Leaked HBGary Documents Show Plan To Spread Wikileaks Propaganda For BofA... And 'Attack' Glenn Greenwald

from the this-is-like-out-of-a-bad-movie dept

Thu, Feb 10th 2011 6:21am — Mike Masnick

Sometimes reality can be more entertaining than fiction. You may have followed the recent story involving a security firm called HBGary Federal, in which the company's CEO, Aaron Barr, told the Financial Times this weekend that he had secretly "infiltrated" the non-group Anonymous and identified its leadership... and that he was planning to hand over the info to law enforcement. Of course, it was pretty questionable how accurate the information is, considering Anonymous isn't actually a "group" with a hierarchy at all. It wouldn't be surprising to find out that there were some folks who were heavily active, but that's different than claiming there's "leadership." Either way, Anonymous did what Anonymous does when someone does something it doesn't like: they hacked. Beyond taking over Barr's Twitter account and revealing all sorts of private info and taking over various web servers connected to HBGary Federal, it also released 44,000 of the company's emails.

Once again, as I've said before, I really don't think this is a good idea. The potential backlash can be severe and these kinds of attacks can create the opposite long-term incentives that the folks involved think they're creating. It also gets people a lot more focused on the method rather than the message and that seems unfortunate.

Still, the leaked emails are turning up some gems, with a key one being that Bank of America (widely discussed as Wikileaks' next target) had apparently been talking to HBGary Federal about how to disrupt Wikileaks. That link, from The Tech Herald, includes tons of details. The full proposal (embedded below) feels like something straight out of a (really, really bad) Hollywood script.

It appears that the law firm BofA was using as a part of its Wikileaks crisis response task force, Hunton and Williams, had reached out to firms asking for research and a plan against Wikileaks. HBGary Federal, along with Palantir Technologies and Berico Technologies put together their pitch. According to the emails discussing this, the firms tried to come up with a plan as to how they could somehow disrupt Wikileaks , see if there was a way to sue Wikileaks and get an injunction against releasing the data.

There are two key slides in the presentation. The first is a totally bizarre plan of attack on Salon journalist Glenn Greenwald, who has been an outspoken supporter of Wikileaks. However, these three companies seem to think that they can pressure him to give up supporting Wikileaks in this case and that will somehow solve a big part of the issue.

According to the Tech Herald, the word "disrupted" in the final presentation was actually written as "attacked" in earlier drafts of the presentation. This suggests some pretty confused thinking on the part of these firms. The idea that Wikileaks would "fold" without people like Glenn supporting them seems pretty silly, as does the idea that Glenn would suddenly give up the cause. Still, it's pretty freaking ominous for the firm to seriously be suggesting that it can somehow put pressure on Greenwald that would lead him to "choose professional preservation over cause." It makes you wonder just what level of underhanded tricks they were thinking about pulling.

Later on in the presentation is the plan to further disrupt Wikileaks, which is basically to create a propaganda campaign around the organization -- as if the press wasn't doing that already. They also have the idea to upload bogus info to Wikileaks, hope the bogus info gets released and then discredit Wikileaks by showing that it publishes bogus info.

Who knows? Perhaps this very presentation is faked and is all a part of HBGary's nefarious plan (since the document is available via Wikileaks...). Either way, the whole thing reeks of the types of organizations that think they're fighting a single, centralized foe, rather than a distributed movement that is interested in transparency. All of these attacks -- even if successful -- wouldn't do much harm to the overall efforts to increase transparency. Even if they succeeded in quieting Greenwald, others would continue to report on this. Even if they discredited Wikileaks itself (and many have tried), others have been springing up nearly every day to take its place.

It's not known whether or not BofA actually agreed to this proposal (or ever actually knew about it), though apparently HBGary Federal employees were hopeful they'd get the deal to provide these services. If so, going on to blab in the press about infiltrating Anonymous probably wasn't the best way of keeping out of the spotlight on these issues...

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Filed Under: anonymous, attacks, glenn greenwald, leaks, wikileaks
Companies: bank of america, berico, hbgary federal, hunton and williams, palantir, wikileaks

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The eejit (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 5:24am

So, basically, they were advocating illegal activities on the behalf of BoA, in order to secure a contract. And they say moral responsibility is dead.
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Chronno S. Trigger (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:16am

Intentional Misdirection
So this guy is ether an idiot, or so smart he has layers upon layers. He ether smacked the bee hive thinking it was a pinata, or he created a Hollywood-esk stile plot to trap Anon and WikiLeaks using fake twitter accounts, web servers, and E-Mails. And managed to do it all without tipping off the hackers or letting it slip via one of his employes or a real server/e-mail somewhere.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:34am

I am shocked. Dp you hear me - SHOCKED! To think that lying sleaze hate filth is lying sleaze hate filth.

It is stunts like this that has generated the lying sleaze hate filth as being lying sleaze hate filth.
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John Doe, 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:40am

Security Firm?
Who would hire a security firm that can't secure their own firm?
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:43am

All this a day after Assange was reported to have said that the bank documents were a snore.

http://www.moneycontrol.com/news/world-news/wikileaks-founder-suggests-bank-documents-ares nore_521224.html

As for the "anonymous" group, Mike, you should know better. Any group, no matter how intentionally "flat" has leaders and followers. Anonymous is no different. They have a few people who are the real movers and shakers, they hold sway over a large number of the underlings. While they may not be elected, they are certainly powerful leaders in the movement.

I suspect all of this is an attempt to stir up anonymous and Wikileaks, and is being used potentially to honey pot them.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:44am

It's amazing what lengths these companies will go to in order to avoid having to be honest.
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chris (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:49am

Re: Intentional Misdirection
he created a Hollywood-esk stile plot to trap Anon and WikiLeaks using fake twitter accounts, web servers, and E-Mails. And managed to do it all without tipping off the hackers or letting it slip via one of his employes or a real server/e-mail somewhere.

interesting theory. so you think this might be some sort of honeypot?

i suppose it's possible. honeypots are great for a number of things, including epic lolz:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJagxe-Gvpw
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:57am

I have to add this:

Either way, the whole thing reeks of the types of organizations that think they're fighting a single, centralized foe, rather than a distributed movement that is interested in transparency.

