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"Thanks to an 'end of life' vulnerability, almost anyone can kill you off digitally; you could virtually kill off a boss-from-hell or an ex. Imagine the nightmare of trying to get an official ID then. The virtual birthing process is even easier to exploit, according to Chris Rock's 'I will kill you & birth you' presentation at Def Con 23."
The presentation goes on to describe how to acquire a doctor's identifying information, register on a state's Electronic Death Registration System, fill out a death certificate, register to become a funeral director, and then complete the death certificate documents.
There are many possible motivations for 'virtually killing' someone: financial gain, exacting revenge, and hindering someone else:
[More after the break.]
"You could be dead right now and not even know it," Rock said. A person who has been virtually killed might not know about it until they apply for a passport or driver's license. And trying to reverse it doesn't mean a person could for sure. An example included a man who was declared legally dead but was an alive, roaming alcoholic; an Ohio judge said the law in his state would not allow a death to be reversed after three or more years had passed. "I don't know where that leaves you, but you're still deceased as far as the law is concerned," the judge told the man. Rock quoted the judge as stating, "Even though you're sitting here in my courtroom, I see you, you're alive, you seem to be in good health, the law restricts me from reversing the prior finding of death."
Virtual birthing is even easier; just register the birth as a midwife or as the result of a home birth. The resultant shell/shelf baby could be used in a number of ways:
In Rock's book, he explained "The Baby Harvest" as a "concept of a criminal syndicate: making and raising virtual babies to adulthood to be put on the shelf for money laundering, fraud and drug and firearm importation." Rock said eventually the fake babies could be harvested, as in 'killed off,' at investment maturity.
Although shelf babies would be a long-term investment, they have the most benefits as those "virtuals" could borrow millions of dollars, launder money, take out life insurance policies, buy guns and drugs, or be sold. Virtual identities could also be used to enhance anonymity; if a person were to use TOR or a VPN, use bitcoin to make payments, yet still end up getting busted...the trail would supposedly lead back to a virtual person who never existed in real life in the first place.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 10 2015, @09:06AM
Golly, the intent of the law is why we have juries and appeals. Also, the voters elect their judges, and when the next election is held, the voters have the option of voting NO, the foolish judge shall not be retained.
(Score: 3, Informative) by VLM on Monday August 10 2015, @11:50AM
the foolish judge shall not be retained.
LOL where I live we have (we had?) judicial voting and the way the racket works is for semi-political positions (supreme court etc) the gerrymandered predetermined winning party picks the one candidate therefore winner and in the non-political races where its political but stealth, the local bar association kinda fixes it such that theres only one candidate and anyone running against the preselected candidates is pretty much ostracized out of the law business. The candidates from the gerrymandered non-predetermined winners often don't even toss up a candidate for the ballot. I can't in my lifetime remember getting to vote in a local municipal judicial election for anyone but the stealth R-candidate or write-in and larger races like state supreme ct have all gone R- since my parents generation so again its pretty much vote for the R- or write in because the R- candidate will win.
It IS possible if the guy is embarrassing enough the local political party will remove him. Locally its a pretty difficult task, insert the old saying about it takes a live boy or dead girl found in his bedroom to get him kicked out of the political party, etc.
Also you have to be realistic, Ohio is just "boring Indiana". Wisconsin is all deer hunting cheeseheads, Minnesota is all hot Swedish-american blond women, Illinois is the local center of massive corruption and mafia activity, Indiana is the ultra-exurb for Chicago residents, Iowa is a big corn field, I could go on and on, but the fact is Ohio has no identity other than being a really boring version of Indiana. Nothing personal against any SN participants from Ohio of course, in fact their participation on SN is possibly the most exciting thing to happen to their state since the Wright brothers. I'm just saying... its Ohio... its kind of the midwest's Florida, if you know what I mean. Like a "local Fark" website in the midwest would have an "Ohio" section and the locals would all know exactly what they're talking about. I mean, there's a reason they found a case in Ohio specifically, its not just geographic randomness. The number of people in Ohio always staggers me, its so populous but so boring.