On the psychology of why rejection and loneliness may be necessary evils for the creative genius
"In the deepest and most important things, we are unutterably alone, and for one person to be able to advise or even help another, a lot must happen, a lot must go well, a whole constellation of things must come right in order once to succeed." — Rainer Maria Rilke
Vincent Willem van Gogh was born on March 30, 1853, in a small town in the southern Netherlands. At age 13 he attended Willem II College, a nearby middle school. An artist from Paris by the name of Constantijn C. Husymans taught at the school, and it was he who first exposed the young van Gogh to drawing. Two years later, however, van Gogh grew frustrated with his schooling and returned home. "My youth was gloomy and cold and sterile," he would later write to his brother Theo in a series of letters now collected as The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh.
He subsequently moved to Paris and famously made a name for himself as a painter. Still, he suffered often with bouts of depression and gloom. At age 36, he decided to move to Auvers-sur-Oise, a sleepy town in northwestern France, where he could be nearer to Theo and to a psychiatrist named Dr. Paul Gachet, who was recommended to van Gogh by friend and fellow painter Camille Pissaro. Jan Hulsker, a Dutch art historian, notes that upon moving to Auvers-sur-Oise, van Gogh suffered a new crisis, "the starting point for one of the saddest episodes in a life already rife with sad events." For a year van Gogh "had fits of despair and hallucination during which he could not work, and in between them, long clear months in which he could and did, punctuated by extreme visionary ecstasy," writes art critic Robert Hughes.
Around this time, van Gogh wrote another letter to his brother, this time about his loneliness. Even if he were to have a friend for whom he cared, van Gogh felt that it would only serve to lead him away from his art.
"We feel lonely now and then and long for friends and think we should be quite different and happier if we found a friend of whom we might say: 'He is the one,'" van Gogh wrote. "But you, too, will begin to learn that there is much self-deception behind this longing; if we yielded too much to it, it would lead us from the road."
The next year, on July 27, 1890, a 37-year-old van Gogh is alleged to have shot himself in the chest with a revolver. "Some think Van Gogh shot himself in the wheat field that had engaged his attention as an artist of late; others think he did it at a barn near the inn," writes biographer Ingo Walther. Van Gogh walked to the Auberge Ravoux, a lodge where he had recently been staying. Two doctors attended to him but without a trained surgeon present the bullet could not be removed. Theo was notified and rushed to be with his brother. The next evening, however, an infection caused by the bullet killed van Gogh. He spent his final evening smoking a pipe and chatting with Theo. His final words were, "The sadness will last forever."
Van Gogh likely had a cadre of mental issues, none of which were suitably diagnosed while he was alive. Yet what seemed to weigh heaviest on him was the inevitability of his loneliness. According to his letters to Theo, he felt he had one of two options: content himself with loneliness or try to countenance his loneliness with friendships thereby derailing his creativity ("lead us from the road," as he wrote).
Aldous Huxley wrote, "If one's different, one's bound to be lonely," and upon thinking about it even a little, it quickly becomes apparent that many of history's creative geniuses have been deeply lonely people. There is the obvious reason for this: dedicating oneself to an artistic pursuit means one has little time for social endeavors. This is what has frustrated flamboyant, gregarious writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Henry James, both of whom wrote about the dreadful isolation necessary to turn out great fiction. But whether it's the mysteriously secretive writing careers of J.D. Salinger or Donna Tartt, the well-known loneliness of Joseph Conrad ("we live as we dream — alone") or the friendship-loneliness conundrum of van Gogh, it becomes apparent that something else is at play. Loneliness is not just sufficient for creativity; it is necessary. It is almost as if one can only be truly creative when one detaches from society.
"Starry Night Over the Rhone," 1888, Van Gogh, Musée d'Orsay, Paris
Sharon H. Kim is an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University who focuses on individual and group creativity. She did her undergraduate work at the Ohio State University and completed her doctorate at Cornell. She has jet-black hair and chunky black spectacles to match. In her most recent study, she found evidence that people tend to be more creative if they have been socially rejected.
What is perhaps most interesting about her findings is that no actual social rejection has to have taken place, the creative must only feel rejected in some way and must establish a feeling of independence, of being "different" than his or her peers.
In the 1956 book The Outsider, Colin Wilson claimed that creative geniuses tend to live on the margins of society, rejected and non-conformist. Yet, a neurological nuance must be added to Wilson's well-known theory. When creativity becomes all that matters — when dreams of fitting in with society and having a white picket fence fall by the wayside — then one's cognitive focus can move from socio-cultural ones (fitting in) to creative pursuits(standing out).
