Today in Tabs: Patterns in the Effluent

Hacking Team, an Italian spyware company and enemy of the Internet already known for selling surveillance software to sketchy government agencies in oppressive third world kleptocracies like Egypt, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, and the United States, was itself hacked on Sunday night. And while nobody wants to cheer for what is, after all, a massive and flagrant act of illegal computer intrusion, HOORAY!! because boy did those bastards have it coming. Right off the bat, the leaked data confirmed that Hacking Team had a contract with Sudan, which it had previously denied having any business with, and also apparently a secret contract with Russia. Hacking Team’s own security was dreadful, according to Lorenzo Franceschi-Biccierai at Motherboard, and leaked password lists included things like “p4ssword,” which is the kind of password an idiot would use for his luggage.

Hacking Team’s primary security flaw, staffer Christian Pozzi, flailed a bit, claiming that the leaked data had a virus in it, which is kind of true in that it included the source code to several of Hacking Team’s intrusion viruses. Then Pozzi’s twitter account was compromised as well, and ultimately deleted. While we wait for the hackers to release a promised full postmortem and howto, you might want to peruse all of Hacking Team’s source code on Github.

Today in Updates: Would-be “Black Grantland” founder Jason Whitlock was fired. Reddit CEO Ellen Pao tried to apologize on Reddit, but was unable to effectively do so, because of Reddit’s dedication to free speech. Meanwhile The Verge just shut off comments completely for the summer. White man gets another chance. Guardian science blogger Stuart Clark dubunks sensationalist garbage published by… The Guardian. Bill Cosby admitted to using Quaaludes for sex, in 2005, in case there was still any doubt whatsoever in anyone’s mind (there wasn’t). Meanwhile, in Boston, a 12 foot tall mound of frozen trash is both a real thing and a perfect metaphor for Boston.

Read: “Just don’t do it“, in Language, a Feminist Guide, Caroline O’Donovan on a collective of TaskRabbits and a sad rich person, and of course, jet fuel can’t melt steel beams.

Today’s Toys: Win a Date With Channing Tatum, and Calvin and Markov.

Today’s Song: Kilo Kish, “On the Way“

~Tabs in the moonlight, Far away my well-lit door~

Thanks to Fast Company and Tinyletter. Today in Tabs has never officially published a mission statement, but if we did it would be: