Microsofters' SLAPP Censorship - Part 5 Out of 200: Clearly Not a Security Professional/Expert, Only Ever Pretending to be One
"The Claimant says he is “a computer security expert”, but his background and his track record in the education sense (genetics) does not support this assertion."
Yesterday we told Rianne's version of events. She's probably the victim harmed the most in all this, as she had done nothing to deserve online abuse. And yet, she got dragged into a dispute which at its core is about security.
Garrett, in my humble opinion, is a clear threat to national security of many nations. He keeps promoting back doors of American companies that pay him to do this (Pentagon budget). Like many before him, he shows that serving billionaires pays off. He has long been trying to silence advocates of real security, as we've explained for many years already. We covered this topic in relation to many people, including the late Ross Anderson [1, 2, 3]. A year ago Andy Farnell et al explained some of the attacks on him.
Now back to Garrett.
How did someone who learned to dissect mosquitoes end up declaring himself a "Security Expert"? Who cushioned this phony narrative anyway? Or why?
My arguments with him started in 2012 when I insisted on real security and not kill switches/back doors controlled by Microsoft and the US Government. He came to this site and started leaving comments, which became more combative over time. He was, in effect, supporting Microsoft and advancing Microsoft's agenda. Even this year he keeps advocating binary blobs from barbaric Pentagon contractors that openly and proudly enable "lawful intercepts" (read: eavesdropping by government cracking, break-ins by the "Good Guys"). Follow the money, the salary. It's rather self-explanatory. While some people get paid to secure systems, others gets paid to implement flawed security and call it "security".
This man has been defaming many people by calling them "Rapist" and making accusation of drugging by them (seems like projection, nothing else, based on his own spouse).
He has spent well over a decade (almost 1.5 decades already) trying to take down or discredit proponents of Free software, free press, transparency etc. He repeatedly attempted to dethrone Linus Torvalds, only to end up effectively banished from Linux.
He also spent many years trying to compel the FSF to 'self-detonate' or self-destruct. He wanted to dethrone and remove the members most devoted to the FSF's core mission. He kept defaming these people and he still casually does so while openly promoting software with back doors framed as 'confidential' (many examples of this). He keeps tricking people into traps using the false assumption of "savvy" or "sage" advice. Ovations come from Microsoft operatives, who absolutely love this agenda. This charade goes on and on, based on carefully crafted false narratives and persistent defamation of the real domain experts.
So who does this guy claim to be and what he is really? In 2024 we examined this in the context of his claim (the trial finished last October and we're permitted to talk about it). Let's look at what we noted at the time.
Extended Defence
This is a Detailed Response to the Claims (Made by the Claimant in April 2024).
The Defence below, prepared by the Defendants, uses paragraph numbers and letters which correspond to the Claims (as per the original). The Defendants copy existing structures to make the correspondence clearer and then end with a statement of truth along with appendices. The purpose of the appendices is to bring up points hitherto uncovered in the context of the Defence.
Shall strict rules and practices of formality not be followed herein, that is owing to professional limitations on the Defendants’ behalf. They are Computer Scientists, not legally-trained solicitors. Nevertheless, while they do not know (nor practice) the law, they probably do know this case best, more so than eyewitnesses, based on over a decade of interactions with the Claimant. The interactions were very much limited to informal means, wherein the Claimant was chasing if not stalking the Defendants, looking to entrap or provoke – trying to elicit controversy or solicit strong responses in the Defendants’ very own network of communication.
