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The Dark Web is having a rough time right now... although the victims in this case won't earn too much sympathy. An Anonymous-linked hacker speaking to Motherboard brought down about a fifth of the Tor network's 'secret' websites (over 10,000 of them) in a claimed vigilante move. The intruder decided to attack a Dark Web hosting service, Freedom Hosting II, after discovering that it was managing child porn sites it had to be aware of -- they were using gigabytes of data each when the host officially allows no more than 256MB. Each site had its usual pages replaced with a message that not only chastised FH2, but offered a data dump (minus user info) and explained the nature of the hack.
Reportedly, the attack wasn't difficult. The hacker only needed to have control over a site (new or existing) to get started. After that, it was mostly a matter of modifying a configuration file, triggering a password reset and getting root access.
From early indications, the perpetrator is handling the data relatively responsibly. It's going to a security researcher who'll hand it over to law enforcement, which might just use it to bust the porn peddlers.
Source:
https://www.engadget.com/2017/02/05/hack-knocks-out-fifth-of-dark-web/
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 07 2017, @08:34PM
"From early indications, the perpetrator is handling the data relatively responsibly. It's going to a security researcher who'll hand it over to law enforcement, which might just use it to bust the porn peddlers."
Wrong. Law enforcement won't be able to bust anybody, because the chain of evidence is tainted. Now if the hackers had went to law enforcement first and said, "Hey, we've got this idea of how to take down this webhost who hosts a lot of CP....." and provided their methodology - without doing it because vigilante rightism or not it is still criminal hacking.... then maybe the FBI and NSA might have made something out of it.
So if anyone gets busted here, it would be the vigilante hackers. Criminal hacking aside, actually they managed to make an obstruction of justice by interfering. So well done, hackers! It's not like the CP peddlers won't find Freedom Hosting III tomorrow or anything and that you just gave them a get out of jail free card for Freedom Hosting II or anything.
Batman is a lovely story. But it is a story, people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 07 2017, @09:13PM
and hardly anyone who matters cares when its used against pedos.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction [wikipedia.org],
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday February 07 2017, @09:15PM
Parallel construction is a Conspiracy of prosecutors and law enforcement to commit perjury by lying to the court and the defense about what their evidence actually is.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 07 2017, @09:47PM
"hardly anyone who matters cares"
So you care. Do you matter?
If so, congratulations, you are hardly anyone.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by choose another one on Tuesday February 07 2017, @10:07PM
Nope, what the evidence _is_ doesn't change, how they got it is where the lying is...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 07 2017, @09:55PM
Sorry, I disagree. Parallel construction is a thing that is *kept secret* from courts and defense attorneys. Does it go on? Of course. But not in a way the defense can use in court, normally.
If defense attorney cannot specify exactly the parallel method used then it is whistling in the dark. But if defense attorney can reasonably prove that evidence was obtained illegally prior to the act of "parallel construction" the subsequent evidence falls as fruit of the poison tree. By the way "parallel construction" is really a near-oxymoron. The illegal evidence is obtained first.... THEN they go back and find a plausible legal route for the court-used evidence. It ain't really "parallel" is it? All it takes is a VERY hard job of proving that. One that our "friends" have made a lot easier.
Anyway, the publicity around this hack means that any person busted prior to this timeframe will have the investigators raked over the coals by even a barely competent defense attorney. "So, Investigator X.... you stated for the record you got this evidence by blah-blah-blah. I call your attention to Defense Exhibit A. The site allegedly used by the defendant was hacked by these so-called white-hat hackers. [Where did the defendant obtain this alleged evidence you're presenting, Investigator? You don't know? Hmm.] Are you aware of that? Don't follow the news, investigator? You mean you weren't exposed to that information at all? Well, Investigator, how can you be sure that the access logs for the site weren't tampered with by those people. You knew them, right? Withdrawn. Isn't it true, Investigator, that you'd do anything to put child pornographers out of business? If a white hat hacker approached you, wouldn't you feel compelled to examine what they said they had? etc. etc."'
Before a jury, all you'd need is to establish reasonable doubt that defendant Pedobear might just be the innocent victim of these so-called do-gooding vigilantes. At a minimum, they've made the prosecutor's job all that more complex. At maximum the CPers will go free now when maybe the cops would have had a shot with their own parallel constructions. (Constitutional or not.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08 2017, @06:35AM
You assume that the defense is competent, and cognizant of this interweb thingy.
