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Tuesday, 14 December 2010
The psychology of media statists
To say that the WikiLeaks imbroglio has not been journalism's finest hour fails to capture the extent to which the fourth estate has failed its basic responsibility to inform the public about the activities of government.
Putting aside the sour grapes that comes from being scooped by a rival, it is difficult to recall another occasion when so many journalists and opinionistas have expressed such unremitting hostility to the public's right to know what is being discussed and decided in their name.
There have been honourable exceptions, but most remarkable is that they remain exceptions to an embarrassing and dishonourable rule. Journalists and commentators who have displayed a consistent opposition to WikiLeaks since the first tranche of Iraq war logs was released have been documented and dissected by Antony Loewenstein, in Australia, John Pilger in the UK and Glenn Greenwald in the US.
Rather than duplicate that work here, it is worth examining the psychology behind those in the media who have been exposed by this saga as enthusiastic servants of state power.
Proximity to the powerful has always had a disabling effect on the critical faculties of impressionable journalists. Some, who are easily flattered, like to get their photograph taken with the subjects they interview (Greg Sheridan with Condoleezza Rice, Leigh Sales with Hillary Clinton). Others see no conflict between their role as an independent journalist and accepting an award from a grateful government lobby group (Greg Sheridan and the Israel lobby).
There is the attraction of sharing confidential discussions with shakers and movers from the US (journalists who have attended the Australia-America Leadership Dialogue) or a fully-paid guided tour of the Holy Land (being duchessed around Israel and the occupied territories by Israeli PR functionaries). Occasionally being so close to the great and powerful can be too much for "giddy minds" and leads to a total dereliction of duty (Leigh Sales "interviewing" Hilary Clinton)...
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Scott Burchill @'ABC'
Remmy Ongala: Tanzania music fans mourn 'the Doctor'
One of Tanzania's most popular musicians, Remmy Ongala, has died at his home in Dar es Salaam.
Born in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo in 1947, he was known as "the Doctor" because he was seen as a defender of the people.
His songs often criticised Tanzania's elite and at the height of his popularity the government tried to expel him on immigration grounds.
But as his international fame grew, he was granted Tanzanian nationality.
His mix of Congolese "soukous" music and Swahili rhythms made him popular across East Africa.
He was also a regular performer at the Womad music festival in the UK until he fell ill 10 years ago and was paralysed.
Despite his ill-health he had toured in Tanzania until recently, mainly performing gospel music.
The BBC's Hassan Mhelela in Dar es Salaam says all radio stations in the country are playing his music and fans are phoning in with tributes.
By the time of his death, even President Jakaya Kikwete was a fan, recently visiting him in hospital.
Ongala often wrote about death - one of his most well-known tracks is Kifo, about the mercilessness of death, saying no matter how rich a person, bribery cannot postpone it.
The singer and guitarist moved to Tanzania in 1977 and joined the Orchestra Super Makassy, until he formed his own group Super Matimila.
He said his music was intended not only to make people dance but also to think.
"I am successful in Tanzania because I write songs about serious topics," his music label, Real World Records, quoted him as saying.
In 1990, he faced opposition to his song Mambo Kwa Socks (Things With Socks) - a reference to condoms - in which he made a plea to young men to practise safe sex.
Radio Tanzania has refused to play it, but live shows and black market tapes have ensured that his message has spread.
Our reporter says there is even a suburb of Dar es Salaam called Sinza Kwa Remmy, named after the musician when he moved to the area in the 1980s.
STATEMENT FROM AUSTRALIAN NEWSPAPER EDITORS, TELEVISION AND RADIO DIRECTORS AND ONLINE MEDIA EDITORS
Dear Prime Minister,
The leaking of 250,000 confidential American diplomatic cables is the most astonishing leak of official information in recent history, and its full implications are yet to emerge. But some things are clear. In essence, WikiLeaks, an organisation that aims to expose official secrets, is doing what the media have always done: bringing to light material that governments would prefer to keep secret.
In this case, WikiLeaks, founded by Australian Julian Assange, worked with five major newspapers around the world, which published and analysed the embassy cables. Diplomatic correspondence relating to Australia has begun to be published here.
The volume of the leaks is unprecedented, yet the leaking and publication of diplomatic correspondence is not new. We, as editors and news directors of major media organisations, believe the reaction of the US and Australian governments to date has been deeply troubling. We will strongly resist any attempts to make the publication of these or similar documents illegal. Any such action would impact not only on WikiLeaks, but every media organisation in the world that aims to inform the public about decisions made on their behalf. WikiLeaks, just four years old, is part of the media and deserves our support.