"Given that creative solutions are by definition unusual, infrequent, and potentially controversial, they are stimulated by the desire to stand out and to assert one's uniqueness," writes Kim. "The experience of rejection may trigger a psychological process that stimulates, rather than stifles, performance on creative tasks."
Scholars didn't always think like this. In fact, Kim quotes a series of studies, principally Roy Baumesiter's 2005 study, which claimed that social exclusion hinders cognitive performance and therefore decreases one's ability to be creative. But Kim flatly rejects this claim, asserting that loneliness and the feelings of rejection instead allow one to better focus cognitive performance on a single, creative task.
Think of it like this: You go to see a play with a friend. During the play you'll likely be wondering what your friend is thinking of the show, what quarrels he or she will take with it, what your discussion will be like on your walk home. But if you go to the theatre by yourself, all of your concentration can be directed on what's happening on stage. Your mental energy is focused.
When we let our focus shift away from the people and things around us, we are better able to engage in what's called "meta-cognition," or the process of "thinking critically and reflectively about our own thoughts," as psychology professor Gregory Feist says.
The difficulty lies in striking a balance. There is solitude, which can lead to meta-cognition and creative focus. But there is also, as van Gogh experienced off and on throughout his life, crippling loneliness that sets the artist back. The gap is razor-thin. Loneliness and depression (Hemingway called depression "the artist's reward") are central to why so many great artists from Hemingway to Plath to Hunter S. Thompson have taken their own life. Sartre is alleged to have said, "If you're lonely when you're alone, you're in bad company," but parsing the distinction between solitude — where one is willfully and happily alone — and loneliness — where one is desperate and depressed to be alone — is a task that should not be taken lightly. "Solitude gives birth to the original in us, to beauty unfamiliar and perilous, to poetry," wrote Thomas Mann. "But also, it gives birth to the opposite: to the perverse, the illicit, the absurd." He might have added: to the crippling, the desperate, the depressing.
Vincent Van Gogh (left) and his younger brother, Theo (right), 1887
Modern studies have shown how great a challenge it is to differentiate between loneliness and solitude. One wants to "treat the loneliness while strengthening the solitude," writes psychotherapist Edward Tick. The trouble is that solitude may not be enough for creative genius because it entails no rejection. Loneliness, however, is the product of rejection, either a rejection inflicted by society or inflicted on oneself and therefore lends itself most to creativity.
Yet, one must wonder, is it possible that creating great art is such a momentous act that loneliness and social rejection cease to matter? In a letter to a seventeen-year-old aspiring author called Leonard, the French-born author Anaïs Nin wrote, "Great art was born of great terrors, great loneliness, great inhibitions, instabilities, and it always balances them." The composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky also seemed to strike this balance. He was notoriously depressed and, as a gay man in nineteenth-century Russia, surely felt socially rejected. But when he had a creative breakthrough all of that went away. "It would be vain to try to put into words that immeasurable sense of bliss which comes over me directly a new idea awakens in me and begins to assume a different form," he wrote to his financier and friend Nadezhda Filaretovna von Meck in 1878. "I forget everything and behave like a madman. Everything within me starts pulsing."
But this may be a balance that only a select few can endure. Creativity stems from the ability to make original, unique connections, to bind together disparate information in a way that few are able to accomplish. "Creative people are better at recognizing relationships, making associations and connections, and seeing things in an original way — seeing things that others cannot see," writes neuroscientist Nancy C. Andreasen. Often, the only way to see what others cannot see is to experience what others cannot imagine experiencing: rejection, isolation, loneliness. The trouble is that rejection, isolation, and loneliness are awful emotions to have to endure. Few can withstand them for a few years. Almost no one can withstand them for a lifetime.
Even a genius like van Gogh could not deal with the social detachment that he felt his creativity demanded. Still, he felt it worthwhile. On October 14, 1875, van Gogh wrote another letter to brother, counseling him to reject society. "Seek only for light and freedom and do not immerse yourself too deeply in the worldly mire," he wrote.
Six months after Vincent died of an infection, Theo died as well. Theo's medical report, according to biographer Wouter van der Veen, noted that he died of dementia paralytica brought on by "chronic disease, overwork, [and] sadness." Van der Veen also wrote that Theo's health degenerated in large part due to his brother's death. Without Vincent, Theo, who also struggled with loneliness, felt more alone than ever.
