* Detect and notify the Ukrainian government about threats or upcoming attacks.
* Identify coordinated manipulative behaviour on social media.
* Last but not least contact Patreon's management to release the funds that have been donated to Ukrainian veterans (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30461038)
Feel free to add to the list, as there is going to be a lot of work in the upcoming days.
* It looks like there won't be a Ukrainian government to speak of in a few days.
* Manipulative behaviour has been identified on twitter and Facebook almost every day for the last few years, and it hasn't really led to much anything. The Ukrainian government can't do anything about that, if the independent banana republics of FAANG don't decide to act, nothing is gonna change.
* Likewise for patreon. It's a private Company and thus sadly, regrettably, out of reach of public scrutiny or regulation. Thoughts and prayers are free and abundant though! Besides, what is the Ukrainian government gonna do with money right now? I bet tanks and air defense systems have long lead times these days, chip shortage and all.
Sorry for the overboarding sarkasm... I guess. But these are my points.
Edit:
Collecting downvotes for that. Not surprised, but I'm not seeing any counterpoints, really. It's okay if you just need a valve to let off your frustration, have at it, but what the parent suggested seems.... pointless, sorry to be blank. I mean, this sort of soft influence might be useful, but we ("the west") have been proving, on an ongoing basis, for multiple years now, that corporate decisions shall not and will not be questioned by our governments, that essentially an american-based platform has unbridled control over what they want to do, and that if they don't care about trolls and bots and harassment and nationalism andandand then there's not much "we" (read: the government, first of all the US government) can^Wwill do. What is the ukraininan government gonna do with more intel on russian propaganda? What's the actionable on that? Start a war with twitter?
As for the first point. Yeah... I don't see the mechanism by which any of this will slow down the physical process of soldiers marching on Kyiv. No NATO state will enter into this conflict, Putin has been pretty openly threatening with nuclear annihilation. And I would doubt that the russian soldiers will be hanging out on twitter enough to really get distracted by some well thought-through anti-propaganda measures.
I don’t see why this would be true. The legitimate government doesn’t have to be in kiev to coordinate the defense of the country.
I think the psychological effect of losing Kiev would be much lower if they planned on that from the start too, but I guess that bird has flown.
Do you know the future for 100%? If not doesn't it worth a try?
(Why is it not hopeless? Russian forces suffer large losses and their morale is breaking, after all, what sane person wants to shoot their peaceful neigbours and relatives? Russians are already taking to the streets to protest the madness one day into this stupid war, who would have expected such bravery from the already suffering Russian people? Half of the European population is already looking for anything they can do to support Ukraine, ordinary Russians raising up or to make Putin and his closest people suffer. Pro Russian trolls who were previously tolerated since we wanted to hear all sides are now kept down. The list probably goes on.)
Every free human is now at war, and for now, for us it is information warfare.
So lets make sure the madmen get nothing for free. Don't run their errands.
Just because the US did it, doesn't mean that Russia is justified or less wrong, both are wrong, and neither get to call out the other for humanitarian reasons.
Please forgive those of us who where tricked into it, too young to vote etc.
I'll try to do my part to prevent more of it.
Edit: as for the phrase "the free world", read it to mean "freer to those inside it" if that helps.
Then you blame the voters of America when their government started an illegal war based on falsehoods.
As a UK citizen, of voting age for 20 years now, I'm guilty as charged. I voted for Blair before the Iraq war, but like many others protested on our streets in the build up (and I haven't voted for them since).
Doesn't make us wrong about Putin though.
But I can remember stories from my childhood about Russians tying up Afghan fighters and driving over them with tanks to make an example, so again without defending drone strikes on weddings or Abu Ghraib or anything other spectacularly bad I
1.) think it wouldn't have been much better if it was the Russians who went in
2.) think the reason why the Russian government hasn't been involved in more badness in the middle east until recently has not been its peaceful nature but the fact that they have been cash strapped.
You can certainly question whether that was worth the cost.
You could also look at some of the responses and choices made by the people/cultures native to this region over the years since then. Yes, "cultures" is plural.
The difference might be that at least it proclaims them, and good people like yourself can hold them accountable to those values.
Seems to me you can't really hold the US military to account, any more (or less) than you can the US police. Maybe a win here-and-there for political PR, but overall no.
