Hey guys. Last night, a member of #opbeast posted to our subreddit in a threatening manner, as well as mass-downvoting a lot of comments in one of our threads. At this time, there is nothing to worry about. I do not think at any point we will have any worry, as they aren't really a hacking group and they aren't going to be capable of hacking a large website like this anyways. Regardless, I think it is important to address this matter so everybody here is fully aware of what we are dealing with and what ramifications we could forsee--which are none, granted you continue to follow basic internet safety practices.
Here's a list of some things you should keep in mind, I just woke up so if I miss anything feel free to add it in the comments:
Have a password with 8 or more characters, utilizing at least one capital letter, a number, and a special character. Avoid putting the special characters at the beginning or end. Don't use anything guessable.
Do not randomly click on links. Hover your cursor over the link to look at the destination (it will show up in the bottom left corner usually). If it looks fishy, don't click on it and message a mod if you aren't aware of how to be perfectly sure. Don't click on short links at all, I will make a change to the rules disallowing these style links.
Do not post any personally identifying or geographic location information. This has always been a strong recommendation in the past, and I think we have done very good at doing this so far.
(Optional) Use a VPN to mask your IP address and therefore location. I recommend this only because it is so cheap so it is good to have as a backup, but it isn't 100% necessary. PIA is a good company, I have also heard good things about tunnelbear which actually gives free service.
If things continue to progress, we will continue to take measures to counteract their attempts. I apologize if this has ruffled anyone's feathers, but at this point there is nothing to worry about as long as you are safe. This is the same caliber of spam as we have gotten from places like subredditdrama in the past.
If you have any questions, feel free to express them down in the comments or PM me or /u/frostfedora.
Edit: I would also like to add, it seems a couple users are still going around and downvoting stuff, so keep in mind that while you are browsing, if you read a post you like or agree with take just a half second to upvote it, even if you aren't replying to it. That is how the reddit voting system is supposed to function. If people end up incurring too many downvotes on a subreddit it can cause them to have to wait to post again which can be mildly annoying.
I use a VPN to protect myself. I would recommend one to all in this scene. Always best to hide your identity.
Tor works well for connecting to Reddit, if you are uncomfortable letting a VPN handle your connections. I also think that VPNs don't protect against some advanced tracking attacks, like browser fingerprinting. People unfamiliar with Internet security concepts may have a look at the Tails operating system - you can think of it as some sort of security-in-a-can system.
Actually, Tails is so well crafted that even people able to roll up his own stuff is going to do well using it,
Tor exit nodes do get blocked regularly.. so it's not always guaranteed to be working. VPN's aren't designed to protect your browser..
I have read about tails a lot, but never tried it. Might be a bit daunting for people to run another operating system.. I have no idea.
I have never had a problem using Tor for Reddit. I have had it with some other sites, but I usually don't care for sites that are hostile towards security technologies when I need security.
It takes longer for me to burn Tails to a DVD than to teach somebody how to use it. Tails is very plug-and-play if you are using pre-windows 8 computers. Just put the DVD in the tray and reboot, the rest is automatic and well documented. If you have a post-windows 8 computer you will have to instruct your UEFI to use the DVD. It is just an extra step.
Browser fingerprinting is not an attack on the browser, it is a set of techniques that can be used to identify your browser and browsing habits. When you use the Tor Browser Bundle or Tails, your fingerprint becomes harder to differentiate from other Internet users, and it becomes harder to identify you using those techniques.
Eew, people still burn to DVDs lol? Flash drives are the main mode of installation I use these days. Especially with 3.0 drives its a breeze.
It is no install media in this case. A standard DVD is read only media, which is what you need when you are talking about running Tails. Or any other Live operating system you intend to use for managing sensitive data without leaving traces all around.
My flash drives are always full of some data, and I have some spare re-recordable DVDs I use for burning install media, so I always use one of those in the end.
I also keep lots of DVDs from magazines and old projects. I always think it is time to put them in the recycle bin, but every now and then I find myself in the need to pull one of those out in a hurry fof some sysadmin task.
To add my voice here as well...
I routinely use tor for my zoo activities and I have not once been blocked from reddit (or wikipedia). Many other places, but never either of those.
Good note on the fingerprinting. You can also use a JS blocker to randomize your fingerprint, like scriptsafe.
Thanks for your message.
Stay safe, people.
Also, isn't it funny how they mass downvote shit?
Are they trying to hide our messages because they're afraid it contains the truth, or what?
Man, you should've seen my face when my comment with 3 upvotes suddenly had -20...
I was thinking the same thing about the downvotes, suddenly every comment was in - double figures
Meh, they think they are scary. I guess they are entitled to their opinion.
Personally, I think they are retarded.
They are certainly entitled to their opinion, as shitty as it is. However, they are not entitled to vote brigade, which is against reddit's policy. They have tried to uphold freedom of speech to a degree. Enough so, at least, that they have stood by not touching our subreddit.
I'd say more belligerent and bigoted than I'd say retarded, but that's just my preference in words lol.
I probably shouldn't use "retarded" so liberally. There are genuine retarded people whom I'd not want at all to assosciate with the effective bully anon-opbeast is.
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tunnelbear gives you 500mb free per month, any over you have to pay. It's also with the free-not good for streaming video. Not that you really need to stream video around here. Anything on youtube doesn't really need a VPN. It's easy enough to toggle on and off.
new account to make myself feel safer
Oh wow. How impotent do you have to be to think mass downvoting is going to have any sort of effect? This is the sort of mental inability that these people operate on: They treat slightly lowering someone's imaginary internet popularity points as some kind of victory for their cracked-out vision of social justice. I honestly feel embarrassed for them.
It does have an effect on subs that are attacked routinely, because of the reddit/sub default config.
Whatever effect they get is fleeting at best
The platform is susceptible to it by default. Wait til it happens to your sub every day.
Saying there'd be no impact is like saying /r/zoophilia doesn't really matter.
Let's just hope they are in all senses of the word lol.
the fact that "anon" works together with Peta and the likes tells me enough.
I don't think that when you'd come to an anon chat room, you'd be finding much support for them anyways.
This just sounds like a peta member that found out about reddit and anon, and thought, I'm going to act all tough and anon would join
I doubt any of them actually work with PETA anyways, if they did it would at least make it less hypocritical. Every person I have confronted on whether they support animal based products has never given me an answer lol.
I'm just wondering, why do(es) the guy(s) think its an awesome idea to mention peta as their ally. I mean everyone on the internet thinks they're a joke
You can PM them and ask :D. Not too sure whether you'd get a coherent response though...
sadly I've missed the dank shitposting from our friend, so I cant form an opinion, and he got banned if I'm right.
When you have as few real allies as they do (or members, for that matter), you want to make it sound like you have more.
less hypocritical? peta is just about the opposite of an animal rights company. they spend a ton of their money on advertising that never works, they make themselves into a joke by doing things like game parodies, and on top of, they kill a ridiculous amount of animals ( heck, theres even a website dedicated to it https://www.petakillsanimals.com/ )