Finally, in 1914, over twenty years after Theo's death, Theo's body was exhumed and moved to Auvers-sur-Oise to be next to Vincent's grave. Now the brothers could rest — together.
^ed
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THE HAGUE, NETHERLANDS (BNO NEWS) — Authorities in Europe and the United States have arrested 17 people and seized more than 400 sites in a coordinated action against markets offering weapons and drugs through anonymity network Tor, officials announced on Friday, just a day after a major drugs market was taken down.
The latest operation took place on Thursday when authorities in the United States and more than a dozen European countries executed 13 search warrants and arrested 17 people after an investigation into darknet marketplaces. On these marketplaces, which can only be accessed through Tor, people can purchase weapons, drugs and even contract killers.
Ulf Bergström, a spokesman for Eurojust, the European Union’s judicial cooperation unit, said 414 hidden sites were seized during Thursday’s operation, which was dubbed Operation Onymous. Also seized was hardware, digital media, drugs, gold, silver, 180,000 euros ($223,500) in cash, and Bitcoins worth approximately 1 million U.S. dollars.
“Users, vendors and those hosting these hidden services were – until now – believed to be relatively safe from prosecution. This action will shake that belief,” Bergström said. He said several vendors and administrators were arrested during the operation, but there was no immediate word on whether any users of Tor sites had been identified.
Sites seized during the operation include “Pandora,” “Blue Sky,” “Hydra,” and “Cloud Nine,” all of which offered an extensive range of illegal goods and services for sale, including drugs, stolen credit card data, counterfeit currency, and fake identity documents. Also seized was “Executive Outcomes,” which specialized in firearm trafficking, and “Super Notes Counter,” which offered to sell counterfeit euros and U.S. dollars in exchange for Bitcoin.
Countries involved in ‘Operation Onymous’ include Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Thursday’s operation came just a day after 26-year-old Blake Benthall, who is known as ‘Defcon’ online, was arrested in San Fransisco for allegedly running the hidden site ‘Silk Road 2.0,’ which was launched in November 2013 after its predecessor was shut down by law enforcement. Benthall’s site is alleged to have enabled more than 100,000 people to buy and sell illegal drugs.
“Underground websites such as Silk Road and Silk Road 2 are like the Wild West of the Internet, where criminals can anonymously buy and sell all things illegal,” said Peter Edge, of Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). “We will continue to use all of our resources and work closely with our U.S. and international law enforcement partners to shut down these hidden black market sites, and hold criminals accountable who use anonymous Internet software to peddle their illegal activities.”
Tor, which is an acronym for the Onion Router, is a network designed to hide users’ real IP address by routing all traffic through the many servers of the Tor network, making it practically impossible to physically locate the computers hosting or accessing the sites. Although Tor is also used for legitimate purposes, criminals take advantage of Tor for a range of illicit purposes, including drugs, weapons, money laundering, and child pornography.
By Jennifer Valentino-DeVries and Danny Yadron
When federal law-enforcement officials can’t track criminal suspects through traditional wiretaps, they turn to tools most commonly associated with hackers: software exploits.
An article in The Wall Street Journal reveals some of the techniques the Federal Bureau of Investigation uses for such surveillance, including delivering spyware to suspects’ computers through emails and Web links. Former U.S. officials say that use of such tools under court orders has grown as more suspects “go dark” by using encrypted and other sophisticated new digital communications technology.
To get such spyware running on a suspect’s machine, investigators often must use tools that exploit holes in the software already on the computer or phone. Through these holes, known as vulnerabilities, investigators are able to get their own programs to run on the machine. To be effective, the spyware must then be stable, run undetected and reliably send information back to law enforcement.
Former U.S. officials said the FBI employs people who are able to make such tools, and it also buys the technology from private companies. In recent years, several firms have begun selling the technology to law enforcement.
A spokeswoman for the FBI declined to comment.
In some cases, federal law enforcement has had contracts and subcontracts with U.S. companies to develop specific computer exploits, said one person familiar with the process. “They hand out a target list and you try to find something,” that person said. “It starts with stuff that lots of people have, like Safari on Mac, then works down into a bunch of weird and very specific software packages.”
As of several years ago, a reliable Safari Web browser exploit could fetch at least $50,000 and sometimes as much as $100,000, the person said. Exploits for Internet Explorer might bring in more, while those for less popular software might cost about $10,000, that person said.