I think this is where you are making a mistake. While there are groups of people interested in transparency, most of them are keyboard warrior types. Few of them would have the guts / balls / lack of brains to put themselves out there to lead something like Wikileaks. Even the bravest of them know they are standing in legal quick sand, and can sink at any second.

It is much clearer at this point that if Wikileaks is discredited, or the information coming from them is proven to be false, misleading, or edited in any way, they will lose credibility. Wikileaks to date has been treated as 100% accurate and right, and is the central "shop" to confirm right or wrong, sort of like the Snopes of leaked documents. Remove their crediblity, and the "movement" has nowhere to turn. Then the space can be filled with contradictory or misleading "leaks" that aren't leaks at all, and the entire transparency thing gets flushed along with Assange and his merry band of men.

What these people are showing is exactly how you take apart a distributed organization: You locate it's key points, you either attack or monitor those points for information, and you use the structures and concepts already in place to create dis-information, confusion, and misdirection so that the organization can no longer function as one.

It is very clever indeed.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:01am

Re:
Anonymous does not have leaders and followers in the traditional sense. Everyone is a leader. Everyone is a follower. One is harmed, everyone retaliates. Time to rethink the current paradigm. It is a part of their culture, I suggest you look into it.

No doubt there are those who are better at hacktivism, but that doesn't make them the 'leaders'. There are also varying hacker groups within anon, each with their own 'leaders' though most the time targets are chosen democratically with the rest of the hacking group. A member proposes a target, and the group either is in consensus or not.

They are legion. A Hydra with thousands of heads. Good luck snuffing that out, mate.

Cheers
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:10am

Re:
Bunch of poo. The "clever" presentation implies that posting to wikileaks is like posting to craigslist and no one will check out if the information is false or not. So there is obvious lack of understanding of what they are fighting.

While there are groups of people interested in transparency, most of them are keyboard warrior types. Few of them would have the guts / balls / lack of brains to put themselves out there to lead something like Wikileaks. Even the bravest of them know they are standing in legal quick sand, and can sink at any second.

A bunch of misinformed fud. Legal quick sand? For anyone outside of Wikileaks defending their actions and not actually participating, there is no legal threat, unless you count easily dismissed lawsuits. There are also supporters, known by name, that will duke it out in public and whose professional career will actually benefit from doing so. Targeting them will be the opposite of clever.
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chris (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:10am

Re: Security Firm?
Who would hire a security firm that can't secure their own firm?

targeting security professionals is a long tradition in hacking circles and a source of much hacker drama.

see: LOD vs. MOD, shimomura vs. mitnick, etc.
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Josh in CharlotteNC (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:11am

Re:
What these people are showing is exactly how you take apart a distributed organization: You locate it's key points, you either attack or monitor those points for information, and you use the structures and concepts already in place to create dis-information, confusion, and misdirection so that the organization can no longer function as one.

How's that working for RIAA and MPAA's fight against P2P networks? If they manage to kill one off, there's a bunch more that just pop up.

You're making the same mistake. You're assuming that Wikileaks, Assange or Anonymous are entities that if killed off won't be respawned as something even more distributed. If Assange, Wikileaks, and everyone involved with them all disappeared today, there'd be (and already are) a dozen organizations that are willing to do the same things tomorrow in the wider spirit of transparency.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:18am

Re: Re:
I do think that Wikileaks and Anonymous are both very different from torrent sites. Torrent sites are sites that often bring great personal benefit to the owners. There is a positive to doing it. You can tweak some noses, get all the latest everything easily, and of course, look like a great man.

Wikileaks style sites aren't just "slap it up and they will come", as they are built on trust. Wikileaks didn't happen overnight, it has taken them a very long time to gain credibility, to be considered accurate and trustworthy. You cannot replicate that overnight. If you could, all those other "leaky" sites would be well known and popular as well. They are not. Credibility is key here.

Torrent sites don't have a credibility issue: You have access to the file or you don't. If you don't people go somewhere else. If you have it today, great. It isn't a marriage, it's just a download.

Anonymous is the same sort of thing: It works because there is incredible levels of trust between the players. But any distributed organization is most easily hurt from within: when the members start to bucker and argue, or get misdirected and work counter to each other, things start to get ugly fast.

So bring on the dozens of organizations, most of them will fail quickly because of a lack of credibility.
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Schmoo, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:23am

Re: Re: Security Firm?
Targeting security professionals is a long tradition in hacking circles and a source of much hacker drama.

Even more important to make sure they're capable then... which you can do by checking their own security, no?

It's much like those emails that webmasters get constantly from SEO wannabes - they always make me chuckle. If I want an SEO expert, I'll search for 'SEO' and whatever niche it is I want, and I'll then have myself a nicely ranked list of the people who not only specialise in my area, but who can demonstrably walk-the-walk. Sorry, entirely unknown cold-caller.
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fogbugzd (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:30am

Re: Intentional Misdirection
>>So this guy is ether an idiot, or so smart he has layers upon layers.

The evidence suggests the former.
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The eejit (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:34am

Re: Re: Re:
You've obviously never been to /b/. They are the most chaotic aspect of Anonymous, and even they can be brought together (see, for example, Chanology).