Already, the chairman of the US Senate homeland security committee, Joe Lieberman, is suggesting The New York Times should face investigation for publishing some of the documents. The newspaper told its readers that it had ‘‘taken care to exclude, in its articles and in supplementary material, in print and online, information that would endanger confidential informants or compromise national security.’’ Such an approach is responsible — we do not support the publication of material that threatens national security or anything which would put individual lives in danger. Those judgements are never easy, but there has been no evidence to date that the WikiLeaks material has done either.
There is no evidence, either, that Julian Assange and WikiLeaks have broken any Australian law. The Australian government is investigating whether Mr Assange has committed an offence, and the Prime Minister has condemned WikiLeaks’ actions as ‘‘illegal’’. So far, it has been able to point to no Australian law that has been breached.
To prosecute a media organisation for publishing a leak would be unprecedented in the US, breaching the First Amendment protecting a free press. In Australia, it would seriously curtail Australian media organisations reporting on subjects the government decides are against its interests.
WikiLeaks has no doubt made errors. But many of its revelations have been significant. It has given citizens an insight into US thinking about some of the most complex foreign policy issues of our age, including North Korea, Iran and China.
It is the media’s duty to responsibly report such material if it comes into their possession. To aggressively attempt to shut WikiLeaks down, to threaten to prosecute those who publish official leaks, and to pressure companies to cease doing commercial business with WikiLeaks, is a serious threat to democracy, which relies on a free and fearless press.
Yours faithfully
Clinton Maynard, news director, 2UE
David Penberthy, editor-in-chief, news.com.au
Eric Beecher, chairman, Crikey, Smart Company, Business Spectator, The Eureka Report
Gay Alcorn, editor, The Sunday Age
Garry Bailey, editor, The Mercury (Hobart)
Garry Linnell, editor, The Daily Telegraph
Ian Ferguson, director of news and programs, Sky News Australia/New Zealand
Jim Carroll, network director of news and public affairs, Ten Network
Julian Ricci, editor, Northern Territory News Kate Torney, director of news, ABC
Mark Calvert, director of news and current affairs, Nine Network
Melvin Mansell, editor, The Advertiser (Adelaide)
Megan Lloyd, editor, Sunday Mail (Adelaide)
Michael Crutcher, editor, The Courier Mail,
Mike van Niekerk, editor in chief, Fairfax online
Paul Cutler, news director, SBS
Paul Ramadge, editor-in-chief, The Age
Peter Fray, editor-in-chief, The Sydney Morning Herald
Peter Meakin, director of news and public affairs, Seven Network
Rick Feneley, editor, The Sun-Herald
Rob Curtain, news director, 3AW
Rod Quinn, editor, The Canberra Times
Sam Weir, editor, The Sunday Times
Scott Thompson, The Sunday Mail (Queensland)
Simon Pristel, editor, Herald Sun
Tory Maguire, editor, The Punch
Walkley Advisory Board
Gay Alcorn
Mike Carlton
Helen Dalley
John Donegan
Peter Meakin
Laurie Oakes
Jeni O'Dowd
Alan Kennedy
Malcolm Schmidtke
Fenella Souter
Monday, 13 December 2010
Families encouraged by ‘open’ disclosure in hidden Hillsborough files project
The hidden Hillsborough disaster files are likely to be released as one all-encompassing dossier.
A panel of experts are currently wading through thousands of previously-unseen documents on the 1989 tragedy.
No timescale has been confirmed for the process although it is thought the committee are working towards a release date in 2012.
So far the families of the 96 Reds fans killed on the Leppings Lane terrace have been encouraged by updates from the panel, headed by the Bishop of Liverpool.
This week they were assured the committee are yet to encounter any confidential papers or be barred any access to particular information.
There are some fears among relatives, who have fought a 21 year campaign for justice, that the two year project could leave them disappointed with suggestions the Government could mark some files as completely restricted.
Just the peasants!!!
NewsHour More than 1,958 people on the Gawker list used the word "password" as their password. http://ow.ly/3o3Xs
FACT mix 210: Bjørn Torske
Keen readers will remember the Norwegian producer’s wonderful 2007 album Feil Knapp featuring in our 100 Best Albums of the 2000s, but he was a cult hero in the house scene of his native Norway and among the disco cognoscenti of the wider world long before that album’s release.
Torske hails from Tromsø,which is just north of the arctic circle and widely regarded as Norway’s capital of electronic music, having given us the likes of Biosphere, Royksopp and Mental Overdrive in recent years. His first techno-oriented productions in the early 1990s were picked up for release by Crammed Discs in Belgium and Holland’s legendary Djax-Up-Beats, and later by Reinforced, the London imprint run by 4Hero’s Marc and Dego.
