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Modern day Robin Hood bank robber donated 25 Bitcoins to help fight ISIS

A self-described “ethical hacker,” who goes by the handle Phineas Phisher, is responsible for some of the highest-profile hacks on questionable organizations in internet history. Two of his previous targets were shady malware makers, assisting governments to spy on their own people. With the help of websites like Wikileaks, Phisher's hacks have illuminated dark corners of government around the world.

A self-described “ethical hacker,” who goes by the handle Phineas Phisher, is responsible for some of the highest-profile hacks on questionable organizations in internet history. Two of his previous targets were shady malware makers, assisting governments to spy on their own people. With the help of websites like Wikileaks, Phisher’s hacks have illuminated dark corners of government around the world.

His most recent target is far less important than the beneficiary. On May 5th, Phisher donated 25 bitcoins, worth about US$11,000 at the time, to a crowdfunding effort  helping farmers and freedom fighters in the post-Syrian farmlands of Rojava.

Phisher Tweet May 2016

Phisher has never mentioned how he attained the bitcoin, only that the money came from “robbing a bank,” according to his post in the Anarchism subreddit. “Bank robbing is more viable than ever,” he claims, “it’s just done differently these days.”

The modern-day Robin Hood, stealing from the rich to give to the poor, is quick to point out his ethics. “Not that I’m a fan of Russian gangsters robbing banks so they can buy luxury cars or whatever,” he explained, “but there’s a lot to learn from their methods.”

While Phisher is keeping the victim bank’s name anonymous, there is little reason to doubt that he was able to do as he says. "The guy is kind of a ninja," said Dan Tentler, the CEO of Phobos Group, which provides attack simulation as a service. "It’s pretty rare you find exploitation, reverse engineering, exploit development, lateral movement, networking/routing, and exfiltration all in the same person," Tentler said in an interview with Ars Technica.

The comment was made immediately after the Hacker Team data dump last year. The 400 gigabyte cache focused on the U.S., providing evidence of the FBI paying over $774,000 for  “remote control” exploit spyware, called Galileo.  Phisher also included a DIY guide to hacking, so others could follow in his footsteps.

“There’s a reason in the last hacking guide I wrote [that] I spoke in favor of expropriating money from banks.”
— – Phineas Phisher

The hackers most famous work was releasing data in 2014, which he procured from a company called the Gamma Group.

Gamma Group was the first shady company Phisher targeted. It’s products, FinFisher and FinSpy, are well-documented tools of oppressive regimes, used to spy on their own citizens and commit espionage.

FinFisher has been used by governments around the world, especially in Africa and the middle east. When Egyptian rebels overthrew President Hosni Mubarak, during the Arab Spring, a contract to run the FinFisher software surfaced. The paper work showed that Gamma Group was charging €287,000 to license the software. Ethiopia, Uganda, and Bahrain have all been implicated in similar scenarios.

While both of Phisher’s previous hacks are well documented, and were well publicized, both Gamma Group and Hacker Team still remain in business.

Upon learning that these companies exist, and what they do, there was no uprising against them, no new laws were passed to curtail their behavior, and neither were charged with criminal conduct.

It appears that Phisher is now using a different approach, the latest hack is the first time he has taken credit for stealing money. Phisher’s stated reason for not naming the bank is so that he can rob it again, and he plans to hand over a larger sum to help Rojava.

The crowdfunding goal for the Rojava project is €180,000, and has currently raised €27,000, including Phisher’s donation. The Rojava project proudly promotes their acceptance of bitcoin on their crowdfunding campaign, with the phrase “We like Bitcoin!” near the top of the page.

The website itself, which has dozens of other campaigns listed on it, encourages cryptocurrency payments at the checkout, by charging credit card fees, and clearly labeling their fee-free cryptocurrency option.

“Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are the future of finance and decentralized economy. We are strong supporters of them, and accept them for this project. We hope to [see] big future Bitcoin projects in Rojava. One of our goals is to heavily promote Bitcoin in Rojava.”
— – RojavaPlan, Coopfunding

The RojavaPlan organizers constantly refer to themselves as “anticapitalists” on their website and marketing materials. Phisher describes their ethos slightly differently, comparing the greater Rojava movement to "other libertarian revolutions or attempts such as anarchism.”

In many ways, Rojava has parallels to Liberland, if you can overlook all the fighting going on between ISIS, Turkey, and the remaining Syrian Government that surround Rojava on all sides.

“Because of the war and the embargo, the farmers get less and less fertilizer every year,” the campaign page says. “This year, only 10% of the needed fertilizer could be imported, which means that farmers will be able to harvest only an estimated third of the expected amount of wheat.”

“With experts predicting a historic drought in the Middle East this year, the harvest will probably be even less. Amidst renewed attacks from ISIS and other jihadist groups Rojava’s people are facing a great famine.”
— – RojavaPlan

Their solution is to start recycling both animal and human waste. “The biological waste of an average Rojavan town is enough to make fertilizer for 60 percent of the land tended to by the town’s inhabitants,” the groups explains. “Together with animal droppings from the farms, Rojava can make enough organic fertilizer for all of its arable land.”

Phisher sees this project as uniquely different than any other country out there trying to improve their crop yield. Rojavan freedom fighters have met with considerable success fighting ISIS, but obviously can’t keep it up if there is a food shortage.

“This project is vital to make Rojava’s people self-sufficient, it is vital to make the social and ecological revolution happen. For years Rojava has stood with the world against terror and fascism. Now it is your turn to stand with Rojava.”
— – RojavaPlan


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