Probably as a thank you for my 25 years of #OpenSource work, someone called the police on me and had be #SWAT'ed & #handcuffed while live-streaming t2 #Linux...
So (not so) fun fact: Keffals, who was targeted by KiwiFarms for being trans (yes that’s all) and got Swatted. She then went to stay with another streamer (EllenFromNowOn) in Northern Ireland. Just for information sake, Northern Ireland is still a bit rocky security wise, Police there still carry guns on the regular. So when she went there, Ellen called up the police and explained the situation to them (they had never heard of Swatting weirdly enough).
Sure enough, someone found her flat, posted her address (with a message referencing a Unionist Slogan, Ellen was from the Catholic Community), and sure enough, the police came. Instead of raiding her all guns blasing (which they normally would) they saw the warning, knocked on the door, saw nothing was wrong, called off the squaddies, and came in to basically make sure everything was okay.
Bare in mind, this was in Northern Ireland, a place where the Police still drive Armored cars and have regular riots, and they handled this better than the Police in London, Ontario.
As an American, this line short circuited my brain:
Police there still carry guns on the regular
I live in a quiet but growing suburban town that’s closer to rural areas than the nearest city. When I walk my kid to elementary school (how European of us, lol) the police officer working as a crossing guard for the kids still has their gun, taser, bulletproof vest, and all their other gear on.
And it’s not a school-specific thing. You just never see cops without their weapons here. Armed and armored is just part of the uniform, essentially.
Yeah the cops on this side of the pond are crazy, and their leadership staff tend to fall a lot further into the “complete psycho” side of the human spectrum.
Thanks for sharing that story though - the dichotomy is absolutely fucking wild, especially considering we’re talking about Northern Ireland.
Yeah, that’s definitely a quandary. But in the case of people who know they might be (or have been previously) targeted with that sort of bullshit, it’s a prudent precaution in the US (and Canada too, evidently)
Oh there’s several ways, especially if you have poor opsec. People used to raid people’s twitch accounts and bring down their internet connections by looking for their username on Skype which had a vulnerability which they could use to find a person’s IP.
For swatters on the otherhand, they tend to either know the streamer themselves or they tend to be groups like KiwiFarms who are a lot more organised and do a lot of research and detective work, like looking at the video, looking for usernames elsewhere, looking for emails, and looking for location clues. It’s really fucked up. They found Keffels’s Motel by the sheets in her room. It’s bad enough if you do not think about these things and just have sloppy OpSec, but even if you do, they can still find you.
The sheets in the motel room, that’s insane. A while back I read something like a stalker caught a reflection in someone’s eye at a train station, that’s horrific enough. But I would have thought being indoors is relatively safe. It is like impossible to put out video content at all without being vulnerable.
I mean, there were riots last month and then the last time I recall riots before then was 2019 when the journalist was shot. There might be more inbetween I’ve forgotten but a cadence of 5 years is more than the ~10 year cadence for mainland UK (which is culturally very similar). Sectarian tensions have died down in the past 20 years - my sister is currently in Belfast and loving it - but they still exist and have deep roots.
Keffals has a bit of a bad stink around her online presence. I think she claimed to be posting sex hormones to underage people at one point, without any kind of medical license. One of the ecelebs on the weirder side of the terminally online subculture.
Obviously no one should ever be swatted. Wanted to mention that she is somewhat controversial though as opposed to a regular activist.
So (not so) fun fact: Keffals, who was targeted by KiwiFarms for being trans (yes that’s all) and got Swatted. She then went to stay with another streamer (EllenFromNowOn) in Northern Ireland. Just for information sake, Northern Ireland is still a bit rocky security wise, Police there still carry guns on the regular. So when she went there, Ellen called up the police and explained the situation to them (they had never heard of Swatting weirdly enough).
