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Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by causi on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @09:29AM (#34412752)
I will never understand people who do illegal things over their own IP. Is it really that hard to find an open access point? Way back in the day when I torrented all my content I used a long-range wifi antenna connected to a public AP and a dedicated PC with a scrubbed drive that never connected to my home network.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by Miner49er on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @09:39AM (#34412862)
Is this even clear cut illegal? "Attempting to provide material support to a designated terrorist organization" sounds hard to prove, and also like it may run afoul of the 1st amendment.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by LastTrain on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @09:40AM (#34412871)
So you did illegal things illegally. And who owned the public AP? Someone not as smart as you? You sure?
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by causi on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @09:48AM (#34412982)
So you did illegal things illegally.

Yep. I said I don't understand people who do illegal things over their own connection, i.e., stupidly.

And who owned the public AP?

McDonald's.

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by VWWHFSfQ on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:38AM (#34413751)
McDonald's has video cameras pointing at every inch of their property 24/7. All they need is a timestamp from the AP and they'll go find your license plate in the parking lot on the surveillance tapes.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by Fnoord on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:47AM (#34413897)
Don't use a car or your own car.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by notch656c on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:49AM (#34413931)
What kind of idiot drives a car with a valid personal license plate while committing crime?

I don't even drive a car when I'm selling shit on craigslist for fear they'll look up the plate and do dumb shit when they're mad the drill I sold them has normal battery life.

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by jollyllama on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @11:32AM (#34414592)
Most criminals (they're risk takers) don't really think these things out and a large percentage of them get away all the time. Stuff goes wrong, footage goes missing, cameras don't work, prosecution bungles some rules, etc.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by VWWHFSfQ on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:51AM (#34413974)
I would ask what kind of idiot drives with an invalid license plate
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by counttheforks on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @11:19AM (#34414380)
Did you miss the part about a long range wifi antenna?
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by WarOnPrivacy on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @11:49AM (#34414854)
A guy on my street grabbed a nearby box store's WiFi and repeated it over an overamp'd, open AP.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by causi on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @03:35PM (#34418557)
I wasn't in the parking lot or anywhere near it for that matter.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by hinata08 on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:29AM (#34413587)
using such setup wouldn't prevent anyone from finding you if you did illegal things that really mattered, like donating to a terrorist organization

you can proudly use it to download torrents (because nobody cares and the feds won't triangulate a signal for torrents), but they can definitely do it for terrorism and intelligence matters. (check out all the stories of spies who had radios, from the 1914 to SOE to cold war)

As a bonus, you even post your story on HN, a site where analysts from all the governments and major companies of the planet meet to talk about tech...

this guy was probably more careful than you

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by LastTrain on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @12:40PM (#34415677)
I was more taking issue with your misplaced confidence about using a public AP than your doing illegal things.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by 2OEH8eoCRo0 on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:02AM (#34413197)
Your strategy might be safer but it also shows criminal intent.

Also- the secret about torrents is that nobody really gives a shit. They're more worried about pedos and terrorists.

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by noptd on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:08AM (#34413284)
>it also shows criminal intent.

Hard disagree, unless you have some citations to back this up.

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by Semaphor on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:46AM (#34413878)
> Also- the secret about torrents is that nobody really gives a shit.

That’s not true in some places like Germany. Just a few seconds of uploading a somewhat popular movie or porn without a VPN will get you a C&D + fees letter.

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by type-r on Wednesday January 18, 2023 @03:27AM (#34424603)
do you have to actually pay anything? in the us you also get a scare letter from your ISP but nothing happens if you ignore it and continue
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by Semaphor on Wednesday January 18, 2023 @04:25AM (#34424901)
Yeah, because it's lawyers working for the rightholders sending them, not ISPs. You can sometimes get out, but only by replying properly, ignoring then will end in court.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by archduck on Thursday January 19, 2023 @10:16PM (#34448759)
Can confirm. I slipped up for a few seconds once while torrenting. My cease-and-desist letter from Sony was personally delivered to my door by the Hausmeister.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by blitzar on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @11:15AM (#34414342)
My crime showed criminal intent. Nothing new there.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by maxk42 on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @10:47AM (#34413888)
>According to the complaint against him, Al-Azhari allegedly visited a dark web site that hosts “unofficial propaganda and photographs related to ISIS” multiple times on May 14, 2019.

I don't understand... how can this be illegal?

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by 0xCMP on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @11:23AM (#34414454)
This is cherry-picked out of a larger case because we care that they know any information about what they did via Tor. I don't think he's specifically been arrested for visiting a website even one like an ISIS propaganda one.
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by TechBro8615 on Tuesday January 17, 2023 @09:11PM (#34422588)
The long-range wifi antenna has always sounded like an opsec urban legend to me. You'll be able to transmit signals to the router, but can you really receive them with any sufficient fidelity if the router itself does not also have a long range antenna or unusually high transmission power?
Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by BenjiWiebe on Wednesday January 18, 2023 @01:04AM (#34423872)
Antennas are reciprocal. They are just as directional receiving as transmitting.

A 10dbi gain yagi boosts your transmitted and received signal equally.

Re:The FBI Identified a Tor User by TechBro8615 on Wednesday January 18, 2023 @04:42PM (#34433526)
Disclaimer: I'm a total noob at anything radio or electronics (and would appreciate an education on this topic from someone who isn't!)

> A 10dbi gain yagi boosts your transmitted and received signal equally

I don't see how this can be true, as long as you're not arguing semantics and actually want to use the wifi. Wouldn't you need two identical routers outfitted with high gain directional antennas pointing at each other? That's easy to do when you control both of them, but the subject under discussion is connecting to public wifi of a router you do not control.

Surely a big antenna pointing directly at a router with a tiny antenna will send signals with more clarity than it receives them. The tiny antenna is broadcasting a weak signal in all directions, and the big antenna is transmitting a strong signal in one direction.

I believe that the big antenna could "pick up" some parts of the radio waves from the router, but wouldn't most environments be too noisy for your receiver to find any useful signal? By the time the already weak radio wave gets to your antenna, it's dissipated so much that you couldn't possibly read enough of it to put a meaningful signal back together, right?