“It’s not a trivial amount of labor,” the person said. “You’re looking at 100 to 200 hours of work to find” an exploit in popular software.
The person said the process when working with law-enforcement agencies is slightly different from the one used by military agencies, mainly because law-enforcement requests are sometimes designed for specific cases. “Some of the software requests were absurd unless you had a specific target in mind,” the person said.
In posts on resume sites, people from other private companies discuss similar work, including working with FBI field agents on “penetration software” and making surveillance tools that were “case specific.”
The Journal article also describes how a firm called Gamma International offers “0 day exploits”—meaning that the software maker doesn’t yet know about the security hole—for software including Microsoft Corp.’s Internet Explorer. Gamma has marketed its products within the U.S., but didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Christopher Soghoian, principal technologist at the American Civil Liberties Union, said he is concerned about the government “sitting on” computer exploits rather than helping companies fix the problems and protect people. The same hacking tools that law enforcement uses in investigations could also be employed by criminal hackers, he said.
Other computer-security researchers say the use of such hacking tools is preferable to rules that would require companies to put so-called back doors into software to easily enable wiretaps. Law-enforcement agencies have been seeking changes to the law to mandate wiretap capabilities in more Internet technologies.
Such back doors “become one-stop-shopping for criminals and foreign intelligence services, not just the FBI,” said Matt Blaze, a computer science professor at the University of Pennsylvania. But if law enforcement has to hack into a suspect’s machine to get information, it “doesn’t put the rest of the network at risk,” he said.
The FBI is using tactics more commonly used by hackers to spy on suspects, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.
According to the WSJ, modern criminals are increasingly communicating online, making them impossible to wiretap. So, the FBI is using tools to monitor things like chat rooms and encrypted programs. For example, agents can secretly activate the microphone on Android phones as well as laptops.
For more on the revelations, head over to WSJ.
The news comes as U.S. surveillance techniques make news on multiple fronts. Earlier in the week, news broke that the U.S. had been helping New Zealand spy on journalist Jon Stephenson.
The story, first reported by New Zealand's Sunday Star Times, claimed that New Zealand had gotten access to Stephenson's phone records with U.S. assistance. According to the Star Times, the New Zealand government had been unhappy with some of Stephenson's coverage of the war in Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden, who first broke news that the NSA has been spying on millions of Americans daily, was granted temporary asylum in Russia on Thursday. After weeks of sleeping at the Moscow airport, he finally left.
REPORT: CYBERCRIME COSTS RISING – The cost of cybercrime to U.S. businesses is up again this year, according to a new report. In news that’s less surprising than it is stark, the average cost to a U.S. company of cybercrime is up nearly 10 percent from last year, according to the study from HP Enterprise Security and Ponemon Institute. Researchers put the average cost to U.S. businesses at $12.69 million, up from $11.1 million in last year’s report. The U.S. saw the highest cost of any country. But the report also found that security measures taken in advance by companies could significantly cut the costs. Companies were grouped based on Ponemon’s Security Effectiveness Score Index, which rates companies based on 24 measures of cybersecurity. The cost to the companies with the worst SES scores was nearly three times as high as the companies with the best SES scores. Deploying certain technologies or governance practices like having a CISO and certified professionals on staff each could save companies millions. The story: http://politico.pro/1ndxHN8
TODAY’S HOT TICKET: CATCHING UP ON CYBER WITH THE WH – The White House’s cyber czar will be the center of attention this morning when he addresses recent cyberattacks on financial institutions, including JPMorgan. Michael Daniel’s remarks this morning at the Center for National Policy will come the day after a New York Times report that President Barack Obama was regularly updated on the JPM investigation and had some questions about it (more on that below.) At the event he’s headlining today, Daniel will address “government concerns about the latest breaches in the financial sector,” according to a preview provided by CNP, in addition to one of his pet issues — the cyber workforce. If that isn’t enough, the event will also feature a who’s who of cyber experts: George Washington University’s Frank Ciluffo, Black Hat’s Jeff Moss, New America Foundation’s Peter Singer and Northrop Grumman’s Vern Boyle. Say hi to Dave if you’re there, or catch the livestream at 9:30: http://bit.ly/ZeNa4j. And just for fun — tell us what you would ask if you could get one cyber question answered by the White House (tkopan@politico.com).