After a stint touring as live synth player for Biosphere, and the release of an album on Djax, Torske took a break from production. Sporadic single releases found their way out into the world, but it wasn’t until 1999 that Torske returned in earnest. He began releasing 12″s through SVEK and Tellé Records, the latter also putting out his Trøbbel LP. Around this time Torske and his partner in crime, the late Erot, fashioned their own distinctive micro-genre, “skrangle-house” (literal translation: rattle house), essentially just a freeform, disco and dub-inflected but resoundingly dancefloor-friendly approach to house inspired by the UK’s Idjut Boys. Erot and Bjørn’s track ‘Søppelmann’ became the signature skrangle-house tune, and helped inspire a whole new generation of Norwegian producers, including Todd Terje, Prins Thomas and Lindstrøm.
Nonetheless, Torske remained an elusive character. When FACT interviewed Prins Thomas in 2007, we asked him who he’d most like to sign if money grew on trees. He replied: “If I could lure him our of his cave for a second, I wouldn’t mind getting some new stuff from Bjorn Torske.” Soon after, Smalltown Supersound unleashed Feil Knapp, easily the most kaleidoscopic and accomplished Torske LP to date. Rooted in disco-tinged house and techno, but with shades of dub, broken beat, Balearica, jazz, avant-electronics, krautrock and ambient, it’s just an impeccably composed and produced work, complex musical ideas conveyed with an easy-going charm.
Torske has just released his fourth album, Kokning. Its title refers to a kind of meal preparation peculiar to Norway: that of putting potatoes on to boil, going out to sea to catch a fish and then returning home to finish cooking. Not sure how that relates to the music, but we like it…Kokning is more rooted in acoustic sound than the heavily programmed Feil Knapp; even its crunchy rhythm tracks are derived from Torske’s experiments recording different sounds, instruments and textured objects in rooms of varying size and acoustics.
We’re absolutely delighted to have this legendary producer helming a FACT mix. His selection is diverse and discerning as you’d expect, with a clear emphasis on genuine musicality. The mix is anchored in classic On-U-Sound, with tracks from African Head Charge, Paul Haig, Creation Rebel and New Age Steppers figuring prominently alongside more frigid post-punk classics from Section 25 and The Durutti Column. There’s room too for the entrancing krautrock spiritualism of Popol Vuh, the expansive live techno of the Moritz Von Oswald Trio and a number of curios as new to us as they doubtless are to many of you. With the nights getting longer and the days getting colder, we strongly suggest you put some potatoes on to boil and give it a whirl.
Direct download: FACT mix 210 – Bjorn Torske
(Available for three weeks)
Tracklist:
Popol Vuh – Aguirre (Ohr/Soul Jazz)
KLF – Dream time in Lake Jackson (KLF Communications)
Yello – Homer hossa (Vertigo)
Creation Rebel & New age steppers – Last sane dream (Cherry Red/ON-U Sound)
Paul Haig – Mad horses (Disques Crepuscule)
Moritz von Oswald trio – Vertical ascent 1 (Honest Jons)
Section 25 – Looking from a hilltop (Eskimo)
Crimea X – Varvara (Hell Yeah!)
Yolanda – Afro rat (Sex Tags Amfibia)
Hank Crawford – Sugar free (Strut)
Don Ray – My desire (Polydor)
Don Ellis – Devil made me write this piece (MPS/BASF)
Sergio Mendes & Brasil ’77 – Promise of a fisherman (A&M)
Gucci sound system – Acarpenter (joakim remix) (DFA)
A. Paul – tribute (Genesis)
Renegade Soundwave – Space gladiator dub (Mute)
Ajello – Android street (Ajello do the job)
Rune Lindbæk pres. Kanakas – Crosby (Luna Flicks)
Durutti Column – requiem for a father (Factory)
Chants et percussions des Maldives – Baburu Lava (Ocora/Radio France)
African head charge – Hole in the roof (On-U Sound)
Dinosaur L – Go bang (Walter Gibbons mix) (Sleeping Bag/Traffic)
Bjørn Torske – Høst (DJ Sotofett Støydubb) (Unreleased)
WikiLeaks cables: MI5 offered files on Finucane killing to inquiry
The offer in the case of the Pat Finucane, the well-known civil rights and defence lawyer murdered in front of his wife and three young children in 1989, is contained in confidential US embassy cables passed to WikiLeaks.
Supporters of Finucane welcomed the revelation of the offer last night as "highly significant" and believe it could pave the way for a fresh inquiry into the killing that would be acceptable to the family.
Owen Paterson, the Northern Ireland secretary, has told Finucane's widow that he will decide early next year whether to hold a hearing that could shine a new light on collusion between gunmen from the Ulster Freedom Fighters and members of the security forces. A refusal to hold such a hearing, which Paterson has questioned in the past, would prevent an examination of the MI5 files.
