Hackgate - Major Upcoming Events

Another quality article from a regular contributor, this time on what we can expect in the coming months.

As the Leveson Inquiry moves towards its conclusion of Module 3 (the Press and Politicians), there is almost a sense of its role as 'centre of attention' is beginning to devolve and disperse into other arenas as multiple court cases start, new ones are scheduled, imminent decisions made on charges, and more arrests are possible. Here is a round-up of some key Hackgate events to look out for.

Rebekah Brooks: sequencing charges and court appearances

Brooks first appearance at Crown Court happened on June 22nd.  Whilst each of her co-defendants are charged with a single related offence,  Rebekah Brooks is charged with 3 counts of conspiring to pervert the course of justice.  These charges refer to allegations of removing and concealing evidence of phone hacking at News International titles.  In addition, Brooks is waiting to hear if she is to be charged with offences under Operation Weeting (phone hacking) and Operation Elvedon (corruption of police and/or public officials). Scheduling  current or future court appearances will therefore be complex

Rebekah Brooks, the former News International chief executive, should know by the end of the summer whether she is to face further charges in relation to allegations of phone hacking and illegal payments to public officials.

The Crown Court ordered a plea and case management hearing for September 26th.

Glenn Mulcaire Supreme Court decision due any day

Glenn Mulcaire has case ongoing at the UK Supreme Court, against being ordered by the Court of Appeal to reveal the names of those commissioning him at News International.  Legally, the case is very complex. Mulcaire's legal team have argued that he does not have to reveal any information that is self-incriminating, but that is not true of phone hacking which might be legally deemed 'intellectual property'. If it is held that some intercepted phone messages were commercially sensitive and contained intellectual property, Mulcaire's case fails.  The Supreme Court hearing was May 7th and 8th, which resulted in Mulcaire losing the appeal.  It was however argued by his defence that the Supreme Court Decision was flawed. Mulcaire's defence team were given a brief period of a few days to prepare and present their counter-arguments, but this period was extended to take account of the cluster of May, June and Jubilee bank holidays.  To date, the Mulcaire case is stilled listed as 'Awaiting Judgement'.

Charging decisions due under Operation Weeting

Batches of case files have been sent in June to the Crown Prosecution Service for charging decisions.

Batch 1  11 June, relating to five journalists - (RIPA) Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (2000)

Batch 2  18 June, two journalists, RIPA

Batch 3  21 June, four journalists, RIPA

Batch 4  22 June, one  journalist and "one other individual", RIPA

Charging decisions on these June referrals will be made in due course.

Andy Coulson's appeal to require News International to pay his legal costs

This Appeal Court case should be scheduled soon, following Coulson being given leave to appeal on May 8th '12

Coulson's appeal centres on a severance agreement with News Group Newspapers on 26 January 2007, two days before he resigned as editor of the News of the World... (A previous court hearing) "ruled in December that a clause in the agreement covered only Coulson's "lawful duties" as editor and that allegations of criminal activity fell outside the scope of the contract."

High stakes indeed for Andy Coulson as he awaits more charging decisions under Operation Weeting and Operation Elvedon.

Andy Coulson: Procurator Fiscal to decide on trial for perjury

Coulson has already been charged with perjury in Operation Rubicon (Strathclyde Police investigation into the Tommy Sheridan/ News International perjury trial). Under Scots law, a decision will have to be made in the near future as to whether Coulson will stand trial following this charge.

Contempt of the House: Hinton, Crone and Myler

On 30 April '12, the House of Commons Select Committee (Culture, Media and Sport) published its report 'News International and Phone Hacking'.

It concluded that Les Hinton, Colin Myler and Tom Crone all misled the Select Committee with their evidence.

This resulted in a Commons debate (Column 990 onwards) on 22 May.  On behalf of the CMS Select Committee, its Chair John Whittindale moved that the House refer its outcomes to the Standards and Privileges Committee for appropriate action. Whittingdale's motion was carried.

Although Committees rarely take evidence on oath, the House of Commons 2011 guidance for witnesses giving evidence to Select Committees is clear. It states that witnesses are expected to answer fully, honestly and truthfully, and that "deliberately attempting to mislead a committee is a contempt of the House”.

In theory, contempt of the House could be punished by imprisonment or fine though these have not been imposed for many years. It is therefore arguable whether the ability to impose such sanctions should be deemed to have lapsed into disuse.  An alternative approbation is to be  summoned in person to the bar of the House, to be admonished by the Speaker.

The whole situation is going to be difficult for the Standards and Privileges Committee to resolve. Firstly, Hinton, Myler and Crone continue to deny contempt and stand by their testimony.  Secondly, Hinton and Myler are both now resident in the United States.  Parliament would naturally be loathe to see any - or all three - refuse to attend the House when summoned for admonishment, exposing Parliamentary powers as toothless.  Nevertheless, the Standards and Privileges Committee is duty bound to respond the the House's wishes at some point soon.

Ray Adams and allegations of corruption

On 31 May '12, the Metropolitan Police Service concluded its review of alleged police corruption which had impeded the original investigation into the murder of Stephen Lawrence.  It then made public its conclusion that there was no evidence that corruption shielded the killers of Stephen Lawrence, and that the force had given all relevant evidence to the 1998 Macpherson inquiry.

The Met released the findings of its review on Thursday, which began in March after allegations about corruption in the Lawrence case made in the Guardian and Independent. The claims centre on former Met commander Ray Adams, who was a senior officer in the south London area where Stephen was murdered, and former detective sergeant John Davidson, who was a senior detective on the first, flawed investigation into the racist killing. Adams and Davidson had been the subjects of internal corruption investigations, after which neither officer faced disciplinary or criminal charges. They retired on full police pensions and denied any wrongdoing. Adams, who left the force because of a bad back, went on to work at a Rupert Murdoch-owned company, NDS, in a senior security role.

The next day, despite the Met review conclusions, Home Secretary Theresa May made an announcement: 

A spokesman for the Home Office said: “The Home Secretary has asked for a QC-led review of the work the Metropolitan Police has undertaken into investigating claims of corruption in the original Stephen Lawrence murder investigation.

To date, no timescale has been given for the new review process.

Operation Baronet, the Surrey Police investigation into the hacking of Milly Dowler's phone

Assistant Chief Constable of Surrey Police, Jerry Kirkby, was due to conclude a final report for submission to Levson by the end of May.  A request to the Leveson Inquiry for an update resulted in the following response on 20 June:

The Inquiry is not covered by the Freedom of Information Act, as detailed here - http://www.levesoninquiry.org.uk/faqs/ - but will endeavour to conduct proceedings in an open and transparent manner.  Documents and information will be made available on the website during the course of the Inquiry, as appropriate and as they are referred to in the hearings.  Therefore it would not be appropriate for the Inquiry to comment on the questions you raise.

Given Lord Justice Leveson's commitment to transparency, there must be good reason to decline to release information - possibly to avoid prejudicing imminent legal action against those involved and/or failing to take action at the time.  More information on Operation Baronet can be found here.

Interesting times, watch this space...

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Hackgate for Beginners - Controversial Cops and News Corp.

[Back to The Leveson Inquiry]

During the Hackgate Scandal there have been a number of police officers linked to News Corp.  Here’s a few key names you might see popping up when following the Hackgate Scandal:

Andy Hayman – A former Chief Constable of Norfolk Constabulary and Assistant Commissioner for Specialist Operations at London's Metropolitan Police, resigning in December 2007 following allegations about expense claims and alleged improper conduct with a female member of the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) and a female sergeant.  After his resignation he would face criticism, along with Sir Ian Blair, from the press and Independent Police Complaints Commission over the shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes.

During Operation Caryatid, the investigation into the interception of phone messages at Clarence House by journalists from the News of the World, the officer in charge of the investigation reported to Andy Hayman.  Hayman told the Home Affairs Select Committee in July 2011 that he had met with News International executives during the investigation, something he considered as not unusual as it would have been odd if he had cancelled the dinner.

The Guardian reported that some police sources said it was “unfortunate” that Andy Hayman went on to work for News International as a columnist for The Times, where even with his knowledge of Operation Caryatid he wrote that there were “perhaps a handful” of hacking victims.