YAHOO WHITE HAT: YES, THE FBI VISITED ME – The security researcher who found that servers at Yahoo, WinZip and Lycos were compromised got a visit from the FBI after making his findings public — a case that he says illustrates the shades of gray in which he and other white-hat hackers operate. Jonathan Hall set up a trap for attacks using the Shellshock vulnerability, one of which he discovered was coming from a WinZip server, according to Wired. Hall traced the attack back, finding a network of infected computers run by Romanian hackers. Not only did he follow the attacks, he accessed one of the WinZip servers and executed a “kill” command that terminated the program. But in his work to, as he sees it, protect the Internet, Hall may have run afoul of anti-hacking laws himself.
After Wired published its story on Hall’s work, he put up a blog post expanding on the topic. He acknowledged he was operating in a gray area, but argued that the feds should not expend resources prosecuting him. “There’s a piece of it that’s really missing to qualify it as being worth prosecuting, in my opinion: criminal intent,” Hall wrote. He compared himself to a woman who stopped her car to let ducks cross the highway, which caused a chain-reaction fatal crash. And then he put the ball back in the FBI’s court: “So, yes. The FBI visited me. That’s sorta what happens when you email them two times and call them three, then publicly announce that you’re very disappointed in the reachability and response time.” The Wired story: http://wrd.cm/1qhJViZ and Hall’s blog: http://bit.ly/1yOmcRx
HAPPY THURSDAY and welcome to Morning Cybersecurity, where (shameless plug alert) your host today will be moderating a discussion with Crowdstrike co-founder Dmitri Alperovitch at Financial Services Roundtable’s Global Financial Summit. It’ll be livestreamed, if you want to tune in to the conversation about cybersecurity in the financial industry. As always, send your thoughts, tips and feedback to tkopan@politico.com and follow @talkopan, @POLITICOPro and @MorningCybersec. Full team info is below.
NIST: RFI RESPONSES IN, JUST NOT UP – NIST is rejecting speculation that the agency hasn’t received any responses to the request for information it put out in August regarding experiences in implementing the cybersecurity framework. Although it has yet to post online any of the responses, it has received them, a NIST spokeswoman told MC. But asked to enumerate the responses or explain why none have been posted, the spokeswoman had no further comment. NIST has a reputation for transparency, so its refusal to post comments or say why it hasn’t done so is out of character. Comments will be posted after the RFI closes this Friday, the agency said. Here’s the RFI: http://1.usa.gov/1u8u0Hf and here’s the webpage where comments should appear http://1.usa.gov/1vNWjgf
DRIP, DRIP, DRIP: WHITE HOUSE MONITORED JPM ATTACK – The New York Times had the big story of the day yesterday, reporting that President Obama and his national security staff were briefed periodically on the attacks on U.S. financial institutions this summer. Asked about the report, the White House told Dave that “the president is regularly briefed on matters of national security importance.” Obama pressed officials on whether the attacks were politically-motivated Russian attempts at retaliation against U.S.-led sanctions against Russia implemented following Russian aggression against neighbor state Ukraine, the Times said. One senior official told the paper: “The question kept coming back, ‘is this plain old theft, or is Putin retaliating?’ … ‘And the answer was: We don’t know for sure.’” The story: http://nyti.ms/1seQMjJ
-- Plus, now The Wall Street Journal is reporting that at least 12 other financial services firm were targeted by the same hackers as the JPMorgan incident. Data was successfully taken from at least one other firm, the WSJ reported, citing investigators. That story: http://on.wsj.com/1vSbE0b
FEDERAL AGENCY SEEKS HACKER TRAP – The Social Security Administration posted a notice this week that it is shopping for a provider of a “honeypot” — a ruse to lure hackers trying to steal citizen information. The honeypot should automatically and securely alert SSA security staff when hackers attempt to intrude into it, capturing data about inbound and outbound connections, firewall logs and keystroke logs, according to the sources sought notice posted by the agency. While honeypots are frequently used in the private sector, by the military and by law enforcement, Trend Micro Chief Cybersecurity Officer Tom Kellermann said they’re somewhat new for federal civilian agencies. Part of what makes the notice odd, of course, is that honeypots rely on the element of surprise — so the SSA broadcasting its plans to potentially secure one isn’t something Kellermann would advise. Tuesday’s posting is just a sources sought notice, which means the agency is simply investigating the state of the industry and hasn’t committed to buying any new technology. Joe has the story: http://politico.pro/1vNHpq6
EAST-WEST DIVIDE: TECH GATHERS ON SURVEILLANCE – Top tech execs and leading lawmakers lambasted the disastrous effects of unchecked NSA surveillance on the tech industry in Palo Alto yesterday at a gathering spearheaded by Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden. But with Congress out of town and the USA FREEDOM Act stalled, the West Coast take fell on deaf ears in D.C. Pro Tech's Tony Romm had the story: “Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt warned that continued NSA snooping would ‘end up breaking the Internet’ and lead to global trade restrictions. Microsoft’s top lawyer, Brad Smith, lamented a loss of ‘trust’ among users. And Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who convened the panel discussion, said the programs exposed by Edward Snowden are tarnishing the ‘American brand.’” The conversation continued to touch on efforts to rein in NSA surveillance in Washington, with Smith noting the conventional wisdom now is that USA FREEDOM will not pass in the lame duck.