Do we do it again?
No, but to say that the instigators of anti-russian sentiment in Ukraine are not mostly Neo-nazi's is ignorant. These articles go back years
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SBo0akeDMY
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/10/azov-far-right...
https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/136008/commentary_56.pdf
Oh my, this is disturbing. What was the probably cause? WMD's? :^/
Not the US. Maybe they did some time unintentionally, but with Putin it was part of his plans.
> they supported [the] Kurds
Of course, the Kurds and the US and Iraq were fighting together against Daesh (the so called Islamic State).
You're giving the impression that you like Assad, Putin, Erdagon, possibly Daesh as well. What kind of person are you, I start wondering.
Agreed that the US has done lots of bad things in the middle east though. (Eg helping the Talibans climb to power, supporting Saddam Hussein for quite long etc)
No one here said they were.
You're misreading.
"Seems someone likes Assad, maybe X" does not mean "Assad and X are allies".
It's possible for someone to like both Stalin and Hitler although they weren't allies (in the end).
That's not really an argument in itself tho.
I’m all for blaming the US where it’s warranted, but I don’t think that particular instance is it.
> no sane person wants to shoot their peaceful neighbors and relatives
and this is the case for all Russians even most of the ones in the army in Ukraine, right now. People do not want war. Period. For a human being to go to war, he/she needs to be heavily indoctrinated to the point of partially losing is normal references. Even today, with heavily indoctrinated armies, only a small subset of the forces are effectively shooting bullets.
War is decided by crazy leaders (and I am polite) far away from the lines.
From listening to people who grew up with the veterans here in Norway I've learned that:
- Germans were told they came here to protect us against the British so they would - in the beginning of the war - shoot to suppress, not to kill. I guess Russian soldiers coming into Ukraine has been tricked to believe the "peace keeping" nonsense too and had a rude awakening.
- Norwegians however were already mad and shot to kill. I guess this holds true for Ukrainians too. This is natural and we've seen it in Afghanistan, Iraq etc too I think.
- German soldiers would cryingly admit to POWs already at the start of the war that they were absolutely not voluntarily there, they'd just be shot if they refused.
No shit they weren't there voluntarily, no sane people want to go to their death, but those were the rules for mandatory conscription for them back then.
Even today some European countries still have mandatory conscription, and while they won't shoot you for refusal, if you don't show up for conscription, military police will come to your house and arrest you, and if you run away, an arrest warrant will be issues on your name.
So yeah, you have to do your mandatory service, even if you don't want to.
I didn't leave because of that, but I did delight I telling them I was beyond their reach. Finally picked up the phone the very day I left.
My dad and uncle both served 3-4 months in prison for refusing as a matter of principle, and my intent was to do so too until we decided to move our startup at the time to London.
Of course the main reason for that conscription was the Soviet Union/Russia. It's gotten very lenient since I left in 2000, as the size of the Norwegian military has been scaled back to the point they only need a small portion of potential recruits.
Unless you decide to go full career in the military, once you're done with the month long boot camp, if there's no war, national crisis or natural disaster that will get the grunts mobilized, the rest of the 5 months of service, are spent by the recruits dicking around on the taxpayers' money, doing useless busywork around the garrison.
And there's almost no way to avoid it unless you suffer from a severe physical or mental illness making you unsuitable for service, as even after you get out of prison for refusal, you'll be drafted back in.
PS: funny that you moved from Norway to London as many Brits I've met look up to Norway as a role model, so I'm really interest in your story
If you're a lower earner, quality of life in Norway is much better, but if you're a higher earner, London is great. And at the time funding in Norway was tricky. But, yeah, I look on British politics with great bemusement and a some sadness - so many lost opportunities.
My grandfather on ny mothers side served and helped hold the nazis back for a few days in his home country and maybe helped some people get away. He later had to surrender and spent a short time in a POW camp before being released.
I respect both very much but I decided to do as my dad and serve.
It absolutely felt like the right thing to do for me.
My main objection was not with the service in itself, but with it being compulsory under threat of prison. Of course today the "compulsory" nature of it is mostly a charade - if you want out it's trivial.
I shyed away from education / officer training because I felt the risk of being sent on peace keeping to the middle east, but 20 years later I see I could safely have done it.