John Yates - A former Assistant Commissioner in the London Metropolitan Police Service, who resigned in July 2011 over criticism of a July 2009 review of Operation Caryatid, in which he decided in one 8 hour sessions that there was no fresh material that could lead to convictions. 

John Yates began to receive criticism when the House of Commons home affairs committee began to look into the way in which the review had been carried out, with a number of statements made by John Yates about the review were contradicted by the evidence of the director of public prosecutions, Keir Starmer.  He received further criticism when it was revealed that he, Sir Ian Blair, Andy Hayman, and Paul Stephenson had attended a number of meals with representative from various News International newspaper titles around the time of the review. 

In a July 9^th 2011 interview with the Sunday Telegraph he expressed “extreme regret” for failing in the initial phone hacking inquiry, but dismissed any suggestion of corruption or improper relationships on his part.  On July 18^th 2011 he announced his resignation in a brief statement.

In May 2012 a report into phone hacking by the House of Commons select committee found that John Yates and Keri Starmer were culpable for failing to properly investigate evidence of phone hacking when it was first brought to their attention during the Operation Caryatid investigation.  The report concluded: "The police at that time had no interest or willingness to uncover the full extent of the phone-hacking which had taken place."

Paul Stephenson – The former Metropolitan Police Commissioner, who resigned after questions were asked about his relationship with former News International journalist Neil Wallis, who was arrested in July 2011 as part of Operation Weeting.

Paul Stephenson first met Wallis in 2006 during his time at the News of the World, and hired Neil Wallis to provide “strategic communication advice and support” to the Metropolitan Police on a part time basis from October 2009 to September 2010 while the Met's Deputy Director of Public Affairs was on extended sick leave.  Among other things this involved advising the assistant commissioner at the time, John Yates, who had recently reviewed Operation Caryatid in July 2009.

Questions about Neil Wallis’s relationship with the Metropolitan Police began went it emerged that he had worked for the police.  It was revealed that Paul Stephenson had met or dined with Neil Wallis on eight separate occasions between 2006 and 2010, more than any senior executive or journalist on any other newspapers, and that he had accepted £12,000-worth of hospitality at a health spa for which Wallis worked as a PR consultant, and where Rebekah Brooks’ husband Charlie Brooks runs an alternative medicine "kriotherapy" centre.

On July 14^th 2011 Neil Wallis was arrested as part of Operation Weeting, and on July 17^th 2011 Paul Stephenson made a lengthy statement announcing his intention to resign as commissioner, saying that questions surrounding his integrity would otherwise become detrimental to the Met as a whole.

Ray Adams – A former Metropolitan police commander who left the Metropolitan Police and joined the News Corp owned subsidiary NDS UK Ltd after a brief stint at Kroll. 

In July 1987 Adams was being interviewed by police corruption investigators when his close associate DC Alan “Taffy” Holmes shot himself.  DC Holmes was the corrupt police officer who Michael Gillard and Laurie Flynn claim in their book on police corruption “The Untouchables” had been working with the recently murdered Daniel Morgan to expose claims of police corruption that possibly involved passing information to the News of the World.

Later on Ray Adams would be involved with the Stephen Lawrence murder inquiry, and the Macpherson report into the Lawrence murder detailed suspicions held by the Lawrence family about Adam’s alleged links with Clifford Norris, the father of one of Lawrence’s murderers David Norris, and Kenneth Noye, also noting that Adams’ evidence had “strange features” to it.

In March 2012 BBC Panorama claimed that Ray Adams had worked closely with a hacker, Lee Gibling, to set up the website The House of Ill-Compute (THOiC), which was intended to gather cable and satellite hackers to one site run by Lee Gibling, and therefore under the control of Ray Adams.  Lee Gibling claimed that Ray Adams provided him with software and instructions to hack their major rival ONDigital.  Those claims were supported by documents passed on to Panorama.

Later Lee Gibling would also allege that Ray Adams used information from the THOiC website to strong arm a number of cable and satellite companies into giving up internal operational security to NDS UK Ltd, claiming that hacks on THOiC showed those companies weren’t providing adequate security to protect BSkyB’s revenue, and that unless they handed over their operational security operations to NDS BSkyB would remove their channels from those companies.  Once NDS took over operational security they used the information from THOiC to arrest various individuals hacking those companies.

[Index]

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Visualised Connections Between Operation Russia and Others Involved With Hackgate

Something Awful forum member Firing Cirrus has been working on a visual representation of links between individuals, groups, and investigations described in my earlier post on Operation Russia, which relates to a large number of figures, past and present, involved with the wider Hackgate Scandal.

In the below chart individuals are marked in red, groups and organisations in green, police operations in blue, and government reports in yellow.  Firing Cirrus explains how to read the chart:

This graph, unlike the previous ones is directional. By that, I mean that a tie between two nodes tells us information about the nodes, beyond just being connected. For example, John Yates links to Operation Russia and Operation Russia links to Ray Adams. By this, I'm aiming to indicate that John Yates is the investigator and Ray Adams is the investigated. There are other directional arrows such as employment etc. On top of this there are dotted lines indicating an alleged connection between people.

 You can read the full story on Operation Russia here.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Operation Russia - Corruption and Controversy

Another reader contribution, this time covering Operation Russia, the investigation into police corruption with links to Ray Adams, the murders of Daniel Morgan and Stephen Lawrence, and much more:

In March 1987, Daniel Morgan was savagely murdered. Allegedly, he was silenced to prevent him taking his knowledge of a network of corrupt Met police to the News of the World's Alex Marunchak. Daniel's business partner, Jonathan REES was suspected of his murder.  

Also in that Spring of 1987, a very secret police operation commenced - OPERATION RUSSIA. Its aim was to investigate organised police corruption in London - particularly in South East London where the Daniel Morgan murder occurred. Intelligence pointed to corruption amongst those who themselves were tasked with pursuing the most serious crimes, such as high-level organised drug suppliers. It was believed that corruption between serious criminals and detectives was allowing both to prosper financially, and protect each other in close collusion.

OPERATION RUSSIA was interested in Commander Ray ADAMS. In 1987, soon after he took over as head of the Metropolitan Police's criminal intelligence branch, SO11, it was announced that Mr Adams was the subject of a corruption inquiry after a criminal alleged improper financial links with informants.

Adams's close associate, DC Alan "Taffy'' Holmes shot himself dead on 27 July , 1987, on the eve of Adams being interviewed by corruption investigators. Holmes had been interviewed twice, and was expected to face further questioning.

According to a South London detective Derek Haslam (himself somewhat controversial) 

Daniel's best contact in the south London police was Detective Constable Alan 'Taffy' Holmes.... Haslam claims Taffy Holmes and Daniel were getting ready to blow the whistle just before the private detective was killed...At the time of the murder, Taffy Holmes was serving on the Brinks Mat investigation.

Commander ADAMS was based at East Dulwich, local to Catford, Eltham etc. It was home of the South East Regional Crime Squad ('SERCS'or '9SERCS'), Detective Sid FILLERY from Catford police station, was initially tasked investigating Daniel Morgan's murder - without declaring his own close business links with the chief murder suspect, Jonathan REES. FILLERY's alleged destruction of evidence has scuppered all attempts to convict any suspect for Daniel's killing. 

One of the chief suspects in the Brinks-Mat robbery was Kenneth Noye - a known, violent criminal.  Noye was rumoured to be a registered police informant too, possibly as a way of getting rid of rivals. It has been suggested that Noye's police 'handler' was Ray ADAMS.

During his trial in 1985 for the murder of Det Con John Fordham - of which he was acquitted - evidence emerged that Noye had told the officer in charge of the Brink's-Mat robbery investigation, Brian Boyce, to ring a fellow officer named Ray Adams. Adams, Noye had suggested, would say he was "not a violent man or a killer". Mr Adams, who later became a commander of Scotland Yard's intelligence branch, is understood to have been one of Noye's police handlers

Another criminal informer allegedly 'handled' by Ray ADAMS was Clifford Norris.  In 1993, in Eltham, teenager Stephen Lawrence was murdered in a racist attack. Clifford Norris's son - David - was quickly identified to police, by multiple local people, as one of the perpetrators.  Clifford Norris, with his a fearsome criminal reputation, may have helped destroy vital evidence and have assisted his son David by coaching him in what to say (or not say) in police interviews. The Lawrence family suspected police corruption in the way the initial arrests were delayed.

