Oprah Crusades for CP Law - And Gets Pwned

This week Oprah has been harping on her viewers to call Congress to voice their support for Senate Bill 1738 - The PROTECT Our Children Act.

On her Monday show, she even shared chilling messages posted to her Oprah.com message board. She quoted these postings as "evidence" of how internet predators are organized in their sick, evil pursuits. Have a look:

"If you still don't understand what our children are up against, let me read you something that was posted on our message boards from someone who claims to be a member of a known pedophile network. It said this, he doesn't forgive, he doesn't forget. His people have over 9,000 penises and they're all raping children. So, I want you to know they're organized and they have systematic ways of hurting children."

For those of you who are up on your internet memes, you'll instantly recognize the creed of Anonymous (Steroidus Hacktococi), "We do not forgive, we do not forget" and the ancient meme "it's over 9,000!!!!" These are some serious lulz.

The Lulz Are Over 9,000

Remember, trolls will say whatever it takes to get a reaction out of you. The more dramatic and outrageous the reaction, the lulzier (funnier) it is for us. And Oprah sure did deliver! Right there on her TV show, for millions to see, Oprah Winfrey cited a bogus message board entry as hardcore evidence of how evil predators are. Oprah, did you learn nothing from your James Frey incident? You need to research this stuff before you put it out there! As of this moment, you're as bad as that crazy family member who forwards every bogus e-mail scare that Snopes debunked years ago. If you're not careful, your personal army is going to ignore your ranting.

And now that Oprah has fallen for it once, Anonymous will be coming after her in ways she cannot predict to get as many lulz as they can. Expect them.

Oprah Needs Help

I would totally go on the Oprah show to explain trolling and the wild side of the Internet. If one little troll can humiliate Oprah's crusade this much, then this is something people need to know about.

Dr. Phil wanted to have me on his show to talk about the Craigslist Experiment and to put me face-to-face with some of the guys who "participated" in it. I said, "no, thanks. I don't think an appearance like that on the Dr. Phil show would be very productive." Dr. Phil is all about sensationalizing interpersonal drama for cheap ratings. He doesn't actually help anyone.

But, Oprah! Oprah is a different story! She's classy. She probably wouldn't get it, but it would be fun to try to explain it to her. Call me, k?

Related Links

Encyclopedia Dramatica - Oprah over 9000 penises

Oprah message boards on child porn episode (9/19/08 community appears to be down, possibly comment flood)

Previous Anonymous shenanigans: Anonymous Rides A Palin Horsecomment=Laura http://www.warped-reality.org 2008-09-24 at 10:47am It's good to see you blogging again. 98.162.183.63

The Background

Earlier Wednesday, members from Anonymous posted on 4chan their successful attack on Sarah Palin's gov.palin@yahoo.com account and images from the account to prove authenticity. Within hours, a white hat within the ranks reset the password on the account, and notified a Palin associate of the attack. Soon after the account was deleted. A McCain Palin spokesperson condemned the attack as a "shocking invasion of the Governor's privacy."

Evidence Still Up At Gawker

While all evidence of the attack was scrubbed from 4chan's boards, Gawker has taken the baton and published the screen caps at its site: http://gawker.com/5051193/sarah-palins-personal-emails. Gawker promises to keep the images up, despite calls from the McCain Palin camp to destroy all copies of the images.

What It Means To Anonymous: It's All About Morality

If it isn't painfully obvious by now, Anonymous are the proto-Jokers of the Internet. They don't obey laws. They disregard conventional ethics. They have no jurisdiction. They have no limits. They are driven by one central idea: non-contradictory morality.

If Anonymous sees you as a moral hypocrite, they'll come after you. If you want to hide it, Anonymous wants to show it. If you want to destroy it, Anonymous wants to preserve it. If you want to worship it, Anonymous wants to mock it. if you want to control it, Anonymous wants to set it free. Anonymous only respects those whose morality is in harmony.

They also do it for the lulz. There's nothing wrong with having a good laugh at someone caught with their pants down.

