艾未未工作室成员回忆艾未未：恶也是需要被证明的
两年前，我偶尔在天涯上看到艾未未调查5‧12地震遇难学生名单的访谈，他说：当这些儿童被遗忘的时候，他们才真正的死去了直播突然被中止后来我。。给他写 了封邮件，希望能为孩子们做点什么。此后的两年时间里，我基本每周都去他的工作室，草场地258号。当时已有几十个志愿者到遥远的灾区寻找名单，我把他们 发回的名字录入电脑，逐个打电话给家长核实。几个月后，我们奇迹般地找到了5197个孩子的确切名字和详细信息。 可是他还想知道这些孩子为什么会死去。2009年底，我们一起写 信给中央，四川省和灾区的每个县市政府部门，要求公开5‧12地震的完整信息。艾神（艾未未）说，我们是替那些不能提问的人提问，我们要问出真正的问题。 我们反复修改，系统地整理了上万个问题，写了一百多封信给教育，建设，民政，财政，公安，基金会部门，但他们无一例外地拒绝回答：该公开的已经公开了，没 公开信息的你们无权知道。
我问艾，你明知道他们不会答复你，为什么还要问呢他回答：恶也是需要证明的。
为了证明，艾未未去了三次成都，我也都去了。第一次是09年谭作 人案开庭，他作为证人被邀前往，半夜成都警察破门而入打了他脑袋一拳，一个月后他脑出血差点死掉;第二次他是去成都西安路派出所报案，警方做了笔录，然后 就杳无音信了，第三次他带着律师一道前往，到金牛公安分局索要报案回执。结果国保便衣把他衣领子都撕破了，他无功而返。成都警察说他装神，网友从此以后干 脆就叫他“艾神”。有人说可以用私人关系找到打人警察，私下解决，艾神一口回绝他坚持像普通人一样报案，起诉，上访，把所有程序走完，记录，公开，让事实 清晰的呈现出来他说：。。没有记录下来，没有公开的事情就是没有发生过的事情。
谁的帐都不卖
5‧12遇难学生家长来北京上访，不少要专程来见他。一年当中，有6,7拨来自不同学校的家长来草场地，他接待，采访，见家长们拮据，他细心地给家长留些钱，嘱咐我走前给，家长们不肯收下走了，艾神埋怨我笨。
艾神天真好玩经常会有网友背个包来找他：。艾神，我想在你这呆着 做点事，行不艾神说，好啊，你就呆这吧他经常会突然？。蹦出些稀奇古怪的想法，比如七一罢网，5‧12两周年的“念”活动，扮李庄合唱，夜访余杰，献锦旗 给新浪，采访“五毛”等，而且马上付诸行动。有网友们说我们也想去啊，然后就一堆认识的，大部分是不认识的网友一起闹腾。
但艾神谁的帐都不卖。他讨厌一团和气，讨厌一切门派，甚至开玩笑 说把所有的知识分子都得罪光才好玩。2009年四川省政府专程派了个小组来北京找他谈，希望他能停止学生名单调查，他拒绝了; 2010年上海政府来北京找他，希望上海工作室拆迁大事化小，价钱好商量，他坚持一切公开; 2011年他拍摄乐清钱云会纪录片，温州市政府外宣办负责人专程来北京与他商量，为社会稳定能否停止拍摄，由他们补偿所有费用，他谢绝了。
两周前，3月30日上午，一群警察涌进了工作室，以检查消防的名 义检查了办公室，宿舍，仓库和住所，并强行登记所有人员证件。第二天晚上8点，又有14名警察进入登记工作室人员证件艾神当场念“身分证法”条款，指该检 查无法律依据，但他们仍强行进行了检查。4月1日早上，10多名朝阳分局警察第三次进入工作室登记了所有人的证件。
4月2日，是连续三天查证后的第二天，艾神离京前一天。我们在院 子里晒太阳，艾神淡淡地说，我现在很危险，他们不仅查了这儿，也查了路青（艾未未妻子）的工作室。国保曾几次提出让我当政协委员，我没有接受。但你们应该 不会有事的。我说，你怎么可能被带走呢。他说，这个国家有觉悟的人还是太少了。
那天正好有十几个学生网友来工作室看他，他们在人人网上约了一起来的。意外地，艾神邀请网友和工作室的人一起午餐。饭后，艾神与我们工作室的人一一紧紧拥抱分别，当时只觉得艾神略带伤感与不舍，与平时不同。
4月3日早上8点左右，艾神在机场被带走中午12点，工作室同事 电话我：。几十个警察来工作室搜查，8名在场人员全部被带走到了南皋派出所。搜查一直持续到下午6点多，工作室和宿舍所有电脑主机，硬盘，笔记本电脑等都 被带走。凌晨3点警方释放了最后一个员工后，工作室断电了，门口停着车24小时盯哨。
我们和他的妻子路青等待着，可是24个小时没有消息，48小时仍然没有任何消息。
艾神预见了今天
半个月过去了，不仅艾神下落不明，艾未未工作室的志愿者，员工竟 也被相继绑架，失踪。4月3日，志愿者文涛，“环球时报”前记者，在距离工作室不到300米的地方被几个陌生人强行拉上一辆车带走了。4月8日，公司的出 纳胡明芬失去联系。4月9日晚上，公司的建筑设计师刘正刚，被几位便装男子当着他妻子的面绑架走了。4月10日凌晨，艾未未的司机张劲松在草场地与朋友分 开后失踪。
当一个国家的法律无法保护一个普通公民时，我只感到悲哀。
艾神预见了今天去年11月，上海当局要强拆他的工作室，他被软禁在北京家中，那天他吃着朋友送来的饭盒，笑说：。将来不管定我什么罪，我都是政治罪。
艾神被带走后，“环球时报”发社论批判他是“一个特立独行的人，身边也聚集了一批像他这样的人。”如果我是其中一个，我深以此为荣。
“老妈蹄花”的正角浦志强律师说：。。。没他，睡着了都会吓醒他那胖大身躯是座山门，挡住了很多风沙他真不在，我们就都悬了得去找他，好让他扛事。
寻找艾未未。
作者为艾未未工作室成员
Dissident warns of 'silent cyber war' Activist says Canadians are within China's reach
Written By CDP.ORG on 2011/04/24 | 4/24/2011
By Don Butler, Ottawa Citizen
Are the Chinese spying on Ottawa resident Maggie Wenzhuo Hou?
Hou, a 41-year-old Chinese dissident who has lived in Ottawa since June 2009, is convinced that agents of the government of China are monitoring and blocking her e-mail and telephone communications.