Finucane's supporters spoke out last night after leaked US embassy cables, published by WikiLeaks, showed that: • Bertie Ahern, the Irish prime minister between 1997 and 2008, told US diplomats that "everyone knows the UK was involved" in the murder.
• US diplomats feared that "elements of the security-legal establishments" in Britain beyond MI5 were fighting hard to resist an inquiry.
• Brian Cowen, the current Irish prime minister, warned that a failure to hold an inquiry could be a "deal breaker"...
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What Do We Learn about Julian Assange From His Alleged OKCupid Profile?
The folks at Reddit have uncovered what appears to be WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's OKCupid dating profile. The uber-private Assange would never be an online dater, you say! But, the last time this user accessed the profile was way back in 2006, when Julian Assange wasn't the cable-dumping anti-hero he is today. Back then, he was just a danger-loving lonely boy. So, if this profile is The Real Him - and the pictures of him and the fake name "HarryHarrison" seem to suggest that it is - then what do we learn about the enigma of Julian Assange by examining the face he wanted to show the world? Or, at least, the face he showed the world he hoped to sleep with?
He is straight. Well, we could have guessed this much, already.
He is 87% slutty. Okay, we could have guessed that too. People never change. Anyway, he confirms it in his "self-summary:" "Want a regular, down to earth guy? Keep moving. I am not the droid you're looking for. Passionate and often pig headed activist intellectual seeks siren for love affair." And in the "Test" section, he came back "87% dominating, 87% slut." But also "Strong Democrat." On the "I'm Really Good At" section, he wrote "A gentleman never tells." So he's also kind of cheesy and gross.
He likes tough, dangerous girls. "I like women from countries that have sustained political turmoil," he wrote. "Western culture seems to forge women that are valueless and inane. OK. Not only women!"
Despite the fangirls, he gets lonely: "Although I am pretty intellectually and physically pugnacious I am very protective of women and children," he wrote. And while he said, "I have asian teengirl stalkers," he ceded: "I could adapt to anything except the loss of female company and carbon." (And carbon. Ha.)
But, mostly, the Julian Assange on OkCupid seems like any pretentious outcast looking for love on the Internet, if more arrogant and vaguely misogynist. It's clear, however, that even back in '06, he was pretty sure that he was heading toward serious international intrigue, as he was also seeking a siren for "occasional international conspiracy." How did he spend his time? "Changing the world through passion, inspiration and trickery," and "directing a consuming, dangerous human rights project which is, as you might expect, male dominated." As for the user name: "Harry Harrison is a scifi writer that was popular in the '70s and '80s for his Stainless Steel Rat character," reports a commenter at Reddit. "The SSR was an intergalactic criminal mastermind with a conscious who was too smart to get caught." So, Julian Assange: Still not really that much like us.
Mike Vilensky @'NY Mag'
Bruce Sterling: The Hacker Crackdown - Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier (1992)
Contents
Preface to the Electronic Release of The Hacker CrackdownChronology of the Hacker Crackdown
Introduction
Part 1: Crashing the System
Part 2: The Digital Underground
Part 3: Law and Order
Part 4: The Civil Libertarians
Electronic Afterword to The Hacker CrackdownVia
wikileaks Indoleaks - a WikiLeaks-style site that launched in Indonesia on Friday - has already published many sensitive docs | http://goo.gl/p4THl
The net will win against deception
Illustration:Andrew Dyson
Governments had better get used to WikiLeaks and realise that feeding the public misleading drivel has become much harder.
Nations need secrets. They are fundamental to the preservation of national security. Democracy demands openness and governments dealing frankly and honestly with the people to whom they are accountable. If the point of national security is to preserve our open democratic society, we must start with a presumption of openness and ask what tests a document must meet to warrant the protection of a national security classification.
Obvious subject matter includes sensitive military technologies, the design and performance of military equipment, technical means of intelligence collection, human intelligence sources, intelligence priorities, defence science programs and priorities, the readiness state of elements of the Australian Defence Force and information about military operations. Release of any such material would enable a potential adversary to put counter-measures in place and/or improve the performance of their own forces.
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Material falling into these categories would be classified ''top secret'', ''secret'', ''confidential'' or ''restricted'' according to the consequences for national security if it were to be made public, ranging from ''exceptionally grave'' to not much.
In my younger days one of the attributes that would attract a ''confidential'' classification was that the information, if known, ''could cause administrative embarrassment''. In these days of freedom-of-information laws, a document could not as a matter of law be withheld on the grounds the information would cause administrative embarrassment - a point to be borne in mind in considering many of the WikiLeaks revelations.
