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IT expert casts doubts on hacking allegations

The Local Denmark
The Local Denmark - [email protected]
IT expert casts doubts on hacking allegations
Jacob Appelbaum at the 30th Chaos Communication Congress in December 2013. Photo: Tobias Klenze/WikiCommons

American computer security expert and hacker Jacob Appelbaum said that the evidence in Denmark's largest ever hacking case is "tainted" and the prosecution "doesn't understand anything related to technology at all".

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The American IT expert and journalist Jacob Appelbaum testified on Friday in the ongoing hacking trial against Swedish Pirate Bay co-founder Gottfrid Svartholm Warg and his 21-year-old Danish codefendant
 
Appelbaum, whose testimony helped clear Warg of hacking charges in Sweden, repeated in the Frederiksberg courtroom that Warg’s computer could have been controlled by others to carry out the hack of IT giant CSC. 
 
Speaking to the press following his court appearance, Appelbaum said Warg’s computer was “clearly a lab computer” designed for multiple users. 
 
Appelbaum said that the prosecution was absolutely clueless when it comes to technology. 
 
“The same facts that were misrepresented in Sweden, I think, are being misrepresented here in Denmark. I don’t think it’s intentional, I just think the prosecutor is ignorant of the topic. He has said that himself and that is an important detail. Everyone has justice in mind, but he clearly does not have technical details in mind,” he said. 
 
“It is pretty obvious he doesn’t understand anything related to technology at all,” Appelbaum added. 
 
 
The American contended that Warg was a “political prisoner, but because he’s white and this is Scandinavia, people laugh at that”. 
 
He also said it was very problematic that, according to revelations from Politiken, CSC itself has provided all evidence of the alleged hack after neither police nor military defence experts were able to come up with anything on their own. 
 
“The evidence being collected by the victim [CSC, ed] is tainted evidence that doesn’t meet the standard of justice anywhere,” he said. 
 
Despite his views on the prosecution's case, Appelbaum predicted that Warg "would not leave Denmark as a free man". 
 
You can hear Appelbaum's press conference below, courtesy of Radio24syv: 

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