Apparently ethnic Russians were being killed in Ukraine (or they have been the last 8 years, but more serious shelling started on February 17, 2022) and that is why Russia invaded.
At least according to Putler's propaganda.
> ethnic Russians were being killed in Ukraine
Far, far more ethnic Russians were not being killed in Ukraine.
Sure, some of the instigators, perpetrators, and fellow travellers of the armed insurrection in East Ukraine are (or were) ethnic Russians, but they:
A) Are being killed for being armed insurrectionists, not for being ethnic Russians.
B) Are (or were) themselves killing ethnic Ukrainians in the course of their armed insurrection.
C) Probably themselves killed quite a few ethnically Russian members of the Ukrainian armed forces.
> (or they have been the last 8 years,
Yeah, exactly: Since they started an armed insurrection.
> but more serious shelling started on February 17, 2022)
Oh, what a convenient date.
> and that is why Russia invaded.
Putler says that is why Russia invaded.
Oh: And so do you. Coincidence?
But you are right that social media networks are strong enablers of evil and helpers to enemies of freedom and democracy. Facebook and Twitter could easily stop (almost) all the misinformation and propaganda, but they don't because it makes them money.
I really doubt they could stop propaganda before the message is sent without deleting a ton of accounts that are false positives.
I also should point that any defense of the freedom of speech also defends freedom of misinformation and propaganda.
If they are actual misinformation and propaganda and you are unwilling to even admit existence of that category, then you yourself are threat to freedom - of speech or otherwise.
> I also should point that any defense of the freedom of speech also defends freedom of misinformation and propaganda.
Nah. Defenders of free speech not being willing to criticize misinformation and propaganda, calling those "valuable vantage points" and being quick to criticize and attempt to shut up criticism of those is what is dangerous for free speech.
Pointing out misinformation and propaganda as such is a good thing.
But the biggest issue in my mind is that fake news, misinformation and bot bullying makes social media money, so they are never going to stop it.
"The answer to the speech is... more speech"
And I agree that this is exactly the problem - winners are who have more energy and opportunity to speak. "Drowning the voices" as you pointed out.
But, how to determine which voice is normal?
Per your suspicion that fake news and misinformation make money, fact checking is alleged to make money to Facebook and fact-checking Facebook affiliates. The links on fact checking materials divert viewers from one arrticles to other and increase clicks and retention at Facebook.
Yes, you are right again - misinformation may bring money to FB, at the very least, when FB tries to fight it. I guess it is a nature of capitalism, to try to make money out of everything.
Yet those are classes of speech.
Let me point out that I was answering the call to stop these classes of speech nearly completely, using magic of Twitter and Facebook.
NATO's mission has always been mutual defense of members. Ukraine is not a member.
The threat of Russian nuclear weapons has been more poignant in the past than today. Neither of your conclusions was true before.
We can see this security guarantee in action right now. Same will happen with NATO's mutual defense guarantee.
[0] https://www.npr.org/2022/02/21/1082124528/ukraine-russia-put...
Documenting the behavior and collecting intelligence is a difficult skill and intensely valuable even if it is not direct retaliation.
I imagine if you are on an isp or IX backbone you could observe flows of packets. But how do you do that from a vpn?
Or should they break in to target systems first, shore up the defences, and then document who else tries to break in?
You mean the Russian propaganda, or the West's propaganda?
Seriously, two years after "two weeks to flatten the curve" everyone is at it _again_ and it's embarrasing.
https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/1506903/BBC-blast...
https://www.express.co.uk/showbiz/tv-radio/1497043/BBC-backl...
https://www.expressandstar.com/news/uk-news/2021/09/27/what-...
And the government promising the send the army in?
When looking at the 30-40min delays in filling in which was largely concentrated in cities, how many people sat queueing for fuel were considering an electric car? And then those filling up were limited to £20 or £30 of fuel so they experienced the same range anxiety as someone with an electric car.
Sometimes its not the message that is important, its the resulting changes that are more important. So the fuel crisis created an uptick in electric vehicle sales.
Its not just Govt discounts for new tech like solar cells that cause a change in behaviour, other entities can also take advantage of situations, or just be manipulated into reporting it.