In the 1999 Macpherson Report, the botched Lawrence investigation was criticised heavily. The Met was branded institutionally racist, and the delays which allowed crucial evidence destruction castigated. One police officer in particular, John Davidson, was deemed to have delayed arrests - though corruption was not proven.  However, there is also in the MacPherson Report a substantial section (chapter 31) devoted to the actions of Ray ADAMS. His strange intervention, via a letter to the Lawrence family, was questionable.  "On the same morning, Mr Adams left the police force never to return. He was ordered to go off sick with a bad back. He retired the following August. He later joined the international investigators, Kroll Associates, as did another senior officer in the Lawrence inquiry, former detective chief superintendent William Illsley."

After his time with Kroll, ADAMS went on to controversial News Corporation employment at NDS.

Meanwhile, OPERATION RUSSIA continued, led by John YATES.  It included investigating the Met's own anti-corruption operations, themselves dogged with allegations of illegality.  For example, questions were raised about an Operation Nightshade by Andrew Mackinley MP in 2000. A constituent of his, a Met detective suspected of corruption, had complained that he had been illegally bugged and recorded:

During the dinner conversation it was mentioned that that day's news had referred to the cross-examination that had taken place during the Macpherson inquiry into the death of Stephen Lawrence. Counsel for the Lawrences, Michael Mansfield, had cross-examined the controversial senior police officer, Ray Adams, about senior Metropolitan police officer relationships with the Norris family or clan.... I want to halt Commander [Andy] HAYMAN's  dilatory and partial handling of my constituent's serious complaints of wrongdoing...Commander HAYMAN should have investigated my constituent's complaints... he invited me to have a security briefing, but I declined, because I thought that such an approach was wholly improper.

OPERATION RUSSIA did net some high-profile convictions, for offences e.g. drug dealing, such as Met detectives Duncan Hanrahan and Tom Kingston. They were both also implicated in OPERATION NIGERIA: the covert bugging of Jonathan REES and Sid FILLERY's  private detective agency, Southern Investigations. Both Hanrahan and Kingston had been supplying Southern Investigations with information illegally obtained from sources such as the Police National Computer.

Ray ADAMS has recently cropped up again in May 2012 in relation to allegations that evidence of police corruption in the Stephen Lawrence case had been deliberately withheld by Scotland Yard. The evidence surrounds "Ray Adams, and whether the Met passed information to the Macpherson inquiry about its investigations into him, may be more likely to increase the pressure on the home secretary, Theresa May, to call a second inquiry."

OPERATION RUSSIA, and its somewhat familiar names, may well be about to come under even closer scrutiny.

UPDATE - As per this post there's now a visual representation of the above information links:

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Lee Gibling - Ray Adams Used THOIC to Strongarm Cable Companies Into Giving Up Their Operational Security

Following on from his earlier posts on THOIC and NDS Lee Gibling popped up on Something Awful and said the following:

Well at some point of time it is bound to surface so i would rather give the facts up right now.

if you recall, i posed a question to Brown Moses, somewhat tongue in cheek, "Why would Operational Security aka NDS UK require the resources of a top team of investigators and Agents plus many paid informants when their media they were solely charged with protecting was to be blunt as safe as the Bank of England in terms of piracy".

More salient was where this budget to fund the Mad Hatters Tea Party was going to come from in lieu of Israel controlling the purse strings.

With no activity on a day-to-day basis for the operational team sitting in Maidenhead cutbacks at every corner were looking likely ultimately misplacing the talent Ray in his team had built up over the course of his tenure as head of Operational Security.

Never to be outdone, Ray came up with a magical plan.

The cable companies with their Sky TV lineup were in respect of set-box security running autonomous outside of NDS operational security. NDS UK were protecting card piracy - cable boxes used no card.

Selective hacks and pirates for cable boxes were to be cultured and made available on THOiC and the resulting impact was then delivered by a series of visits to the Cable bosses.

Ultimately Ray won his battle to retain the use of UK Operational Security personnel to take over the battle against what was presented as "blanket piracy" in their industry. I know the words used in the meetings with the Cable bosses as Ray had me write the study paper on his behalf.

Before long, the department had secured full time jobs for both Len Withall and Chris Le Maitre, both whom enjoyed the spoils of "rounding up" the same pirates that had been lured to share their spoils via THOiC.

The budget secured!

Did Israel know - I do not think so but Ray had bosses so go figure.

 You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Lee Gibling Answers Some Questions About THOIC and NDS

Recently Lee Gibling has been in contact with me, and offered to fill in some of the gaps in the earlier investigation of his ICQ logs and Ray Adams' emails.  As I posted earlier, they showed that Lee Gibling worked for a company called AIM who were working on behalf of NDS competitor MindPort/Irdeto at the same time as he was working for NDS on the THOIC website project, and Lee offered to filled in some of the details that were missed.  First he talked about the Panorama programme Murdoch's TV Pirates:

Panorama touched on very little; air time is expensive and litigation from unsubstantiated talk can be dangeous.

I placed a lot of trust in Panorama and this was not displaced. All they went with was 100% but yes, a lot of questions remain unanswered.

Some people say that this is a decade old and it is old hat but if you think the mobile hacking is big business then be prepared to see the hat blown off of News Corp

On Digital was only the one company featured in Panorama that through NDS design I brought to their knees, but under their instruction and that includes on-digital we took on anything we wanted which included the whole UK cable industry.

Many thousands of jobs were lost indirectly as a result of actions made from NDS UK what was called Operational Security at Ray Adams headquarters in Maidenhead and it needs to be brought to account.

My respects go to Milly Dowler family.

He added there was much more filmed for the Panorama programme

The Panorama interview was a single "take" with Vivian. Yes, they condensed the programme to 30 minutes but the interview at one location went well over 2-1/2 hours and covered much that the Producers did not have time to consider as part of the programme. Will there be a Part II aired?  Maybe.

 Then he went on to provide more information about the AIM/MindPort/Irdeto situation:

To set some records straight - afterall many of you have invested much energy into piecing the jigsaw together, Andy Coulthurst is NOT a hacker but a full employee/technician at NDS UK. The other AC that is mentioned in email/ICQ is Andrew Curle who was at the time head of operations at Mindport/Irdeto.

I can also reveal as this is in the public domain albeit not surfaced (surprisingly) that Barry Watters was employed by Sky as a consultant and enjoyed office space at Sky.

Yes, he was seconded to Mindport on a very lucrative retainer, however, I do not believe that Sky knew this. Martin Gallagher of course knew I worked for Ray Adams, as did Barry Watters. I did communicate directly with Andrew Curle and was retained by AIM all of which was known and engineered by Ray Adams. Did NDS Israel (the top chain) know of this arrangement?  Of course they did. It's important to outline that NDS UK operational security had their budget contributions from Sky and Israel plus contributions were made to it by Ray Adam's opposite number in the Pacific Region and Asia which would be Avigail Gutman. Hence the reporting line involved many people although ultimately the buck and call was with Reuven Hasak in Israel. 

And explained how he came into contact with Ray Adams in the first place

Contact was made with Ray Adams via an Agent (employee) meeting at my home in Essex at the time. Thereafter, the same week i was introduced to Ray Adams at his offices in Maidenhead. Bit like visiting Father Christmas at Harrods .

He also gave more information on the subscriptions for THOIC that were discussed in the emails

There was NEVER any monies taken on THOiC - that would have detracted from the whole BDS ethos of using the community as a medium to either attract talented members and/or a complete audience when used to farm out information or media.

Yes, a handful of closed areas where in operation all of which were under control and instruction by NDS personnel who used pseudonyms during their online time on the forum. 

 He went on to pose this question

Why would such a significant operational security department (at great cost) be needed for the UK/Europe regions when the Sky [digital] card itself was not at risk of being compromised?

He also explained the situation with new accusations:

While I was in the UK last week or so I was introduced to Ian Gallagher of the Mail on Sunday. The introduction was made via Max Clifford. We were all set to reveal so much (far more than the Panorama programme), information that I believe will set the record straight once and for all.

The content would have been explosive however, the Mail on Sunday decided they could not follow through. I am not sure ANY newspaper under the current regime would have the balls to print. 

