Has ATS ever been the subject of a DDOS or a Hacking attempt by Hackers/Gov't

I am just curious as to the unusual nature of this website. Has ATS ever been subject to an attempted DDOS or a hacking attempt at the server database to uncover the IPs of the members.

If so how secure are the IPs in the database, how long are they kept, and under what circumstances does such information have to be given up.

Sorry I am security paranoid lol

The terms and conditions are quite clear:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

22a) Disclosure: TAN also reserves the right to disclose any known personal information when required by law or in the good-faith belief that such action is necessary to conform to the law or comply with a legal process served on TAN, protect and defend the rights or property of the TAN domains, or visitors to these domains, identify persons who may be violating the law, the legal notice, or the rights of third parties, and cooperate with the investigations of purported unlawful activities.

If you're breaking the law, or ATS is subpoenaed for your information they are compelled to provide it. Otherwise your IP, registration email, and any other personally identifying information is kept secret by ATS and it is quite secure.

Thanks I just get worried that my talking gives away too much information at times which can be unappreciated by certain types of people. I have never done anything illegal, but sometimes the ideas and musings that I have, I get concerned that it may be of interest to them.

reply to post by THE_PROFESSIONAL


I've been saying things on these boards and in public for years. Sometimes right in front of LEO.

I'm not on a list and no one has kicked my door down. At least not yet. So I wouldn't worry.

reply to post by THE_PROFESSIONAL


The question as asked remains unanswered. I would personaly like to know if this site has ever come under attack from unspecified hacking or other methods of attack by ANY entity . To centre to firmly on government interferance leaves one exposed to "other elements".

Total Information Awareness

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you.

Only the admins could speak authoritatively on such questions as server log retention and details of possible government interaction with ATS, but that won't stop me from offering my (admittedly less informed) opinions as a mod, for what little they may be worth.

Regarding server logs, I know SkepticOverlord (aka "SO") has publicly mentioned that he takes special steps to minimize the amount of detailed connection data kept, and that it is discarded rather quickly by industry standards. Some data is kept for statistical and administrative purposes, but I think most of it makes its way to tbe bit bucket fairly fast.

That said, the nature of discussion boards is that our account data and posts are, by design, kept indefinitely. So who said what, how and when is in the forums for all to see, and if it came to something incriminating, that's what would matter most, anyway.

More broadly, the AT&T/NSA Narus Collaboration Imbroglio and its unpublished variants suggest that much, most or possibly all Internet traffic is monitored by the NSA. In light of some rather interesting behavior out of China and several other countries as well, it's also safe to assume the U.S. government isn't the only government that monitors Internet traffic, nor that governments are the only groups that monitor traffic, for that matter (i.e., Google).

Considering the amazing amount of surveillance literally built in to the Internet, it would be foolish to assume anyone using it has anything approaching real privacy. Rather, and I strongly recommend this, it is much better to assume everything you do via an Internet connection is being monitored and act accordingly.

That specifically means avoiding participation in illegal activity online and, considering the rather high profile of ATS and the fact that it's against the rules, trying to pursue criminal objectives here would be extremely unwise.

ATS is the best place to discuss conspiracies, and the worst place to plot them.

Enemy Of The State

I don't know of any actual DDOS or hack attempts by any government agencies on ATS. That doesn't mean they haven't happened, or that the idea hasn't been bandied about. I know SO has mentioned we get a lot of visitors from government domains, but I suspect that's mostly personal interest rather than official business.

Genuine "professional interest" or attacks on ATS by government agencies would undoubtedly disguise their origins, since it would be asinine not to do so. That said, there was the Juniper Three fiasco (tucked away in RATS somewhere, I believe) which, due precisely to its absurdity, was probably just some government servant with too much time on his hands and inadequate adult supervision.

But when all is said and done, I can't really see why a government would want to shut us down. Most of what we do is gather and discuss information from other sources on the Internet. We specifically prohibit illegal activity, discourage disclosure of personal information and generally focus on what other people are doing, rather than ourselves.

Compared to other "target rich" sites that specialize in hacking, piracy, drugs, porn, gangs, jihad, militias, smuggling, violent protests, etc., (all of which are almost certainly monitored very closely) ATS is probably not of much professional interest to law enforcement or governments in general. There's already plenty of people out there advertising their desirability as surveillance subjects, and compared to them, we're practically saints.

That doesn't mean we should be complacent, nor that we should assume complacency on the part of governments toward what we talk about here, but rather that it's good to keep some perspective.

Disinformation Management

I will say that I sometimes wonder if some members are here "on business" due to their behavior. The accusation of "disinfo agent" is common enough to be a tired cliche around here, and such claims are almost always completely spurious -- enough so to render them meaningless. Plus, personal commentary violates the rules anyway, so it's somewhat moot.

Making a determination harder is that it's normal for pretty much anyone to have some sort of passion or agenda that brings them here. Simon's Area 51 articles first caught my eye many years ago, and we have many longstanding members who are experts on all sorts of subjects. Of course even experts can still be wrong, so simple disagreement really doesn't prove anyone is here to deliberately spread false information.

What catches my attention are members, often new but sometimes on old "sleeper accounts", who come along at certain times when a topic is hot in the news, and all they do is spam vast amounts of information on that one topic, all of which conforms to one side of the story. Again, that in itself may just mean strong opinions and passionate interest, but there are other signs.