Sure enough, someone found her flat, posted her address (with a message referencing a Unionist Slogan, Ellen was from the Catholic Community), and sure enough, the police came. Instead of raiding her all guns blasing (which they normally would) they saw the warning, knocked on the door, saw nothing was wrong, called off the squaddies, and came in to basically make sure everything was okay.
Bare in mind, this was in Northern Ireland, a place where the Police still drive Armored cars and have regular riots, and they handled this better than the Police in London, Ontario.
As an American, I read this, and it made me me want to cry
As an American reading this, I kept wondering when the mayhem and death would occur.
As an American I wondered when the police would be made the victims and the actual victim would either get shot or arrested and blamed.
As an American I got shot while reading this in my Home.
As an American, this line short circuited my brain:
I live in a quiet but growing suburban town that’s closer to rural areas than the nearest city. When I walk my kid to elementary school (how European of us, lol) the police officer working as a crossing guard for the kids still has their gun, taser, bulletproof vest, and all their other gear on.
And it’s not a school-specific thing. You just never see cops without their weapons here. Armed and armored is just part of the uniform, essentially.
The bullet proof vests really get me. They are so heavy and unlikely to be nessesary but some cops wear them ever day just to LARP.
One could argue the vests are like seat belts in a car. You don’t need them 99.9% of the time.
Ironic because it’s not unusual for cops to not wear seatbelts but they are more likely to die in a single vehicle accident than a gun fight.
Yeah the cops on this side of the pond are crazy, and their leadership staff tend to fall a lot further into the “complete psycho” side of the human spectrum.
Thanks for sharing that story though - the dichotomy is absolutely fucking wild, especially considering we’re talking about Northern Ireland.
How often are police tipped off before hand that someone is anticipating being SWATed though?
That situation is practically unheard of so it’s impossible to know how police in the US would respond.
Yeah, that’s definitely a quandary. But in the case of people who know they might be (or have been previously) targeted with that sort of bullshit, it’s a prudent precaution in the US (and Canada too, evidently)
How on earth are these psychos able to find streamers’ actual addresses?
In the US, property records are public records. Easy to find someone’s address online if you know their full name and the county they own property in.
Go try it!
Oh there’s several ways, especially if you have poor opsec. People used to raid people’s twitch accounts and bring down their internet connections by looking for their username on Skype which had a vulnerability which they could use to find a person’s IP.
For swatters on the otherhand, they tend to either know the streamer themselves or they tend to be groups like KiwiFarms who are a lot more organised and do a lot of research and detective work, like looking at the video, looking for usernames elsewhere, looking for emails, and looking for location clues. It’s really fucked up. They found Keffels’s Motel by the sheets in her room. It’s bad enough if you do not think about these things and just have sloppy OpSec, but even if you do, they can still find you.
The sheets in the motel room, that’s insane. A while back I read something like a stalker caught a reflection in someone’s eye at a train station, that’s horrific enough. But I would have thought being indoors is relatively safe. It is like impossible to put out video content at all without being vulnerable.
Regular riots in Northern Ireland. ?
I mean, there were riots last month and then the last time I recall riots before then was 2019 when the journalist was shot. There might be more inbetween I’ve forgotten but a cadence of 5 years is more than the ~10 year cadence for mainland UK (which is culturally very similar). Sectarian tensions have died down in the past 20 years - my sister is currently in Belfast and loving it - but they still exist and have deep roots.
A lot more regularly that they do in the rest of the UK.
In Northern Ireland?
Where did you hear that then ?
Keffals has a bit of a bad stink around her online presence. I think she claimed to be posting sex hormones to underage people at one point, without any kind of medical license. One of the ecelebs on the weirder side of the terminally online subculture.
Obviously no one should ever be swatted. Wanted to mention that she is somewhat controversial though as opposed to a regular activist.
what’s underage for hrt? like… 12?
Regardless of the drug, someone who isn’t a medical professional shouldn’t be mailing it to children.
Police in London, Ont are pretty bottom of the barrel if we’re being honest