(Score: 3, Informative) by ikanreed on Tuesday February 07 2017, @09:14PM
Chain of evidence will keep it from being used in court, however, it could be sufficient, as a privately supplied source, as probable cause for a sting or raid on the perpetrators to get valid evidence.
It's like... if I dug a human femur from your yard, and took it the police, they couldn't use it to indict you(probably), but they could claim my evidence suggests probable cause to investigate your home. You know, after they figured why the fuck I'm digging femurs out of your yard, and whether I'm probably telling the truth.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 07 2017, @09:28PM
Chain of evidence will keep it from being used in court
I am not a lawyer, but I'm not even sure this is true. My understanding is that Chain of Custody [wikipedia.org] refers to the responsibilities and expectations of authorities, not to civilians. So the chain of custody would begin when the vigilante brought the evidence to the authorities, and end once the trial was over and the thing was disposed of.
After all, the courts are willing to accept eyewitness testimony. How is this any less reliable?
I would think that the source of the problem is the credibility of the evidence. On its own it is nowhere near enough to meet "beyond a reasonable doubt" for conviction, due to the ease by which it could be forged or planted. However, it would be fully submit-able to courts and they would accept it as something presentable to the jury, in so far as it is provable that the authorities received the evidence from a vigilante (as opposed to identifying it conclusively as being linked to the defendant).
Contrast this with a kilogram of cocaine which "disappeared" from the police storage locker for a few hours before being "found." I think that drugs would summarily be disregarded by the courts due to the unaccounted for period.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday February 07 2017, @09:50PM
Your intuition isn't unreasonable, but the common prohibition does exist and does serve a purpose, though I think both myself and the grandparent oversimplified how it works.
The rule isn't about evidence quality. Nor is it about chain of custody. No, the thing that might get this evidence tossed out of court is the 4th amendment. Namely that evidence gathered without a warrant, in general, doesn't stand in court. Fruit of the Forbidden Tree, I think they call it. The how and the why of the 4th amendment probably has more words written about it than I've read in my entire life, and like you, I'm not a lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that private citizens collecting evidence without a warrant is also likely to not be allowed in court.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 07 2017, @11:08PM
The rule isn't about evidence quality. Nor is it about chain of custody. No, the thing that might get this evidence tossed out of court is the 4th amendment. Namely that evidence gathered without a warrant, in general, doesn't stand in court. Fruit of the Forbidden Tree, I think they call it. The how and the why of the 4th amendment probably has more words written about it than I've read in my entire life, and like you, I'm not a lawyer, but I'm pretty sure that private citizens collecting evidence without a warrant is also likely to not be allowed in court.
Now here I'm on more firm ground. I am still not a lawyer, but Nathaniel Burney [lawcomic.net] is (albeit not your lawyer, each case has specific details, laws vary by state, disclaimer, disclaimer, etc).
The key point is to read that 2nd section of the linked chart, about who is violating the privacy. The 4th Amendment only applies to the State, not to private individuals. This is why the police can accept into evidence drugs that a person brings into a police station that they claim came from somebody else, among other things.
If the vigilante on their own, not solicited by the State, provides evidence to the police, it is valid. They acted on their own as a private individual. They can do it once, maybe twice... however, if it happens with any frequency, the Defense can argue that the vigilante was acting on behalf of the State and thus the 4th Amendment applies. As a result, they would need a warrant to use the evidence in court... probably...
Actually, that chart is very worthwhile to scan through (assuming you don't want to read the whole comic). The 4th Amendment is much more complicated and provides less protection in fewer circumstances than people think, and it's interesting to learn more about it. The same with the 5th Amendment [lawcomic.net]. There is also a chart in regard to eyewitness evidence, too, but that's a very specialized (albeit common) field and thus may not be as fun to learn about.