--Wyden also weighed in on the current spat over smartphone encryption, siding against top brass at the FBI. Tech firms “should not be required to build back doors into their products,” Wyden said, rejecting the idea that government should always have the key to circumvent security features. “What’s needed is to find laws that ensure liberty and security are not mutually exclusive, so companies are not forced to duke it out with the government in technology labs.” The story, from Pro Tech: http://politico.pro/ZeFCyA
REPORT WATCH:
-- Employers and higher education leaders recommend developing curriculums with industry input and offering better internships as ways to attract students to cybersecurity careers, according to a (ISC)² Foundation and University of Phoenix report based off a focus group roundtable. http://bit.ly/ZRnA6L
QUICK BYTES
-- Chinese officials want to beef up the nation’s cybersecurity and develop more software domestically to be free of Western products, state media reports. Reuters: http://reut.rs/1vRpP5H
-- DHS’ plan for federal government-wide realtime computer network diagnostics — the troubled CDM program — is in “great shape,” insists Asst. Secretary Andy Ozment. Federal News Radio: http://bit.ly/1ndTXXn
-- Israel aims to become a cybersecurity superpower, and the IDF is launching an ambitious program to groom the next generation of cyberwarriors in high school. Washington Post: http://wapo.st/1ndTX9L
-- South Korea’s military, facing stepped-up cyberwarfare efforts from the North, is pushing a more aggressive cyber policy. AsiaOne: http://bit.ly/1ExKDmy
-- Tesla CEO Elon Musk worries that artificial intelligence may determine the best way to rid the world of email spam is to get rid of the humans. CNET: http://cnet.co/1o0oCbd
-- Bond insurer MBIA reportedly knew about its breach for two weeks before acting, and the customers put at risk included thousands of local governments. Reuters: http://reut.rs/1vNGxBK
-- Internet pioneer Tim Berners-Lee defends the decision to not build security into the Web from the get-go. The Register: http://bit.ly/1oSIMyI
-- EisnerAmper’s Fifth Annual Board of Directors Survey finds cybersecurity and social media use are top risks that concern boards of directors in 2014. Lexology: http://bit.ly/1vOBQYG
-- The Health Information Trust Alliance has established a threat exchange system aimed at automating the sharing of cyberthreats in the healthcare industry. SC Magazine: http://bit.ly/1ndfj7b
-- The FDA explains its thinking on recent device cybersecurity moves in a new blog post. FDA: http://1.usa.gov/1ri6LqH
-- The U.K. gets tough on revenge porn. Naked Security: http://bit.ly/1yOx5CO
That’s all for today. Keep on keepin’ on.
Stay in touch with the whole team: Tal Kopan (tkopan@politico.com, @TalKopan); Shaun Waterman (swaterman@politico.com, @WatermanReports); Joseph Marks (JMarks@politico.com, @Joseph_Marks_); and David Perera (dperera@politico.com, @daveperera).
Why am I writing about th3j35t3r in a blog which focuses on cyberharassment and cyberbullies?
I’ve been monitoring his Twitter feed for a long time now and frankly I can’t think of anyone online right now that is more targeted by Tards than this guy/gal/group.
The biggest irony of all is that the people who are targeting him/her/them most frequently call themselves Anonymous.
Now I’m not going to get into the whole issue of who is or isn’t a ‘real Anon’ or who does or doesn’t reflect the concept, etc. It just gets complicated because pretty much anyone can declare themselves Anonymous irrespective of the core ideal which Anonymous represents and irrespective of whether they actually follow that core ideal or not. Although they all claim to and no doubt genuinely believe that they do follow it.