It's unclear whether these particular members of Anonymous performed this attack because they question Palin's integrity or because they recognized one helluva good drama-creating prank. Either way, they've furthered the reputation of Anonymous, the cause of Anonymous, and the legal scrutiny on Anonymous. Which brings me to my next point:

What It Means To The Law: It's Not On Anonymous' Side. Or Palin's

Clearly, unauthorized access of a person's e-mail account is a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. There's just one little problem: Anonymous members are very good at not giving up their identities. Whether they use basic anonymizing tools like a web proxy, Tor, or free wi-fi at a cafe, if Federal investigators cannot pin down access to a verifiable IP Address, there's no way to track down the perpetrators.

Here's what investigators are up against:

1. Get a warrant to obtain access records from Yahoo, the maintainers of Palin's e-mail account, if Yahoo has kept those records now that the account is deleted.
2. Start working backwards: from the Yahoo records, see which IP addresses accessed the account and opened specific messages.
3. Assuming Anonymous covered its tracks with a web proxy, investigators will then have to get a warrant to access records of the proxy, just like they did for Yahoo. Repeat step 2.
4. Tools like Tor help people stay anonymous by routing their traffic through international intermediary destinations like Germany and Venezuela. If Anonymous used Tor, investigators will have to work with international law enforcement agencies to get permission to access ISP records. This can be done in a few days to a few weeks in Germany. Venezuela will probably tell us to go f&*! ourselves.
5. Assuming investigators get international cooperation, they will most likely being trying to get ISP records for some kid's home computer. Those records may or may not be available, depending on how often they're purged. Time is of the essence in this situation.
6. If investigators can get those international records, they'll continue working the IP Address trail backwards to discover either a live American IP Address, or more likely yet another international address. (Tor can route you through multiple international points if you like.)
7. Repeat the hunt for international IP Addresses ad nauseum until they finally get back to an American IP Address. That address might point to someone's home, or it will probably point to a free wi-fi location, in which case the investigation is dead. For example, Seattle Metro offers free wi-fi on many of its buses. Talk about the ultimate mobile command center for launching attacks!

As you can see, law enforcement is on the extreme losing end in the battle against Internet hackery. Even the NSA's domestic spying program is largely ineffective against Anonymous' tactics. It's very doubtful the FBI will investigate this incident beyond a warrant for Yahoo's records.

What It Means To Politics: You're All On Notice

It means not even politics is safe from the drive for transparency from the Internet's hacking underground. While this incident is clearly illegal and unethical, it does produce one pretty flower: with people like Anonymous around, it's going to be harder for politicians to hide their dirty secrets from the public.

If Anonymous can make Scientology think twice and send the Palin camp scrambling, it can certainly serve as a vigilante force for truth in many other areas. That raises one final question: if Anonymous takes the vigilante role further, how long can they be trusted with the power that comes with such a role?

What It Means To You: The Only Good Defense Is To Not Be Stupid, Stupid.

I've harped on this point about a billion times now, and I'm going to do it again: these things happen because people are stupid, either through technological ignorance or personal irresponsibility. In the case of Palin, I think it's a little of both. If you value your privacy, keep it private. If you're worried about impropriety, run it past your advisors. If you're going to deceive the public, don't put your fly-by-night prowess in the hands of fucking Yahoo.

While I don't have first hand knowledge, I have been advised over and over that the majority of services out there are easily hacked. Yahoo Mail/Yahoo accounts, Hotmail, MySpace, LiveJournal, T-Mobile, and anything powered by Microsoft is all extremely vulnerable to an experienced hacker, and in some cases novice hackers who have access to hacking tools or are good at social hacking/manipulation. It's easy to trick people into handing out security information, or looking it up yourself, especially if it's a date of birth, or a social security number. There are good solutions to protect yourself here, but that's a topic in itself that I'll get to in some other article.

Until then, follow the first rule of the Internet: if you wouldn't want the public to find out about it, don't put it on the Internet.

Related Links

Vidalia Tor Bundle - easy setup for anonymous web browsing through Tor

Gawker.com - archive of screen captures of Palin e-mailscomment=kmkc http:// 2008-09-18 at 5:22am u r an asshole 128.210.218.112

Official Video FoxNews.com

http://www.foxnews.com/oreilly/. Click on the "is it legal?" link, then "sex ad shocker." Our segment is at 2:34.