Take the chip shortage and the Ukraine crisis when thinking of Ukraine being the largest Neon producer and its relevance to the chip supply chain. Neon production is a global supply change risk at the moment so events are making changes occur. Bosch is now fabricating their own chips albeit 300mm https://techcrunch.com/2021/06/07/bosch-opens-1-2-billion-ch... and Intel have also announced a new chip fab in Germany. https://siliconangle.com/2021/12/23/report-intel-build-new-c...
So Russia going into secure Ukraine and thus Neon means the EU & US get a stick poked into their bike wheel!
Nothing is ever what it seems!
Panic buying begins
Prepare for the worst
Winter of discontent
Fuel rationing
ARMY to step in
BBc headline was
“Petrol shortage, don’t rush to buy say ministers”
Quote from the article:
> "Ukrainian cybercommunity! It's time to get involved in the cyber defense of our country," the post read, asking hackers and cybersecurity experts to submit an application via Google docs, listing their specialties, such as malware development, and professional references.
If you're not Ukrainian, I guess the request is not aimed at you. Probably exactly for the reasons you mention. And if you were, the request is to fill in the form, not to go rogue.
Edit: @dang maybe change the title to "[...] calls on its hacker underground [...]" to make this a bit more clear?
Maybe there could be some formal initiative to clear out the grey/black area's so white hats can not fall upon their ethics.
The joke of sanctions implemented by the EU and the US, and they are a joke, since EU continues to import gas from Russia, and SWIFT use continues by the Russian Federation, is a symptom of the same attitude seen on many Ukraine residents just 48 hours ago.
A kind of cognitive disconnect between the obvious war coming your way, and a refusal to accept it, until it is at your door.
You have a ex-president of the United States openly praising the Russian president on the media, and also US TV networks openly doing the treasonous job of promoting Russian views in the US. If the Russian army quickly overtakes Ukraine you have Russian troops staring across the border to Polish troops. Some of the small countries that are now members of NATO, still have small pockets of Russian speaking communities. You think Russia will not claim they are also being discriminated and need another peace keeping operation?
In case of a conflict between Russia and a NATO member, it's mushroom clouds we are looking into. So I find your legalistic concerns incredibly detached from the seriousness of the current situation.
Arguably, gas is of military value, so maybe it's more advantageous to allow Russia to have the money and have the gas than the other way around. Depends on if the money goes towards other armaments - but I'm sure Russia has plenty of those in any case.
That said, why wouldn't Russia stop selling? Hmmm.
> ex-president of the United States openly praising the Russian president on the media
> US TV networks openly doing the treasonous job of promoting Russian views in the US
Can you clarify, I feel there might be a dubious definition of 'praising' and 'promoting' at play here.
You had US military and ex-military, doing work for Russian's since the 2014 Obama administration. That explains a lot of what has emboldened Russia.
"Trump being advised by ex-U.S. Lieutenant General who favors closer Russia ties" https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-trump-adviso...
"Michael Flynn—Once Indicted Over Russia Communication—Voices Support For Russia Ahead Of Potential Ukraine Invasion" https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2022/01/24/michael-fl...
But I think the other stuff (Flynn in Trump admin) is old-news; Biden administration had also talked of better diplomatic ties with Russia recently, before the invasion started. Dems have been somewhat more pro-China than Trump also, and I'm somewhat hesitant to distinguish being "pro-China" vs "pro-Russia"; both are strong mutual allies, at least in backing each other up both in terms of resources and PR.
Also, could you respond in full e.g. "Flynn was pardoned by Trump, meaning that..." so I don't have to guess what you mean.
EDIT: ok it was done, thanks. Although I'd add he was caught not disclosing talking to an ambassador (he is afaik allowed to do so), and then accused of lying about it to the FBI.
Per my post, there was a lot of politicking in that incitement that by itself would have justified the pardon.
TBH, I just don't know - which is what I mean by "politicking"; The more I read the more I feel I'm either missing something, or fed mis-information or a skewed perspective.
There was a whole thing about altered or manipulated notes during the Flynn incitement - yet Wikipedia page for Flynn barely mentions it, or McCabe, and McCabe's page mention his firing (which he says was based on an attempt to discredit him) but barely mentions Flynn..