Anonymous genuinely doesn't work like you think it does.
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Hephaestus (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:36am

Re:
"It is much clearer at this point that if Wikileaks is discredited, or the information coming from them is proven to be false, misleading, or edited in any way, they will lose credibility.... Then the space can be filled with contradictory or misleading "leaks" that aren't leaks at all, and the entire transparency thing gets flushed along with Assange and his merry band of men. "

The problem with sending wikileaks false or misleading statements or document is, the only thing wikileaks does is redact information from documents it publishes, not create it. So giving them false information for them to publish will not discredit them. All they need to say is we were given false information that was cleverly created in an attempt to discredit us ... then the masses of Anonymous and the EU equivelent of human flesh search engines come for you.

If Wikileaks is removed and you attempt to fill the space with mis-information you end up having a credibility problem rather quickly and people will ignore you and find a source that is credible.

"either attack or monitor those points for information, and you use the structures and concepts already in place to create dis-information, confusion, and misdirection so that the organization can no longer function as one."

You are talking about how to take out a standard hierarchical structure. Not a distributed structure that is constantly being fed from multiple random points. It doesn't work for terrorism, it won't work for wikileaks. The second problem is the sheer numbers. 2 billion people online -vs- a small group trying to discredit wikileaks.
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cc (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:41am

Re: Re: Re:
There are dozens of Wikileaks clones, including many new ones being created by reputable news organisations! Should Wikileaks lose credibility, others will quickly rise to take its place -- and they'll have learned from Wikileaks' mistakes.

That's what you don't seem to understand: you don't look at Anonymous, leak-sites, P2P etc as ideologies, you look at the individual manifestations/implementations of those ideologies and think that if the those can be destroyed, the ideologies will be destroyed.

But their strength is in numbers. Perhaps you can take 4chan, Wikileaks and TPB off the internet, but that won't kill the ideologies behind them -- the people are still there, and the problems those people have with the current state of affairs are only made worse.

Think about it. Is there a way to convince the people in Anonymous that Mubarak is actually good for Egypt? Is there a way to convince whistleblowers that leaking torture accounts is a bad thing? Is there a way to make pirates less disillusioned with copyright law?
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:49am

I'm amazed Christopher Tolkien didn't sue Palantir ;) the globe on a pedestal is a clear giveaway...
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:50am

Anybody has a link to the image with the response from Anonymous to those persons?

It said something along the lines of "You infiltrated anonymous and now you must pay, about the information you gather it was public information that anyone could have collected and we will deny you the sales of those information releasing it ourselves since it is meaningless anyway"

If that is the best money can buy for protection those firms are screwed.
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Anonymous a-hole, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:55am

Re:
You'll be hearing from the lying sleaze hate filth anti-defamation league soon.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:59am

Anybody has a link to the image with the response from Anonymous to those persons?

It said something along the lines of "You infiltrated anonymous and now you must pay, about the information you gather it was public information that anyone could have collected and we will deny you the sales of those information releasing it ourselves since it is meaningless anyway"

If that is the best money can buy for protection those firms are screwed.

Quote from Aaron Barr

�as 1337 as these guys are suppsed to be they don�t get it. I have pwned them! :)�

Source: Crowdleaks: Anonymous retaliates against HBGary espionage

Hmm...who owned who there?

And now the picture everybody wants to see with the Anonymous response.

Anonymous response JPG
Source: Techspot: Anonymous hacks security company HBGary for working with FBI
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 8:03am

Re: Re:
You make the assumption that the "false" information won't check out. You don't just send them stupid stuff that won't pass inspection, you create reasonable "alternate realities" based on what they could actually check - locations, dates, times, receipts... whatever it is. Give them enough information so the document creates a viable alternate universe. They report it, prove them wrong, they lose credibility. Then they are forced to check the next set of documents more deeply. Think of it as terrorism and the TSA, if you like.

You only have to look at sites like Snopes to realize that many, many people are mislead by false information on a daily basis, and that it is spread far and wide.

You are talking about how to take out a standard hierarchical structure. Not a distributed structure that is constantly being fed from multiple random points.

I think you miss the point here. First, anonymous isn't truly random. Just like any grouping, it has leaders and followers. Yes, there are random acts that come from random people, but the true action of any group still comes from leaders, named or not. I suggest re-reading "The Tipping Point" to get a better understanding of people who are connectors.

Just like terrorists, individual cells can choose action, but that action is random is often not very effective and certainly not sustained. The true acts of terrorism (like 9/11) require a large number of people working in concert to plan, find weaknesses, organize, and implement a plan that spanned years and countries. It isn't some guy waking up in the morning and deciding to hijack a plane with a couple of his friends. When you get in the middle of those groups, when you can change the messages or modify the communications in a manner that changes what they are trying to accomplish, you can hurt their abilities to do true damage.

Remind me again of the last large scale terrorist attack in the western world.

The 2 billion people online thing is also high end misdirection. Again, see snopes.com for more information on most of those 2 billion people. People are easily lead and mislead, they are often too eager to be on the inside of something to even consider who they are dealing with, and in the end, they can easily be pumped full of credible information that just isn't true.

Heck, plenty of people (yourself included) agree with Mike Masnick all the time, even when he blatantly shows that he is making things up.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110207/02222612989/if-artists-dont-value-copyright-their-w orks-why-do-we-force-it-them.shtml
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Josh in CharlotteNC (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 8:08am

Re: Re: Re:
I do think that Wikileaks and Anonymous are both very different from torrent sites.

I agree they are very different, but not in the ways you say.

If you don't think there is any "personal benefit" to being a part of Wikileaks or similar groups, then you don't understand the concept of political activism. Just because they don't get paid or get something for free doesn't mean there's no personal benefit. In fact, those personal benefits are so much greater than monetary considerations. They want to change the world for the better.

Torrent sites absolutely depend on credibility. There's not much point spending hours downloading fake or low quality files, so the people who upload high quality files are well known and protect their reputations.
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TAMwannabe, 10 Feb 2011 @ 8:23am

But Mike, your wagon is falling apart. Your wheels, you need to fix them.
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techflaws.org (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 8:25am

Re: Re: Re:
Remind me again of the last large scale terrorist attack in the western world.