Either that or I’m sadly mistaken about what the core ideal is. No doubt that is possible and if I am I’d like to be corrected because that means that I should reconsider my support.
Based on what I believe the core ideals of Anonymous are, there is no-one who represents the Anonymous ideal more than th3j35t3r including those Tards who keep targeting him with their numerous and ongoing FailDoxes and cyberharassment campaigns.
The exception to that would be those real hacking groups (not the skids who all claim to be hackers and create their little drama whore ‘sects’) which have managed to maintain complete secrecy and are generally unknown. The other exception to that are those groups that are open and known but manage to maintain complete secrecy about what it is they actually do.
I’m not going to draw attention to them by naming them and anyone who is serious or interested knows who the real ones are with the really serious people who are really good at what they do, anyway.
So, to me, and of course, this is just my personal opinion, they and th3j35t3r represent the real Anonymous not a bunch of loud mouthed egofag skids and n00bs who run around doxing people like th3j35t3r and other legitimate social activists/hacktivists, for no reason, or for completely idiotic reasons that they, more often than not, just fabricate, or by taking a minor ‘transgression’ and exaggerating the issue beyond recognition to rationalize their behavior.
That said, it’s important to note that I’m not a member of the Anonymous Collective, have never been and am speaking as an outsider. So, my opinion on this has as much value as those who read this choose to give it and no more.
I do, however, openly and publicly support what Anonymous does by writing about the Ops I support on my main blog and promoting the videos that I agree with. That is my contribution to the cause and I believe that it’s just as important as the actions that the hacktivists and social activists engage in because if people don’t know what they’re doing because people like me aren’t promoting their causes and advocating on their behalf, all their actions don’t mean very much. You need both. It isn’t a case of one vs the other.
Now, let’s look at the facts and from this point on I’m going to refer to th3j35t3r as a ‘he’ simply out of convenience. I have no idea who he/she/they are nor do I want to know and if I did ever stumble across that information I wouldn’t share it. You’d have to waterboard me to get it out of me.
Th3J35t3r Facts:
He has been online for 5 years now or is beginning his 5th year as of November 9th, 2013 when he celebrated his anniversary.
During this time, he has managed to remain completely anonymous despite:
1. Thousands of attempts to dox him.
2. At least some of the attempts were made by people who claim to have expertise in the InfoSec field.
3. Numerous people have attempted to befriend him and women have attempted to seduce him in order to extract personal identifying information from him. Some self-identified as social engineers.
All without success.
So I have to wonder why there is such an obsession with doxing th3j35t3r and why is it coming mostly from people who claim to be Anonymous?
Well, first of all, the only elements of Anonymous who appear to be obsessed with th3j35t3r are the skids and the n00bs. The serious Anon hacktivists and social activists don’t appear to be concerned about him at all.
In my opinion, the skids and n00bs do it because of:
1. Their own egofaggotry, that is, they think they know-it-all, they think they’re the best, and they want to prove it by taking on the ‘fastest gun in the west’ much like the gun slingers in those old westerns who couldn’t get out of town without having a shoot out because someone wanted to prove they were faster on the draw.
2. This delusion they hold about themselves is an indication of their own anti-social personality disorders and need to cyberharass people.
3. They may or may not also engage in the odd bit of social activism or at least try to present themselves in that light in order to establish some credibility for themselves before starting a cyberharassment campaign against someone. Now, it’s always possible that the intent was genuine but their personality disorder just took hold. Either way the end result is the same and the cause is the same. That said, most of those with anti-social personality disorders simply use things like social activism both as a means of covering up their anti-social personality disorder by making themselves appear to be caring people as well as a means to their end of rationalizing cyberharassment against people.
That is, those same people who want to be ‘epic’ and take on th3j35t3r will also likely be the same ones on Facebook and other sites, leading theRIP Tards and other Tards in various cyberharassment campaigns.
Their psychology is really no different. As I pointed out in one of my previous blog posts, normal, sane, rational people don’t go around destroying other people without serious cause. These habitual doxers usually make it crystal clear that their intent is to destroy the person and there is usually little or no real cause for them to do so.
I can perfectly understand and sympathize with the person who kills the pedophile who raped their child. It may not be the right thing to do but it’s understandable and I may or may not be above such an act myself.
I don’t understand or sympathize with those who want to destroy a person because they don’t agree with them on some issue or because they say something they don’t like or do something they don’t like or associate with someone they don’t like.
It’s called Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Association and both are constitutionally protected civil rights. Cyberharassing people on any of those grounds means that the Tards are violating their targets civil rights.