He also mentioned Hairymonster/FR15K

I do know that after all this time, (and I do not take kindly to blanket dismissals from Israel), that Hairy Monster holds some important collaborational evidence that between us working together can deliver a rock solid testimonial to the Leveson Enquiry.

At this present time, my solicitor (Mark Lewis) has not been contacted in respect of tribunal requests. 

 You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

All 14659 Ray Adams emails Leaked Online

While digging through various forums I've come across this post on the Digital Spy forums which links to a zip file of what appears to be 14659 emails from Ray Adams' computer, much more than have already been published by Austlian Financial Review.

They've been split into 4 folders, Inbox, Sent, To Ok and Deleted, and appear to represent the emails covering 1997 to 2002.  While it's impossible to verfiy if these are all genuine I've spot checked some of the new emails and they do seem to be legitimate.

As News Corp has already lawyered up and taken some emails offline it's possible these files will be deleted at some point in the near future.

You can view my earlier posts on Ray Adams here.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Ray Adams, Tron, Chaos Club, and a Curious Journalist

This was a curious sequence of emails, starting first of all with a freelance journalist Burkhard Schröder trying to contact Ray Adams through one of his colleagues:

From: burks@BURKS.de [mailto:burks@BURKS.de]
Sent: 25 May 1999 11:09
To: gyampolsky@ndsisrael.com
Subject: Boris Floricic


Hallo, Berlin-Kreuzberg 25.05.99

I would like to get into contact to Mr. Ray Adams. I am a free lancer in
Berlin, Germany, and writing a book about Boris Floricic alias "Tron". Mr.
Adams should know a lot about this difficult subject.

Sincerely Burkhard Schröder

This seems to have immediately rang alarm bells

From: Yampolsky, Gerry (UK)
Sent: Tuesday, May 25, 1999 1:09 PM
To: Grant, Mal
Subject: FW: Boris Floricic
Importance: High


talk about suspicious

And was passed from one man to another

From: Grant, Mal
Sent: 26 May 1999 21:51
To: Adams, Ray
Subject: FW: Boris Floricic
Importance: High


Ray,

As discussed.

Mal

Until it eventually reached Ray Adams, who sent out an unusual message

From: Adams, Ray
To: cyberdyne@euro1.com
Date: 5/27/1999 10:23:00 PM
Subject: FW: Boris Floricic

Would you ask your friends at the CHAOS club if they want me to speak to
this journalist.

Ray Adams

The CHAOS Club was a group of German hackers Boris Floricic aka Tron, belonged to, and one of their members, with the email address cyberdyne@euro1.com, replied:

From: Marc [mailto:cyberdyne@euro1.com]
Sent: 27 May 1999 14:28
To: Adams, Ray
Subject: Re: FW: Boris Floricic

At 12:22 27.05.99 +0100, you wrote:

>Would you ask your friends at the CHAOS club if they want me to speak to
>this journalist.
>
>Ray Adams

he also contacted me
everybody ignores him at the moment cause boris parent's
did not want him to write anything at the moment. so in respect
to his parents i also ignore him more or less.

regards
marc

It should be noted there's no evidence to suggest anyone else in the Chaos Club but cyberdyne@euro1.com was contacted by Ray Adams.   Acting on his advice Ray ignores him

From: Adams, Ray
To: Marc
Date: 5/28/1999 12:49:16 AM
Subject: RE: FW: Boris Floricic
Tell your friends at the Chaos Club that I will also ignore him.

Ray

But pretty soon the journalist contacts Ray Adams directly

From: burks@BURKS.de [mailto:burks@BURKS.de]
Sent: 01 June 1999 16:37
To: radams@ndsuk.com
Subject: Tron


Hallo Ray Adams Berlin-Kreuzberg 01.06.99

I am writing a book about Boris Floricic. You knew him, and I got a lot of
informations about this theme, also about NDS. We should talk a little bit
about the circumstances of your "friendship" :-) with Tron.

I know something about your statement to Berlin's police. I am also very
intersted in all informations about Andreas Helm und Michael Kallmeier.

Please contakt me by phone +49 +30 6183387, 0172 382 9895 or - better - by
e-mail burks@burks.de

The book: "Burkhard Schröder: "Tron - Tod eines Hackers", Reinbek
(Rowohlt) 1999

Burkhard Schröder

Ray Adams replied, and also forwarded the message onto Marc:

From: Adams, Ray
To: cyberdyne@euro1.com
Date: 6/2/1999 8:47:30 AM
Subject: FW: Tron

To see.

-----Original Message-----

From: Adams, Ray
Sent: 01 June 1999 22:47
To: 'burks@BURKS.de'
Subject: RE: Tron

Hi

I heard that you have been asking about me. You should have approached me
direct in the first place.

So telephone me on ++ 44 385 313857.

First tell me a little about yourself. I have worked with many journalists
over the years. What have you written?. Are you any good?. What is
your angle? etc. You know the sort of thing. In the meantime I am making
my own enquiries of you so the quicker you respond the quicker we get on.

There is no need to put inneuendo in inverted commas I am a very
straightforward and respectable person.

Ray

So the journalist replies, answering Ray's questions, and asking some of his own:

From: burks@BURKS.de [mailto:burks@BURKS.de]
Sent: 02 June 1999 12:06
To: RAdams@ndsuk.com
Subject: Re: Tron


Hallo Ray Adams,

nice to meet you. :-

>First tell me a little about yourself.

Please look at: http://www.burks.de/english.html

>What have you written?.

Ten books, mostly about the extreme right szene in germany, one about
heroin, I will publish a novel next year. There is a link to an article of
the New York Times (in english) about me. Look on my page http://
www.burks.de/burks.html. Numerous articles about everything.

>What is your angle? etc. You know the sort of thing. In
>the meantime I am making my own enquiries of you so the quicker you
>respond the quicker we get on.

The police does not work any more. They rely on the medical expertise
which concluses: suicid. I am able to disprove this expertise to argue
further.

I know something about your connection to Tron. BTW: NDS is not very
suspcious. :-) Only a little bit :-)), because Jossi Zuriel has been
talking a little bit bullshit some days after Tron disappeared. I have a
fax which proves this. You met Boris twice at Kempenski and Hilton. You
offered a job to him, I have been told. What happened exactly? How do you
get to know about him? Tron's mother supposes too that you visited Tron at
his home.

I also have the delivery note from NDS to Tron. IF I know exactly what he
got from NDS, I would be able to check better out on which he was working
in the last weeks of his life.

Do you know Andreas Helm and Michael Kallmeier? They are VERY suspicious.

Tron mets two guys (not young) at saturday, after he left the house of his
mother. He has been seen entering a car from Belgium, I have been told.

I am interested in "Joy" and/or "Alfredo" and everything Boris told you
about his "blocker"-deals.

BTW: I have rough informations about the products NDS is working on and
about your job visiting young hackers in Europe.

>I am a very straightforward and respectable person.

Why not. I'm impressed. You worked for Scotland Yard, isn't it? What about
using PGP?

Greetz from Berlin

BurkS

Ray replies, and yet again forwards it's to Marc

From: Adams, Ray
To: cyberdyne@euro1.com
Date: 6/3/1999 4:39:26 AM
Subject: FW: Tron

-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: 02 June 1999 14:38
To: 'burks@BURKS.de'
Subject: RE: Tron

Some of what you say is familiar.

Boris was bright. Such people come to notice. NDS offers sponsorship at
University and possible employment therefater. This is normal business
practice.

The package that was sent to Boris was totally innocent. It was a couple
of chips for his University project. He could only buy them if he
purchased 100 at a time and as he only needed a couple I sent them to him.
They were ordinary off the shelf products.

I do not know anyone called Zuriel.

If you have evidence that Boris died other than by suicide I would assist
you all I am able. However, at the end of the day you must work with
Police on such matters. Are you interested in Justice or just a story?

There is nothing suspicious about NDS or the contact with BORIS. It was
open and normal.

You are wrong about visiting the Kempinsky hotel twice. It was once.

As for names of people I would like to know what you intend doing with any
information on such people. Are you suggesting that they were behind the
death of Boris? I have no such knowledge.

I still do not know what it is you are attempting to do. If I have any
information to establish that anyone killed Boris then I would give it to
the Police and not to you. What makes you think that I would do otherwise.