Remind us again why there needs to be one? Bin Laden has dealt a blow the US economy will be suffering from for quite some time. There's no need to blow up anything when your institutions dismantle themselves or lose any moral highground.
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An Anonymous Dude, 10 Feb 2011 @ 8:48am

Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
Yo, dude who's claiming Anonymous isn't random.

There is a little bit of truth to that. A little. But, uh, it's like an infection. Let's think of a disease, a sickness, a flu strain. You take antibiotics to kill off the disease, right?

But you need to keep taking them. Otherwise the strain evolves and overcomes what's killing it. It's vested in survival.

Now, that analogy is simple, if you keep taking the antibiotics, you're good. But Anonymous isn't really an organized structure, at all. A random person will say 'Hey, this is really cool, we should do this.' If it's relevant to their interests (snicker) they'll all roll out. That's how the Scientology protests started. Someone doctored up a cool recruitment poster thing, and they rolled out. There wasn't really much in terms of organization.

Look at the protests in Egypt. There were a few sparks, some outspoken people that started it. Some of those people were disappeared. What continued to happen?

People poured out in droves regardless.

This ain't the easiest thing to fight. It's not a simple thing. Wikileaks is spawning like weeds. Anonymous will always have someone pop up to push everyone to revolt. The only way to keep Anonymous from going all crazy is to stop fighting them and let the tide recede.

They're rebels. Self-righteous rebels. You may not agree with them. I certainly don't all the time. But to attack them is to paint a gigantic bullseye and invite retaliation.

That's when their slogan kicks in. They do not forgive. And they do not forget.

The future is going to be an interesting place.
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cc (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:04am

Re: Re: Re:
Simple question: who does the fact-checking of Wikileaks documents? Is it Wikileaks itself, or is the work outsourced to other news organisations such as The NY Times, El Spiegel and The Guardian?

And one more thing. Should someone start posting fake leaks, will the buck stop with Wikileaks, or will everyone start asking the obvious: WHO is uploading fake leaks and WHY?
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:06am

"Infiltrating Anonymous" = "posting on 4chan, suggesting a habbo raid and getting one 'lol okay!' in response".

Poor fella.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:10am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
WHO is uploading fake leaks and WHY

you won't be able to ask that question, because all submissions to wikileaks are suppose to by anonymous. If they broke the anonymous on this one, they would be admitting that things aren't truly anonymous, and would scare off contributors.

It's all about trust - break the trust, and everything is lost. It's why Assange's wild claims and threats are dangerous, because they are undermining the crediblity of the organization, and more and more of the ex-members are Wikileaks are calling him out (but I doubt that Mike will run with that story).
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:15am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
"personal benefit" for some may be doing something they think is altruistic or otherwise good for the world. These are people who would also go to be care givers in 4th world countries. More power to them.

For most people, personal benefit is a more simple "I got more stuff" or "I got more street cred" or "I am the best know dude in my crew". Things aren't done for greater purposes, only greater standing or personal profit.

Another story Mike didn't run with is that the vast majority of movies and music on torrent sites come from very small release groups. These are the altruistic types. Pretty much everyone else in the "scene" is just sponging off of them for personal profit and cred-points.

Anonymous has been very quiet the last little while. I suspect legal action has pretty much sent all the kids to detention. While you can claim their is no leadership, they seem to have changed course awfully fast for a boat with nobody at the helm.
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Not an electronic Rodent, 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:30am

Re: Re: Re:
The thing I can't work out about you is whether you;
have a personal beef against Mike,
have a fundamental beef against the general ideology displayed by some of the people on this site
are just argumentative
are conducting some sort of wierd social experiment in arguing for a doctoral thesis
or whether you genuinely believe in the opinions you espouse.

Assuming you are the One True Oracle and your various implied predictions come true;
Wikileaks and Anonymous are crushed and no replacement emerges and governments and major corporations get to do anything they want without public scrutiny
Killing file sharing is in fact possible and Governments enact the massive legislation neccessary to do so
Content companies gain complete control over their content and using it is only available via sanctioned gatekeepers and technologies (and by implication access to "art" and "artists" is only available via the same)
The US government (and corporations by proxy) manages to gain control of worldwide patent and rigid patent control and licensing policing is rolled out universally to prevent any copying of any kind of technology or process without appropriate licensing fees.
The US government, by proxy of agreement of nations, siezes control over the worldwide internet and polices it to it's satisfction and that of the major corporations.

I have to ask; Is that a world you actually want to live in? Or are you predicting these things because you are a major fatalist? Or for some other reason I can't fathom?
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Hephaestus (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:48am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
"Assuming you are the One True Oracle and your various implied predictions come true;"

I am the one true oracle not him ;)

"The US government, by proxy of agreement of nations, siezes control over the worldwide internet and polices it to it's satisfction and that of the major corporations."

If I wanted cable TV and a land line telephone I would still have one. It sounds like the world you are describing.
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Chris in Utah (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:57am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
Is it just me ..o wait, he cant fathom

" And so it is to the printing press--to the recorder of man's deeds, the keeper of his conscience, the courier of his news--that we look for strength and assistance, confident that with your help man will be what he was born to be: free and independent."

Was JFK a fatalist? /sardonic
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Hephaestus (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:59am

Re: Re: Re:
"They report it, prove them wrong, they lose credibility. Then they are forced to check the next set of documents more deeply."

You will end up with people asking who is uploading fake documents to wikileaks and why. Once that starts it doesn't matter how anonymous they think they are someone will find them. Darpas ballon challenge makes this perfectly clear. Finding the names of the anonymous women in the Jullian Assange case in 12-15 minutes also makes the point.

"It isn't some guy waking up in the morning and deciding to hijack a plane with a couple of his friends."

