Last week I wrote about a starving artist – not the usual kind, but one who is intentionally starving, i.e. staging a public hunger strike, to get the attention of the New Yorker magazine.
I found the story and his quote (“The last thing they want me to do is drop dead out here…then someone will look over the article with a fine tooth comb”) to be amusing – but please, please, aspiring media relations pros, don’t try this at home (or work)!
On a much more serious note, yesterday the New York Times wrote about “reputational attacks,” i.e. malicious penetration of a Website, especially the media, to plant false stories and/or retaliate about news coverage (see Hackings Rattle Media Companies). According to the article:
PBS fought… to restore the Web sites for… “Frontline” and “PBS NewsHour,” which were crippled by hackers who said they were angered by coverage of WikiLeaks. The incidents were the latest examples of what security experts call “reputational attacks” on media companies that publish material that the hackers disagree with. The PBS attack was said to be motivated by a “Frontline” film about WikiLeaks that was broadcast and published online on May 24…. When the anonymous hackers posted a fake news article on a PBS blog and published passwords apparently obtained from PBS servers late Sunday night, they attached complaints about the film, which was titled “WikiSecrets.” The PBS attack appeared to start with Sunday’s publication of a fake news article about the rapper Tupac Shakur being spotted alive in New Zealand. (He died in 1996.)
The article included a quote from Frontline Exectuvie Producer David Fanning:
“This is what repressive governments do,” he said. “This is what people who don’t want information out in the world do — they try to shut the presses.”
It is an excellent point and highlights how dangerous and evil this type of incident is; last week there was a lot of buzz regarding the Pentagon’s classification of hacking as a potential Act of War; in addition to the many other forms of hacking that can be destructive, messing with a free press is right up there, and supports the notion that hacking can be a good enough reason to go to war.