Rayt

The journalist replies with some questions that probably aren't the best for winning over Ray Adams

From: burks@BURKS.de
Sent: 02 June 1999 23:21
To: RAdams@ndsuk.com
Subject: Re: Tron

Hallo Radams,
NDS sponsorship at University and possible employment
therefater.

What kind of employment? What did he think about beeing employed in
UK?
This is normal business practice.
I know. I asked: How did you get into contact? Did you read about
him? Your informants?
The package that was sent to Boris was totally innocent. It
was a couple of chips for his University project.
That seems to be not true, because he finished this project some months ago. Don't pull my legs. Someone described this PICs to me. May be basic chips to decrypt PayTV. I am not sure. What kind of chips exactly, please?

if he purchased 100 at a time and as he only needed a couple I sent them to him. They were ordinary off the shelf products.
And why did you send this chips? Because of friendship? Didn't he say for what he need this chips?

I do not know anyone called Zuriel.

Then you will learn something about NDS now. I got this Fax from Jerusalem, some months ago:

I have meanwhile learned that they are mainly a pay T.V. company and that they have no connection with Defence sources in Israel...Finally I went to Jerusalem and in the company's offives found the deputy gegeral director who tried to convince me to talk to the company's spokeswoman in London...The Deputy Manager, Mr. Jossi Zuriel, admitted that he knew that Boris Floricic has disappeard 4 days ago but he did not know, till I told him, that he was found dead - hanging from a tree. How did he know about his disapperence? From the Internet on which hackers who break into the Internet, mentioned that he has disappeared. He claims he has no idea about the Lieferschein and chip and is trying to make contact with the company's president in London.

If you have evidence that Boris died other than by suicide I would assist you all I am able. However, at the end of the day you must work with Police on such matters.
Very soon, the police will close all their files. They announced it last
week: Suicid. And I don't believe it.

Are you interested in Justice or just a story?
I will get 5000 $ for the book and have to work six months. That is the
answer.

There is nothing suspicious about NDS or the contact with BORIS. It
was open and normal.
Sure. :-) Why did Markus Kuhn, Cambridge, work for NDS some times ago?

You are wrong about visiting the Kempinsky hotel twice. It was once.
Yes. The second time it was the Hilton, I was told. Or in reverse order.

As for names of people I would like to know what you intend doing with any information on such people. Are you suggesting that they were behind the death of Boris?
Not behind. They know something they did not tell the police. May be, they know who was interested to meet to Boris at saturday (the day he disappearde). He has been seen after he left his mother's home...

give it to the Police and not to you. What makes you think that I would do otherwise.
The police is not interested. I was told that you went to the police in Berlin. I will force the police to be interested in some aspects. There a some aspects of your headhunting-job which I am interested in too.
(Please excuse my bad english). I give NDS a fair chance to talk about the connection between the company and Boris. Why don't you encrypt your e-mail?

Greetz
BurkS

Ray is unimpressed with the line of questioning

Nachricht vom 03.06.99 weitergeleitet
Ursprung : burks@burks.de
Ersteller: RAdams@ndsuk.com
Your information about the chips I supplied is totally inaccurate. I do not like your insulting comments.
When he was sent the chips he was in the process of making his hardware device for his university project. I know the dates. You are wrong. If you are wrong about such a simple thing then you are probably wrong about other things. I do not lie and have no reason to lie.
Besides, I do not see how the questions you are asking can assist the Police to pursue what you are allegeing as to the cause of his death.

Again there is no one in NDS named Zuriel.

NDS does not need a fair chance in you book investigation as NDS has done absolutely nothing wrong. We have nothing to hide.

I have provided the Police will a full account of our dealings with Boris. They
were open and innocent.

As for pgp I have no reason to hide what I am saying.
Ray

Unfortuantly at that point there appears to be a break in emails, which continues when the journalist sends another email, this time in German, and which Ray Adams forwards to Marc

From: Adams, Ray
To: cyberdyne@euro1.com
Date: 8/2/1999 11:49:00 PM
Subject: FW: at once

-----Original Message-----
From: burks@BURKS.de [mailto:burks@BURKS.de]
Sent: 02 August 1999 12:00
To: radams@ndsuk.com
Subject: at once


Hallo Ray Adams Berlin-Kreuzberg 02.08.99

Ich habe Ihre Infos positiv verifizieren können. Dabei erfuhr ich, dass
sie angeblich Holländer seien und Deutsch verstünden.

Offenbar waren die Devices für ein Projekt Trons bestimmt, eine
Entschlüsselungsmaschine zu bauen. Er ist aber nicht sehr weit damit
gekommen.

Den Bericht der Yedioth Achronoth habe ich unter "grober Unfug"
eingeordnet. Ich habe ihn mir übersetzen lassen.

Ich habe starke Indizien für Suizid sammeln können, obwohl die Details
noch dubios sind. Aber sie werden ja schon darüber Bescheid wissen, da
einer meiner Informanten in engem Kontakt zu ihnen stehen soll. :-)

In diesem Sinne...

Gruss Burks

And translated via Google Translate

Hello Ray Adams Berlin-Kreuzberg 08.02.99

I can verify your information positively. And I learned that
Dutch and German are they supposed to understand.

Apparently, the devices were intended for a project Trons, a
To build decoding machine. He is not very far with it
came.

The report by the Yedioth Achronoth I'm in "utter nonsense"
classified. I have to translate it myself.

I was able to gather strong evidence of suicide, although the details
are still dubious. But they are indeed already know about it, because
is one of my informants are in close contact with them. :-)

In this sense ...

Gruss Burks

And after that there's one more email, again copied to Marc:

From: Adams, Ray
To: cyberdyne@euro1.com
Date: 8/3/1999 3:46:10 AM
Subject: FW: at once

To see

What is this that he did work for PMK - I do not believe it.

ray

-----Original Message-----
From: burks@BURKS.de [mailto:burks@BURKS.de]
Sent: 02 August 1999 18:15
To: RAdams@ndsuk.com
Subject: Re: at once


Hallo Radams,
You wrote:

>As you know my German is not very good.

I did not know that. Sorry.

>He was not a threat or a problem to us.

I know this. He was only a problem for Irdeto. :-)

>His death was very sad. The Police are convinced that it was
>suicide. I do not have any information to the contrary.

They will finish the investigations very soon.

> My own personal view was that if Boris did commit suicide
> then there must have been a heavy pressure on him.

Did you know that he got dyslexia?

>I had the impression that he would establish the truth.

I do not share this impression.

>I know that Boris was in touch with Dutch and Belgian people.

Especially with "Joy", Eurosat Electronics, Kermst. http://209.215.141.2.
Boris also worked for Paul Maxwell-King sometimes. You should know this.
:-))

>The connection was to do with the hack of the Irdeto
>company products.

Boris sold some variations of the Irdeto-Hack.

>This is nothing to do with NDS.

Sure.

Burks

So, it's clear Ray Adams had a close relationship with one individual who claims to be a member of the Chaos Club, and the journalist had plenty of questions about NDS and their relationship with Tron, although it's interesting to note Ray Adams' surprise Tron was possibly working for PMK.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

More on Ray Adams and His Control of THOIC

Following on from my earlier post about Ray Adams and the hacking group THOIC Something Awful forum member Nation has come up with yet another very interesting email where Ray Adams discusses THOIC

RFC Headers:

From: Gutman, Avigail
To: Adams, Ray
Date: 12/9/1999 2:47:06 AM
Subject: RE:
-----------------------------
Ray -- I agree that we need to get exclusivity with him.

I would like to speak to Reuven, to increase my budget for next year so as to include part of his maintenance. What do you think?

I know Len is trying to help Lee manage his time better. One of the things I think Lee needs is a periodical "bigger picture" view, which will enable him to shift his focus according to our changing priorities... I would be happy to sit with him on some of these - if and when you think that would be appropriate.

Another thing that perhaps Andy can help him with is "automation" of certain routines he goes through. I don't know if he is open to this or not - but with the long-term relationship view in mind - this could save on time and resources....

Regards

Avigail


-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: Wednesday, December 08, 1999 5:17 PM
To: Gutman, Avigail
Subject: RE:


No need to phone. I handled it. I said that English is not your
first language and that you are also under tremendous pressure with a
heavy workload and no one to assist you. I told him to consider
himself as your assistant.

