A hacker known as Martha Root broke in and deleted three white supremacist websites at the end of a talk during the annual hacker conference Chaos Communication Congress in Germany.
I mean, it is technically true, but in a trial with a jury of peers it wouldn’t matter. This reminds me of the old school outlaw definition. If you were declared an outlaw the laws of the land no longer applied to you. You could commit crimes, but it also meant anyone and everyone could commit crimes against you without repercussions. It was a bit of a given that you would commit crimes because if you were declared an outlaw you probably were already committing crimes, but now anyone could rob, harm, or even kill you and it wouldn’t be a crime.
I say fuck these neo-nazis but this is cyber terrorism technically.
I agreed with another comment that this is probably not cyber terrorism, because definitions of cyber terrorism indicate a wide spread impact on people while this only impacts a relatively small group. Your definition isn’t quite right either as one potential goal for cyber terrorism is to cause disruption or fear. Terrorism as a general term may be politically motivated but it doesn’t have to have the goal of influencing policy directly. Technically revenge can be a goal of terrorism.
Eh, I want to like this statement because I hate these people, but I can’t in good conscious call it something it isn’t. This sort of thing is the essence of debate because we have good people doing bad things to bad people and then have to justify why it’s ok despite it being bad. It’s justice vs righteousness, it’s lawful neutral vs lawful good. The only reason why this is acceptable is because it’s against people that we deem not worthy of legal protection, but as a precedent that’s dangerous territory. As soon as the definition of people not worthy of legal protection changes it suddenly becomes a problem.
At it’s core this person probably committed a crime, but people don’t care because it’s against a bad ideologue. It’s like if we said it’s ok to round up and execute neo-nazis, a lot of people would rejoice, but if you change that to most any other group they would cry about human rights. At the end of the day rounding up and killing anyone is a bad thing no matter who it’s against.
At some point the scales will not balance well and you need to be ok with that. There is no paradox of intolerance, for example, because tolerance is itself part of a social contract that bigots broke all on their own and once that’s out the window they do not get to reap the benefits of it. Social contracts aren’t easy math but they do make sense.
This isn’t blowing up a furry website because someone thinks that’s weird. White supremacy is an incredibly dangerous ideology that has no place in whatever better society we claim to be aiming for. No one killed them for it, either. White supremacy built a website and a better person removed that website the same way one might paint over a swastika but leave the nice mural.
I agree with the sentiment, but sadly can’t agree with the implementation. Laws exist in a neutral environment, you can’t bypass them just because the other party is someone society disagrees with. Even if they are committing crimes you can’t unilaterally exact justice against them due to vigilante laws.
This event took place in Germany, Crimical Code §§ 202a-d criminalizes unauthorized access, interception, and manipulation of data, with penalties ranging from fines to imprisonment, covering acts like phishing and data espionage. Within German law this should be a crime. Germany has laws against neo-nazis, but this would be vigilantism which Germany also prohibits.
It’s a slippery slope to ignore your own laws because they support the popular narrative.
Look, I am aware of the dangers of vigilantism but I’m struggling to see why you’re so dead-set on this. There is basically no movement from those in power to actually curb these people and that’s where I start to care a whole lot less. Yes it’s still important to consider somewhere in there but hey, if the German government wasn’t doing anything about it then I guess that means they’ve passed on the opportunity.
I’m not certain on much, but what I do know is that I believe in law. I like rules and I like order. Even more so I want rules and order to apply universally. You are arguing on the side of chaos against others with the privilege of law to protect you. That’s all well and good until those same standards are applied against you.
What do you think laws are? Even in the best of societies they are based on that specific society’s idea of morality. They are still important and they definitely should apply universally, but when they cease to function they lose their worth. That website needed to be taken down, and not getting removed by the government left a citizen to need to bring that balance back.
You might not enjoy what it looks like, but if you truly seek balance then it’s what you’re asking for.
Laws are supposed to be just and equal, it is a common mistake in believing that they should be equitable or that they will be implemented justly or equally.
You’re probably right, I went back and double checked the definition of cyber terrorism and the main difference is scale of impact. To be cyber terrorism it would probably have to impact a larger group of people.
It would also have to cause terror. The people using these websites live in such an abject state of terror about their own inferiority that this probably had no measurable effect anyway.
I think you have sense on your side there about outlawry. It existed as the photo negative of the golden rule, and it’s a great way to make an example of people who break the social contract.
