Right. You decided – with no evidence but your own gut – to take it to the next step and call if fraud.
That part was aimed generally at all the other commenters saying it’s the congregation’s own fault.
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Very. Unmitigated dicks are unmitigated dicks precisely because they do it merely for the lulz. I hope this perpetrator gets caught pronto - because success once just means they will almost certainly do it again.
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I’m on a Jewish music listserv. A fairly well-known singer posted an invitation to a free Friday-night song service. Next notice from the listserv was a post from a participant saying “Your Friday night service is showing offensive images of pedophilia.” The listserv moderator had to explain how to contact the original poster. These are well-meaning folks who are used to saying “All are welcome” & getting maybe 20 participants max in a live setting. If they are paying attention to Zoom’s problems & set up a password with a waiting room, they are still shocked to get 100 people from all over the world. It takes 20 minutes to 1/2 hour to check all the names against an RSVP list & let them in from the waiting room. If somebody RSVPs with a name or email that is different from their Zoom user name they may get turned away & then get very upset. I don’t know what Zoom can do to make it better but I hope they do something, or that people find an app that is more secure (in every way).
I’m still extremely paranoid about Zoom & per advice given here I have set up a separate computer user for Zoom only. I try to reveal only my Zoom name & a throwaway email address. If I’m forced to use my real name (for school or doctor) I wear sunglasses & a scarf to avoid facial recognition software. Nonetheless Zoom has managed to mess me up – since I naively allowed Zoom to notify me of meetings, now I get a nagging pop-up every ten minutes from Office365 asking for access. I always say no & so the popup never stops & I can’t figure out how to turn it off. Nobody on the internet seems to know either.
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Found the case files, along with 21 others where Zoom is a named party.
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Setting aside the fact that it was porn, child or otherwise, which raises many serious issues, we still have a matter of perception. One persons “unmitigated dick” is another’s crusader for change, stepping forward to give the establishment a poke in the eye. [Steps off soapbox] But, yeah, in this specific case, I’d lean towards unmitigated dick.
Sure. Us sheep deserve it when the haxxor 3l33t shit on us… /s
It’s not “heroic” to mock and bully others. It’s weak and childish.
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This isn’t an example of a bold crusader fighting for positive change, it’s just the digital equivalent of a sex offender walking up to a church pulpit and flashing the congregation. Except even less principled because the perpetrator in this case knew he was extremely unlikely to get arrested.
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Wasn’t there a story this week about someone who hacked a state government in order to expand access to unemployment? That’s heroic. This is not.
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But, see, the people who did this were religious so they deserved it! And they were using a commonly used and relatively accessible app instead of some ultra secure l33t h4x0r app that like maybe five of the geekiest geeks ever know how to use. We should look down on them because they’re religious and because their tech prowess isn’t up to our standards!
Plus we should make all sorts of excuses for the people who did this for God knows whatever reason. If they even did this. Pics or it didn’t happen.
EtA: This comment brought to you by a heaping helping of
/s
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Unsolicited dick pics are literally a form of harassment. Period.
Maybe that’s not what you mean by “unmitigated dick” , but there is no room for doubt in this case whether or not it was harassment. There was no mutual consent.
Some stranger coming into your house or office and yelling at you to clean up the place may call themselves an agent of change, but they’re just a harassing trespasser… and that’s a far milder example of what this person did.
This wasn’t a meeting in a public place. This wasn’t a city council meeting or a protest inviting counterprotest. This was a group of people minding their own business who were attacked and harassed by someone just because that someone could.
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Reminder that we have a policy against victim blaming here. Even if tools exist to prevent zoom-bombing, there is an argument to be made that given the ubiquity of the service, making them clear, obvious, and easy to use is still Zoom’s responsibility.
And none of that justifies asshole behaviour, especially if this was also illegal/exploitative content.
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Sometimes, the weirdest threads go sideways…
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So much fro that AI nudity filter.
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They might do better working on their security issues more generally.
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And there should also be some reasonable expectation for Zoom’s ability to block repeat offenders at the IP level once the problem is brought to their attention. Password-protected admission isn’t practical or appropriate for every kind of online gathering.
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Blocking at the IP level really isn’t an adequate technical fix, but I agree with the point that Zoom, and not the users, should bear the primary responsibility for securing their product. The good news is they have hired a slew of top security talent recently, so hopefully they get issues like this hammered out. Pressure from a lawsuit is of course, a-ok as well.
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Way back in the day, porn sites were thought to be highly insecure because of viruses and stuff and they probably were at first. But the porn industry is nothing if not highly inventive and took quick measures to secure their sites. So it turned out that the easiest, most vulnerable sites to hack were…churches, mainly because most all their sites would be run by parishioners with very little grasp on how security works.
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He is not calling it fraud. He is saying it seems improbable. I don’t agree with him, but there is a vast difference there.