We need to speak soon about making Lee totally and exclusively ours
and the budget that is needed. This month he cost me £5,000 out of
my budget for his retainer and a new computer and a 21" monitor.
This is very high but it gives an indication of the type of costs we
can run into. TEL is paying him something like £1,500 a month. We
will need to get the TEL part from somewhere else to bring him fully
in- house. I have thought of making him an NDS employee and thereby
subject to an NDA.

Anyway I would appreciate your thoughts. Also think of this.
Until now he has developed THOIC in design and content on his own with
nudges from me. We need to look critically at what THOIC is and dose
and see if it needs to change.

ray



-----Original Message-----
From: Gutman, Avigail
Sent: 08 December 1999 15:04
To: Adams, Ray
Subject: RE:

Ray -- I'm sorry, written words are sometimes heard harsher than they
are said...

I was actually using the term jokingly, and the emphasis was on "is
everything alright" with HIM.

He IS a valuable resource and I tell him this every time we speak on
the phone and in emails, too. I don't say it for his ego - I say it
because I really think it.

Should I phone him on this - I don't want him to worry or to be
offended... I'll do whatever you suggest.

Regards

Avigail

-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: Wednesday, December 08, 1999 4:41 PM
To: Gutman, Avigail
Subject:


Avigail.

You are not and never, or will, be blacklisted. Why do you use such
strong words.

THOIC is now of significant importance to us. I am preparing a Mk 2
site in case THPOIC is ever exposed. However, I think you will agree
that THOIC is a wonderful tool to have. I keep impressing on Lee
that he must not take any risk and expose the site. Add to that his
jumpiness when he sees something that makes it look like the finger of
suspicion is pointing to him. Even MM said openly to him that he
suspected that his E Mail had been accessed.

Lee has no background or experience as a field investigator. He does
not have the ability to evaluate or judge. To him everything that is
said is true and of equal value. It is pointless trying to pass on
the skills and judgement to him - it would take too long. So my
constant message is that of caution.

He does not know you. He has not met you. He can only judge by the
written word. You have challenged him in the past but that is water
under the bridge. So please do not even suggest that there is
anything being witheld from you.

Now. It is clear from your message to him that you have other
sources. He will now be looking for clues as to who they are.
This is an ego problem. He means you know harm, but, you have
questioned his trust of you and want him to be open - and now you tell
him you have other sources and are keeping things from him. This
will wind him up. It is not necessary to let him know these things.
Always come to me with such issues.

Relax., You have complete access to a valuable resource.

Ray

If you want to look through some of Ray Adams selected emails you can still download them at the Austrlian Financial Review website, no doubt there's plenty more from where the above came from.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Ray Adams, Hairymonster and Spying on the THOIC Community - UPDATED

I came across a rather interesting post on the Digital Spy Forum's discussion of hackgate by forum member FR15K, aka Hairymonster

I have remained silent on this topic up until now, I feel I have a unique perspective on this as I was the person 'HairyMonster' aka 'FR15K' who along with several others pretty much spread the message about Lee G back in 2001. I have seen first hand the emails and various other documents/evidence that the BBC has back in 2001 (Which have not been tampered with as Mr Peled has suggested) and at the time hoped something would come of it. Sadly there were more pressing things happening back then which had more of a right to be newsworthy.

I was rightly prosecuted for running a hacking advisory website of my own back in 2008 by Virgin Media and ironicly NDS who were the main expert witnesses in the case. I do not seek in any way shape or form to undermine the charges which in my opinion were fair and the correct outcome for Virgin Media. However I am pretty much disgusted that I raised this issue during police interviews and was ready to show evidence only to be told that they had spoken to NDS who had pretty much assured them it was all rubbish. Typical eh?

As someone charged and convicted of something of which it is overwhelmingly clear members from NDS operational security had done themselves I find it an utter farce that action has not been taken against the man who openly admitted running a hacking advisory service on TV along with those who have openly admitted to funding it. The law should stand not only for people like myself but also for those with wealth and power.

I hear OFCOM are looking into the Murdochs and deciding if they are fit and proper to run BSKYB, personally I would not let them run a News Agents never mind a News Empire.

I will now retreat back into the murky shadows where I belong. 

Which was followed by a second post

I deserved the Jail sentence, I held my hands up and plead guilty. I do not in any way dispute I ran a hacking advisory service. Like I said earlier it was the correct outcome for Virgin Media.

My Co Defendant was jailed for producing a tv hacking guide, something of which an NDS funded hacking advisory service had itself done 7 years earlier via the THOiC Offline Ezine.

THOiC was not only undermining ITV Digital it was undermining NTL/Telewest, now Virgin Media amongst many other platforms across Europe and Asia whilst being funded and operated by NDS. I know as I was there and saw it as I am sure there are a few others on this site who saw it too.

The BBC program touched on a small part of what was REALLY going on.

This lead my to this thread, NDS Monitoring Sites? posted in April 2001, which had a copy of a post made about the situation that makes very interesting reading

ATTENTION: THOIC FORUMS WORK FOR Sky !!!! (29-04-2001 until 30-06-2001)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hairy Monster has just been in touch with me and blown the whistle on probably the biggest SAT Forum Scandle EVER.........

Orignal Post: www.xdigital.addr.com/cgi...1&t=000603

I have place the original link also incase anyone thinks this is a wind up.
forums.modshack.co.uk/vie...2&TID=1736
THE THOIC THING - Please Read

I have received over 50 mails in my mail box asking WTF was going on a THOIC last night so rather than reply individualy I have decided to post it here since THOIC removed it PDQ.

The NOW EX THOIC MOD CyberGaf last night in spectacular fashion QUIT from thoic giving the reason for him quiting as he does not want to be a stooge for NDS (NDS=***) and claiming that Lee Gibling Paul Briton and a few others were part of NDS and that THOIC is one big cover for an orginisation whos job it is to bust people and take sites down.

A few weeks ago a member calling himself FRISK decided to post up emails alledgedly from Lee G to ted@infopop.com (UBB) which shown him to be grassing up sites for not having licences for UBB.

In the list were

Modshack (At that time merged with Xdigital)
Xdigital (After we split)
Sat4All (Who at the time were hosted by THOIC)
& a few others like All-Tech.

Anyhow to cut a long story short I removed the post as I thought it was BS but on seeing what I saw last night I aint too sure now and so I have decided to post it here.

From: THOiC Networks© <webmaster@thoic.com>
To: "Warren, Mike" <MWarren@ndsuk.com>
Subject: Re: Hi
Date: Tue, 14 Mar 2000 10:00:11 +0000
Organization: THOiC Networks©
Reply-To: webmaster@thoic.com
Message-ID: <qb3scss08u2gfvnejvmclmdvk8kf06d1h9@4ax.com>
References: <71711A2AEB88D1118B5700805FF52D7001B332D4@dill.hro w.ndsuk.com>
In-Reply-To: <71711A2AEB88D1118B5700805FF52D7001B332D4@dill.hro w.ndsuk.com>
X-Mailer: Forte Agent 1.7/32.534

On Tue, 14 Mar 2000 09:26:44 -0000, you wrote to THOiC Online:

>Congratulations Vicki

Thanks Mike -
>Lee
>Your expenses were signed by R.A. and have been taken by hand to Finance
>and received by them last Wednesday I asked that they were dealt with asap.
>As a matter of interest although Len is still on holiday till Monday am I
>not right in believing there should be receipts with the invoice [not for
>one item agreed by RA, but for every thing else?]
Yes - you are totally correct - LW asked me to hang onto them for his
return - it's really not a problem, I wouldn't dare bill anything I
shouldn't

For those who downloaded the EMails in full all 30 odd meg of them then I am sure you will be left in no doubt of it.

All I can say is like Gaf I spent half my days over at thoic and even closed the old modshack and cableshack sites so I could be a bigger part of it. I went away for a few days because of family reasons and on my return found I had been booted as a MOD, even then I still supported them.

But no longer will that be as I am not a grass nor am I a tool for NDS and I will never be. This sucks big time as I have seen all the evidence I need to see to make me beleive and so have many many many others

THIS IS A WARNING

Every mail, every thread, every pivate message is logged on thoic and sent to NDS on CD each week. If you continue to use it then so be it but do not say no one warned you. I have passed on this info to several other site members and have had conversations with them all so they all know the score.

We can sit down and do nothing or we can all unite and say **** to them its your call.

