conspExec | 9 points | Nov 18 2016 21:32:23

Clarifying on HONEYPOTS RIOT and MATRIX

Over the last day i've noticed a very surprising amount of posts about honeypots. Most of them are posted by uTuxi and PixelBot. Yesterday uTuxi actually spam posted the same message 50 times on a top post. I had to get a mod to remove his/her posts. From their history logs, it does not seem like they are trying to derail our investigation but rather their posts are motivated from paranoia. While paranoia is often times good it can also breed mistrust within a group with a dedicated goal. As always research yourself and apply your own due diligence. Below is a general summary of the suspected topics.

Matrix is a new open source project that was started a few years ago with the goal of connecting all social chatting platforms like IRC under a specific protocol so users from different social platforms can talk to each other whilst using their own social platform. Riot is an open source website that is built around this protocol's specification and allows for people to use the website to chat instead of downloading a Matrix client. Open source means the code used to build both Matrix and Riot are free and available for everyone to inspect, change, and redistribute. Most dedicated investigators are now on Riot and Matrix. We've compartmentalized and formed into teams investigating different subjects with the idea being that we'll then share it with the lobby and then to other platforms. This is for our safety and so we do not as easily get derailed and information will not be leaked before it can be used appropriately for #PizzaGate. The Matrix project is also not controlled and anyone can throw up their own servers if one server shuts down gets compromised etc. These servers can then hook up together to form a new service if need be. This means the Matrix chat channel is also one of the only platforms for #PizzaGate that is not currently under the control of a 3rd party. As a side note for the most part most of the people who are in Matrix also happen to be Internet sleuths. In short, we know our shit, and prioritize OpSec over everything else besides this case.

Regarding honeypots, which is basically a trap through the use of computers/servers/services to identify an individual by their connection and connecting patterns. ANY website or server you visit knows your IP automatically. Be it Google, Yahoo, Bing or etc. This is how the Internet works. To further complicate things not only do the servers you connect to know your IP address but also the relaying intermediate routers as well as your ISP and the server's ISP. Also remember what was said about Prism. There is a high chance that one of those relays could be a NSA datacenter. Run a traceroute on your own computer to google.com and see how many intermediate routers know about your connection! Are they all honeypots? The simple answer, no.

If you want to protect your security visit the links in this subreddit about VPNs and Tor. Or just use your own search engine and search those same terms.

On windows, open CMD, type tracert google.com

If you're on Linux you already know the answer.

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