Large scale hacks to Tsai's office appears to come from China and Ma government

The computers in the Tsai Ing-wen's campaign headquarters were found to be hacked last Saturday.

The report (in Chinese) says that the hacks are in the form of Trojan horse, aiming at info stealing but not destruction. The headquarter was not aware of it until a "falsified Chairperson's schedule" was circulated among the headquarter personnel. The person responsible for the circulation had no idea where it was from.

Tsai is both the president candidate and the chairperson of DPP's. Her office holds all the info regarding how the DPP had planned and is planning to campaign for the president and legislator elections early next year, including how to deploy the resources, who is gonna take charge of what, etc.

All these info were stolen, alone with critical private info like user names, passwords, etc, of the headquarter personnel's.

The report didn't mention how long the stealing had been going on. A Trojan horse type of hack usually stays in the victim computer for a long time while gathering info. It's likely that the DPP has been operating like an open book for a long time in the eyes of her opponents.

The DPP had the ip's traced, and found that the hacks came from 3 sources:

1. China's national Xinhua News Agency (XNA);
2. Individual hackers;
3. Some "special group" inside Taiwan;

The XNA denied any involvement. But the investigation reveals attacks came from the XNA in Beijing and going through the XNA branch in Malaysia.

The 3rd group is revealed to be from the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission, an office in Executive Yuan (RDEC, 行政院研考會) of the Ma Ying-jeou government.

There's no comment from Ma government so far. The DPP said they don't want to speculate anything now.

They do complain about the reluctance of the police in pursuing this case. A police office was quoted as saying, "don't pull the trigger only because you see a shadow," when he/she was asked to investigate.

This is not the first time the police plays dormant to threats against the DPP. Two Three months ago, a facebook user publicly call for assassinating Tsai. The police claimed they will investigate.

There were several online assassinating calls against Ma Ying-jeou in the past. Each of them was dealt with in a lightning pace --- whoever made that claim was caught by the police the same or the next day.

But when the target was Tsai, it's a different story. Two Three months from the date the police claims to investigate, the one calling for killing Tsai is still at large now. There's no sign if the police intends to catch this guy. Update: for the assassination call on the Facebook, the police says that they've asked the Facebook in USA to provide the user info but to no avail. They say they will keep trying.

High School Student Arrested for Asking Ma to Step down

Can any one recall the time that people still had the freedom to ask the former president Chen Shui-bian to step down, without the fear of getting arrested or questioned by the police ?

On March 3rd, a high school student was arrested immediately by the police for shouting "Ma Ying-jeou step down!" when Ma was in transition of his Taiwan High Speed Rail (HSR) ride through Chiayi (嘉義).

According to the Liberty Times (嗆「馬英九下台」高三生遭逮捕), the student was interrogated in the police station, which scared the student's mother to death. She asked the police for leniency. The police didn't release the student until some document was signed (confession of a crime?) and the student got finger-printed.

The police office at HSR Chiayi Station claims that the reason they "brought" the student in is to "persuade him to focus on study in order to be a good student". They also claim that they conducted "personal information investigation" for the safety of president.

It seems that the student was alone so he didn't violate the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法), which requires a gathering of at least 3 people before the police can claim illegal.

He only voiced his protest so he was in no way exercising any violence.

It is obvious that he did not violate any law, and had no threat at all to the society or to Ma Ying-jeou.

But the police arrested him anyway. His family is scared and now he has a police record.

It is still in the first year of Ma's team but it seems that Ma has already imposed a fear factor into Taiwanese mind.

We have a long way to go before this nightmare could possibly over, guys -- 8 years in exact, as Ma often claims.

Taiwan Premier Liu will NOT apologize for police violation of civil rights

The first demand the students made in the current protest against Taiwan police violation of civil rights during Chen Yunlin's (陳雲林, Chairman of Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, China) visit is that President Ma and Premier Liu should apologize.

Premier Liu, in response to a question he was asked in Legislative Yuan (to apologize for the police misconduct), said toady,

道歉？劉揆：挺兩天就過去了
劉揆回說，立委在立法院要他道歉，「我就沒有，這種事挺兩天就過去了」，意外說出真心話。

"I didn't apologize. This kind of thing, you just wait for a day or two and it will pass."

With a slip of words, Premier Liu reveals what he really has in mind about the student protest.