In the case of Anonymous it is just that. A couple friends getting together, telling a couple other people, so on and so forth until it stops a web site cold.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 10:05am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Anonymous is so quite they hax'd a security firm... hate to see what happens when they get loud....

/b/
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 10:07am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
The thing I can't work out about you is whether you;
have a personal beef against Mike,
have a fundamental beef against the general ideology displayed by some of the people on this site
are just argumentative
are conducting some sort of wierd social experiment in arguing for a doctoral thesis
or whether you genuinely believe in the opinions you espouse.

None of the above.

I have no beef. Techdirt is mental bubblegum away from the day's work.

It is incredibly easy to sit in a room full of people you agree with and every time someone says something, you say "yeah, right great!" and everyone goes back to doing nothing. Here there are plenty of opinions, different opinions, and different takes. It is a challenge.

Further, because Mike Masnick so clearly has an agenda, it's fun to watch him try to stretch the truth to match his views. It is incredibly funny to call him out on it and watch his usual collection of lap dogs and lackeys trying to cover for him. It is classic when Mike gets down to the old "you don't know what you are talking about" or "oh grow up", rather than accepting that he made an error of logic.

Most importantly, I am a lover of movies, music, and other forms of entertainment. I see much of what is pushed here in those areas are a short term feast that will empty out the warehouses, leaving us little to eat tomorrow. I love a good buffet, but I also like eating every day.

So take it as entertainment.

Now, as for the rest of your post, I don't suggest for a second that any of them are "crushed", rather like many other things, they lose their crediblity and trust, and as a result, cease to be front line relevant.

File sharing is in the same boat: It won't go away, but it will likely be tamped down to a level where it is no longer inflicting great financial pain.

The rest of your stuff is just bullsh-t I never said. Thanks for making it all up, it was amusing but stupid.
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cc (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 10:19am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Or you look for a whistleblower, duh.
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Hephaestus (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 10:41am

Re: Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
"That's when their slogan kicks in. They do not forgive. And they do not forget.

The future is going to be an interesting place."

Yeah ... cyber flash crowds, or as Douglas Wood calls it The Party Of 'We'
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Andrew D. Todd, 10 Feb 2011 @ 10:55am

Some Advice for Bank of America.
There is some doubt about what Bank of American proposed to do to Glenn Greenwald, but, by way of, um, friendly admonition, I think Humphrey Bogart had the last word on the subject, in the film _Deadline USA_ (1952) Speaking to a Capone-like gangster, the newspaper editor says:

"Never beat up a reporter...
It's like killing a cop...
It just makes the whole lot of them come down on you..."
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 11:14am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
quite indeed.

You mean that ALL of anonymous got together and hacked it, or one single person who decides to claim to be part of anonymous did it?

*sigh*
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 11:17am

Re: Re: Re: Re:
You will end up with people asking who is uploading fake documents to wikileaks and why.

Which would violate the anonymous nature of Wikileaks, and further undermine it's standing of confidentiality and standing. Would you feel godo about leaking secret documents to an organization who keeps track of who submits anonymously?

In the case of Anonymous it is just that. A couple friends getting together, telling a couple other people, so on and so forth until it stops a web site cold.

... and yet, police in many countries were able to make raids and arrests on those supposedly anonymous ringleaders who ran the botnets. Absolutely amazing! They must be Kreskins!
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Hephaestus (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 11:46am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
You really just don't get it do you.
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Random Dude, 10 Feb 2011 @ 11:57am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
No, not really amazing. If you're stupid enough not to use proper security it's not suprising. There's always a few stupid people for law enforcement to parade around and pretend they solved global crime.
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good grief, 10 Feb 2011 @ 12:07pm

Domestic Christian terrorism
Anyone think that Aaron Barr is anything but a Christian terrorist? Now that the man's emails have been exposed and we see the lengths of unamerican activities and assaults against Democracy that Barr and HBGary engage in, does anyone still think the scumbag is anything but a Christian terrorist?
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Hephaestus (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 12:15pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"File sharing is in the same boat: It won't go away, but it will likely be tamped down to a level where it is no longer inflicting great financial pain."

That is the mistake everyone in the content industry is making. Its not "Piracy" thats killing content. Its competition and the content industries own (in)actions.

20 years ago 2-4 hours a day for entertainment used to be ...

TV with 4 stations, Radio or Record Player, a couple local phone calls. With about 1,000 musicians or bands you could choose from.

Now 2-4 hours a day for entertainment is ...

TV with 200 channels, 2,000+ online TV stations, Radio, mp3, Social networking, NetFlix, YouTube, email, gaming, texting, calling everyone its basically unlimited now, blogging, education, reading online, etc. And now we have 5 million bands giving away a sizable chunk of their music.

Notice the massive difference in the competition for peoples time? Its only going to get worse as the people doing all this (14-32yrs old) age and also teach the older crowd.

The whole piracy is killing the content industry is a total fail. It maybe accelerating it, but its not causing it.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 12:19pm

Loved the Firefox logos for all the browsers.

Seriously people read that document. Just WOW!
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Hephaestus (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 12:30pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
As I was saying ... you really don't get it. They nailed a couple sloppy kids to parade around in front of the media. They can now say "see we are doing something about this". There is no way for them to go after 40-60 thousand people, so they choose to make examples (reads as martyrs) of a few who didn't cover their tracks. Next time you will see instructions on how not to get caught circulating. Making Anonymous even bolder, larger, and more dangerous.