Was that important? Was the DOJ justified in dropping charges, or was Barr corrupt? Was the Pardon justified given the FBIs shady tactics (although shady tactics might be their modus-operandi..), or not? Or maybe the pardon was more motivated by Flynn being "inner-circle" than anything FBI or Russia based. I just don't know.
I'd pick you up on "lying about it" - I consider the FBI to be heavily politically active, esp in the Trump/Comey times, so describing them as "law enforcement" in these situations is misleading.
I added detail to my previous comment, but I don't really trust the outcome of an incitement where the FBI held all the cards - you get the same thing when people accept one-sided plea deals from the police - "they even admitted they did it".
There's a whole lot of context around this. For example, you can characterise the FBI as simply "Law enforcement", but you could characterise the DOJ-under-Barr the same. If you have reason to doubt/discredit the DOJ, them you should equally allow for the same wrt the FBI-under-Comey.
He was paid $45,000 for his appearance, but again "forgot" to report that income. What is the US bar for the word "treasonous"?
You are cherry picking facts without context, and just repeating tabloid headlines.
Poland would be a more difficult target to justify than the Baltics; only 0.1% of Poles speak Russian; 30% of Latvians are native Russian speakers. I could see Putin going there next.
So, not likely that Latvia is next.
"‘If a war starts, they will come here first’: Latvia mounts a wary border watch"
https://www.politico.eu/article/war-russia-ukraine-latvia-mo...
I am not, even slightly, sure that this is the case anymore. Economic sanctions is as far as anyone is willing to go anymore it seems - and half-assed ones at that.
I absolutely cannot see the US, England, or any other NATO countries sending people to die in Latvia. There just is zero stomach for that in most of the world.
And people like Putin know that, is the problem, I think.
There is another very dangerous scenario that has not been considered. A Russian inspired coup in one of the existing NATO countries with a not so small large Russian speaking population. That government then saying they want to leave NATO.
On another side, it's not even mentioned that in the middle of the war action in Ukraine, nobody seems to have noticed Putin just annexed another country, Byelorussia. The Russian troops were supposed to leave at the end of their 3 week long exercises, but they are now leaving...never.
Belorussia has been a Russian puppet since the collapse of the USSR, nobody's noticed it because nothing has changed.
"Referendum on Belarus’ constitutional amendments set for 27 February" https://president.gov.by/en/events/referendum-po-vneseniyu-i...
Not sure what you mean by SWIFT being the last option before war, war is happening right now.
> Not sure what you mean by SWIFT being the last option before war, war is happening right now.
The War isn't happening for NATO. NATO as we all know won't do anything regarding the Ukraine invasion. If Russia starts to bulk troops on the Polish border - or any other NATO member, EU will try to solve it diplomatically using the SWIFT option before really going to War.
Obviously, you'd want a real legal opinion.
I do wonder at what point the US just declares Russian computer systems beyond the protection of US law. At some point, that happens, right?
I doubt the US would prosecute you though for hacking Russia.
The Ukrainian American veterans flying to Poland to defend Ukraine right now are also breaking US law, but there will not be any legal consequences for their courage and bravery.
For another country to go after US citizens, the country has to first file paperwork in US federal court, and then, have a judge care enough to proceed.
What drugs are you on to think Russia has any standing in US court regarding _anything_ that happens in Ukraine?
But Russia can be an ally against certain enemies like isis because interests align. Similiar to China.
Ukraine is a democracy ally which puts them on another level and talks about them joining nato also put them on a different level.
For this reason, just like how our troops are not in Ukraine but in surrounding countries watching, our NSA hackers are most likely standing down as well, as tragic as it may be.
As a result, even if that binding is still in power, is it worth defending Ukraine by going to war against Russia? That would literally start World War III. Letting Ukraine fall is terrible, awful, painful - but it's better than WWIII.
I used to work for an anti-phishing firm that you’ve likely never heard of. We routinely disrupted and dismantled phishing campaigns and bot networks being used by Russian crime networks as well as suspected IRGC (those folks have to get currency somewhere and importing an crack cocaine is apparently not their style)
Our malware research and SOC folks were pretty much all former Feds or Military Intelligence. They would routinely counter-hack servers we couldn’t take-down through legitimate means. While it was most certainly a “let’s not discuss this in an email” it was understand and briefed by our legal department that it was a “grey area” and that the USG would never even bother us as we were hitting adversarial nations anyway.