So Premier Liu obviously denies any police wrong doings under his and Ma's administration.

If President Ma has any wee bit of sense of guilt about ripping Taiwanese off the right of free speech and the right of walking on the street freely without the fear of police brutality, he would have asked Premier Liu to apologize before he does.

So the mentality of Premier Liu and his determination to ignore student's request signal the direction Ma's government is gonna take to deal with the student protest -- just ignore it. Not only is President Ma not gonna apologize, but also, neither National Security Bureau Director Tsai Chao-ming (蔡朝明) or National Police Agency (NPA) Director-General Wang Cho-chiun (王卓鈞) will step down (the 2nd demand of the protest).

To the innocent students participating the movement, it's probably their first fight for fears of losing human right they have been enjoying since they were born (thanks to those students who stood up to fight for that before them).

Unfortunately, facing a President and a government willing to sacrifice the human right of his people in order to please an official from China, I am afraid the goal of the current protest is too far to be reachable.

Do kids and grandkids of these innocent students still have the freedom of arranging a sit-in protest without being ran over by tanks like what happened in Tiananmen Square Massacre launched by China government in 1989 ?

May God have mercy !

Live broadcast of student protest against police brutality in Taiwan

Updated : 081110.0745

The "martial law"-like police control that Ma Ying-jeou's government imposes on Taiwanese, especially that during the visit of Chen Yunlin (陳雲林), the chairman of Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS), has triggered widespread anger among Taiwanese. Students all over the island are organizing protests to demand the government with the following appeals:

1) President Ma Ying-jeou and Premier Liu to apologize to the public;
2) Director of National Security Bureau and that of National Police Agency to step down;
3) Revise the unconstitutional Assembly And Parade Law (the current Law requires all demonstrations to be pre-approved, which often used as a political tool to screen protests);

The protest organizers insist the protest to be peaceful and non-partisan. The participation of any political figure is denied. No banner, flag, slogan are allowed, except the only one provided by the organizer, which reads: "The Police Violates the Law."

Live broadcasts are setup for people around the world to witness and participate:

1) Taipei: http://live.yahoo.com/wenli

This is the first protest. Started on 11am, Nov. 6th (Thursday) in front of Execute Yuan, it was dispersed by the police yesterday. Students regrouped on the Freedom Square. It's been going on for ~50 hours now.

2) Tainan: http://live.yahoo.com/tainandirect

Started just now (1 pm Taipei time, Nov. 8th, 2008). It's in Guang-Fu Campus of Cheng Kung University.

3) Taichung: http://1106.ezyou.cc/Home/tai-zhong-chang-ci

This one will start 2 pm, Nov, 9th, 2008, Sunday. See the above link for location. [Tim Maddog edit: It's at Citizens' Square (市民廣場), on the south side of Gongyi Rd. just west of Yingtsai Rd.]

Update-081110.0745:
live broadcast of Taichung protest:
http://live.yahoo.com/tcantiapl
Decode: tcantiapl = tc(Taichung) + anti + apl (Assembly and Parade Law)

Please spread the news.

Ma Ying-jeou is turning a democratic Taiwan into a police state. With the absolute authority he administrates, the current student protests could potentially be turned into "Tiananmen Square of Taiwan."

International media, if you are watching this, please H~E~L~P~~~ ...

Update-081110.0745:

1. MARK YOUR CALENDAR: Simultaneous broadcast of all protest sites at 12:30 PM, Nov.10, Monday, Taipei time (or, 11:00 PM, Nov.9, Sunday, Eastern Time)
   
   
2. The protest is officially called: Wild Strawberry (野草莓)
   
   
3. Hsinchu (新竹):
   11:00Am, Monday Nov.10 (Taipei time), Tsing Hua University (清大小吃部)
   
   
4. Changhua (彰化):
   Well it was between 4~5:00pm, Sunday, Nov.9. I didn't learn this until now. Don't know how it went.
   
   
5. Official websites of the protest:
   Taipei: http://action1106.blogspot.com
   Taichung: http://tcantiapl.twgogo.org
   English: http://taiwanstudentmovement2008.blogspot.com/
   
   
6. English writint/speaking volunteers needed urgently. Please contact yvonne8604(at)gmail(dot)com or check out the English site above)
   

cross-post @ Taiwan Matters