This phenomena is expanding globally, Anonynous, human flesh search engines, the recent mirroring of wikileaks, etc. They are all the same thing, The party of 'We'. In each and every case, it has been to go after evil, corruption, oppression, and cruelty.
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aldestrawk (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 1:24pm

Re:
http://i.imgur.com/em14R.jpg

Security firms are often targets of hackers. It's a tempting challenge and receives max lols. What is surprising here is that they went out of their way to provoke Anonymous in order to gain publicity. If the following link is of an actual email from the stolen stash [I am trying to confirm this] then it makes both HBGary and HBGary Federal look very bad.

http://img823.imageshack.us/img823/7462/hbgary.jpg

View this in contrast with quotes from Greg Hoglund, CEO of HBGary, in this article:

http://www.scmagazineus.com/anonymous-takes-over-security-firm-in-vengeful-hack/article/ 195837/

Aaron Barr met with the FBI last Sunday. I would have loved to be a fly on the wall for that one. Anonymous says they intended to sell their info to the FBI. I doubt the FBI would be buying that information. I think it was an effort by HBGary Federal to gain favor with the government for future contracts and good publicity for them. If the FBI was seriously monitoring those particular IRC channels and Facebook accounts then they must now be angry with Aaron Barr for disrupting their investigation.
HBGary has a product release this month. Greg Hoglund is giving a talk at the RSA conference in S.F. next week where he is a distinguished speaker. Aaron Barr is speaking at the Security B-Sides Conference next Monday, also in S.F.. This is very bad timing for them. I think they have truly succeeded in undermining their company.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 2:47pm

Re:
That worked so great in Tunisia and Egypt.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 2:57pm

Re: Re: Re:
It doesn't work that way, if you create that much trail it becomes real and no matter how much debunking is done people will not believe it after that.

And your explanation of why people are sheep is why is so dangerous to put out false information, if you don't have credit you won't be believe it afterwards no matter what you try.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 3:13pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Correction a disposable individual did it.

Lawyers and law enforcement are not at the top of the food chain here. They don't understand the system(environment) they are in.

One individual did it with the knowledge of millions of other persons. They exchange knowledge that is what anonymous do, they exchange information, that information can be ideas, jokes, idle chat or dangerous knowledge, you think that one individual is holder of all the knowledge necessary to do something?

*Sigh*
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 3:42pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
What you don't realize is that 200 channels are owned mostly by the same 4 companies that owned the channels you could watch before. You are deluded to think you have many more choices, but you do not.

You also confuse delivery method with delivery source. All of those delivery sources are still only delivering what was available before, just in different ways. The whole business is still done on the same basis: content created to sell.

Honestly, if piracy disappeared tomorrow, don't you think that demand for legal sources would go back up? Or are you assuming that everyone would suddenly not listen to music, not watch TV, and not see movies ever again?

The 14-34 year olds quickly become the 25-45 group that is more happy to settle down on a couch to watch a movie or enjoy Greys Anatomy.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 3:44pm

Re: Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
That's when their slogan kicks in. They do not forgive. And they do not forget.

And then they get real jobs, they start actually making something worth stealing, and then they remember why they hate people like anonymous.

The exuberance of youth meets "hey you kids get off my virtual lawn". Check back in 20 years and let me know how it works out for you.
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G Thompson (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 6:20pm

Re: Intentional Misdirection
Nah he's not a complete idiot... some parts are missing.

Like the part of his brain that should state in red blinking letters 3 foot high "When infiltrating an anonymous group, you need to stay ANONYMOUS"
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:24pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
I think in the end this sort of sums up the problem you have:

Lawyers and law enforcement are not at the top of the food chain here. They don't understand the system(environment) they are in.

They aren't the top of anyone's food chain. People are. But people in their infinite wisdom who realize that no matter how much they may argue about things, there has to be a leader, there has to be choices, and there has to be people there to consider our sort and work laws that are generally for the betterment of all.

Anon is really anarchy. A total disrespect for the rule of law, a total disrespect for personal rights or space. It is nothing but horrible, vengeful nastiness. It's like the mongrel horde without a leader, just randomly burning buildings and sacking electronic villages without reason, except perhaps to show their friends that they can do it.

Most of them appear to be children or young adults busy being children. They have the strength to fight the battle, but don't yet have the brains to realize that not every battle is meant to be fought. They are an intellectual blunt instrument.

In the end, most of them will grow up and get over this phase, in the same manner that most people stop needing to sing the ABC song to know what comes after P in the alphabet. Until they, they can all group together, like almost every other gang, and prove that they are rough and tough hackers.

Joy be with them for they are unshowered.
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velox (profile), 10 Feb 2011 @ 7:41pm

Re: Re: Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
You've demonstrated over the past few weeks that you can talk a bold scoffing line.

The problem is you don't know what you don't know.

To some of us, that is obvious.
What's more, you've already been caught in verifiable errors.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Feb 2011 @ 9:50pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
They aren't the top of anyone's food chain. People are. But people in their infinite wisdom who realize that no matter how much they may argue about things, there has to be a leader, there has to be choices, and there has to be people there to consider our sort and work laws that are generally for the betterment of all.

Exactly there must be a leader that respects them and that takes their problems seriously not one that just pay lip service and do nothing and instead screw them to make his buddies happy while the rest starve.

Anons are becoming the stuff of legends, already and something strange is happening is not just kids anymore, is not dumb people with a grudge, Anon is made up of people from all walks of life is a growing discontent with today's leaders that is fueling that, the disrespect came from the people who are suppose to represent them and instead are leaving them out in the cold and the more people feel that way the more Anons you have, heck look at you, you are Anon(semi-Anon), you are discontent with something and don't want to expose yourself the thing is, there is more people disagreeing with you then there is people agreeing, you don't need to be a genius to see that, every f'cking forum on the internet is full of people who don't like people like you.
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Andrew D. Todd, 10 Feb 2011 @ 10:41pm

The Law Relating to Soliciting Crimes (California)
This would appear to be the applicable section of the California Penal Code. Depending in what a court decides Aaron Barr was attempting to organize in respect of Glenn Greenwald, he could go down for anything from one to nine years.

http://law.onecle.com/california/penal/653f.html
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 3:45am

Re: Re: Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
"And then they get real jobs, they start actually making something worth stealing, and then they remember why they hate people like anonymous."