I mean, it is technically true, but in a trial with a jury of peers it wouldn’t matter. This reminds me of the old school outlaw definition. If you were declared an outlaw the laws of the land no longer applied to you. You could commit crimes, but it also meant anyone and everyone could commit crimes against you without repercussions. It was a bit of a given that you would commit crimes because if you were declared an outlaw you probably were already committing crimes, but now anyone could rob, harm, or even kill you and it wouldn’t be a crime.
I say fuck these neo-nazis but this is cyber terrorism technically.
Terrorism is the use of force against civilians to influence a nation’s policy. This is not it.
I agreed with another comment that this is probably not cyber terrorism, because definitions of cyber terrorism indicate a wide spread impact on people while this only impacts a relatively small group. Your definition isn’t quite right either as one potential goal for cyber terrorism is to cause disruption or fear. Terrorism as a general term may be politically motivated but it doesn’t have to have the goal of influencing policy directly. Technically revenge can be a goal of terrorism.
I call it self-defense, honestly.
Eh, I want to like this statement because I hate these people, but I can’t in good conscious call it something it isn’t. This sort of thing is the essence of debate because we have good people doing bad things to bad people and then have to justify why it’s ok despite it being bad. It’s justice vs righteousness, it’s lawful neutral vs lawful good. The only reason why this is acceptable is because it’s against people that we deem not worthy of legal protection, but as a precedent that’s dangerous territory. As soon as the definition of people not worthy of legal protection changes it suddenly becomes a problem.
At it’s core this person probably committed a crime, but people don’t care because it’s against a bad ideologue. It’s like if we said it’s ok to round up and execute neo-nazis, a lot of people would rejoice, but if you change that to most any other group they would cry about human rights. At the end of the day rounding up and killing anyone is a bad thing no matter who it’s against.
At some point the scales will not balance well and you need to be ok with that. There is no paradox of intolerance, for example, because tolerance is itself part of a social contract that bigots broke all on their own and once that’s out the window they do not get to reap the benefits of it. Social contracts aren’t easy math but they do make sense.
This isn’t blowing up a furry website because someone thinks that’s weird. White supremacy is an incredibly dangerous ideology that has no place in whatever better society we claim to be aiming for. No one killed them for it, either. White supremacy built a website and a better person removed that website the same way one might paint over a swastika but leave the nice mural.
I agree with the sentiment, but sadly can’t agree with the implementation. Laws exist in a neutral environment, you can’t bypass them just because the other party is someone society disagrees with. Even if they are committing crimes you can’t unilaterally exact justice against them due to vigilante laws.
This event took place in Germany, Crimical Code §§ 202a-d criminalizes unauthorized access, interception, and manipulation of data, with penalties ranging from fines to imprisonment, covering acts like phishing and data espionage. Within German law this should be a crime. Germany has laws against neo-nazis, but this would be vigilantism which Germany also prohibits.
It’s a slippery slope to ignore your own laws because they support the popular narrative.
Look, I am aware of the dangers of vigilantism but I’m struggling to see why you’re so dead-set on this. There is basically no movement from those in power to actually curb these people and that’s where I start to care a whole lot less. Yes it’s still important to consider somewhere in there but hey, if the German government wasn’t doing anything about it then I guess that means they’ve passed on the opportunity.
I’m not certain on much, but what I do know is that I believe in law. I like rules and I like order. Even more so I want rules and order to apply universally. You are arguing on the side of chaos against others with the privilege of law to protect you. That’s all well and good until those same standards are applied against you.
What do you think laws are? Even in the best of societies they are based on that specific society’s idea of morality. They are still important and they definitely should apply universally, but when they cease to function they lose their worth. That website needed to be taken down, and not getting removed by the government left a citizen to need to bring that balance back.
You might not enjoy what it looks like, but if you truly seek balance then it’s what you’re asking for.
You seem be be operating under the assumption that laws themselves will always be just and equal.
Laws are supposed to be just and equal, it is a common mistake in believing that they should be equitable or that they will be implemented justly or equally.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Laws
Sending a link with no additional context doesn’t make a point. What are you trying to say with this?
Paradox of tolerance. It’s absolutely self defense at the society level.
Technically illegal, yes, but it has nothing to do with “terrorism” though.
You’re probably right, I went back and double checked the definition of cyber terrorism and the main difference is scale of impact. To be cyber terrorism it would probably have to impact a larger group of people.
It would also have to cause terror. The people using these websites live in such an abject state of terror about their own inferiority that this probably had no measurable effect anyway.
I think you have sense on your side there about outlawry. It existed as the photo negative of the golden rule, and it’s a great way to make an example of people who break the social contract.