An American War on GNU/Linux, Software Freedom, and British Investigative, Science-Based Reporting - Part I - A Matter of National Security
This month there was an escalation well anticipated because hired guns don't view themselves as lawyers but as vicious attack dogs. And their clients, who are American, have severe crises in the US [1, 2]. Their outlet is, attack the reporters, get hired guns in London to do the "dirty work". It is my honest opinion that this is overt abuse of process and their legal licence should, in my humble opinion, be perpetually revoked based what they did to us (they had done this to other people before us, based on still-public sites; they seem to be criminals' law firm - they help cover up horrible things and they proudly call themselves "Reputation Solicitors"). Their latest 'accomplishment' is helping a millionaire sue a university after it had pushed back against his opposition to D.E.I.
Their American customers may have been deluded into thinking that their critics are not allowed to criticise them anymore after a court ruling (injunctions have very specific scope though). We are not contesting any injunctions, we continue to give the full context and related criticisms, which are unflattering - and rightly so. This is perfectly lawful and transparency serves the public interest.
In this series, which started today with a teaser/introduction, we'll focus on national security and computer security ramifications.
What's at stake here isn't just women violently abused. We don't spend a million bucks on lawyers who repeatedly lie to as many as 3 judges (as these ones - these lawyers - very clearly did). We are allocated money by the state in order to state our case and assure justice is served, as opposed to attack dogs being served as a reward for volleying about 75 KG of legal papers into our home. It's moreover time to put an end to such activities of theirs, at least by talking about the matter (it's not unprecedented in their history). That's why we've got politicians involved.
What does this have to do with tech?
A lot!
Part of what's at stake here is Microsoft corruption. When we exposed such corruption in 2021 we began getting SLAPPs. Some time in the future we'll show the full timeline and it's shockingly revealing (the proximity of events, including the removal of GitHub's CEO, "departure" of his longtime sidekick Miguel de Icaza, and arrest of his best friend, Graveley).
Garrett has been stalking me in IRC like a leech, 24/7, since then (2021) and even before. He used his authenticated account and even hijacked names of other people (he admitted this in Court). He tried all sorts of ways and means to get "revenge" against me. Eventually we muted him and in 2023 he got banned.
Last October, when grilled by me under sworn oath, he admitted that he had spoken about suing me (to Graveley). They were in this together all along, then they repeatedly lied to several judges about it. The lawyers knew. This puts them at risk now. So they want to silence us. Remember that the "S" in SLAPP is strategic.
"Microsoftianism is not a technical problem but a political and staffing matter," an associate explains. Remember that while in prison Graveley was a Microsoft employee (he does not deny the issue; he wants to delete records by issuing threats) and last October Garrett admitted to me that he was partly connected to Microsoft. Afterwards he admitted something to the same effect in public.
As a reminder, Debian got stacked by Microsoft staff [1, 2] (a form of subversive corporate entryism). They're pushing hostile agenda instead of serving Debian's mission; they vote on Debian GRs (General Resolutions) and engage in social engineering. This alone is a big problem which we've covered here before. It imperils a lot more than just computer security.
Then there's Google paying Debian huge sums of money... and then censoring Debian Developers who merely ask very legitimate questions about Google's motivations and disregard for human rights. The GAFAM money comes with strings. Debian now has corporate "masters". The same is true for GNOME, which is controlled by GAFAM and by IBM. They're all suppression facts and ousting people who ask questions; they're created culture of censorship and cover-up (not limited to the CoC), e.g. when SSH gets compromised. How can we trust them?
Lately there has been a lot of discussion about the United States ramming down everybody's throat "age checks" at the OS level [1, 2, 3], with many videos made about it as well, e.g. [1, 2, 3]. This issue won't go away any time soon.
This isn't a case of opportunistic alarmism, it's actually happening and distros respond to it, sometimes more formally [1, 2] and sometimes deferring.
"This age gating which is being advanced in legislations across the world is a huge threat to software freedom," an associate has explained, "and I would posit the primary goal with the "think of the children" noise as a distraction."
"Pushing it into the OS layer allows them to ban GNU/Linux and the *BSDs It will be used to push further DRM in the form of proprietary blobs into the stack. [...] Restricted boot, UEFI, TPM, EME, etc. "
Well, proprietary blobs inside the stack is the best form of bug doors or back doors one can attain. Nothing would please the US more than direct access to every computer in the world, more so seeing the brutal war-hawks turning down diplomacy and drawing up kill lists (or strike locations) based on "big data".
This month the hired guns are trying to get articles about computer security removed. Some of them concern 'secure boot'. They claim to do so on behalf of a fake 'security' 'expert' with phony credentials (circular legitimisation, a loop). As we noted earlier today, he is just a poser and his spouse publicly says he cannot even code!
If you want real security, then listen to experts who can code, not people who get hired guns in London to attack the family of someone in another country.
14 years ago: TechBytes Episode 69: Richard Stallman on Restricted Boot (UEFI), Coreboot, GRUB, and Boot Freedom | Richard Stallman Speaks About UEFI
21 years ago: Stallman calls for action on Free BIOS
In the next part we'll show why the attacks on us are, in effect, an attack on all computer users, on real security, and on national security.
Those people are only Americans who try to advance the interests of American corporations by weaponising courts abroad. Third parties fund their litigation.
Last year we published almost 6,500 pages, but this year we plan about 10,000+. They will try to slow us down, but they've mostly scored own goals, invoking Streisand Effect and showing the disproportionate reaction (their client publicly boasts wanting to put my family in prison because his own spouse had called him a rapist). What truly adorable people. █