Within this framework a security classification would apply to many diplomatic communications, but it cannot be justified by a desire to protect the exchange of scuttlebutt, or self-aggrandisement such as Kevin Rudd big-noting himself by referring to the French and German efforts in Afghanistan as ''organising folk-dancing festivals''.
Nor should national security classifications be used to conceal the real assessments and motives of the governments we elect.
Some striking examples of this have come to light in the past couple of days. One relates to the Chinese response to provocative and unnecessary commentary about China in the 2009 Defence white paper, which I understand was inserted at the behest of then prime minister Rudd. The Australian public was told from the defence minister down that China had no particular problems with this content. Now the WikiLeaks material reveals that in fact the paper's principal author was ''dressed down'' by the deputy director of foreign affairs in the Chinese Defence Ministry. No national security purpose was served by misleading the Australian public in this way.
Other leaks show that Rudd was less than frank about his attitude to US deployment of ballistic missile defences, publicly opposed but privately telling the US we were on board.
Perhaps the most serious case relates to the prospects for the war in Afghanistan. The stock line from Western governments is that they are optimistic, things are going well, perhaps not quite as well as we would like, but we are making progress. What we find from WikiLeaks is that the real assessment, no doubt shared by all our NATO allies, is quite different. In October 2008 Rudd told visiting US congressmen that the national security establishment in Australia was very pessimistic about the long-term prognosis for Afghanistan, a pessimism evident in a December 2009 cable reporting the views of Australia's special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, former defence secretary Ric Smith, who referred to the ''train wreck'' the Australian Federal Police has to deal with in working with the Afghan National Police.
This deceptiveness is unconscionable. The situation it suggests is that all Western governments involved know the outlook in Afghanistan is bleak, but none is prepared to confess this to the public. They all cling on, feeding us their bromides, hoping that when the war is lost it will be on someone else's watch. Meanwhile, they attend the funerals, praise the fallen and comfort the families.
Such deceptiveness is not confined to the Rudd and Gillard governments. The Howard government was committed to the US invasion of Iraq by July 2002. Yet John Howard insisted right up to the eve of the March 2003 invasion that no decision had been taken on our participation.
This particular game is up - governments will sooner or later be outed when they say one thing to foreign governments and another to their public. The world is witnessing something like a collision between galaxies; the hot, swirling mass of secret diplomatic correspondence has come into collision with the rapidly changing and supremely adaptable mass of the internet. The latter will devour the former, and governments had better get used to that. The leaks are technology-driven, occurring because they can.
The consequences will not be confined to the foreign policy arena. In the hubris of power and their desire to stay in office solely for the purpose of being in office, modern governments routinely mislead us in two ways. They feed us an endless stream of misleading drivel manufactured by spin doctors, and they withhold information about their real agenda and other inconvenient truths the public has a right to know about. This is now much harder to sustain.
Julian Assange will no doubt pay a heavy price for his role in this inevitable development, but in the long sweep of history he will be seen more as hero than as villain.
Paul Barratt is a former intelligence analyst and a former secretary to the Australian Defence Department.
Anonymous isn't: LOIC leaks internet address of user
Researchers at the University of Twente in the Netherlands report that the LOIC (Low Orbit Ion Cannon) software used in pro-Wikileaks Anonymous attacks discloses the identity of the user.
If hacktivists use this tool directly from their own machines, instead of via anonymization networks such as Tor, the Internet address of the attacker is included in every Internet message being transmitted. In the tools no sophisticated techniques are used, such as IP-spoofing, in which the source address of others is used, or reflected attacks, in which attacks go via third party systems. The current attack technique can therefore be compared to overwhelming someone with letters, but putting your address at the back of the envelope. In addition, hacktivists may not be aware that international data retention laws require that commercial Internet providers store data regarding Internet usage for at least 6 months. This means that hacktivists can still be traced easily after the attacks are over.Here's a PDF with details on the report. Attacks by "Anonymous" WikiLeaks proponents not anonymous utwente.nl (via Slashdot)
Xeni Jardin @'Boing Boing'
Hacker Magazine condemns Anon's DDoS attacks
2600 Magazine, a quarterly journal for the hacker community that has published since 1984, is speaking out against numerous media reports that hackers are responsible for a spate of attacks on numerous e-commerce corporations as part of the ongoing Wikileaks controversy.
Denial of service attacks against PayPal, Amazon, Visa, Mastercard, and other corporations and entities have been underway for the last few days, as widely reported in the mainstream media. Each of these targets had previously taken some sort of action against the whistleblower website wikileaks.org and its affiliates. The media reports almost invariably refer to "hackers" as being behind these actions. While there is great sympathy in the hacker world for what Wikileaks is doing, this type of activity is no better than the strong-arm tactics we are fighting against.
