
A family devastated by relentless cyberattacks - rafaelm
http://specialreports.dailydot.com/how-to-destroy-an-american-family
======
ksenzee
Comments like "Not exactly somebody I feel much sympathy for" and "he
definitely was heavily involved in similar activity himself" miss the point
entirely. The point is that swatting is too easy. Victims can't count on law
enforcement to help. Family members are victims too, and they're powerless. I
don't care how little sympathy you feel for Blair/r000t, his little sister did
not deserve to have her school put on lockdown because of something her
brother may or may not have done online.

~~~
Buge
I think it's worse that the mom was fired from her job because of the attacks
and had a miscarriage, and now she can't find a new job because of the damage
to her reputation.

------
codyb
Well that was an unpleasant read and it sounds like an absolute horror story
for this group of people.

I, for one, am at a loss as to a solution for antics like this. It ends up
affecting the entire community when police and fire personnel are being called
to locations where no crime or fire is occuring, schools are being put on
lockdown, and small businesses and franchises are making orders for people who
did not desire to purchase their products. And the idea of having your
utilities shutting off is pretty harrowing.

What do you do at this point? I'm surprised they haven't lifted roots, changed
names, and moved but that's a tall order.

If they used very generic names like John Smith they'd likely be able to
escape into obscurity regarding searches. They could proceed to stay off
social media.

But is that a solution? Or forcing innocent people to abandon their lives they
spent so long building up for the spat of two teenage/now young twentyish age
kids?

We're starting to see two factor authentication become a thing more and more
often, and password managers. These seem like they could help a lot of people
tremendously but when companies value security over convenience people are
probably far less likely to use their services en masse.

And of course where would the advertising revenue come from if client
information was too strongly protected.

How intractable is this issue? And will there be a day when an 18 year old
from halfway around the globe won't be able to destroy a family over a period
of years? And if that day comes, what does it entail for individual liberties
and privacy?

------
MrFoof
The NY Times also just ran a story[1] on another serial swatter, including the
immense effort (over 1000 hours across all involved) of a rankled Georgia
detective to actually bring him to justice, since the swatter was a Canadian
minor.

Little help from the FBI until the victim count had surpassed 40. Extreme
difficulty getting Canadian law enforcement to play ball until they were able
to get video evidence of the swatter broadcasting his antics live on the
internet.

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/29/magazine/the-serial-
swatte...](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/29/magazine/the-serial-
swatter.html?_r=0)

~~~
meowface
And all this for a guy whose full name and address is contained within a
Pastebin entry on the first page of search results when you Google his
username! Imagine how hard it must be to identify swatters who have serious
OPSEC.

~~~
MrFoof
I think the reality is when he was caught, that Pastebin page didn't have
anywhere near the PageRank it does today. Moreover, the detective that did the
bulk of the legwork wasn't tremendously savvy in regards to how online
communities (and all the activity) work, which makes it a bit impressive that
he was able to get his perp. He had a real ramp up there in order to be able
to make real progress.

~~~
meowface
>I think the reality is when he was caught, that Pastebin page didn't have
anywhere near the PageRank it does today.

That may be so, but you would think one of the first things an investigator of
cybercrimes would do is Google search. Searches of "[username] real name" or
"[username] dox" could provide instant leads for tons of cases.

>the detective that did the bulk of the legwork wasn't tremendously savvy in
regards to how online communities (and all the activity) work

Indeed, this is the real issue. It's unfortunate that cybercrime investigators
did not even bother looking into this. I suppose they may have their hands
caught up with admittedly worse crimes, like child pornography and theft.

------
Asbostos
It sounds like the only serious, tangible problem that happened was that Amy's
employer (Ingalls) fired her because she was the victim of hackers, and then
she couldn't get a new job because future employers didn't like what hackers
had written about her on the internet. This is a pretty big failure of
employment law as well as immoral behavior of the employers. That's the kind
of widespread discrimination that we try to prevent against blacks, women,
etc. But it can still be perpetrated against individuals and there isn't even
any popular belief that it's wrong.

Imagine two headlines:

"Ingalls Health System fires woman after finding offensive comments on her
social media account."

"Ingalls Health System fires woman after finding that she was gay."

Both are equally terrible, but only one is popularly considered to be very
bad.

~~~
protomyth
I pretty sure the daughter and local busk pail dispute your assessment of only
one serious tangible problem.

