Security News International law enforcement shuts down cybercrime communication platform Ghost

[Gandalf_The_Grey]

Content source

https://www.techspot.com/news/104784-international-law-enforcement-shuts-down-major-cybercrime-communication.html

Digital Mob Comms: Thousands of criminals were using the same "social network," Ghost, to conduct illicit activities worldwide. The platform offered multiple encryption options, but despite these security measures, Europol and other agencies successfully broke through and arrested its administrator.

A broad coalition of law enforcement agencies has dismantled Ghost, a platform offering advanced, encrypted communication services for criminals. The platform was run by a single administrator, a 32-year-old man arrested in Australia, and allowed users worldwide to exchange messages and even assassination requests.

Europol worked with agencies from nine different countries to take down Ghost. The platform supported three different encryption standards, and users were reportedly able to delete all previously exchanged messages by sending a single, specific code.

David McLean, assistant commissioner of Australia's federal police, said Ghost was widely used by notorious criminal organizations, including Italian mob syndicates, outlaw motorcycle gangs, Middle Eastern groups, and Korean gangs. These groups relied on the app to coordinate drug trafficking operations, order assassinations, and more.

International law enforcement shuts down cybercrime communication platform Ghost

A broad coalition of law enforcement agencies has dismantled Ghost, a platform offering advanced, encrypted communication services for criminals. The platform was run by a single administrator,...

www.techspot.com

 

[jamey910111]

The kettle calling the pot black…? the biggest gangsters are european and american syndicates…lol @ “middle eastern” groups?? Even that expression doesnt make sense here because the kettle is way worse than the pot to be compared.

I mean everytime they take down a chat group or something cause its not their favourite groups they use this excuse. This is as orwellian as it gets. That’s how full on assault on free speech spreads imo. This is such a timely issue, right after telegram too. I wonder who’s next..

My point is the underlying reason as to why this is happening is questionable - for me it's not entirely clearly if it's done in the name of protecting citizens, or if it's do to other reasons, since a whole platform was shut down, unless one is to believe that it was actually done because all crime organizations use this group exclusively. Just saying that the information is to be taken with a grain of salt. I mean think of Snowden, wikileaks, etc etc... that's all. It could've been doen for othe rreasons but the state reasons could be be 'gangs' to sell it to people.

 

[Victor M]

full on assault on free speech

Criminals do not deserve to have free speech. The law protects you only if you don't violate the law. The govt puts criminals in jail and they lose their freedom period.

You are thinking that free speech is a god given right. No it is not, it is given by law. Some countries do not have free speech laws.

You cannot compare it to Snowden's case. Snowden wanted to be a whistle blower, and he broke laws that protects government's secrets. That pales in comparison to what criminals do. Thet kill people, enslave people with narcotics, among other bad things.

 

[jamey910111]

Criminals do not deserve to have free speech. The law protects you only if you don't violate the law. The govt puts criminals in jail and they lose their freedom period.

You are thinking that free speech is a god given right. No it is not, it is given by law. Some countries do not have free speech laws.

You totally missed my point - i was merely saying that it doesn’t make sense for big criminal's to put no name criminals in jail. Furthermore, we dont know the underlying reasons of this news story. Anyway a lot of the evidence shows that twitter is the enabler of many western criminals, but i wonder why no one is concerned about that. But this is even worse, because those being tracked may not even be criminals, they may just not be to europe and us’s political liking - in that case this may not have anything to do with criminality. Snowden and assange are cases in point. I am just trying to reply via a discussion here that’s all.

 

[Victor M]

those being tracked may not even be criminals

Well if you believe the whole thing is a lie then anything is possible. But you need to provide some reasons and motive for this lie. Without giving any evidence that the governments are lying and hiding something, you really have nothing to say. All the good movies about conspiracies have some reasonable answer.

I will provide some material for you. US Govt has always been against private encryption. NSA proposed a Clipper chip on every computer that gives the government a back door to de-crypt privately encrypted messaging.. FBI has on another occasion asked Apple to de-crypt some private info on some alleged criminal's ipbone. And I remember Apple refused or said it was impossible. Other governments may have the same view ( you need evidence for this though) . China for instance prohibits strong private encryption and forbids or strongly regulate imports of such technology.