You are certainly out of touch with reality, because even if that is to be taken as true, their ideas will be built upon by the next generation who will be even more intelligent and possess even greater skills. This is only the beginning.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 5:06am

Re:
Yeah, you'll have them shut down in a week. Should be easy-peasy! A piece of cake! Childs play! You've got it all worked out there big boy!

*snigger*
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 5:20am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"In the end, most of them will grow up and get over this phase....."

Pure comedy gold. Yeah, hating injustice is just a phase we all go through, a bit like hating sprouts when you're a kid.

LMFAO. Where does he get this shit?
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 5:50am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
You fail to present the equally viable alternative to your fantasy story, that exists only in your head, that any attempt to discredit Wikileaks will be more likely to backfire and have the reverse affect. You're right that it's about trust. The problem with your little fairy-tale is that you fail to mention (not realise, because you know full well and are terrified of it) that "your side" has no trust whatsoever. Hard to do anything at all when nobody trusts you, at all.

It's hard to lie to people when you've been exposed as a liar. Thought that would be obvious to you by now.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 6:01am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Cool story bro!
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 6:13am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Ok, you're just outright shilling now or being totally fucking idiotic.

I'll do you a favour and explain something you've never been able to grasp. I'm not trying to educate you though, since that's impossible to a man who cannot think logically or rationally. It's clear you do not grasp this concept from your previous lame (and equally idiotic) attempts to depict Mike as "outing you" for placing a colored icon next to your "Anonymous Coward" name.

Anonymity is an outright accepted status for those seeking to do good. Nobody, except liars and fantasists like yourself, wants anonymity for those doing wrong. In that case, they WANT the very opposite.

I hope they do attempt to discredit Wikileaks. It'll be the best ammunition Wikileaks has ever had.

The fact they haven't yet, and are still pussyfooting around wondering how to exactly go about doing so, shows exactly what the situation really is.

Oh and your attempts to pass off posting here as something to kill the time is PURE COMEDY GOLD!
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 6:22am

Re: Re: Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
More fantasy from inside TAM's head. Apparently, he can tell the future!
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 6:29am

Re: Re: Re: Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
Although in TAM's defence, I should point out how difficult it is for somebody caught inside the misinformation and indoctrination to see outside of that.

Maybe one day Anonymous will unplug TAM from the matrix?
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 6:38am

Re: Domestic Christian terrorism
It's impossible to take seriously anybody who uses the term "Unamerican". There is no plausible way an American can be UnAmerican. The term UnAmerican is a signal, like the christians drawing a fish in the sand, that someone bought the propaganda hook, line and sinker. It's virtually hate-speech imo. At least, that is it's intention, to demonise your neighbour.

Please stop using this term.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 6:45am

Re: Re: Re: Maybe you should check out Anonymous's stomping grounds
Oh and btw, can I just draw a parallel between your comments about Anonymous "growing up and moving on" and your contined obsession with trolling this site for the last, ooooh I dunno, about 5 years(???).

Some people are just incredibly obsessive!
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Gene Cavanaugh, 11 Feb 2011 @ 6:52am

Anonymous tactics
"Once again, as I've said before, I really don't think this is a good idea."
Never present a problem, present a solution.
If you see a problem, but have no alternative approach, it is more appropriate to merely say "This could be a problem", not "I really don't think ...."
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 7:56am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
When you discover that people can find legal free alternatives and your sales don't go up what will you do?

Cry?
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Feb 2011 @ 7:58am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Don't make me pull the links for free legal content it will be flagged as spam an take 2 days to appear and you will take the rest of your life to see it all.
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Feb 2011 @ 9:19am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Set up a google web site.
Fill it with the links.
Allow all.
Post the link here.
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Ronald J Riley (profile), 11 Feb 2011 @ 9:30am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"It is classic when Mike gets down to the old "you don't know what you are talking about" or "oh grow up", rather than accepting that he made an error of logic."

And lets not forget Mike accusing everyone of lying about him.

"Further, because Mike Masnick so clearly has an agenda, it's fun to watch him try to stretch the truth to match his views."

Mike Masnick most certainly acts like a marketing huckster. All the drivel about free marketing which ranks right next to MLM business models. Much of the free software is similar. In each case a small group at the top cons lots of other people into working for free while the leaders rake in money.

Mike seems to have free on the brain, kind of like water pressure on the brain. He acts like everyone should have to adopt a "free" loss leader business model and that if they don't then people should be able to steal. As i see it people have a choice if they do not like a pay up business model they can simply not buy. If everyone did not buy then a business might adopt he free loss leader model which Mike hypes. But they should not have to adopt the model just because Mike says so and people should not be allowed to steal just because some of them get together and and reinforce each others desire to steal.

I am still trying to figure out if his positions on 1 st amendment and related issues are real or if all that is window dressing to cover his promotion of big businesses agenda.

Ronald J. Riley,

President - www.PIAUSA.org - RJR at PIAUSA.org

Other Affiliations:
Executive Director - www.InventorEd.org - RJR at InvEd.org
Senior Fellow - www.PatentPolicy.org
President - Alliance for American Innovation
Caretaker of Intellectual Property Creators on behalf of deceased founder Paul Heckel
Washington, DC
Direct (202) 318-1595 - 9 am to 9 pm EST.
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Feb 2011 @ 9:40am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"What you don't realize is that 200 channels are owned mostly by the same 4 companies that owned the channels you could watch before."

In the US it is actually 7 major and 60 minor corporations.
the 6 major are GE, Time Warner, Disney, News Corp, CBS, Viacom. GE is divesting itself of NBCU to Comcast Which is why I quote 7 major corporations and only have 6 listed. GE is selling NBCU because they see the failure of network TV coming.

"don't you think that demand for legal sources would go back up?"

What online legal sources?

"The 14-34 year olds quickly become the 25-45 group that is more happy to settle down on a couch to watch a movie or enjoy Greys Anatomy."