If you’re gonna play hackerman for UA, just do it smart.
read up on "unlawful combatant" and "irregular combatant"
Now if look more specifically at cyber, then there are laws such as
The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA)
The Stored Communications Act (SCA)
The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA)
The Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA)
By analogy, if A does crime to B, it isn't B who prosecutes, it is the appropriate governmental organization.
Just belatedly noticed https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30471631, perhaps you hadn't seen it
So, have at it.
Sure, don't take legal advice from me. Use a VPN.
I'd take away "by and large" here.
Many of them are also exceedingly generous, open and friendly and cares deeply. This holds true for both sides of the political spectrum.
They've also suffered a lot to end two world wars that they didn't start.
This is even more true of the Russians, and as an outsider, I'm wondering how much of their politics is informed by those memories.
It never ceases to amuse me how ignorant I am in my comments despite my attempts at being smart, wise and fair.
Of course you are right.
That said, this invasion is still a crime and I am utterly fed up by Russian actions in neighboring states, their constant lying, especially after MH17 was shot down, getting more or less away with state sponsored cheating in sports, simulating bombing raids against Swedish power plants etc. We should have seen this coming a long time ago.
(In my defense however, note that from the very start of this, even before the protests in Russia were known to me I think I have not said a bad word about the Russian people, barely a bad word about the men in boots and only after they started aggression and mostly - I hope - just about the leadership.)
> This is even more true of the Russians
No, it is not. The First World War was started because Russia backed up Serbia's refusal of Austria's ultimatum after a Serbian operation assassinated Austria's crown prince (and France & the UK backed up Russia, while Germany backed up Austria, and the whole powder keg blew up). The Second World War started because of the German invasion of Poland — and who else invaded Poland sixteen days later? The Soviet Union, which had signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact with its supplementary German-Soviet Frontier Treaty. Moreover, modern-day Poland is really an amalgamation of western Poland and what used to be eastern Germany: the Soviet Union kept about one third of what had been Poland.
They where allied with the Nazis in the second one and invaded 16 days after the start.
1) you will never be able to travel to Russia or a Russian controlled territory. Ever.
2) you will always be at risk for a hack-back or other issues when the dust settles and they seek revenge.
You should delete your comment before you cause someone to go to jail.
"before you cause someone to go to jail"
If you take legal advice from pseudo anonymous users on aggregate websites you deserve to go to jail. Even in writing that, the users did not "cause" anyone to go to jail; the moron reading and acting on that comment did. Have some respect for individuality mate.
(To any dumbarses reading this comment, launching cyberattacks against adversarial nation states will land you in prison if you're lucky, a body bag if you're not)
That's a huge gamble.
What you're talking about is not.
I wish there was another option. I wish people in Ukraine weren't suffering.
-- from wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incitement
Here's the more relevant wikipedia link:
The idea is that a jury is allowed to make its decision without any outside interference. A jury can acquit a person even it they think the person is guilty. Thus a jury could give you a fee pass on hacking Russian systems, but you'd be relying on them to realise that and then think the moral reasons for acquittal out weigh the legal reasons for conviction.
Obviously courts don't like jury nullification try to prevent it, without harming a juries independence.
So possibly not a good idea to rely on jury nullification as your get out of jail free card.
California’s state Supreme Court ruled in 2001 that jury nullification is not a valid decision… and my understanding is if the outcome case can be attributed to “jury nullification” (i.e. could be as obvious as the defense suggesting it as an avenue to the jury, which ironically itself is legal, or as technical as the jury refusing to consider or explicitly refusing a piece of evidence that is entered in the record— think a moral objection to the law, or “evidence undeniably shows the defendant left the scene at 7pm, but we the jury contend it was 6pm”) it legally would be considered a mistrial and allowed to be re-litigated— and the sole person who has the power to attribute something to jury nullification and/or declare mistrial? The judge.
I'm based in the US. The problem is that the US, unlike Russia, will not simply agree to allow attacks against foreign targets so long as its suits their strategic purposes. And I suppose that's for the best. In the meantime, myself and people like me simply aren't going to risk our entire careers to retaliate. I suppose if we felt strongly enough we would've joined the NSA and done this legally. I wish Ukraine the best and hope our "official" hackers are doing their best to assist or will be unleashed soon.