Civil Rights are something which I thought was supposed to be a core ideal of Anonymous. So, frankly, who do these Tards think they are when they attack th3j35t3r or those who associate with him because they don’t like his opinion on something or the fact that some support him?
Isn’t Anonymous all about Civil Rights? Am I wrong?
That’s not to say there isn’t some actual social activist opposition to th3j35t3r. There is no doubt that there is. He makes no secret out of the fact that he doesn’t agree with WikiLeaks and brought their site down and he’s not shy about expressing his political opinion where Assange is concerned.
Is this personal? Is he threatening to ‘destroy Assange and his family’? No. I’ve never seen him take that approach.
He keeps it all in the political domain and he has a right to do that.
I disagree with him and support both Assange and WikiLeaks and consider what they do extremely important. So what? We disagree on something. That’s no reason to hate him.
I respect him for the things he does that I agree with just like I support the Anon Ops that I agree with and ignore the one’s that I don’t agree with.
However, the self-righteous Tards who hate him because he doesn’t agree with them on some issue seem to think they have the right to impose their views on everyone and no-one can possibly be moral or ethical unless they follow their deemed politically correct party line.
They also seem to think they have the right to destroy anyone’s life who dares to disagree with them or associates with those who disagree with them.
Freedom of speech gives th3j35t3r just as much right to his opinion as it does you or I. I agree with some things he does and disagree with some things.
I see no reason to hate him or anyone else because he or they don’t agree with me on everything or something. It’s a good reason to get into an interesting discussion if both parties can handle that or simply to agree to disagree.
One of the actions on Twitter that brought a smile to my face was when th3j35t3r decided to throw down the gauntlet to Kevin Mitnick because of his position supporting Snowden.
He was going to protest Mitnick’s support by having a political virtual sit-in by dDosing and bringing down Mitnicks web site.
He initiated things like a gentleman with Mitnick by letting him know that he was going to target his site and why.
Although I don’t think he gave him the technical details of what he was planning. The irony was perfect. He used an Android to bring down Mitnick’s security business site. How did Mitnick react? Like a true gentleman in return. They shook hands and moved on. It was a pleasure to behold.
That is how normal, sane, rational people who don’t have anti-social personality disorders handle these things.
When it comes to the 99%, the reality is that we are NOT going to agree on MOST things. Everyone comes from different ideologies and backgrounds and represents different social and political views.
I’m a Freethinker and don’t accept any ideology. I determine my position on issues based on logic, reason and empirical evidence.
However, we can ALL agree on SOME things like the importance of protecting our Civil Rights. And even on that issue some might not believe that our Civil Rights are in danger. They would wrong in my opinion but they’re allowed to hold that belief whether I agree with it or not.
In the end, Anonymous and Occupy can only be successful if they recognize that fact, don’t try to push sectarian positions and stick to the general issues that matter to most of us irrespective of whether we agree with any particular ideology or not.
The Tards are incapable of recognizing this or the importance of this concept so we will likely forever be dealing with their Tard ways.
Since they’re now getting together in Tard groups to do Tard things en masse we all need to be aware of this phenomenon that’s occurring and have good strategies to deal with it.
From what I’ve seen, th3j35t3r handles all of this quite well. He will only retaliate to the degree necessary to get them off his back which is exactly what needs to be done.
Unfortunately for the Tards and because of their own stupidity, it sometimes means that you have to do quite a lot of damage before they’ll move on.
The benefit of that is that since they tend to be cowards as well, it makes them think twice before they’ll do it again.
They might try to repeat the behavior using other strategies but they’ll always find themselves in the same position again if enough people continue to stand up to them.
Th3j35t3r, on the other hand, and those following him, might miss it if all the drama stopped completely. It’s almost always entertaining to watch these Tards make fools of themselves over and over again.
They may be doing it for the lulz but the one’s that are actually having the lulz are those of us watching th3j35t3r’s feed and watching him pwn them over and over again.
If anyone were to actually dox th3j35t3r, given the support he has on Twitter, that someone could find themselves in more trouble than they can handle. I’m pretty sure I won’t be only one ticked off if that were to happen. Just saying….
I think that every person who has been doxed by these Tards as th3j35t3r should automatically get a free J T-Shirt which says th3j35t3r-2, the3j35t3r-3, etc. on it and a membership card to a club called ‘Doxed as th3j35t3r’.
Stay Frosty ;-D