Specifically, they may try to gather personal data from members (e.g., names, email addresses, etc.) in the form of "petitions" or other kinds of solicitation, try to goad other members into incriminating behavior, attack members who disagree with them and disrupt threads that put forth ideas that differ from theirs. All of these activities, not so coincidentally, violate the terms & conditions, which is worth noting.

Sometimes it seems thorough enough to be professional, but even then, sometimes a troll is just a troll.

In the end, it doesn't matter what the motive is or whether it's government-sponsored, because the eventual outcome for people who, whether on "official business" or not, repeatedly and intentionally disrupt topical discussion is the same:

Which is why it ultimately makes sense to focus on what we do best and not worry about who's watching, because what we do best isn't illegal, and as long as enough of us keep each other informed around the world, hopefully it will stay that way.

My interest in a clear and informative answer to the question of wether ANY entity , be it government, industry, or individual, has ever attacked this site using technological means, has nothing to do with the legality or otherwise of any content on this site, or my own involvement in it. It is curiosity alone which drives me to request once again, has there been ANY attack against this site of any kind, or not? Very simply put question, therefore in theory ought to have a pretty plain answer ... perhaps a single sentence would suffice to answer this one

If ATS was hacked or trolled, I would bet it would be connected to the encyclopedia dramatica page about ats. Though in my opinion, that site is shady and could be linked to GLP and or 4chan some how, then again who knows it could just be some one with a grudge.

reply to post by TrueBrit

For the record, I didn't type out that response in the three minutes that elapsed between your post and mine.

I was speaking to the topic in general.

reply to post by Majic


I appreciate that. You would have to have a pretty prodigious words per minuite count to have typed that whole response out and posted it right after mine lol. I think it would be cool if someone who can answer my question would though. Just for the informations sake. Cheers.

Originally posted by XL5
It could just be some one with a grudge.

I have wondered this myself. How secure are ip addresses from theft by anyone?

Yes. Every site out there has been hacked if it popular enough.
Do a trace route or "whois" command on the site address.

Internet "security" is a ruse, the entire thing.

I once knew an elite hacker (and I've seen his work as proof!) who had written programs to hide his identity online. I don't know the precise term he used but he told me that unless you randomize your IP every ping, AND randomize some internal code that specifies your individual computer EVERYTHING you do online is traced by multiple different agencies, constantly.

He compared the computer to a body. Everyone puts on clothes thinking it's protection; some people put on armor, and some live in a plastic bubble... but the people watching us live in little molecule-size trackers!

Just to give one example of what this guy could do... He hacked someones computer, while the person was working on it. You could watch the mouse pointer and then typing, then he flipped the monitor view upside down. The person stopped typing... then he began typing on their computer. He had full control just by doing a scan for Comcast IPs. They say the person needs to "allow" this and you can't get past firewalls and all that - using Unix this guy did it all to some random person he found from a scan.

Anything on any computer that can access the internet is not safe from prying eyes. Know it... Live it.

Be afraid, very afraid.

Words do have consequences... Depending on several factors of course.

If you are involved in illegal activity of any kind, or are under any kind of surveillance everything you write or post online, any files you post, or share with others can come with consequences.

If you think you are paranoid... You ain't seen nothing yet.

The government, and especially federal agencies are far more paranoid than the entire collective membership of ATS could ever be.. even in a time of grave crisis.

reply to post by THE_PROFESSIONAL


I used to feel the same way, until I realized that no one listens what I have to say anyway, so screw it.

Hey Majic thanks very very much for your excellent post. I haven't had a response that nice before. Thank you for the effort and clearing my concerns.

Yes my computer is very secure but the data that goes through ATS is not secure because it goes through middleman servers. If you look at the root DNS servers, I believe a lot of them are us government servers lol. The root DNS servers are only like 12 in the USA and most of them are government owned so it is guaranteed that your information is being filtered through a government server before it gets to ATS, hence them knowing the IP address of origin.

A way to thwart them knowing the information posted would probably be to encrypt ATS using htttps. That way they would know only the orign IP address, but would not be able to link the post to the ip address.

reply to post by Thermo Klein

AND randomize some internal code that specifies your individual computer

Yes that is just the MAC address of the computer lol

The thing about taking control of another's computer. He was able to do it because he used an exploit on an open port. Its not that hard if you do the research into it hehe. If the target computer was secure there is no way even the best hacker in the world would get to it. They person who got hacked didnt have good firewall and left vulnerable ports open from which he used an exploit to get access.

various agencys reguarly monitor sites such as ATS as to make sure we havent "figured them out"

Originally posted by redfezbudking
various agencys reguarly monitor sites such as ATS as to make sure we havent "figured them out"

I thought various agencies regularly fund, build, provide content for, maintain and monitor sites such as ATS so as to make sure we don't figure anything out.

Ill throw in some comments on this...

I have worked for internet service providers in the past, plus run quite a few email servers for people and companies on a variety of operating systems, and let me just say that the attacks never stop... They can usually all be completely blocked, but they keep on trying their attacks night and day..

These attacks come from all over the world, and sometimes I have seen in the logs plenty of government IP's the DoD, CIA and Army, Navy etc. etc..

The military probes are usually some strange thing like IPv6 or some other seldom seen protocols..

Usually it is someone's bot or script trying to brute force dictionary password to login as root or other accounts on systems running linux, telnet or SSH ....

It happens everyday to most anyone including the Whitehouse, NASA , everyone is on the list.. it is a real digital circus out there in internet land...

Best thing to do is just run firewall apps and use hardware firewall appliances,. or whatever fits your need of security..

Just my 2 cents