In the past that was said about the 14-26 year olds also. It hasn't happened. Next year it will be the 14-37 year olds, the year after the 14-40.

Basically you expect people to just stop blogging, emailing, texting, gaming, using YouTube, netflix, etc because they have gotten older. Thats not going to happen.

I get it your view is people will say "Oh look I am now 40, its time to stop communicating with all my friends and become a couch potato(e)." ("e" added to make fun of a former vice president)
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Feb 2011 @ 10:33am

Re:
To funny they posted his address, social security number, and phone number. They missed his mothers maiden name and birthday to put the finishing touches on it.

Aaron Barr is going to have to ....

Move.
Change his phone number.
Fix his credit rating.
Find a new career.
Change his name.

Sounds like it really sucks to be him.
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Feb 2011 @ 10:42am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"It's hard to lie to people when you've been exposed as a liar. Thought that would be obvious to you by now."

To funny, and true
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Hephaestus (profile), 11 Feb 2011 @ 10:47am

...
ha!

No wait.

HA!
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Almost Anonymous (profile), 11 Feb 2011 @ 10:49am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
I'm going to have to demand that you reimburse me for all the brain cells that I've lost reading your drivel.

However on the other hand you truly are an epic troll, and for that you deserve some small amount of respect.
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Ronald J Riley (profile), 12 Feb 2011 @ 8:32am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"demand that you reimburse me for all the brain cells that I've lost"

You must be running nearly empty by now.

Ronald J. Riley,

President - www.PIAUSA.org - RJR at PIAUSA.org

Other Affiliations:
Executive Director - www.InventorEd.org - RJR at InvEd.org
Senior Fellow - www.PatentPolicy.org
President - Alliance for American Innovation
Caretaker of Intellectual Property Creators on behalf of deceased founder Paul Heckel
Washington, DC
Direct (202) 318-1595 - 9 am to 9 pm EST.
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Not an electronic Rodent, 14 Feb 2011 @ 1:32am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
The rest of your stuff is just bullsh-t I never said. Thanks for making it all up, it was amusing but stupid.
Well it's possible I'm conflating there. It can be a little tough sometimes to tell the difference between 1 anonymous snarky troll and another. You do however come across as having have a massively negative world view and put your "points" in a way that attacks others and rarely provides anything to support what you assert so vehemently.

Personally I'd call that the "Redbeard Rum" style.
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chris (profile), 14 Feb 2011 @ 8:07am

Re: Re: Re: Security Firm?
Even more important to make sure they're capable then... which you can do by checking their own security, no?

kind of. a lot of offensive security types are all teeth and no shell.
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fonestar (profile), 17 Feb 2011 @ 8:47pm

Re: Balls
you wrote:
"I think this is where you are making a mistake. While there are groups of people interested in transparency, most of them are keyboard warrior types. Few of them would have the guts / balls / lack of brains to put themselves out there to lead something like Wikileaks"

Well let me tell you that I am a professionally employed network technician. I hold a CCNA, and a diploma and I am a VOCAL supporter of Wikileaks and Anonymous! It is scum like Aaron Barr that counts on wusses like yourself to stay employed. I will not stay silent as my human rights and freedom of speech is torn away! It is morons like yourself that lack the brains, that see safety in Mubarak's approaching horsemen until they realize the crowd is against them. Power is transient and faster-shifting than ever. I do not think it is impossible that we could see the leaders of the Bush regime stand trial for war crimes in my lifetime.

Because you lack the balls to change the world do not assume that your colleagues do as well! Pathetic turd.
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fonestar (profile), 17 Feb 2011 @ 9:02pm

Credibility
Anonymous Coward, You sound like you are more hip to the lingo of Board Rooms and the likes of Aaron Barr than you are an anarcho-syndicalist hacker group. Your (worthless) knowledge does not apply here. Like Aaron Barr you don't "get it". You can't even seem to fathom what Anonymous is let alone mangle it into terms that someone like yourself could understand. Like Hezbollah or Al-Queda they cannot be defeated because beyond an organization they are more like a belief system. Why not go on IRC and drop your precious expertise there? I am sure they would value your opinions and engage you in civil debate...
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asrchitecto, 24 Oct 2012 @ 8:09pm

Paedophilia will get you less jail time than standing against Injustice!
It's RRRReallly fantastic we have private companies running around spying domestically on the public and receiving funds from both government and corporations. A law onto themselves. Private security contractors, preoccupied with destroying the lives and/or credibility of private citizens, framing them with sordid tales of sex or whatever them and their partners can cock up to try AND protect the dear leaders and their paymasters. Best of all they are completely hopeless at it - your tax dollars go a long way

Once again, as I've said before, I really don't think this is a good idea. The potential backlash can be severe when administered by whip while screaming the name of the horned god of greed. Plus, blood tends to congeal among the banknotes and try explaining that to your bank-manager!

But of course corruption does not exist in government and corporations, morality keeps them safe from their own evil and they have a "get out of jail free card" they stole from the library Monopoly set.

YAY
now you can sleep better at night Aaron!
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Mark Harder, 20 Jul 2013 @ 9:31pm

Cointelpro anyone?
This is what most worries me about NSA, or any counter-intelligence gathering agency possessing my content or even the pattern of my contacts.
The best defense being an offense, sooner or later or already, it will occur to these agencies that their critics as well as our enemies can be manipulated using that collected information. If publicizing the methods and goals of our counter-espionage agencies constitutes treason, the giving of aid and comfort to our enemies, as many of our elected officials claim, then they must be viewing the public as an enemy. So the logic is simple: opposition movements among the public are enemies, so disrupting them is simply an extension of the counter-espionage charter. There is a precedent in operation Cointelpro, in which the FBI used its information gathering and provocateurs to disrupt radical anti-war and black power groups and individuals.
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