These attacks, in addition to being a misguided effort that doesn't accomplish very much at all, are incredibly simple to launch and require no technical or hacker skills. While writing such programs requires a good degree of ingenuity and knowledge of security weaknesses, this doesn't mean that everyone who runs them possesses the same degree of proficiency, nor should we necessarily believe people who claim to be doing this on behalf of the hacker community.
What the above named corporations have done to Wikileaks is inexcusable and constitutes a different sort of denial of service attack, one that is designed to eliminate an organization, an individual, or an idea. We find it inexplicable that donations can easily be made to hate groups and all sorts of convicted criminals through these same services, yet somehow a website that publishes leaked information - and which has never been charged or convicted of a crime - is considered unacceptable. We believe it's not the place of credit card companies or banks to judge the morality or potential threat level of anyone, let alone those who are following in the long tradition of journalists and free speech advocates worldwide.
The assault on Wikileaks must not be overshadowed by the recent denial of service attacks and these certainly must not be allowed to be associated with the hacker community. This will play right into the hands of those who wish to paint us all as threats and clamp down on freedom of speech and impose all kinds of new restrictions on the Internet, not to mention the fact that the exact same types of attacks can be used on "us" as well as "them." (Interestingly, it was only a week ago that "hackers" were blamed for denial of service attacks on Wikileaks itself. That tactic was ineffectual then as well.) Most importantly, these attacks are turning attention away from what is going on with Wikileaks. This fight is not about a bunch of people attacking websites, yet that is what is in the headlines now. It certainly does not help Wikileaks to be associated with such immature and boorish activities any more than it helps the hacker community. From what we have been hearing over the past 24 hours, this is a viewpoint shared by a great many of us. By uniting our voices, speaking out against this sort of action, and correcting every media account we see and hear that associates hackers with these attacks, we stand a good chance of educating the public, rather than enflaming their fears and assumptions.
There are a number of positive steps people - both inside and outside of the hacker community - can take to support Wikileaks and help spread information. Boycotts of companies that are trying to shut Wikileaks down can be very effective and will not win them any sympathy, as the current attacks on their websites are unfortunately doing. Mirroring Wikileaks is another excellent method of keeping the flow of information free. Communicating with friends, family, classes, workplaces, etc. is not only a way of getting the word out, but will also help to sharpen your skills in standing up for what you believe in. This is never accomplished when all one tries to do is silence one's opponent. That has not been, and never should be, the hacker way of dealing with a problem.
2600 Magazine has been publishing news, tutorials, and commentary by, about, and for the hacker community since 1984. We were sued in 2000 by the Motion Picture Association of America for linking to a website containing source code enabling Linux machines to play DVDs and thus became the first test case of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. In a similar vein, we are supporting Wikileaks by linking to their existing website through wikileaks.2600.com. We've already changed where this address points to twice as Wikileaks sites have been taken down, and will continue to ensure that this link always manages to get to wherever Wikileaks happens to be. We hope people follow that link and support the existence of Wikileaks through whatever method is being publicized on their site.
###
CONTACT:
2600 MAGAZINE: THE HACKER QUARTERLY
webmaster@2600.com
Emmanuel Goldstein, Editor
Emmanuel@goldste.in
www.2600.com
+1 631 751 2600
WikiLeaks backlash: The first global cyber war has begun, claim hackers
He is one of the newest recruits to Operation Payback. In a London bedroom, the 24-year-old computer hacker is preparing his weaponry for this week's battles in an evolving cyberwar. He is a self-styled defender of free speech, his weapon a laptop and his enemy the US corporations responsible for attacking the website WikiLeaks.
He had seen the flyers that began springing up on the web in mid-September. In chatrooms, on discussion boards and inboxes from Manchester to New York to Sydney the grinning face of a Guy Fawkes mask had appeared with a call to arms. Across the world a battalion of hackers was being summoned.
"Greetings, fellow anons," it said beneath the headline Operation Payback. Alongside were a series of software programs dubbed "our weapons of choice" and a stark message: people needed to show their "hatred".
Like most international conflicts, last week's internet war began over a relatively modest squabble, escalating in days into a global fight.
Before WikiLeaks, Operation Payback's initial target was America's recording industry, chosen for its prosecutions of music file downloaders. From those humble origins, Payback's anti-censorship, anti-copyright, freedom of speech manifesto would go viral, last week pitting an amorphous army of online hackers against the US government and some of the biggest corporations in the world.
Charles Dodd, a consultant to US government agencies on internet security, said: "[The hackers] attack from the shadows and they have no fear of retaliation. There are no rules of engagement in this kind of emerging warfare."
