping it's about who is being eavesdropped on.
In once case private individuals, in the other the government (or government agents).
Re:They aren't heroes (Score:3, Insightful)
Please avoid personal attacks on Slashdot just because you don't agree. Yours was particularly tasteless and inflammatory.
Re:I Guess This Means ... (Score:5, Insightful)
The conference call seems to be the tip of the ice burg. They knew about the call because they are intercepting FBI/police emails.
The more people involved the more opportunities they have to gather information.
Re:All I Can Say (Score:5, Insightful)
Is Hooray. What a dump for the Hoover's and Peel's plonkers.
Secret policemen are the enemy of Democracy and Liberty. Freedom cannot be defended by means of surreptious authority.
"Secret Policemen"? The FBI and Scotland Yard are the moral, legal, and operational equivalents of the KGB and the Gestapo? Are you serious?
Tradecraft (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Anonymous is the least of their worries... (Score:5, Insightful)
Who's to say that there's not an occasional "Anon" that also works for the FBI?
Here's how to scare 'em: "We are all moles".
Re:Anonymous is just a bunch of lulz-seeking idiot (Score:4, Insightful)
Better anarchistic thugs than authoritarian thugs.
Re:All I Can Say (Score:5, Insightful)
No.
They are moral, legal and operational equivalents of Inspector Javert.
But they are on track to reach STASI equivalency, in th coming decade.
Re:Wouldn't it be a pity... (Score:3, Insightful)
It amuses me how conspiracy theorists and other anti-government figures claim that current governments are always just one step away from martial law or fascism (or, more often, how they've already been there for centuries), about how they're gleefully abusing our rights, mistreating us on an inhumane scale, or the usual overused go-to phrase, "raping us all in the ass". They always say that the government are bloodthirsty, amoral, self-indulging quasi-human entities that wouldn't think twice about "disappearing" us to further their own political goals and how they're getting more and more brash in their actions, like they don't care what we think at all.
And then they turn around and claim that "the public" saying mean things about them on a computer will somehow stop all this from happening. That a well-armed, apparently cartoonishly evil government would, for some as-yet-unexplained reason, suddenly give up if the public whines about them, and not, say, just start slaughtering all detractors and anyone else in their apartment complex/neighborhood as a means of controlling dissent. That writing strongly-worded (STRONGLY-worded, mind you) letters would stop the bombs and bullets headed towards the public and restore peace and tranquility and then Jesus would come back or something.
And people wonder why it's so fun to troll places like these. Carry on! Suuuuure, the gun is mightier than the public, buddy! Keep on believing that your evil evil evil government will arbitrarily stop exactly short of your passive-aggressive revolution ideas!
Re:Anonymous is just a bunch of lulz-seeking idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
Better anarchistic thugs than authoritarian thugs.
No, not really. That's a false choice. How about "Neither"?
Re:Anonymous is just a bunch of lulz-seeking idiot (Score:5, Insightful)
Or, it's brilliant.
Let's say Anon managed to through some one-time gap (ie a sympathetic insider, perhaps) managed to get the login details to this one conference. It's meaningless, because they can't repeat the success.
However, if they leak it:
- heads roll at the FBI
- everyone's walking on eggshells because of management fury
- everyone's required to use full-secure protocols and resources for the stupidest trivial conversations
- FBI still doesn't know who leaked it, so begins witchhunt which consumes resources, and makes everyone nervous.
I think it's probably a one-off, parlayed into a fairly clever bit of system-attack.
You know, like a single coordinated unrepeatable multiplane hijacking could theoretically cause an entire country to be consumed by paroxysms of paranoia for more than a decade, leading to absurd legislation, efficiency costs for hundreds of millions of people, as well as actual TRILLIONS of dollars of waste.
Right?
Re:I Guess This Means ... (Score:2, Insightful)
The FBI has been violating the Constitution for years by attaching GPS tracking devices to suspect's cars without a warrant. And the FBI has been violating the law with regards to National Security Letters [aclu.org].
Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
Re:I Guess This Means ... (Score:2, Insightful)
I think his point was that they've shown their hand either way, and he's probably right.
Self-identifying Anon folks aren't NSA employees. Without serious restraint and forethought any advantage they've got is momentary. That overwhelming desire to brag is a weakness.
Re:Eavesdropping on phone calls: good or bad? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a poor comparison. When Anonymous becomes a publicly traded company that poses as a legitimate media player, then it would make sense. No shit Anonymous is breaking the law, that's what they do and they're doing so for a cause (whether it's justified or not is irrelevant, they seem to believe in it).
News Corp. eavesdropped on conversations for personal gain, oftentimes exploiting grieving families.
Selective outrage is certainly useful for the logical thinker who doesn't compare apples and oranges.