SLAPP Censorship - Part 27 Out of 200: Using the Tor Network to Hide From Consequences
Yesterday we spoke of unreasonable requests that were pointless (e.g. one requesting documents that were created and sent by oneself) and even abandoned due to their futility. Further down it was noted that hard evidence exists that the Canadian who committed cybercrimes against my wife also communicated (in private) with Garrett, whom she sued 1.5 years ago [1, 2]. Only 1-2 weeks after the countersuit the Canadian attempted to deplatform several Web sites (without success, we're not in America) - in effect an effort at social engineering that we'll cover in the future. We believe it speaks volumes about the sort of "taste" Garrett has in people and what he deems to be "jokes" (like client, like lawyer).
Of course social engineering can extend to attacking one's critics/exposers, even defaming them to scare any future challenger/s. Ever wondered why Richard Stallman became so quiet about this Garrett thing? Garrett keeps defaming like half of the FSF's Board; he keeps getting away with it while hiding behind his precious "First Amendment", which he does not even agree on/with.
Now back to the aforementioned Canadian and Garrett.
It should be noted that this social engineering was openly discussed by those two in 2023 (we captured and documented this) and was again attempted earlier this year. People who fake their technical credentials try to compensate by other means, even if they clearly lack social skills and credibility built on a real track record (getting your mates to write about you in Wikipedia is a "poor man's hack"; richer people pay PR agencies to do this).
Uncomfortable facts are still facts. For justice to prevail we need the hard facts. Colluding with other Americans to drain the legal budget of the "opponent" is unfair (can lead to mistrial) and seeking funding from a third party (or parties) to volley legal papers almost heavier than myself (I'm almost 95KG because of sports) does not and cannot contribute even to the mere perception of advantage, as "lawfare" (or "lawyering up") is about money, compensating for a lack of something else. Regarding about half a dozen attempts to settle with us, this was about trying to save face, not money. Our money lasted a lot longer than theirs and they tried to keep the offers secret (because it's embarrassing).
Every part of this series merits an introduction for those who know little or nothing about the case/s (it actually started in 2021 with this pre-action letter). First of all, we want to remind readers that we've received threats from burner accounts, set aside online "hit lists". We are receiving threats to remove articles about an oversensitive Brett Wilson LLP (a men's club), but it's hard to attribute these messages to Brett Wilson LLP itself (they took several American clients to attack my wife and I, recycling the text in this process). Second, our barrister, who was a renowned Ofcom official for decades, felt very strongly about what they did to us (he said he had never seen something so bad!) and said we should write about it. Hence, we do.
As a roundup of key issues and where we stand, right now Brett Wilson LLP (trying to reinvent as the business perishes) shows absolutely no comprehension of how the Net works (it's just an ardent Windows/Microsoft shop), it conflates interpersonal communications with "Publications", it is desperate to delete past articles about Brett Wilson LLP (despite them being accurate, they point out no mistakes), and they try to prevent us from writing any more articles about what they did to us and still do to us. Their clients are doxing relatives of mine (Brett Wilson LLP should know it's illegal; they profess to champion privacy laws but they don't), are engaged in social engineering attempts to deplatform entire community sites, and it seems rather clear that Brett Wilson LLP has itself engaged in what we deem to be contempt of court. We were told by legal professionals that they merely bully us to cover their own behinds and to cover up for their American clients. One was in prison for strangling women, another is alleged to be a rapist by his own spouse; those two work together, in tandem/cahoots so to speak, based on sworn-on-the-Bible testimony under the UK's High Court observation; Garrett swore on the Bible under supervision and admitted what he had repeatedly lied about - not for the first time - through his lawyers and his barrister, so he values the Bible more than his GNOME/Microsoft buddy. They are desperate to hide what happened (people who send threats for a living are desperate to avoid daylight, as that helps show they are "hired guns" who issue sometimes dubious "confidentiality" demands or issue wholly unlawful demands of secrecy). On top of that, they pick on my wife (who the Judge acknowledged received abuse she neither deserved nor invited) and it boils down to a technical dispute over back doors, going back to 2012 (indeed, 14 years ago!). This costs the British taxpayers money (for Americans' benefit) and is putting at risk journalism in the UK, so there's also a moral aspect which extends to multinationals versus national sovereignty. We're hardly the first to point out Americans are misusing British courts (chronic abuse of process) to suppress the second-largest English-speaking journalism industry on the planet. This issue is widely recognised, yet it remains largely untackled due to lobbying by libel lawyers.
In late 2024 a barrister asked us to send material related to the use of Tor (for online abuse, as acknowledged by the Judge). Our own barrister replied to him, albeit with concision (he had also prepared our D.A.C.C.). Here is our own response to the request:
Under Paragraph 15.27.4 of the Defence and Counterclaim “after the First Defendant approached those running the Tor network about the Claimant’s misuse of Tor, the sock puppet trolling and harassment subsided”Requests
9. Please state:
(a) the date(s) and time(s) the First Defendant approached ‘those running the Tor network’;
(b) the names of the individual(s) ‘running the Tor network’ the First Defendant contacted;
(c) the date or period the Defendants contends the sock puppet messages ‘subsided’; and
(d) whether the Defendants or either of them received any response from the Tor network or ‘those running the Tor network’ and when.
Regarding (a), the date is in the message below: (also Request #4 from the solicitor)
21/08/2023, 11:16
To: frontdesk@torproject.org
URGENT: Your own staff misuses Tor to commit serious crimesHi,
Isis Agora Luvcruft (Sarah Michelle Reichwein) and the partner, Matt "Gas the Jews" Garrett (yes, he said that over Tor), are using many nodes in the Tor network to commit very serious crimes.
The crimes include
Hate crimes DDOS Doxing Death threats Defamation Impersonation
A lack of enforcement within your own ranks (Isis Agora Luvcruft) will result in prolonged and very negative publicly, potentially costing you funding.
Tor is meant to protect activists, not facilitate criminal activities, including by your own staff.
b) This is an insincere question to ask because Tor – like Tails (an operating system preloaded with Tor) - keeps its staff under a veil of some anonymity and frontdesk@torproject.org is the correct address to contact, not an individual/person. M.J.G. is fully aware of this (his spouse comes from Tor), so we question the motivation of such a ‘dumb’ question.
c) Very shortly after the message above was sent Techrights made it known that it had reported the matter to Tor. Over the coming days it seemed clear this had an effect and we received highly confidential E-mails to indicate the matter was discussed online, albeit in secrecy. This was a milestone. This was very incriminating. We need to protect the sources of these leaks.
d) The message to the Tor Project was a report and contained no questions, so there was no expectation of an answer (nor was there an answer from the generic account, frontdesk@torproject.org).
The reason we do not share replies to all of their questions is that injunctions exist and we cannot share these replies. We comply with orders because we - unlike Brett Wilson LLP lawyers who lied to several judges - respect the Court. Contrary to what they fantasise about, those injunctions cannot hide what their client said about transgendered people (he never denied saying that; he even openly admitted this afterwards).
Lawfare means that given the "right" amount of money, somehow the good people will be spun as "bad" and the culprits will be portrayed as the "victims". █
Image source: How Tor works, step 3 (What is Tor Browser? Software for protecting your identity online)