PARTIES
1. Both Defendants are Computer Scientists with an accomplished track record and respective university degrees, along with industry experience in the field that they studied. The First Defendant has a First Class Bachelors Degree in Software Engineering, having graduated at the 92th percentile in 2003. The Second Defendant graduated with a Computer Science Degree 3 years earlier. They both humbly practice the trade, in which they are fully qualified. They both worked for many clients in the British Government and the British public sector in general, e.g. Home Office, Greater London Authority, Parliamentary Ombudsman, Food Standards Agency, Cabinet Office, NHS, several councils, and several major universities. There are also security clearances involved. Unlike the Claimant, they possess both formal qualifications and boast a long and unchequered track record in the domain, without endless job-hopping (which has been very much evident in the Claimant’s case). Adding various important particulars, duly and without prejudice, either wilful or accidental:
1.1 The Claimant says he is “a computer security expert”, but his background and his track record in the education sense (genetics) does not support this assertion. Many of his alleged qualifications are mere assertions (ad hoc) and this is actually a very relevant if not crucial - albeit contentious - point, dating back to 2021 when he began confronting (online) the Defendant Dr. Roy Schestowitz, who had completed his Ph.D. at the Computer Science Department at Manchester University, supervised by the Head of Department (the most distinguished role in that department, home of the first-ever programmable computer) who also has an O.B.E. Incidentally, as Arm Limited is brought up by the Claimant, Dr. Schestowitz also worked closely with (and for) Prof. Steve Furber’s group. He is a British computer scientist and mathematician, who is the brain behind Arm and also a personal friend of Dr. Schestowitz’s supervisor, Prof. Chris J. Taylor. The Claimant constantly appeals to authority (a lot of self-promotional, shameless, ego-stroking language if not drivel in his various pre-action letters, which he likely co-authored in order to save money, then handed over for editing and attorney’s signature) in an apparent attempt to compensate for the lack of actual merits of his claims and his respective work, either because of his insecurity or because he wishes to deceive, lacking any solid approval except based on perceptions, even where fiction is interjected into a supposed portfolio. Dr. Schestowitz repeatedly reported on this, upsetting the status of the overambitious Claimant. The Claimant, who had difficulties pursuing a Ph.D. (he tried twice), has spent many years publicly defaming Dr. Schestowitz – possibly motivated by his desire to “shoot the messenger” and seek reprisal - and was repeatedly cautioned about this by Dr. Schestowitz, who politely asked him to stop doing this or potentially face unspecified legal consequences. The Claimant did not stop this behaviour and – worse yet - continued seeking retribution – to the point of cyberstalking people close to the First Defendant, not just the First Defendant himself, for a period of several years. It seemed rather obsessive-compulsive – a subject that shall be revisited later in the Defence and elaborated upon in the Appendixes. Dr. Schestowitz not only wrote about this and recorded videos about it. He sought legal advice to that effect. After Dr. Schestowitz had cautioned the Claimant, i.e. the same person who had vilified him or would become a future Claimant (an astounding reversal of narratives), he started dirt-digging on Dr. Schestowitz, in effect spying on Dr. Schestowitz’s Internet Relay Chat (IRC) network and channels 24/7 (24 hours a day, every day) for a period of several years. In 2021 Dr. Schestowitz was sent a pre-action letter by a solicitor of the Claimant, alleging “libel” over an old tweet from Twitter.com – a tweet that did not even name the Claimant (also not seen by more than 100 people by some relatively generous estimates). Dr. Schestowitz published about 951,000 tweets over the years, so cherry-picking one or a few is not hard. Context is also lacking; that is the inherent nature of social media and why it was entirely abandoned by the First Defendant several years ago (the Second Defendant does not have an active account in any social media at all, for she is quite a private and reasonable person who is publicity-shy). Dr. Schestowitz never responded to the Claimant’s lawyers and no further action was taken. All in all, Dr. Schestowitz was sent about 3 if not 4 pre-action letters by the Claimant between 2021 and 2024. No actual legal action was pursued until April 2024. This seems like a flagrant misuse of process to harass not only Dr. Schestowitz but also, seeing that Dr. Schestowitz never – not even once - responded to the Claimant or his lawyers, partly because of experience and sound, professional legal advice (and a thick skin, not to mention Dr. Schestowitz felt he himself had been the victim of defamation from the Claimant for many years), he started sending registered post with pre-action letters to Roy’s humble wife, who never spoke to the Claimant in any form whatsoever as she prefers to keep a low-profile and never ever get embroiled in any argument, either offline or online. She is exceptionally non-confrontational by nature, unless repeatedly provoked and viciously attacked by racist people (which unfortunately happens sometimes). This utmost escalation – and this is something that the Defendants both believe entirely - amounts to harassment in its own right. Roping in court processes is a practice embraced also by the Claimant’s associates, who did exactly the same thing to both the First Defendant and to the Second Defendant. Tricking the system into participating in this harassment extended to family members, webhosts, cops, and lawyers. The unrelenting nature of this harassment shall be elaborated upon later in the Defence.
We'll continue this tomorrow in Part 6. █