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Wired and others are reporting on a Tor blog post claiming that Carnegie Mellon University researchers were paid by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to help attack Tor hidden services:
"Apparently these researchers were paid by the FBI to attack hidden services users in a broad sweep, and then sift through their data to find people whom they could accuse of crimes," Dingledine writes. "Such action is a violation of our trust and basic guidelines for ethical research. We strongly support independent research on our software and network, but this attack crosses the crucial line between research and endangering innocent users."
Tor's statement all but confirms that Carnegie Mellon's attack was used in the late 2014 law enforcement operation known as Operation Onymous, carried out by the FBI and Europol. That dark web purge took down dozens of Tor hidden services, including several of the most popular Tor-based black markets for drugs including the Silk Road 2, and led to at least 17 arrests. Tor, for its part, has made efforts to subsequently block the attack, which it says it first detected in July of 2014.
When WIRED contacted Carnegie Mellon, it didn't deny the Tor Project's accusations, but pointed to a lack of evidence. "I'd like to see the substantiation for their claim," said Ed Desautels, a staffer in the public relations department of the university's Software Engineering Institute. "I'm not aware of any payment," he added, declining to comment further.
Tor's Dingledine responded to that call for evidence by telling WIRED that it identified Carnegie Mellon as the origin of the attack by pinpointing servers running on Tor's network that were used in the de-anonymization technique. When it asked Carnegie Mellon if the servers were being run by its researchers—a suspicion based on the canceled Black Hat conference presentation—the anomalous servers disappeared from the network and the university offered no response. The $1 million payment, Dingledine says, was revealed to Tor by "friends in the security community."
Previously:
July 26, 2014: Russia Offers $111,000 to Break TOR Anonymity Network
September 30, 2014: Tor Executive Hints at Firefox Integration
November 8, 2014: Huge Raid to Shut Down 400-plus DarkNet Sites
November 10, 2014: Tor Project Mulls How Feds Took Down Hidden Websites
November 17, 2014: Is Tor a Honeypot?
December 22, 2014: Servers Seized After Tor Developers Warn of Potential Government Attempt To Take Down Network
(Score: 1) by tftp on Friday November 13 2015, @12:06AM
It's not legitimate for the Government to spend my money trying to stop this
The state has a legitimate interest in keeping its citizens healthy because those people may be one day needed to defend the country. The society also has a legitimate interest in keeping its members healthy because drug habits cost healthcare money and increase crime. (You cannot buy stuff on Silk Road or elsewhere for long if all that you do in life is drugs.) This all, naturally, collides with the personal interest (and freedom) of a person to do whatever he wants with his body.
One solution to that - as I already proposed here a few months ago - is a special zone, with walls and guards, where drugs can be purchased and used freely. Any adult can come in, and anyone who is free of drugs in their body can leave. Doctors will be available to test the leaving patrons, and to help those who need it. Inexpensive rooms will be available inside to recover from drug use. Those doctors will be paid by the entry fees and by the other income, as drugs are cheap - much cheaper than what criminals charge for them now. That would be like a casino. I may not want to see roulette tables on street corners; however the vice can be lawfully and safely exercised in special locations. Similarly, those who want to do car racing are already welcome to do so on private tracks; those who want to walk around naked can sign up with a nudist club; those who like to shoot clay can do so in properly equipped places.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by n1 on Friday November 13 2015, @12:37AM
My assumption would be that 'special location' should be the privacy of the drug users own home. Like sugar, tobacco, alcohol, prescribed medication and other 'legal' drugs/highs can be consumed in 'special locations' or can be consumed in the comfort of ones own residence.
If you drive drunk, walk the streets intoxicated, go to work drunk etc, you don't get the "oh it's legal, i drank the 40oz before i left home this morning, totally not drinking on the job" excuse, dangerous behavior with criminal or social penalty exists for such cases. We need 'drug zones' as much as we need 'free speech zones'.
There are so many people with addictions and crutches already, stigmatizing and segregating people is not a solution to that. You can get your high from consumerism, buying useless shit you don't need. Put your whole family into debt, make yourself homeless. But that's ok, because taxes were paid all along the way and your wasteful lifestyle was good for the states GDP. The only irresponsible thing you did was not pay off that credit card, not the irresponsible consumerism and consumption in pursuit of the necessary psychological stimulation to make life worth living.
Do irresponsible consumers, workaholics, binge eaters, chocolate addicts, fast-food junkies, work-out addicts, etc get a special 'freedom zone' too? They can all create socially and personally damaging results for the participants and those around them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 13 2015, @02:45AM
But that's ok, because taxes were paid all along the way and your wasteful lifestyle was good for the states GDP. The only irresponsible thing you did was not pay off that credit card, not the irresponsible consumerism and consumption in pursuit of the necessary psychological stimulation to make life worth living.
I think you might find this article about the dark side of free markets [theconversation.com] to be of interest.
"It is now not uncommon for 11-year-olds to be diabetic. I see one reason for it every time I check out at my local Safeway in Washington. The candy is right there at the cash register, waiting to be eaten.
But this does not mean that the manager of the store is mean or even irresponsible. If she has qualms about this practice, she would face a real dilemma: she needs to show a profit. The margins at supermarkets are tiny. No matter what her morals, she has almost no choice but to place those sweet impulse buys where customers can see them. In other words, there is an economic equilibrium in which businesses take advantage of every opportunity to increase profits. In such an equilibrium, the candy will be at the checkout counter.
Curiously, while economists understand each and every such instance where people are tempted to buy things that are not good for them, they fail to appreciate that this occurs because of a general principle of economics. They fail to understand that free markets, as bountiful as they may be, will not only provide us with what we want, as long as we can pay for it; they will also tempt us into buying things that are bad for us, whatever the costs.