For those who still don't beleive well nor did I until I got sent private emails that I had sent lee and Bigbird and only we knew about. I was then sent more info that has left me in no doubt that LEE = THOIC = NDS = BAD NEWS. Please pass this info and this message to every one you know as it effects them.

Please if you are a member of thoic then change your forum and email passes with imediate effect.

 "R.A." is almost certaintly Ray Adams, and shows he was signing off on the expenses incurred by what appears to be pulling the strings of the THOIC community, and demonstrates the extent to which Ray Adams was involved with all of this.

Update - FR15K/Hairymonster made another post on the Digital Spy forums with more information

North Wales Police Hi-Tech Crime Squad, although in their defence they were a little out of their depth with things and were pretty much reliant on NDS and VM bringing them up to speed so I can excuse them. The two officers who were in charge of my case were fairly decent human beings and I would in no way class them as the same as the other shower from London.

In my stupidity I actually thought they would ask for me to back up my claims and look a little further into things, it would of not changed the eventual outcome of my case but it would of shed a little more light on matters concerning THOiC and the involvement of NDS.

I was also shocked to be told that NDS were in my home at the time of my arrest and helping the police to gather evidence. In the end almost all of the items taken were returned with the exception of a PC and a couple of hard drives. My sky digital boxes were both un-compromised as was my free to air only satellite box. I had no card programming hardware or cards other than those supplied by Sky themselves which were once again un-compromised, I may of known how to get FREE TV but I paid just the same as everyone else.

The original charge was conspiracy to defraud which I refuted all the way and in the end I was charged with the then unheard of 'Providing a Hacking Advisory Service' which in my view and I am sure that of many others they were actually guilty of themselves, if not far more.

Since those days back in 2008/09 I have stepped away from the whole hacking scene and other than chatting to old friends in chat rooms I pretty much have no hand in it. As far as I am concerned VM got justice although I hasten to add that Cable Piracy is just as rife now as it was back then which is shame. It was only the other week I heard of a case of several people being arrested for supplying a card share service and openly condemned them on a public forum, I am sure they are not the only ones doing the same.

The thing is though, I was guilty, no more and no less. I rightly went to prison for running my site whilst these people remain at large and untouched for doing far worse to the paytv industry than hackers EVER could.

Utter Shambles in my opinion. 

Update 2 - Hairymonster made another post

If you can imagine at the time Lee as being someone people trusted then you can understand that with his position (and the fact that he hosted many hacking sites on his NDS paid server other than THOiC) he had access to things which the general public did not. This made him a valuable asset to have as he was ingrained into the world of tv hacking and very few suspected him. The emails and so far unreleased ICQ messages clearly show people passing info to Lee with regards files and hacks as well as messages from private sites being forwarded to NDS as Intel.

From the point of view of NDS he must of seemed like the golden ticket into a world they wanted access too. THOiC hosted many what were at the time thought private forums where almost ALL encryption systems were discussed. Hacking groups were formed by bringing people with similar interests and goals together and many of those groups still exist today as a result.

Anyone who was getting close to or even suspected of getting close to compromising NDS was paid a visit or shut down, in many cases they used the intel gathered from THOiC to use to formulate Electronic Countermeasures they could roll out more or less within days if needed. The cards you currently have in your boxes right now as a result of intel they gained that their current cards were about to be compromised, they acted quickly to close the doors, which tbh is fair play to them.

The problems start when you do not tell your competitors what your up too and allow and promote their systems to be compromised.

THOiC was set up by Lee as having the appearance of a hosting company and the first time I found out what was going on was when I was approaching Lee for hosting of my domain name, I was quickly asked to go to a different IRC server and was promptly told what was going on. At first I refused to believe it and demanded proof. Sadly indisputable proof was given to me and the rest as we say is history.

As someone who has spent many years hating Lee G for his betrayal with good reason I actually kind of made my peace with him to a tiny extent as he told the truth in the end.

Not all power corrupts, some people wield it responsibly and for the better good. Unfortunately many others seem to think that wealth can buy them the right to do anything they bloody well please and more than often is the case it seems that it is true. No matter what political party is in power there are people who see themselves as above the law and will use power and influence with those in downing street to get what they want.

The recent article about Sky News hacking emails highlights the idiocy of these people, it could then also be argued that the person who took Ray Adams (Stolen) emails was also acting in the publics interests? And to be honest more so?

I know there are a few on here who used THOiC in its heyday for what ever purpose and I know that these people will agree 100% that the site was a hacking advisory service.

The UK systems were the tip of the iceberg, the thing is THOiC encouraged people into that lifestyle. Everything was pretty much handed to you on a plate.

Like I said in the program my own site was considered by NDS to be a one stop shop for PayTV hacking, IF that is true then it is equally true that THOiC was a supermarket if not an entire shopping centre if I am being realistic.

During the interview with the BBC I was asked to view files that they had managed to get hold of which were taken from Lee's computer back in 2001, I quickly identified several files as being the ones put upon the site for the OD hack. I was not prompted to look at them nor was I told what to look for etc..

The reason I knew what to look for is because I had seen them before from the original source THOiC, they were correctly timestamped and dates and were the same files without a doubt.

The Panorama program whilst not covering the whole of the subject due to time constraints was pretty much spot on with minor details such as the colour of Lee's BMW which was in fact Yellow but we will forgive them for that. The Factual content was correct and they had the same story from the persons from both sides of the coin, I was shocked to see that Lee had given a full admission but then he said nothing that many people did not already know.

Ray and Len claim they had little to do with things but the emails and testimony of Lee show clearly that they were in it up to their necks. As too was Avigail Andy C and many others along the way.

I find myself in the awkward position of backing Lee as he for once is the one telling the truth. I mentioned the other day that I had kind of made my peace with Lee since the program, my reasoning being that he has come forwards and told the truth about what was going on back then which for me closes the book to some extent and validates my original claims that he was working for NDS back in 2001.

The one thing I can not and will never forgive him for is the betrayal of people who considered him to be a good friend and a noble man, those of whom he set up to fall from great heights and all in the name of an NDS paycheck.

Panorama described him as the 'King of the Pirates', well I can assure you that is NOT the Moniker that they use for him. They call him 'The Snake'.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Ray Adams and his Super Secret Slush Fund

Nation on the Something Awful forums has come across some more interesting emails from Ray Adams' stolen emails where he discusses payments being made, and has spotted a very interesting email among them:

RFC Headers:

From: Withall, Len
To: Adams, Ray
Date: 1/15/2000 1:23:42 AM
Subject: RE:
-----------------------------
Ray As this will now be coming direct from our accounts and not a bank then we will not need that No2 account we just discussed(re passwords etc).
As the new system will start from this month then it will leave £1882.99 in that account.????
Len

-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: 14 January 2000 14:12
To: Withall, Len
Subject: FW:

To see.

Ray

-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: 14 January 2000 14:07
To: Hasak, Reuven
Subject: RE:

Greg Gormley replied at 2.05pm today.
He says that Len will make out one of his usual payment sheets at the end of each month. On receipt in accounts Greg will code it up accordingly. He will use the 1370 coding. Greg asked me from which part of your budget he should take the money. He assumes from 'information'. I said that you would E-Mail him the detail.
I am still awaiting instructions from Vesco as to where the money will be sent. If he does not change anything before the end of the month we will send it to his usual bank account in Bulgaria.
We will start at end of January.
Many thanks
-----Original Message-----
From: Hasak, Reuven
Sent: 13 January 2000 17:25
To: Adams, Ray
Subject: RE:

so, as we talked I am awaiting your call.
I assume I can pay him directly from my UK budget.
-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: Wednesday, January 12, 2000 06:21
To: Hasak, Reuven
Subject: RE:


The deal with Pluto is $5,000
Vesco asked for £5,000. You will remember that we negotiated him down from $100,000 upfront plus a salary (engineers salary)
So you are not wrong as we have two separate deals. I can manage to squeeze the rest from somewhere.
Ray
-----Original Message-----
From: Hasak, Reuven
Sent: 11 January 2000 16:42
To: Adams, Ray
Subject: RE:
Importance: High

I'll feed you with 20,000 and we'll see where we go. PS-Are you sure we are talking UK POUNDS and not US$ (Is it my bad memory according to which we pay him 5000US$ ????)