You can read the first two responses here:

Weev: Response to NYT article, part 1

Excerpt:

"I typically am cautious of the press. Every time the press and I cross paths, it simply causes trouble for me or those around me. I while ago I met with Matt Schwartz from the New York Times Magazine, under the explicit condition that I would be covering philosophy and history and not my personal business. I feel I didn't really get what I want out of this exchange, as the important philosophy I conveyed to him was only conveyed in short bits that I think were taken out of context."

The Medium: Guest Post: Mattathias Schwartz Responds

Excerpt:

"Trolls have a parasitic relationship with their targets - that is to say, a relationship of dependence. As much as trolls like to abuse their targets, they need them to stick around and stay angry. A homogeneous community of trolls is like the 4chan random bulletin board, /b/, meaningless noise. So in a sense, a bit of trolling can be taken as a sign of a healthy community, because it needs a backdrop of sincere users and shared norms to feed on."

As you can see, the views are diverging dramatically already. But that's the reality of magazine stories. We would all like to have our personal views espoused and glorified in a mainstream media piece; even me. What greater validation can one receive than to have his views endorsed by one of the world's largest rags? And what greater betrayal is there than to discover your views have been condensed and marginalized in favor of someone else's agenda? I admit: I was a little disappointed that many of the finer points of trolling that Matt and I talked about didn't make in to the article. But, like I said before: that's life.

We all need to remember that Mattathias answers to an Editor, and that Editor has to balance the sincerity of the piece with the practical needs of the readers. As intelligent as NY Times readers are, this trolling thing is relatively new to them. The facts and opinions that Weev and I put forward have to be distilled down into something manageable and accessible to the general public.

That's why I'm actually glad to see Mattathias and Weev follow up they way they have. This is one of the rare times you'll see two-way journalism. How often do reporters take responsibility for their pieces by addressing subjects' concerns? This is rare and extraordinary. Most people read an article, and that's the end of the perspective. Now they get to actually interact with the people they're reading about. The internet is simply marvelous this way.

I, too, have responded to the piece. However, I put my responses in the comments sections of The Medium articles, where they were quickly drowned out by dozens of other responses. I'm reposting my thoughts here (with a couple of editing tweaks) so they're easier to find and link to.

In Response to Trolling for Ethics

From The Medium: Trolling For Ethics on 7/31/2008:

I've read this article three times now, and I'm still absorbing it. I think it's an amazing piece of reporting. It was accessible and painted a good generalized picture of the online trolling universe. It earns tremendous merit as a piece that showcases what balanced, ethical reporting should look like, as well as a piece that forces the reader to engage in critical thought.

Trolling has a spectrum of personalities, and I think they're faithfully represented here. When it comes to trolling, it's true that there's nothing funnier than watching an emotionally or intellectually unstable person have a dramatic, public meltdown to a few pokes & prods. It only gets better when the target escalates the situation with even more drama.

You know how on your favorite basic cable reality shows the camera captures some crazy person's meltdown? You squeal with delight at the sheer entertainment value of it. Same thing here. Trolls love a good online meltdown. It brings the lulz. (And just like how The Soup on E! documents all the best TV drama of the week, so EncyclopediaDramatica.com documents all the best drama of the Internet.)

Of course, there's the extreme edge of all that trolling, like with the Hendersons and Megan Meier. That's probably more like a premium cable show. The morality is ambiguous. There are no clear good guy or bad guy characters. The lulz are less obvious. But you tune in anyway because it's captivating and challenging.

The only thing that I'm sad wasn't covered is the one troll ethic: you'll never see us go after someone who has their act together. If they say or do intelligent, clever, witty, insightful things, we'll be the first to cheer and shower them with praise. We love smart people.

But God help you if you're a drama queen who complains about having a broken back that's prevented you from seeing the world in one blog post and the next day posts an ugly naked arched-back-on-a-jungle-gym photo talking about how worldly you are. You are batshit crazy, and we're going to troll you until you break.

(Edit: That's not to say telephone harassment is just playful trolling. That's the realm of /b/ and Anonymous who readily proclaim themselves far more than just garden variety trolls. I address this distinction in my next response further down.)