..."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 13 2015, @03:14AM
Chocolate? Addicts? You kind of lost me there. How does my consumption of chocolate cause damaging results for you either socially or personally? Not that I'm addicted, mind you. I don't actually need to eat the chocolate....
(Score: 2) by Zz9zZ on Friday November 13 2015, @03:45AM
Emotional damage when you haven't hard your chocolate fix, financial costs from poor diet, eating too much chocolate and raising the prices for the rest of us :P
~Tilting at windmills~
(Score: 3, Insightful) by TheGratefulNet on Friday November 13 2015, @04:37AM
sounds like you are in favor of a nanny state.
I could not disagree with you more. people should be free to do whateve they want as long as it does not hurt others, and doing drugs does NOT hurt others. if you think it 'harms society' you have been listening too much to nancy reagan et al.
the war on drugs is the dumbest waste of money this country (and the ROW) has ever engaged in. stupid beyond belief, for those who actually have experience in this area.
I could care less if someone shows up 'at work' drug or stoned; that is not the issue. if they are unable to function or are a danger, that's quite another thing; but if someone is able to manage it (many are), then I see nothing wrong with it.
people drive distracted all the time. any parent with brats in the back seat is more of a danger on the road than most 'stoners' are. they are far more distracted and a risk to those around them. someone who is sleep deprived is a danger. someone who is emotionally upset is a danger. and yet, we seem to want to demonize the 'drug users' even though they are a small percentage of the problem people in the world.
I wish people would stop looking for 'easy boogeymen' to blame. its not helping.
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 2) by n1 on Friday November 13 2015, @10:34AM
I think my point got lost in there. I am not advocating a nanny state at all, my argument it against it. Maybe your reply to me was by accident?
I didn't say there should be criminal penalty for everything, just pointing out that criminal and social consequences already existt. I am not endorsing 'freedom zones' because where do you draw the line, thats why i used fast-food junkies and workaholics as examples of other types of people who would need special zones to protect society if we go down that route.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Friday November 13 2015, @05:00AM
If you drive drunk, walk the streets intoxicated, go to work drunk etc, you don't get the "oh it's legal, i drank the 40oz before i left home this morning, totally not drinking on the job" excuse, dangerous behavior with criminal or social penalty exists for such cases.
Those penalties are usually applied after the drunk driver kills someone. Converted into my model, all drunk patrons of all drinking establishments would be driven home by specially arranged taxicabs - or allowed to sleep it off in a nearby hotel. Regardless of the method, they would be safely kept off the streets - for their own benefit and for benefit of others. Otherwise "a few bad apples" will eventually spoil it for everyone, the society will scream bloody murder, and all new cars will be sold with alcohol sensors, on consumer's dime. Freedoms then will be lost, not increased.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 13 2015, @01:24AM
Wow, that's probably the most authoritarian "fix" to the war on drugs as anyone could possibly come up with. Entrance and exit drug testing? So if you want to smoke a joint after dinner instead of drink a beer you have to commit hours if not days of your life? And that all presumes your CSI-level understanding of drug testing is how it works in real life.
Come on man.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Friday November 13 2015, @07:01AM
A modern day opium house... safe to come and do the drug(s) within. Opium houses were common a long time before the war on drugs - they just were convenient for users.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anal Pumpernickel on Friday November 13 2015, @08:41AM
The state has a legitimate interest in keeping its citizens healthy because those people may be one day needed to defend the country.
Then you'd have to ban everything that could conceivably make people unhealthy and force people to exercise. How much is freedom worth to you? If you think this is a good idea, probably not much.
Furthermore, I assume you speak of the draft. Government thugs have no legitimate moral authority to force people to fight for them in a war, and indeed, if someone were to shoot said government thugs for trying to force them into some war, I wouldn't feel too bad for the thugs. Running away or refusing and going to jail are acceptable ways to rebel. There should be an explicit constitutional ban on the government's ability to call for drafts, regardless of the situation.
If you meant voluntary service, then you can't mandate that people be 'healthy' because they might one day, at some unspecified point in the future, decide to enlist in the military. That's no longer voluntary and would impact the freedoms of people who have no desire to be in the military.
The society also has a legitimate interest in keeping its members healthy because drug habits cost healthcare money and increase crime.
Many people have said that government healthcare will enable a nanny state to control what you put into your body or what you eat. Good job proving them right, in a way. However, this is not necessary, because we can simply accept that the fundamental right to control your own body is more important, and then accept increased taxation (assuming that's even needed). Few seem to consider this possibility, as if freedom as a concept is completely foreign to them.
As for drugs increasing crime, that is false. People commit crime and then drugs become the excuse. Drugs cannot cause crimes because they are not sentient. If you take drugs and then commit crimes, that's on you. If being under the influence of drugs makes certain people more likely to commit crimes, then that is still their fault for taking the drugs and then taking those actions. You cannot blame drugs for this.
One solution to that - as I already proposed here a few months ago - is a special zone, with walls and guards, where drugs can be purchased and used freely. Any adult can come in, and anyone who is free of drugs in their body can leave.
The only real solution is to respect people's fundamental right to control their own bodies. Anything else is unacceptable. Safety is far less important than freedom, and as such, I'd much rather live in a society that respects our freedoms but is less safe and less stable.
If you're willing to trade fundamental liberties for safety and/or to save money, you are a mere coward who lacks principles. Why so many people who despise freedom live in countries that supposedly strive to be free rather than just moving to existing dictatorship hellholes is beyond me. I guess that's part of being an authoritarian: You want to strip everyone of their freedoms.