Wednesday, July 22, 2015

Tool Used By Detained Lawyers Gets Attacked Day After Detentions Began, Day Before Being Mentioned in Government Report

On July 9, 2015, a Twitter user posted the following:
Someone is prying open the door at lawyer Wang Yu's home, and the power has been cut. Her husband and son are not home. Wang Yu has been accepting sensitive cases for several years. She was the attorney in the Jiansan River Case, the Fanmugen Case, and the recent Butcher Case, and the authorities have had their eye on her! The government media outlets will be soon be mobilized to smear her name! I hope people are paying attention!
王宇律师@wangyuLawer 家现有人撬门,家里被断电。老公儿子都不在家。王宇律师近年一直接一些敏感案件,建三江案,范木根案,这次屠夫案也是她在代理,被当局视为眼中钉。不惜动用部级单位媒体来打压抹黑她!望大家关注!
On July 10, 2015, the following announcement appeared on the Twitter account of Telegram Messenger:

At 11:09 pm on July 11, 2015, the Ministry of Public Security published the following announcement on its official "Strike the Four Evils, Eliminate the Four Harms" Sina Weibo:

[Ministry of Public Security Uncovers "Rights Defense" Plot] Over the past few days, the Ministry of Public Security has directed law enforcement agencies in Beijing elsewhere in a coordinated action to smash major criminal gang that used the Beijing Fengrui Law Firm as a platform to organize, plot, and hype-up over 40 sensitive incidents and severely disturb social order. A criminal enterprise has been brought to light comprising a large, well-organized, and tightly coordinated group of "rights defense" lawyers, provocateurs, and petitioners. 
【公安部揭开"维权"事件黑幕】近日,公安部部署指挥北京等地公安机关集中行动,摧毁以北京锋锐律师事务所为平台,先后组织策划炒作40余起敏感案事件、 严重扰乱社会秩序的重大犯罪团伙。一个由"维权"律师、推手、"访民"相互勾连,组织严密、人数众多、分工精细的犯罪团伙浮出水面…
That post linked to a 4,000+ character article co-authored by Huang Qingchang (黄庆畅) from the People's Daily and Zou Wei (邹伟) from Xinhua entitled "Ministry of Public Security Uncovers "Rights Defense" Plot" (公安部揭开“维权”事件黑幕). An excerpt:
How did such a large group communicate and maintain coordination? Police discovered that they held regular organization meetings, dinner parties, exchanged "work experience," and discussed planning. They also used real time communication tools such as Weixin, QQ Groups, and "Telegram" to carry out their plans to incite and launch trainings. There are many groups like this, with some making a name for themselves at flashpoints, some making a name for themselves through targeted operations, and making a name for themselves through mutual self-interest.

Zhai Yanmin confessed that "'Telegram' was used mainly for organizing and making connections, and the talk found therein was basically all attacking the Party and the government. . . . We used it to plan and organize all sorts of solidarity actions, and since we didn't want to let the government know, we could have images and text erased at fixed times."

这么大的群体,如何联系并保持行动一致?警方查明,他们一方面定期组织聚会、聚餐,交流“经验心得”,商讨行动计划;另一方面,通过微信、QQ群和“电报”等即时通讯工具沟通联络,进行煽动策划、开展业务培训。类似的群有很多,有的以热点事件命名,有的以行动目标命名,有的以共同利益命名。

“‘电报’主要用于组织串联,里面的言论基本都是攻击党和政府的。”翟岩民供述,“我们在里面策划、组织各种声援活动,可以设定时间删除图片和文字,就是不想让政府知道。”
 On July 13, 2014, Telegram posted a notice on its website entitled "A DDoS in Asia Pacific." Some excerpts:
Telegram's Asia Pacific server cluster has been under a DDoS attack since Friday morning.
. . . .
The garbage traffic came from about a hundred thousand infected servers, most noticeably, in LeaseWeb B.V., Hetzner Online AG, PlusServer AG, NFOrce Entertainment BV, Amazon and Comcast networks. That said, the attack was distributed evenly across thousands of hosts and none contributed more than 5% of the total volume.
. . . .
By now we know that the attack is being coordinated from East Asia.

We've noticed a three-fold increase in signups from South Korea in the last two weeks. The last time we were hit by a massive DDoS was in late September, 2014, in the wake of the South Korean privacy scandal when signups from that country spiked as well.
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