All that having been said, there are only two ways to deal with a troll:

1. Don't reply. Don't privately address him. Don't acknowledge his comments. Don't even make a "he who shall not be named" style reference in another blog post. Just pretend the troll doesn't exist. This gets rid of 90% of the trolls out there instantly. Then, if you're smart, shut up and quit blogging for a few days and logically re-evaluate the post that set the troll off. Chances are, there is a glaring flaw in your post that makes you look like an idiot or a nutjob, and that's why you got trolled. Don't post again until you're ready to amend it or defend it with better logic.

2. With the other 10% of trolls, you have to play the game. For every insult you receive from a troll, play along and join in the joke. If someone tells you're fat (because you probably are), don't get offended and rant. Just reply with a photo of a whale and say, "You damn skippy I'm fat! I would say this photo is me, but that wouldn't be fair. The whale isn't that big." If you can successfully take yourself and the insults less seriously, you will win the good graces of the troll and he'll either go away, or he'll chill out, knock off the insults, engage you in surprisingly intelligent and witty conversation, and you'll have made a new online friend. And trust me, it's good to have a troll for a friend.

Of course, now that I've revealed this, no troll is going to let up because you've all been warned and can no longer claim ignorance as an excuse. So, your only recourse is to just not be stupid and/or batshit crazy on the Internets. If you can do that, everything will be just fine. However, just so I can be absolutely clear about this: if you escalate a war of words with a troll, you WILL lose. We know all the tricks. We have access to all the resources. We know all the laws. We're all friends with each other. We have done this thousands of times.

Yeah, we're total assholes. And we don't care.

In Response to Mattathias Responds

From The Medium: Guest Post: Matthias Schwartz Responds on 8/1/2008:

So, it's the second day of this article's life, and I still regard it as an exemplary piece of journalism. Mattathias should be proud of his work, and people should really take time to reflect on his message.

However, I think if there is a weak point in the article, it is that /b/ gets painted with the same brush stroke that Weev and I do. Let's be clear: there are distinct differences among us.

/b/ members who engage in harassment are quick to point out that they aren't merely trolls. They acknowledge the nature and seriousness of their actions, and the impunity with which they carry out their deeds. They know who and what they are and they don't pretend to be innocuous. I won't cast a moral judgment on them simply because their value system is so vastly different from anything the rest of us know that criticism is nearly meaningless.

Weev is someone to be feared for obvious reasons. I know a lot of people have tried to argue that he trolled the NYT with his outrageous statements. There's no way he is all he says he is. All I have to say is: are you sure? Let's assume Weev rented that Rolls Royce Phantom. He would have had to have it come down from L.A. and be around for two days for $395/hr. How many trolls do you know are willing to spend that kind of money just to get their kicks messing with a bright young reporter from New York?

And then there's me. I make no excuses for me: I troll every once in a while, and I'm not nice about it. Even though I don't phone harass or do anything that crosses into /b/ territory, I know I'm a jerk. Years ago, I trolled indiscriminately for kicks & giggles without realizing what a fantastic and informing tool trolling can be. These days I troll when I want answers about human behavior. Even though it didn't make it into the article, Mattathias and I talked about this extensively.

The trolling that keeps my attention is the stuff that reveals human nature. Yes, I can have a civilized conversation with you, and take what you say at face value. However, as we all know, people are too often wrapped up in their own politically correct notions to say what they really think and feel. If I want to know what you really think, all I have to do is troll you for a bit, and your true colors will light up like a Vegas billboard. That's something you can't get by harassing someone over the phone.

Does the thought of a troll prying into your head make you uncomfortable? It should. Nobody wants to have their secret thoughts and feelings known, much less exposed, especially online. But I will share with you one observation I've had over the years: the more you try to hide who you really are, the more miserable you'll be whether you're talking to me or not. Take what you will from that.

Again, this is a good article with questions about morality that readers should contemplate carefully. Mattathias has taken the time to craft a masterpiece that encourages you to look inside yourself as much as you look outward. That's a gift you don't run across everyday.

Update (8/4): Correction

I just read a comment somewhere that said, "If Mr. Fortuny truly wants to 'save' his victims, he should somehow make his purpose known to them."

