Remote

Jim Zhou

@jimz@infosec.exchange

I write (mostly #Python) #code and write about (mostly American) code and case #law and #regulations. The two tends to meet at #baseball.

I want to grow up to be #OrinKerr or #DonWillet.

Ask me about why crypto tracing is snake oil, and how 50% of the DEA's "crypto task force" quit their job during COVID and raised $10 mil on what appears to be tooling I wrote and CC0ed while misleading investors with an embellished resume.

That's also why #xmr is where it's at, so I can geek out on the small stuff. #avgeek #thehobby #homelab #kinsey #cato #reversing #burningman #wtf

0 Followers

0 Following

6 Posts

Joined December 27, 2023

Github:

https://github.com/jimtje

Posts

Jim Zhou @jimz@infosec.exchange · Jul 22, 2026

Replying to @Nonya_Bidniss@infosec.exchange

@Nonya_Bidniss@infosec.exchange Except we literally are not signatories to the ICC and even if we wanted to, the Rome Statute requires that our justice system act in a way that is unconstitutional even if we had an enforcement agency tasked to do it. It would violate the 5th, 6th and 14th amendments. It would also violate the presumption against extraterritoriality (or we'd have another colonial style 'International Settlement of Shanghai' situation), forcing us to essentially conduct an extraordinary rendition. The validity of a warrant not based on Article III powers would also give legitimacy to ICE's administrative BS. Arguably Gideon v Wainwright would also fail because frankly there's no competent counsel in our jurisdiction. I hope our politics would go from wishcasting to reality. Please, if that's the strategy, send all such wishes to Arsenal FC. We might repeat the league, we definitely can't do anything like letting a fundamentally civil and partial and unconstitutional system take over for a sec. Trump's doing that already.

Jim Zhou @jimz@infosec.exchange · Jul 21, 2026

Replying to @mikesiegel@infosec.exchange

@mikesiegel@infosec.exchange @cR0w@infosec.exchange Which is the worst transgression: Not knowing modelscope exists, not knowing what Communism means, or not understanding that having the choice to make something free instead of being made to make something free is a feature of capitalism because it implies private ownership and property rights? Hiring standards for executives have gotten real low either way. They should replace the exec with a chatbot instead.

Jim Zhou @jimz@infosec.exchange · Jul 21, 2026

Replying to @Walker@infosec.exchange

@Walker@infosec.exchange In the 9th Circuit there is case law on what was a default judgment (because even if you serve someone in Pakistan a subpoena they can't get a visa to come to the US anyway)but the judge decided to flesh out what "purposeful availment" means that establishes jurisdiction. Except the lawyers made their case by geolocating Cloudflare IPs in Arizona because... their offices are in Arizona. And there's nobody to rebut any of the assertions. The result? Since you literally can't pick your anycast CDN IP, applying the correct facts, the law is actually working exactly opposite as intended. All sites that use CDNs would be outside3 the court's jurisdiction. The holding has now spread to New York: https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=5281974995515683328&q=purposeful+availment+cloudflare&hl=en&as_sdt=3,29 So much of American law is built on top of tech illiteracy and the assumption of tech illiteracy that the rationale that comes from someone putting a cloudflare ip into ipinfo and is now the law is both sad, and also, feels apt for our times. Meanwhile, I'm sure I can jerry-rig something that lets me run masscan through a rotating bunch of cf workers.

Jim Zhou @jimz@infosec.exchange · Jul 21, 2026

Replying to @patrickcmiller@infosec.exchange

@patrickcmiller@infosec.exchange The most absurd part to all this is that there's no visa appropriate for one to apply in order to respond to lawsuits (B-2s might not require you to perjure to the consular official but aren't nearly long enough), but a moot point when China isn't issuing passports to most people anyway. Fortress Besieged situation. Life imitates satire.

Jim Zhou @jimz@infosec.exchange · Apr 06, 2026

Replying to @sig_ug@infosec.exchange

@sig_ug For reals, back when the source for one of the first RW was being passed around Alphabay forums (for testing... seriously, it's all logged) there were camps that simply wiped, period, and those who didn't. Short-term quick hitters v long term big payout models, I think. Wish there's data to see which one is more profitable on average, 10 years later. My guess is that if you can properly ascertain data value, you can make $$$ and the breach won't ever be known. Skids HnR.

Jim Zhou @jimz@infosec.exchange · Feb 27, 2026

Replying to @tinker@infosec.exchange

@tinker@infosec.exchange This sounds A LOT like the justification DHS put out to approve their own (totally illegally in like, multiple ways) not-a-rule-but-absolutely-a-rule to collect social media handles to.. root out... terrorists attempting to enter the country... when the whole system only affects those legally in the country. "Immigration benefits are optional." Except the biggest chunk of people affected are literally not applying for an immigration benefit. Naturalization is explicitly carved out in the Constitution. All the other stuff is pulled out of someone's ass to keep out first the Chinese and then all non-northern-Europeans 100 years later. And sure, if you have already finished the I-485 process it's entirely optional to apply for the non-benefit in question, but the other applicants are applying because DHS have insisted on illegally detaining them if they fail to do so with a huge lead time. It would be optional if their liberty interest is optional. Enforcing illegal EOs is also optional. Working for DHS is optional. Except agents had an actual choice that they made to be fascist thugs who repeat the utter nonsense coming out of the White House which accidentally defined foreign terrorist in a way that only Donald Trump seems to fit the entire set of definitions to a tee (thanks to the UK's nationality laws technically making him not someone who can move there but via his mother, the equivalent of what we call being a national). Can't make this stuff up.

Jim Zhou

Posts

Remote instance