Comments on: Threats against Afghan blogger

By: » Blog Archive » BBC Sending Death-Threats? Or Just Blaming The Victim?

Fri, 20 Jan 2006 21:36:43 +0000

[...] Since none of this has deterred us, however, one enterprising al-Beeb staffer in Afghanistan now stands accused of resorting to more … um … drastic measures: “Sohrab Kabuli”, Afghan blogger and winner of the Freedom Blog Award for his Farsi blog, Shared Pains, has been getting death threats. […] Kabuli, who blogs in English as Afghan Lord under a pseudonym in order to protect himself, has received numerous threats posted to his blog from the same IP address which belongs – shockingly – to the BBC. [...]

By: gina

gina — Wed, 03 Aug 2005 18:06:20 +0000

i hope they catch the bast______ds

By: Misa

Misa — Sat, 30 Jul 2005 21:14:06 +0000

The fact the IP remained the same over however long is irellivent, as people have posted, the mentioned IP seems to be a gateway. most gateways on large networks i would imagine would keep the same ip so the network doesnt need reconfiguring everytime the IP changes. It wouldnt take much hassle to find out which computer (or which NIC at least) was assigned the ip at those times.

By: In the Bullpen » Terrorism News in Brief

In the Bullpen » Terrorism News in Brief — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 21:23:01 +0000

[...] Read up on the amazing case here and here (BBC Statement). Is it possible two Left-leaning media organizations in England employ the same enemy which has attacked England? Nah. That’s just silly. [...]

By: Daniel

Daniel — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 20:41:19 +0000

mikem:

You forgot “right-wing bloggers,” “likudniks,” etc.

Open Mind:

“It would not surprise me at all that a person, even a reporter, would not realize that IPs can be traced, though.”

Gold!

By: Emma Morrow

Emma Morrow — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 18:03:24 +0000

What are the chances that the same terrorist poster could obtain the identical DHCP address in posts weeks apart? Virtually none. Besides, even if it is dynamic, you know what time the posts were made, just get the service providers to determine the computer from the IP address at that time. It should be logged.

I have no doubt that it could be a BBC employee. Even in England the BBC is a hard Left, anti-Bush rag. Just imagine how much hate for freedom bloggers a BBC employee in the middle east must have.

By: monkeybrau

monkeybrau — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 17:54:17 +0000

If they know the IP address and the time of the post, it literally will take MINUTES to look at the DHCP or static IP logs on the BBC network. As a network administrator, I can tell you that this is something that shouldn’t take more than 5 minutes.

The network logs will show the “MAC” address of the computer/network adapter that connected to THAT IP at THAT TIME and is uniquely identifiable. They should be able to narrow down the PC that had this IP address on those dates and identify the person who used that PC.

Good luck and take care. I hope this person is exposed very soon.

By: Otis Wildflower

Otis Wildflower — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:47:07 +0000

Listen, even with DHCP/NAT, you have logs that tell you which system MAC address acquired which IP address, and when. So you can, if you have the desire and technical know-how, walk the cat back to at least a particular piece of hardware (since MAC addresses are hardware unique IDs for most desktop PCs/Macs). You can trace this thru ethernet switch logging, DHCP logging and firewall/NAT logging.

That is, if you have technical competence and have due diligence logging. I believe the BBC has that competence, but not necessarily the desire.

By: Open Mind

Open Mind — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:41:59 +0000

Well, where is the BBC reporter based? It may be that his locale has one assigned IP address, and it may be that he is the only BBC reporter there. That would explain why his IP would stay the same for so long.

Or not.

It would not surprise me at all that a person, even a reporter, would not realize that IPs can be traced, though. Plenty of smart people don’t realize that, so I wouldn’t use that as evidence either way.

By: Fides

Fides — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:39:51 +0000

Jim:

Racist! Your use of the term ‘black’ clearly indicates you do no understand whom you may hurt or slander, as I’m sure the Beeb will tell you. You consequential backpeddling doesn’t matter. ;)

By: Junyo

Junyo — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:30:12 +0000

IP addresses are logical addresses, not physical. On most large networks they are dynamically assignned, i.e. an address that belonged to a specific computer yesterday belongs to another today, and yet another tomorrow, this person kept the same IP for better than a month. Does the BBc use static IP’s or multi-month DHCP leases? Spammers and malicious hackers compromise networks all the time to generate unwanted traffic and/or attacks from a network with no connection to them other than poor security, so as Vann said someone outside the BBC could be taking advantage of a compromised network. Most firewalls make all of the traffic from a network look like it’s coming from a single address, and the address in question resolves to webgw0.mh.bbc.co.uk (which I’d guess is Web Gateway 0, a proxy or firewall server with dozens if not hundreds of users behind it).

I’m more than willing to believe the Beeb would employ a gutless terrorist sympathizer, but you need a little more evidence before you start naming names.

By: Jim Peterson

Jim Peterson — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:25:58 +0000

I should clarify: “black blogging” is the new term for blackballing the main stream media when they step over the line with certain articles and reports. We are determined to get our scalps. This time the scalp has to be the threatening BBC employee fired and behind bars.

By: Jim Peterson

Jim Peterson — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:23:13 +0000

My question is how long will it take before we black bloggers get another “take down” like Aslam?

You just got another Instalanche here. Will this get results? Will this become a major BBC scandal until the instigator is behind bars?

Inquiring minds want to know.

By: mikem

mikem — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:18:15 +0000

I have been following this story for well over 15 minutes and I’m trying to be fair. This has Karl Rove’s fingerprints all over it; blah. No terrorist sympathizer would ever be dumb enough to post a hateful, threatening email; blah. This is an attack on the unbiased BBC by partisan political operators; blah

By: Global Voices Online » Blog Archive » BBC statement on Afghan blogger threats

Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:17:15 +0000

[...] The Committee to Protect Bloggers recently received the following statement from the BBC in response to complaints by Afghan Blogger Sohrab Kabuli that somebody has been using a BBC computer to threaten him. The statement was sent by Mike Gardner, Head of Media Relations at BBC World Service: The BBC has met with Sohrab Kabuli – the pseudonym for the Afghan blogger – who alleges that offensive e-mails were sent from a BBC staff member in the Kabul office. [...]