This commenter is absolutely correct, and I feel foolish for not thinking of it myself. I absolutely have a duty to inform people of why I do what I do. But, how should I go about doing it? Oh, if only I had a way to communicate my message on a massive scale to millions of people. Perhaps I should talk to a reporter for a mainstream media publication and discuss my views on this subject. That might do the trick. I'll keep everyone posted on how that goes.

Related Links

NY Times Magazine: The Trolls Among Us

The Medium: Trolling For Ethics

Weev: Response to NYT article, part 1

The Medium: Mattathias Schwartz Responds

The Zen of Lulz: Did You Know You Have Green Hair?

4chan /b/

President George W. Bush on Cyber Crime and Cyber Terrorism (response to NY Times article)

Up until now, my connection has been perfect. It rarely goes down, and that's only around midnight every six weeks or so for just a couple of minutes.

This time, however, my connection spontaneously died at 7pm, came back a few minutes later, and missed me off to no end as only half of the web destinations I tried actually worked. I could get to Google, but not Microsoft. This site, but not gmail.

My own standard troubleshooting didn't fix the problem, so I let the connection sit overnight and called tech support in the morning. It roughly went like this:

Phone guy: WelcometofiossupporthisisJustinhowcanIhelpyou?

Me: Hi there, my connection died for a few minutes last night. When it came back, I could only reach about half of my web destinations. For example, I could get to Google, but not Microsoft. I did some basic troubleshooting and didn't have any luck.

Justin: mmhmm. Hang on a second while I check your area ...

waiting for about two minutes listening to each other breathe ...

Justin: alright, it looks like there's an outage in your area that should be fixed by 3:23pm.

Me: An outage that only affects my ability to get to certain sites? That seems kind of weird.

Justin: I don't have any further information, except that you should expect resolution at 3:23pm.

Me: Alright. Is that central or pacific time?

Justin: It doesn't say, so I don't know.

Me: Wow. Okay then. So there's no troubleshooting steps we should go through? You don't want to check my router?

Justin: No that's alright. 3:23pm. Today.

Me: Okay then. Thanks for your ... help.

Justin: Thanks for calling. *click*

Wow. Way to make me feel completely unimportant there, Justin. But, to Justin's credit, not more than 30 seconds after I hung up the phone my connection started working properly! Outage, huh? That's what I thought.

I didn't believe Justin's outage claim, and for good reason. I've done a lot of tech support in my time and claiming an "outage" is standard procedure when you're not supposed to admit something ... like your company fucked something up.

Oh well. My connection is good as new and running smoothly, so I guess this isn't so bad.

Related Links

The entire FIOS saga

A Little Bit of History Before We Begin

Remember this guy? Almost two years ago he sent me a DMCA notification because I used his photograph in my editorial about DMCA. The complainant sent the photo to me directly through Craigslist. (See Craigslist Experiment) By DMCA procedure, the photo had to be immediately taken down.

However, additionally under DMCA procedure I have the opportunity to refute his DMCA claims by filing a counter notification. After that, the complainant has 14 days to file for an injunction to keep the allegedly offending material down. If he doesn't, I am free to resume my use of the material. Obviously, I never heard back from the complainant after 14 days, so I resumed my use of the photo.

Fast forward to 18 months later when I get an anonymous tip that I'm being sued for $75,000 in copyright infringement and unspecified damages for invasion of privacy. Interesting. Then I checked out the details of the case, and it got just plain bizarre.

Suing You King George Style

The first thing that struck me as odd was that I was being sued by a John Doe in Illinois Federal Court. Ok, but John and I are both residents of Washington State. He says so in his complaint. Shouldn't personal jurisdiction apply here and require the suit to take place closer to home?

Maybe, maybe not. Civil procedure on jurisdiction is usually clear, but there are exceptions to the rules. In this case, Doe argues that since I attended Lulzcon, and alleges that I spoke specifically about him, that I have availed myself to the jurisdiction of the court there. We'll see about that.

Suing someone in a distant court is what's called doing a "King George," named for King George III of England who would charge his subjects with a crime and require them to make appearance before him in his court. Usually, these subjects would be in distant lands and had no opportunity to defend themselves against the King's frivolous and usually fraudulent charges. However, the King would summarily find his subjects guilty because they did not appear before him as required.