The battle now centres on Washington's fierce attempts to close down WikiLeaks and shut off the supply of confidential US government cables. By Thursday, the hacktivists were routinely attacking those who had targeted WikiLeaks, among them icons of the corporate world, credit card firms and some of the largest online companies. It seemed to be the first sustained clash between the established order and the organic, grassroots culture of the net.
But the clash has cast the spotlight wider, on the net's power to act as a thorn not only in the side of authoritarian regimes but western democracies, on our right to information and the responsibility of holding secrets. It has also asked profound questions over the role of the net itself. One blogger dubbed it the "first world information war".
At the heart of the conflict is the WikiLeaks founder, the enigmatic figure of Julian Assange – lionised by some as the Ned Kelly of the digital age for his continued defiance of a superpower, condemned by his US detractors as a threat to national security.
Calls for Assange to be extradited to the US to face charges of espionage will return this week. The counteroffensive by Operation Payback is likely to escalate.
The targets include the world's biggest online retailer, Amazon – already assaulted once for its decision to stop hosting WikiLeaks-related material – Washington, Scotland Yard and the websites of senior US politicians. There is talk of infecting Facebook, which last week removed a page used by pro-WikiLeaks hackers, with a virus that spreads from profile to profile causing it to crash. No one seems certain where the febrile cyber conflict will lead, only that it has just begun...
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Mark Townsend, Paul Harris in New York, Alex Duval Smith in Johannesburg, Dan Sabbagh, Josh Halliday @'The Guardian'
Incompetent (Australian) BitTorrent Researchers Strike Again
I almost cried this morning.
Last summer we debunked a study by the University of Ballarat’s Internet Commerce Security Laboratory (ICSL). Carefully we spelled out the many obvious mistakes that were made, both in data collection and the research design in general. In addition, we contacted the lead researcher, offering our help.
Several news outlets who published the story were kind enough to acknowledge our critique, but the researchers themselves went silent and didn’t respond directly to the errors we pointed out. Today, the same researchers are again making headlines, and it seems that they haven’t learned a thing.
In a replication of the study they conducted earlier this year, the researchers have studied what’s being downloaded on BitTorrent. Among other things they want to find out which files are popular on BitTorrent at the moment, and how many of these are infringing.
But there’s a problem. Again.
In common with those behind last year’s study, the researchers have no clue what they are doing. Mistake after mistake has been made, as we will point out below. The worst part is that some media outlets appear to be taking this research seriously, while it’s in fact a disgrace for anyone who works in academia.
In large parts the methodology is the same as last time, so we won’t report all the painful mistakes that were pointed out before. Instead, will will just sum up some of the new findings, and point out why these are clearly wrong.
In their top 10 most downloaded (read ‘seeded’) movies, we find the following titles that have been available for years:
Last summer we debunked a study by the University of Ballarat’s Internet Commerce Security Laboratory (ICSL). Carefully we spelled out the many obvious mistakes that were made, both in data collection and the research design in general. In addition, we contacted the lead researcher, offering our help.
Several news outlets who published the story were kind enough to acknowledge our critique, but the researchers themselves went silent and didn’t respond directly to the errors we pointed out. Today, the same researchers are again making headlines, and it seems that they haven’t learned a thing.
In a replication of the study they conducted earlier this year, the researchers have studied what’s being downloaded on BitTorrent. Among other things they want to find out which files are popular on BitTorrent at the moment, and how many of these are infringing.
But there’s a problem. Again.
In common with those behind last year’s study, the researchers have no clue what they are doing. Mistake after mistake has been made, as we will point out below. The worst part is that some media outlets appear to be taking this research seriously, while it’s in fact a disgrace for anyone who works in academia.
In large parts the methodology is the same as last time, so we won’t report all the painful mistakes that were pointed out before. Instead, will will just sum up some of the new findings, and point out why these are clearly wrong.
1. Most downloaded files
The data collected for the new study was gathered in July 2010, and the researchers used the number of active seeders at the time to determine what files are ‘most downloaded’. One would assume that such a list would be dominated by new titles, but according to the Australian researchers this is not the case.In their top 10 most downloaded (read ‘seeded’) movies, we find the following titles that have been available for years:
Wanted (2008)
Hancock (2008)
Juno (2007)
Step Brothers (2008)
Gladiator (2000)
Toy Story (1995)
At TorrentFreak we have years of experience at tracking BitTorrent downloads, and we’ve never seen any old titles in our weekly lists. Older titles do show up as popular in tracker scrapes sometimes, but they are always from fake torrent files or manipulated trackers. Common sense should have alerted the researchers that something might have been wrong with their data collection methods or sample.
The report also claims that the aXXo release of the film Wanted had a massive 50,582 seeders two years after it was released. Aside from the fact that we haven’t seen such a high seeder count in weeks, it is absolutely impossible that a download would have these impressive figures two years after it first became available.