As a side note, upon reflection, I really wonder how the 4th Amendment interplays with the "Police are offering $50,000 for evidence leading to the arrest and conviction of ___." Clearly such things are legal (... I think?), but I don't see how that interplays with the 4th Amendment. Maybe evidenced provided during that type of warrant is not admissible, and thus police frequently don't need to pay? I do know that such rewards frequently end up with informant not actually being paid due to a variety of reasons.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08 2017, @01:33AM
If the vigilante on their own, not solicited by the State, provides evidence to the police, it is valid. They acted on their own as a private individual. They can do it once, maybe twice... however, if it happens with any frequency, the Defense can argue that the vigilante was acting on behalf of the State and thus the 4th Amendment applies.
They're still acting as an agent of the government (even if they only do it once), whether official or not. Courts may accept this, but they are wrong in doing so.
The 4th Amendment is much more complicated and provides less protection in fewer circumstances than people think, and it's interesting to learn more about it.
You need to distinguish between what the 4th amendment actually protects and what judges say it protects; they are different things. If judges support tyranny, then they need to be ousted and replaced with judges who will actually follow the Constitution. Let's not get into the paradoxical 'The courts are always right.' argument, because it's stunningly, blatantly idiotic.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08 2017, @06:30AM
At best you're chasing unicorns. At worst, you'll never be a lawyer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08 2017, @06:50PM
They're still acting as an agent of the government (even if they only do it once), whether official or not. Courts may accept this, but they are wrong in doing so.
So to be clear, from a moral perspective, you are holding the government responsible for the actions which they did not ask for and did not expect?
If a food bank was giving out soup to the hungry, and it turns out that one of the donators had (unbeknownst to the food bank) stolen the cans of food from a supermarket, would you hold the food bank responsible? Would you hold the hungry people responsible?
You need to distinguish between what the 4th amendment actually protects and what judges say it protects; they are different things.
You are correct, but have it exactly backwards. What the 4th amendment actually protects is what society (and by proxy, the courts... and by further proxy, the police) accepts it as protecting.
What you are describing is what it theoretically or nominally protects, and only what a non-legal-expert interprets it as protecting. That is laudable, and maybe "better" in an abstract sense based on numerous moral frameworks, but none of that matters when a person is facing time in jail. Even if Socrates was correct in the philosophical world, in the physical world he still drank the hemlock.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday February 07 2017, @10:59PM
OK. Let's say it's like that. You dug a human femur from my yard and took it to the police.
No, it wouldn't give the police probable cause to search my home, on several grounds. (pun intended.)
Even if you could persuade a police department that they wouldn't end up paying me millions for defamation and false prosecution, my defense attorney might call you to the stand and ask you several questions:
*OK, you were treasure hunting and found this bone allegedly in my client's yard. Did you have permission to do so? [Yes - gee, it seems strange my client should give you permission to dig up his yard if he knew there were human remains there, doesn't it?] [No - so you admit you were trespassing on my client's private property?]
* Why didn't you call the police on your cell phone and leave the femur in place? [Look of disbelief no matter what you answer.]
*I see. And what is your evidence that my client had anything to do with this - you were on his yard, right? So why couldn't somebody else have been digging in his yard and hid that bone?
*OK. So the truth is, sir, there's no reason for this court to believe that YOU didn't kill the person, stash the body in his yard, and then you dug it up to frame my client, right, sir?
*These bones allegedly found in my client's house. Isn't it reasonable to think then that YOU planted them in my client's house, sir?
Again.... Batman is a wonderful story. But fruit of the poisonous tree rarely gives the results you are expecting.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday February 07 2017, @11:03PM
Probable cause to search your house isn't defamation. They call it "probable cause" because they're upfront admitting it's not true.
I've never heard of anyone receiving damages for being investigated for a crime. Not under any circumstances. And it's only false prosecution if... guess what, they prosecute you(which they won't if the search warrant doesn't lead to further evidence).
So... congrats.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08 2017, @03:35PM
The police can't be sued for defamation, eh? But if you allege that I was responsible for the bone in the yard, and it is untrue, and I suffer harm because of it? I may not win, but you bet I have a prima facie case and can make you spend money on lawyers. Would I win? No, but I can.
While we digress, I am happy to educate you: http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2007-07-27/news/0707270325_1_search-warrant-mengel-detective [baltimoresun.com] The Maryland Supreme Court ruled that police can indeed be sued for libel for false statements as part of obtaining a warrant. Two cops were suing other cops for libel the other cops alleged in a search warrant against the first pair. That has nothing to do with this, other than to refute your claim that that defamation cannot exist during an investigation by officers' conduct. Did they get money? Dunno, don't care. It's enough to know in some jurisdictions officers can be sued for it. Five seconds on a Google search for that one, BTW.