Looks like John Doe is running the same tactic here.

The Standard Copyright Whining

There's no surprise here, so I won't go into many details: Doe has a copyright on his personal photo. Yes, he does. It's federally registered. You can look it up. He's arguing that his copyright gives him unilateral power to control how that photo is used. Hmm, where have we heard this argument before?

Fair use is a slam dunk in this case.

EFF Up Your Chances of Getting Good Representation

So what's a blogger to do when his free speech rights are being trampled? Contact the EFF, of course. There's just one problem with that: the EFF works with Doe's law firm on other cases, so they've declined to help me.

Seriously?

The EFF, guardians of civil liberties and individual rights in the Internet age, are working with a law firm that is trying to chill my free speech using tactics worthy of the RIAA? Are you fucking kidding me?

I like the EFF. No, actually, I fucking love them. Everywhere you go online, the EFF stands up against legal pitbulls trying to intimidate individuals from standing up for their rights. They fight for anonymity, whistleblowers, protection against censorship and a lot more. Why, why, why would they choose to work with a firm that uses the very tactics and philosophies they fight?

I think this is a mis-step for the EFF. I donate to them. I will continue to donate to them. But I'm shaking my head at this one.

Tort and Re-tort Sitting on a Fence: Are They Private?

Lastly, the privacy complaint is an interesting one, even though I don't think it holds up. Privacy laws have a lot of tort reference to them. That is, there aren't a lot of specific civil codes. You just have to sort of figure it out, or cite a helluva lot of precedent.

I'll be curious to see where this part of the complaint goes, if it goes anywhere.

Let Me Introduce You To My Amazing Lawyer

That would be me. You see, not a lot of attorneys are very knowledgeable about copyright law, or anything even remotely associated with the Internet. And as soon as you mention that your suit is for $70k, you can actually hear the "ka-ching" sound over the phone as they require a $10,000 retainer, just to get started. Yes, the lesser attorneys of the world will only ask for the paltry sum of $5,000. Even so.

You do have the various branches of the ACLU who are too busy handling life & death crusades to think about my first world problems. That's ok. I don't know if I want to turn to their Chicago office who said that handling e-mail was "too complicated, could you please send us a fax."

The groups who are versed in what to do, like the Stanford Fair Use Center, and the ACLU of Northern California are overwhelmed handling these kinds of cases. Now you're beginning to understand the scope of this issue. This isn't a couple of guys having a pissing match in court. This is a broad method of attack adopted by those who seek to permanently silence or stop anyone they perceive as even the slightest threat. And they get away with it because defense is costly and/or time-consuming. Most people simply give up and roll over. Except me. I absolutely will not allow another copyright abusing precedent to happen here.

So here I am, going Pro Se on this. This is going to be fun.

The Conclusion

I'm sure there are dozens of rfjason-haters cheering right now. Are you excited? Are you? Huh, are you? Are you, are you? Yeah? You're excited? You want me rub your tummy? Ohhhh, you're such a sweet hater. Yes you are. Yes you are!

Anyway. I know a lot of other people will look at this issue and have a fair amount of anger at how civil law works. Lack of personal jurisdiction? Frivolous copyright complaints? A John Doe accuser? No lawyer to take the case? Shouldn't the judge toss this one out? Not until both sides have made their arguments. Cvil law differs from criminal law. In Criminal law, the system ensures fairness by giving maximum protections to those accused against the maximum power of government. Civil law, on the other hand, has a more caveat emptor flavor: if you can't fight off the sharks, don't go swimming in the water. And I think that's exactly the way it should be.

But, this is a clear cut example of the floodgate copyright law abuse has opened. Saying or displaying anything about someone? Watch out first for your DMCA threat, then your lawsuit. But, whatever you do, don't roll over and take it. These are your rights at stake. It's up to you to defend them.

That having been said, unless you're an actual lawyer, you most likely don't have a clue what you're talking about. So shut the hell up. I've had all the casual (and utterly wrong) advice/toldyaso's I can stand.

Related Links

Don't Tread On Me (Or, how I learned to stop worrying and ignore DMCA threats.)

Craigslist Experiment

Lulzcon

Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)

Stanford Fair Use Center

ACLU of Northern California