Hackers shelve crowdfunding drive for Shadow Brokers exploits by Bill Brenner.
From the post:
To some, it was a terrible idea akin to paying bad people to do harm. To others, it was a chance to build more powerful defenses against the next WannaCry.
It’s now a moot point.
Forty-eight hours after they started a crowdsourcing effort on Patreon to raise $25,000 a month for a monthly Shadow Brokers subscription service, security researchers Matthew Hickey – perhaps better known as Hacker Fantastic – and x0rz, announced the fund’s cancellation. Thursday morning, the page was empty:
…
Brenner covers alleged reasons for the cancellation and concludes with poor advice:
Better to not go there.
As I pointed out yesterday, if 2500 people each contributed %100, the goal of raising $25,000 would be met without significant risk to anyone. Cable bills, to say nothing of mobile phone charges, easily exceed $100 for a month.
If a subscription were purchased for one month and either the Shadow Brokers don’t release new malware or what they release was cobbled up from standard malware sites, don’t buy a second one. At $100 each, isn’t that a risk you would take?
Assuming Shadow Brokers are serious about their malware-by-the-month club, a crowd funded subscription, premised on the immediate and public release of each installment, damages existing systems of patriarchy among/at:
- Blackhat hackers
- Governments (all levels)
- Software vendors
- Spy agencies (worldwide)
- Whitehat advisors/hackers
Whitehat-only distribution follows that old saw of patriarchy, “we know what is best for you to know, etc.”
Some innocent people will be hurt by future malware releases. That’s a fact. But it’s an odd complaint for governments, spy agencies and their whitehat and vendor allies to raise.
Governments, spy agencies, whitehats and vendors have jointly participated in the slaughter of millions of people and the oppression of millions more.
Now facing some sharing of their cyberpower, they are concerned about potential injuries?
Looking forward to a deeply concealed entity stepping forward to purchase or crowd fund a release on delivery copy of the first Shadow Brokers malware-by-the-month, month 1.
Take a chance on damaging those patriarchies? Sure, that’s worth $100.
You?