
Foes of Russia Say Child Pornography Is Planted to Ruin Them - prostoalex
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/09/world/europe/vladimir-putin-russia-fake-news-hacking-cybersecurity.html
======
dmix
I remember a legal case a few years back when the Pirate Bay guy was arrested
in Cambodia for hacking into a government computer. They found hacking tools
and stolen data on his machine. He used the legal defense that since his
computer was also found to have malware on it that anyone could have put those
tools onto his computer and could have used it as a jump-off point for the
attack.

It didn't end up working, he was found guilty. But it's an interesting
defense, especially if there isn't any other evidence or motive pointing to
the defendant.

Given the insecurity of desktop operating system's and the prevalence of
malware that any infosec expert could attest to this could become one of those
common fallback legal defenses (similar to "my rights against unjustified
searches were violated") when there aren't other good options.

------
api
Now consider "pizzagate," a claim that John Podesta and possibly Hillary
Clinton were somehow involved in some kind of child trafficking ring based on
a few cryptic out of context sentences in their e-mails. Clinton was known for
being anti-Putin, while her rival Trump seems pro-Putin.

Can I be forgiven for thinking we're in the midst of a full-blown cyber war
assault by Russia against political opponents abroad?

If this is indeed the case, I really think the best thing for US intelligence
to do would be to take a page from the Russian playbook and leak everything
they have on this and "doxx" everyone involved.

~~~
pat_space
What's more likely, Podesta getting phished or "a full-blown cyber war assault
by Russia against political opponents abroad"?

~~~
geofft
Podesta _was_ phished. That is a fact.

But every Pizzagate claim relies on _interpretations of_ the emails that were
(accurately, to the best of my knowledge) leaked, not what's in the emails.
The "evidence" is stuff like a handkerchief with a map that seemed "pizza-
related," plus the claim that this must be coded language because obviously
people don't have pizza-related-map handkerchiefs, plus 4chan and
UrbanDictionary references to "pizza" and "hot dog" being coded language used
by pedophiles.

It's the same as with the "spirit cooking" nonsense. Yes, he was invited to a
"Spirit Cooking dinner". No, there's no reason to believe that a "Spirit
Cooking dinner" really means a Satanic ritual. It _could_ be, in theory, yes;
there's no way to prove that it isn't. But it probably isn't.

~~~
api
Is there even any evidence that he attended this dinner?

... that and having a taste for pretentious shock-art is not a crime last I
checked. I've had a little bit of contact with East Coast elite circles before
and that kind of vapid modern "aaaaaht" is par for the course. Never saw
anything quite as over the top as Abromovic but I definitely saw things in the
same shock-jocking coated with art school babble genre. I always figured it
was a stuff people pretended to like for social signaling purposes.

I don't consider all the pizzagate claims _impossible_. Blackmail has
historically been a tool of political manipulation and so a high placed
blackmail ring is not unthinkable. I just consider them unlikely, especially
in light of the (IMHO rather obvious) existence of an intentional cyber
warfare and propaganda campaign against the Clinton presidential campaign.

I've become even more suspicious after listening to one or two interviews
about "pizzagate" and hearing the following names and sources mentioned
repeatedly: Brietbart news, gab.ai, 4chan, and the Washington Times. The
latter is owned by a front for the Unification Church. The first two are
pretty well known alt.right outlets, and 4chan is not exactly known for being
a forum for unbiased rigorously vetted investigative journalism. (Nor is
Reddit.)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Times)

The sources for this seem to have negative credibility.

I'm being equal opportunity here. If there was a massive push to label Trump
as head of a child abuse blackmail ring and all the info came from hard-left
rags and people known for supporting Clinton I'd be just as skeptical.

~~~
DearDon
I think you're pretty spot on with this. A handy thing to keep in mind when it
comes to things like these is that we can only speculate. It happens too often
that speculation and assumptions are presented as fact, or that someone
retelling what another person says fails to use the same qualifying language
and states something as fact.

I've personally come to speculate that there is some dodgy and disgusting acts
occurring at this pizza joint. I'm not going to get dogmatic and explain why.

The media, through negligence or design, seems to almost always picks the
weakest arguments and presents them as the best there is, if by design it's
akin to strawmaning in my book. It works to drum up insane amounts of
controversy and/or presents the opposing narratives case as weak. This is why
we have 4chan and reddit with these rabid 'citizen journalists' that do all
this investigation and forget how stupid it, and they, can be made to sound,
it's also why we're going to get more of them, they can navigate through
information that allows them to speculate (with good judgment in some cases
IMO) that the MSM will just not cover.

~~~
pcwalton
> I've personally come to speculate that there is some dodgy and disgusting
> acts occurring at this pizza joint.

There was only one "dodgy and disgusting" act that occurred at Comet Ping
Pong. That was when a man, misled by totally fabricated nonsense, brought an
assault rifle into the store to, _at best_ , intimidate and threaten innocent
people.

The people spreading this conspiracy theory should be ashamed.

------
Tade0
"May have returned"?

Friends, in the eastern block it never went away in the first place. </slavic
accent>

------
redthrowaway
Did "No politics for a week" not end up happening?

~~~
geofft
That ended early:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13131251](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13131251)

