(Cross-posted at Blue Commonwealth)
Climate deniers have been crowing like roosters on crack ever since the theft and widespread broadcast of emails from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit. Certainly some of these emails (like many private conversations unexpectedly made public) show a few of the scientists involved in a petty and embarrassing light. But right wingers are trying to make of this a case that is much broader than one or two inappropriate emails. Indeed, they are trying to postulate one of the most massive global conspiracies ever launched – and the most improbable, starring geeky, pocket-protector-wearing scientists as opposed to the usual all powerful and malevolent Illuminati, Masons or Trilateral Commission.
Indeed, the only way for the conspiracy claims of such noted climate scholars as Sarah Palin to make any sense would be if you assumed that thousands of scientists have manipulated the findings of thousands of experiments and models in order to – let’s not sugarcoat this – lie through their teeth. There would have to be a secret pact among the majority of the world’s earth scientists (covering fields from meteorology to oceanography to zoology, etc.) to spread false data and mislead the world.
And what would be their motive? Some combination of money and power, I guess. (I haven’t read Michael Crichton’s fictional rendering of this vast conspiracy, so I couldn’t tell you for sure.) To a certain mindset, perhaps, it all makes sense.
While I’m not big on conspiracy theories, it strikes me that a much more interesting line of questioning would focus on the curious coincidence that some very skillful hackers would steal and sort through 13 years of emails, sending the most embarrassing ones to climate denial websites – right before the international climate summit in Copenhagen.
In case this also strikes you as interesting, consider these points and questions as well:
- Why were these emails released from a server in the Siberian city of Tomsk?
The Daily Mail quotes a Russian hacking specialist as saying "It appears to have been a sophisticated and well-run operation, that had a political motive given the timing in relation to Copenhagen.’" The story also states:
Computer hackers in Tomsk have been used in the past by the Russian secret service (FSB) to shut websites which promote views disliked by Moscow. Such arrangements provide the Russian government with plausible deniability while using so-called ‘hacker patriots’ to shut down websites.
In 2002, Tomsk students were said to have launched a ‘denial of service’ attack at the Kavkaz-Tsentr portal, a site whose reports about Chechnya angered Russian officials.
The FSB office in Tomsk put out a special Press release saying that what the students had done was a legitimate ‘expression of their position as citizens, one worthy of respect’.
- Per
The Australian
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change vice-chairman Jean-Pascal van Ypersele said the theft from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit was not the work of amateur climate sceptics, but was a sophisticated and well-funded attempt to destroy public confidence in the science of man-made climate change. He said the fact the emails had first been uploaded to a skeptic website from a computer in Russia was an indication the hackers were paid.
"It's very common for hackers in Russia to be paid for their services," Mr van Ypersele said. "If you look at that mass of emails, a lot of work was done, not only to download the data, but it's a carefully made selection of emails and documents that's not random at all. This is 13 years of data, and it's not a job of amateurs."
- Canada’s
National Post reports on a number of recent attempts to break into the computers and offices of climate scientists at the University of Victoria:
Andrew Weaver, a University of Victoria scientist and key contributor to the Nobel prize-winning work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, says there have been a number of attempted breaches in recent months, including two successful break-ins at his campus office in which a dead computer was stolen and papers were rummaged through.
"The key thing is to try to find anybody who's involved in any aspect of the IPCC and find something that you can ... take out of context," Mr. Weaver said, drawing a parallel to the case of British climate researcher Phil Jones, who was forced to step down this week after skeptics seized upon hacked emails they allege point to a plot to exaggerate the threat of climate change.
"People don't like it, so they try to discredit it, and the way they try to discredit it is by attacking the individual responsible for it," Mr. Weaver said.
University of Victoria spokeswoman Patty Pitts said there have also been attempts to hack into climate scientists' computers, as well as incidents in which people impersonated network technicians to try to gain access to campus offices and data. However, those incidents took place at the Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and Analysis, she said -- an Environment Canada facility located at the university. As such, Environment Canada would be the investigating agency.
- The one conspiracy that has long been well proven and documented involves the multimillion dollar investment by major fossil fuel companies, including Exxon-Mobil and Koch Industries, in creating the whole network of climate denial websites, organizations and "experts" whose existence is designed to spread doubts about climate change so as to protect these companies’ profits. Huffington Post summarizes those (unfortunately too successful) efforts
here.
Needless to say, the American news media has not pursued any of these threads to see if they add up to a story. After all, they are only obligated to cover right-wing conspiracy theories.
You can keep up with the continuing efforts by our right wing friends to discredit climate science and scientists worldwide at the new website,Swifthack (as in Swift-boating) set up by blogger Josh Nelson.