And you make no mention of the fact that police will consider YOU the prime suspect in your example above, with the property owner certainly there but in second place. Nor have you provided any refutation that a defense attorney would have a heyday with hacker-obtained-evidence. Enough to free someone? That depends on the jury - and I can't see a defendant in that position where tainted evidence can be implied not wanting a jury trial - though a CP charge may be considered too hot for a jury so I dunno. But it sure can muddy waters that might have been clearer if the hackers had kept their mitts off.
And you are right that most attorneys don't know the Internet from an Innertube. BUT many-if-not-most attorneys are news junkies because that's a wonderful way to ambulance chase. And technical knowledge is a real handicap when it comes to formulating a defense strategy which involves technical things. Because it doesn't matter what you know. It even doesn't matter what you can prove. It only matters to a defense attorney what you can credibly Allege as alternatives. Tech-dumb attorney wants to convince tech-dumb jury of something technically impossible but plausible, hopefully bamboozling the tech-dumb prosecutor and tech-dumb judge as well.
So.... thanks and you're welcome.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Thursday February 09 2017, @12:17AM
You don't go to the police. Instead, wait until the neighbor is gone and form a crew with the local stoner boy, Vietnam vet, and loud mouthed electrician. Then dig up their yard, and possibly their basement looking for further clues.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by choose another one on Tuesday February 07 2017, @10:15PM
Given that half the CP on the dark web is/was reckoned to be run by the FBI (and other law enforcement probably run part of the rest) - see e.g. https://thenextweb.com/security/2016/11/11/the-fbi-likely-ran-nearly-half-the-child-porn-sites-on-the-dark-web-in-2016/ [thenextweb.com] it is very likely that law enforcement would just have to bust themsleves.
This scenario becomes even more likely when you consider that someone had to pay for the data (bandwidth), someone got the host to override bandwidth limits, and someone apparently didn't care about the expense... sure smells like a govt. agency.
If so, oops...
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08 2017, @02:53AM
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An astute observation, and almost certain to be partially true, applying to a number of sites affected. These are important stories to see and to report on, but I wish the submitters would not buy into the witch-hunt lingo like "child porn", which in practice means almost anything, including crude fictional drawings, photos of 17 year olds having consensual sex, and photographic evidence of sexual abuse; that is, what witch hunters call "child porn" is often not what most of us would call porn, and has no children involved.
I would also like to notice the extreme hypocrisy exemplified by the cracker, which is the norm whenever one mounts an attack on free expression. The cracker has undoubtedly downloaded some or all of what xe calls "child porn", thereby committing the same crime (at least in USA) as the alleged website operators. If the cracker wants to claim this is ethically ok because xe did it with the right intentions, we only need to point out that, for all xe knows, the same is true of the people who were sharing the illegal files on the hidden web.
The above analysis, of course, is hair splitting, and mostly irrelevant in the face of facts: the child abuse imagery, fictional or photographic, just as the sexual abuse imagery, just as the murder imagery, just as the mass murder imagery, just as the imagery of an evil nazi using a chainsaw to rape and then dismember a mother and a child have only a tenuous relationship to the acts being depicted. It is very telling that the nazi example would be perfectly legal in USA, as long as no genital contact is shown, but a picture of 2 17 year olds having consensual sex is not. The purpose of every anti-"child porn" law on the books is the same around the world: to prohibit an informed discussion about the child abuse and the sexual abuse, so that the law enforcement has the right of the first night, and every night with people and children it is intended to serve. In the world where we cannot freely share the evidence of abuse, the abuse blooms. The second purpose of any such law, just as important as the first, is to give politicians a reason to censor the public forum. Once the reason exists, the censorship tools are created, and once the tools are created, they are applied to anything else of interest. This works mostly because the misuse of tools is itself censored, which is why the USA law enforcement hates Snowden so much: he peeled off the most important layer, which is required to hide every other crime against the people and their human rights.
Anonymous ~ 0x9932FE2729B1D963
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday February 08 2017, @03:48AM