For first time ever, feds asked to sit out Defcon hacker conference

http://arstechnica.com/security/2013/07/for-first-time-ever-feds-asked-to-sit-out-defcon-hacker-conference/

by Libertatea • 13 years ago

184 30 13 years ago

adventured2• 13 years ago

Roll over and take it, or push back, those are the only two choices.

There's little question there will be consequences to pushing back against the Feds, they're often vindictive bastards when you don't bow to their authority, but who can stand to live with actively helping to ensnare your fellow citizens in a police state?

dragontamer6• 13 years ago

Do you know any "Feds" yourself? You may be surprised at who is a "fed" or not. Prejudice is definitely not a noble trait.

As was brought up in the other thread, Dark Tangent himself can be considered a Fed, considering that he sits in the Homeland Security Advisory Council, as well as a top officer in ICANN.

Perhaps we'll be seeing Dark Tangent resigning his post as Homeland Security Advisory Council? Or perhaps there is more to "Feds" than you might think.

nknighthb2• 13 years ago

A "fed" is a member of federal law enforcement. I don't know how you're getting the impression it means all federal employees or contractors. It just doesn't, and never has.

coopdog• 13 years ago

I hope so. I wonder if Defcon was shaping up to be only feds this year, or if there were indications of coming conflict.

I think active rejection by your peers is a reasonable punishment for unconscionable activities in the community. And the reverse should be true for anyone who quits in disgust.

It won't fix the problem completely, but it will have an effect on recruitment and retention. Even if feds in the intelligence industry move to more reasonable IT fields within government, or take contracts as civilian pen testers.

PavlovsCat4• 13 years ago

Do you seriously challenge the ones you know? Or is it just small talk?

The feds who pout about stating the obvious, because they're oblivious to their colleagues, seriously need to shape up. I mean, how could you possibly catch robbers and thieves if you can't even look past your own nose?

Are you seriously saying the feelings of random good people who got caught with a bad crowd are worth a police state? There's people who became Neonazis just because they wanted friends, too. Does that mean I don't get to diss Neonazis in general? Nope. Because structures and systems matter more than the people who happen to work in them. The flypaper is the concern here, not the flies sticking to it: they don't get to "take it hostage", and you much less get to take it hostage on their behalf.

adventured2• 13 years ago

You're incorrect. I'd argue it depends on what you're prejudiced against, as to whether it's noble. I happen to be very prejudiced against police states, and government tyranny in general, and the people that actively help to make it possible. In this case, my use of Feds is meant to represent the federal authority figures that are leading the charge in erasing my civil liberties, and I think that was obvious given the rampant discussions here for weeks on the NSA and its leading proponents.

A proper synonym for prejudice is bias. I like that word even better than prejudice in this case. It can be said that I'm absolutely biased about this subject.

appleflaxen• 13 years ago

I don't know any Feds, but I'm perfectly capable of judging their actions. When there are such bald violations of civil liberty, the only ethical thing to do is speak up.

Snowden did.

Everyone who didn't is culpable in the fascist enterprise (to varying degrees).

PavlovsCat4• 13 years ago

There is this German saying, "Lieber ein Ende mit Schrecken, als Schrecken ohne Ende." which translated means "Rather an end with terror (in the sense of fright, not terrorism), than terror without end.".

Bullies get even worse ideas when they're not stood up to. The same goes for brownshirts, and anything in between.

DanielRibeiro• 13 years ago

Long HN discussion on this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6024094

tehwalrus• 13 years ago

No better group to stand up to them! I don't count myself among the defcon types (my computer wouldn't last 5 minutes on their conference Wifi, I'm sure) but they, if anyone, have the right mindset to challenge the feds, and come out with only minor bruising.

wrath• 13 years ago

If they are going to ban the feds from attending the conference, are they going to ban the contractors who are working with the feds also? I imagine that the majority of the "security and hacking" type work is not done directly by the feds but by their contractor (e.g. in Snowden's case he was not working for the NSA but for Booz Allen Hamilton).

If they are just banning the feds then I think this is just a press stunt since it won't change a single thing.

Udo• 13 years ago

Of course it's a stunt. That's the whole point, to make a symbolic statement. There is no imaginable practical consequence from this besides expressing unhappiness. That doesn't mean the gesture is meaningless.

rantanplan• 13 years ago

True. To be honest I would be quite suprised if they didn't do something like this. Kudos to them.

ropman76• 13 years ago

I most likely going to get down voted for this, but am I the only one who sees the irony in that this is a conference dedicated to breaking into systems and they don't want the people who are arguably better at it than anyone else?

stevedub• 13 years ago

They didn't break in, they asked for the keys and were given them

epoxyhockey• 13 years ago

DT's post is analogous to you can't fire me, I quit. The sequester is affecting travel & training budgets and gov't employees can't afford to attend.

nathan_long• 13 years ago

This could be important. If the security community continues to publicly hold these agencies at arms length, working for them may acquire a stigma. If the effect were strong enough, the agencies might feel a need to change their stance in order to be able to hire.

For first time ever, feds asked to sit out Defcon hacker conference

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