~~~
Asbostos
local busk pail? I'm not denying there were a lot of horrible things, but
largely temporary and more psychological than financial. Even the son being
held in jail for 2 weeks doesn't seem as bad in the long term as losing your
income, your ability to get a job, and consequently your house.

~~~
protomyth
Businesses - man I really hate autocorrect

I doubt the affect on the daughter or the husband are temporary, they will get
hit as everything lives on in search.

------
CM30
Wow, that's pretty messed up. But do you know what's the worst thing here?

How someone got fired simply because people were talking crap about them/in a
feud with a member of their family. How exactly is that legal? Why are we
seeing employees firing people just because people insult them online? That
Ingalls would do this is utterly pathetic.

Oh, and the whole utility companies thing. Why? Do they not train their staff
about this sort of thing nowadays? Is it really so hard to ask for the
password first, and then simply cut off the call if it isn't provided? It's
like they trust people far too much nowadays.

If those things were resolved, events like this would be far less damaging in
the future.

~~~
pjc50
That's what "at will" employment is, sadly.

------
x1798DE
This doesn't sound like what I would think of as "cyber attacks". This is a
traditional leverage of a militarized police force as a weapon. The same could
easily have happened before the internet, and I suspect it was less common and
less intense because before there were SWAT teams it wasn't possible.

~~~
kaitai
This couldn't have happened before the internet: many of the attacks are
automated and many take advantage of the fact that you don't have to pay
extortionate long-distance rates for international phone calls, both direct
consequences of the ease of communication enabled by the internet of today.

Calling in pizza, gravel delivery, police, and hourly death threats from
Finland in 1991 would have been quite expensive.

~~~
mikeash
Additionally, it was really hard to piss people off who lived far away from
you before the internet took off. Even if a Finn could do all these things in
1991 (phone phreaking to bypass the high cost?) they would have no motivation
since they'd probably never get that pissed off at somebody in the US.

~~~
Buge
And what they want is a reaction. Without the internet they would not be able
to see any reaction.

------
joesmo
"She asks the policemen precisely what she needs to do to prove she hasn’t
just been murdered. Holding out her arm, she sighs as they take her blood
pressure."

What? Seriously? I mean, yes cops are incredibly stupid, but they're not this
stupid. I don't believe this happened. And if it did, the cop should be fired.
Can someone really be that stupid to think that someone who is standing up in
front of them is not alive? I call bullshit. Even a cop cannot be that stupid.

EDIT: Why not just ask for ID, since now all the cop's proven is that someone
is alive, not who that person is. Ridiculous.

~~~
rwhitman
When you call 911 the police usually show up followed by paramedics / fire
dept or vice versa. Depending on the city this is standard practice. The
medics typically take blood pressure before leaving, not sure why but assuming
this is a policy about confirming everyone is ok before they leave.

The writer likely simplified the scene by omitting the fact that EMTs arrived
with the police.

------
angersock
I can't help but notice Blair (the fellow who, in theory, drew the troll's
ire) is basically never looking at the camera, and is wearing a Postal
t-shirt. Not exactly somebody I feel much sympathy for.

The real point, though, is only brought up towards the end of the article:
it's the hyperactive and hyperconvenient systems in place that allow for such
easy exploitation and harassment. Swatting wouldn't happen if police were a
bit more measured in their responses.

~~~
vezzy-fnord
_and is wearing a Postal t-shirt_

What's wrong with Postal? It's a good franchise, although RWS' decision to
outsource Postal III development to Akella proved to be a gaffe. Nonetheless,
it is hardly any more obscene than, say, South Park.

~~~
angersock
Well, if you're doing a character piece, and the person who is arguably at
least half to blame for the misfortune befalling his family is cheerfully
wearing a shirt for a game explicitly about causing collateral damage to
civilians...it's rather tacky.

------
juandazapata
The will be devastated by obesity anytime soon...

------
meowface
Not that Blair/r000t deserves this sort of retaliation, but he definitely was
heavily involved in similar activity himself in the past, and has poked the
hornet's nest many a time.

Warning: graphic/obscene content.

[https://encyclopediadramatica.se/R000t](https://encyclopediadramatica.se/R000t)

[https://r000t.com/](https://r000t.com/)