-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: Tuesday, January 11, 2000 04:34
To: Hasak, Reuven
Subject: RE:


We are paying him £5,000 a month.
I can probably squeeze some out of my budget but not most of it. Until now we have used the money we hid away. There is £1,700 left of that. Thus it means that the accounts dept are not aware of our payments. Expenses etc are not a problem.
What do you think. We have to come up with 30,000 in total to get to the end of the year.
PS today we recruited Pete Tarmey, the big friend of Hannibal. We shall have to wait and see if he is truthful and loyal to us.
ray
-----Original Message-----
From: Hasak, Reuven
Sent: 10 January 2000 21:12
To: Adams, Ray
Subject: RE:

before robbing the bank , talk to uncle Reuven.
PS-how much do you need until the end of the year?
-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray
Sent: Monday, January 10, 2000 07:49
To: Hasak, Reuven
Subject:


Going home . Alex arrives later tonight. Staying at my house.
We are now out of money to pay Vesco. The £30k that we spirited away from last year budget is exhausted. Tomorrow I rob a bank.
Ray

Paying people with money hidden away in secret accounts that their own accounting department doesn't know about?   I hope they've been declaring those payments on their tax self assesement forms otherwise they could get into big trouble with the HMRC.

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com

Ray Adams and his friends, the Bulgarian Hackers

Earlier this week the Austrlian Financial Review received an archive copy of 14,400 emails that appear to have come from the laptop of Ray Adams, Former head of security at NDS. They published a 6mb selection of around 700 pages of emails, and have asked people to look through them. 

Something Awful forum member Nation found a number of emails relating what appears to be the recruiting of a hacker, and possibly requests for work by Ray Adams.

First it appears a Veselin Nedelchev sent the profiles of two individuals, Nedeltchev and Donev to Ray Adams:

From: Veselin Nedelchev <veselin@kz.orbitel.bg>
To: Ray Adams
Date: 2/23/2001 9:06:54 AM
Subject: correction

Nedeltchev

Attended Grammar School equivalent in Kazanlak. A school with a technical profile stream until 1976

1976 to 1978 Military service in Bulgaria.

1978 Student at Technical institute in Gabrovo (Nothern Bulgaria) studying electronics. Graduated in 1981.

1981 engaged at I.M.M Government technical micro-electronic Institute in Kazanlak. Employed until 1990 as director of Micro-electronic research.

Visited Switzerland on Government Project and remained in Switzerland at end of project where employed by ADEZA, electronics company, on short term consultancy. Returned to Bulgaria and formed company ALIENS, specialising in microprocessor technology development and research.

In 1997 commenced as consultant to NDS (UK)

DONEV

Attended Technical institute in Kazanlak until 1986 when selected for specialist training at I.M.M. the government research Institute. So engaged until 1985

Joined Army for military service until 1988

From 1990 to 1995 engaged in the research and design departments at I.M.M. Specialising in Micro technology, micro-processor and encryption research. Responsible for development of protection systems in smart card technology.

Fluent in Russian and Bulgarian technical languages.

In 1994 joined private company ALIENS, Kazanlak, Bulgaria as partner. Company responsible for development of micro electronic and engineering techniques applicable to smart card technology and protective encryption methods.

1997 engaged as consultant to NDS. Visited and worked in Israel as specialist team leader with NDS in Jerusalem and Haifa. Units responsible for the protection of Pay TV encryption technology. Visited UK and engaged on applications of satellite broadcast encryption techniques.

The units within NDS that Donev has worked with are re-locating from Israel and Germany to the UK. He will be required to continue working with NDS in the UK.

It appears the first profile Veselin's own information, plus the profile of one other, “Donev”. Interestingly there’s a series of emails between Ray Adams and the email address aliens@engineer.com, which may be related to the above highlighted ALIENS, Kazanlak.

For example, this email was sent by Ray Adams to two accounts named vesco and Plamen

for <RAdams@ndsuk.com>; Fri, 26 Jan 2001 03:03:13 +0200
Reply-To: <alien@engineer.com>
From: "Alien" <alien@engineer.com>
To: "Adams, Ray" <RAdams@ndsuk.com>
Subject:
Date: Fri, 26 Jan 2001 03:06:43 +0200
Message-ID: <AAECIPKPADKNHJGCJDKHAEIGCAAA.alien@engineer.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
X-MSMail-Priority: Normal
X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0)
Importance: Normal
In-Reply-To: <F128BF333D06D41192D700508BC25EAC26C8EF@MOTH>
X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2919.6700


From: Alien <alien@engineer.com>
To: Adams, Ray
Date: 1/26/2001 12:06:44 PM
Subject:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'm thinking how to explain it...
Is there a position 'main hacker'?
How is it going to look in the form?

:-)

you can fax anything you want on my home phone line: +35943120600


Plamen

p.s. Write anything you would like to. I don't care.

-----Original Message-----
From: Adams, Ray [mailto:RAdams@ndsuk.com]
Sent: 25 ßíóàðè 2001 ã. 12:36
To: 'Plamen'; 'vesco'
Subject:

The sooner I have some information that I can supply to the immigration people the better.

I could fax the forms to you so that you can see the type of information that we are having to supply. What is the best fax number for you.

Ray

So this seems to prove that Plamen is using the aliens@engineer.com email address. It certainly seems to imply that Plamen is a “main hacker” as he describes himself, and that Ray is trying to help him with immigration documents.

This email from Ray Adams to the aliens@engineer.com account seems to show they build up a trusting relationship

A letter with a sealed envelope from Barclays Bank has arrived at my house - addressed to you...

To which he receives this reply

Hi Ray,

I'm very happy to hear you again...
I trust you completely. Please, open the envelope and send me the access codes via e-mail as soon as possible. It is URGENT. Thanks in advance.
Zvi is coming here at 16-th (Wednesday).
We (me and Vesco) will meet him at the airport...

the visit to UK could be very nice 'vacation' :-)

In this email we see more information on what the guy has actually been doing

It is very good job - good salary, very good conditions, chance for development in the position, small responsibilities as to keep your mouth shut...

The first project was to get out some code, to look at it and to explain some part of the program inside. Everything was well documented, the code was not protected and the CPU architecture was well known. Where is the challenge in this? Nothing is unknown!

The second project was to construct DDT having only FEW BYTES of code, boring again! I could have accepted the first project as a test, but the second was not a test. Someone really thought it was a challenge or he was simply bored to do it himself and said "The fucking Bulgarian has to do it for a lesson". I did my best and I found something challenging in it, leaving a trap, just a small detail inserting random element in its behavior. I was surprised when Zvi asked for my opinion and sent me another DDT made by someone else using the same method and having the SAME detail UNTOUCHED! It meant the person constructed the new ECM has not taken even a look at the
kill packet, he has not even tried to understand what it does, he just used it literally knowing what it should do because I claimed that it should work and someone tested it and said it works.

The next project is to give a LECTURE to some guys on the subject "How to write better protected software for our products - the confession of one ex-hacker..." I apologize for the irony but I couldn't keep it.

Plamen also offers to use some of his other skills

I have another idea. Why don't you let me hack some of your competitor's products? It will be fun for me and profitable for the company...
...This letter is not something I could send to anybody else except to you

This email provides more details of the work the hacker was doing for Ray Adams

Hi Zvi,

I need information urgently. I would like to know is there a service ID:FB90 or ID:E047 in the Galaxy system. The last job was a hard nut! I think I found solution...
Well, it depends of your answer but if it is yes - the problem has no solution. Probably you would have to change some of the IDs of the services...

Is there a way to give me program making signatures? I would like to test the DDT before sending it to you in order to avoid the bugs...

Plamen

p.s. I modified the glitcher program to support Galaxy cards. It now supports both DTV and Galaxy. Would you like to have it? :-)

Finally in this email it seems Ray has a special take for Plamen and Vesco

I have a mission for you and possibly for Vesco as weel.

One question is who Vesco is? The original emails with the two profiles were sent by 'Veselin Nedelchev', so it’s not a massive leap to imagine his nickname could be Vesco. Could “Donev” be Plamen?  Interestingly Plamen Donev is a Bulgarian football coach, maybe the nickname Plamen is a play on that?

You can contact the author on Twitter @brown_moses or by email at brownmoses@gmail.com