The inaccuracy of the most downloaded film list is nicely illustrated by the researchers themselves. Aside from gathering data from BitTorrent trackers, they also looked at the 100 most searched for terms on the BitTorrent search engine isoHunt at the time. Interestingly, none of the older movies listed in their top 10 most downloaded list was present in the list of popular searches.
Based on a sample of 127,600 torrent files they conclude that nearly 70% of the torrents are video content and less than 2% is software.
If we look at the >10 million torrent files (unique hashes) that are available on a quality torrent site such as BitSnoop, we see a different picture. On BitSnoop 9% of all torrents are categorised as software, while video adds up to ‘just’ 52%. This leads us to believe that the sample the researchers used is heavily biased towards video content, or that their categorization algorithms are flawed.
Or put differently, most torrent clients allow people to use multiple trackers. That means that they can be listed as a seeder at several trackers at the same time. The researchers didn’t calculate this in, and are therefore overestimating the download counts, which were already suspicious to begin with.
Sadly enough we have to conclude that this new study is just as bad as the previous one, and totally unusable to describe the BitTorrent landscape. We’re not exaggerating if we say that the researchers are incompetent, lack common sense, and are too stubborn to take advice when we offered it.
When I contacted researcher Dr. Paul Watters last time he sent the following reply: “I would be happy to send you a complimentary of my O’Reilly ‘Statistics in a Nutshell’ book that might give further insight into statistical methodology.” I chuckled, since I’ve worked as an academic myself for years, publishing in high impact peer-reviewed journals.
Perhaps the State Government of Victoria, IBM, Westpac Banking Corporation, the Australian Federal Police and Village Roadshow should ask for a refund, as they all supported the research financially.
Hancock (2008)
Juno (2007)
Step Brothers (2008)
Gladiator (2000)
Toy Story (1995)
At TorrentFreak we have years of experience at tracking BitTorrent downloads, and we’ve never seen any old titles in our weekly lists. Older titles do show up as popular in tracker scrapes sometimes, but they are always from fake torrent files or manipulated trackers. Common sense should have alerted the researchers that something might have been wrong with their data collection methods or sample.
The report also claims that the aXXo release of the film Wanted had a massive 50,582 seeders two years after it was released. Aside from the fact that we haven’t seen such a high seeder count in weeks, it is absolutely impossible that a download would have these impressive figures two years after it first became available.
The inaccuracy of the most downloaded film list is nicely illustrated by the researchers themselves. Aside from gathering data from BitTorrent trackers, they also looked at the 100 most searched for terms on the BitTorrent search engine isoHunt at the time. Interestingly, none of the older movies listed in their top 10 most downloaded list was present in the list of popular searches.
2. Popular Categories
As we suggested, to determine the popularity of various categories the researchers used a random sample of torrents this time, instead of the sample of popular torrents they previously selected. Despite this change the gathered data differs significantly from what most torrent sites report.Based on a sample of 127,600 torrent files they conclude that nearly 70% of the torrents are video content and less than 2% is software.
If we look at the >10 million torrent files (unique hashes) that are available on a quality torrent site such as BitSnoop, we see a different picture. On BitSnoop 9% of all torrents are categorised as software, while video adds up to ‘just’ 52%. This leads us to believe that the sample the researchers used is heavily biased towards video content, or that their categorization algorithms are flawed.
3. Multiplying Trackers
The last point that we want to address is again an illustration of the incompetence of the researchers. What we missed last time is that they simply added up the reports of the different BitTorrent trackers they scraped. If “torrent A” is tracked by 5 individual trackers, then the researchers add up the seeder counts of them all, while in fact they are often used by the same downloaders.Or put differently, most torrent clients allow people to use multiple trackers. That means that they can be listed as a seeder at several trackers at the same time. The researchers didn’t calculate this in, and are therefore overestimating the download counts, which were already suspicious to begin with.
Sadly enough we have to conclude that this new study is just as bad as the previous one, and totally unusable to describe the BitTorrent landscape. We’re not exaggerating if we say that the researchers are incompetent, lack common sense, and are too stubborn to take advice when we offered it.
When I contacted researcher Dr. Paul Watters last time he sent the following reply: “I would be happy to send you a complimentary of my O’Reilly ‘Statistics in a Nutshell’ book that might give further insight into statistical methodology.” I chuckled, since I’ve worked as an academic myself for years, publishing in high impact peer-reviewed journals.
Perhaps the State Government of Victoria, IBM, Westpac Banking Corporation, the Australian Federal Police and Village Roadshow should ask for a refund, as they all supported the research financially.
Ernesto @'Torent Freak'
Sunday, 12 December 2010
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