Our Lord of the Flies moment
In its war on researchers, the FBI doesn't have to imprison us. Merely opening an investigation into a researcher is enough to scare away investors and bankrupt their company, which is what happened last week with Chris Roberts. The scary thing about this process is that the FBI has all the credibility, and the researcher none -- even among other researchers. After hearing only one side of the story, the FBI's side, cybersecurity researchers quickly turned on their own, condemning Chris Roberts for endangering lives by taking control of an airplane.You cannot promote the (true) idea that security research benefits humanity while defending research that endangered hundreds of innocents— Alex Stamos (@alexstamos) May 16, 2015
As reported by Kim Zetter at Wired, though, Roberts denies the FBI's allegations. He claims his comments were taken out of context, and that on the subject of taking control a plane, it was in fact a simulator not a real airplane.
I don't know which side is telling the truth, of course. I'm not going to defend Chris Roberts in the face of strong evidence of his guilt. But at the same time, I demand real evidence of his guilt before I Continue reading