While she can't prove her allegations, she can offer up a long list of circumstantial evidence to support her claims. Based on her dissident status and documented attacks by China-based hackers, security experts say hers is a credible story.
Alex Neve, secretary general of Amnesty International Canada, says Chinese monitoring of human rights activists in this country is a "well-known and notorious pattern."
Hou is a "high-profile, outspoken human rights activist who has some real credibility because she's freshly out of China, has first-hand experience with human rights violations and is quite well connected to a number of known human rights activists still inside China," Neve says.
"So it does not surprise me at all that she could be, would be or was targeted for some sort of hacking or computer surveillance by the Chinese authorities."
But Ron Deibert, the director of the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab, which in 2009 uncovered GhostNet, a cyberspy ring based in China that was gathering intelligence in more than 100 countries, counsels caution when assessing cases such as Hou's.
"There are so many people who read about issues of espionage or information-based attacks and jump immediately to the extreme conclusion," Deibert says.
For her part, Hou says "Canadian authorities" are interested in her experiences, and have interviewed her three times about them. She decided to go public to warn Canadians about what she calls China's "silent cyber war."
"The Canadian public is just sleeping while, as we Chinese say, a tiger's sleeping next to you. People should wake up. This country is slipping into danger," she says. "When I came to Canada, I thought I'd be safe. I don't feel safe anymore. I feel like I'm in China."
Hou first got involved in human rights and political activism in China while attending Sichuan University in 1989, the year of the Tiananmen Square massacre. In 2003, she founded and led a now-defunct human rights group in Beijing. She's now director of the human rights committee of the Democratic Party of China, an exiled opposition party.
While in China, she was arrested and detained many times, most recently at the time of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, when she was imprisoned for 18 days for her involvement in human rights protests.
When she became pregnant late that year, she managed, with help from some Canadian friends, to leave China for a teaching job at the University of Ottawa. She gave birth a month later and taught courses in human rights and political activism in China at the university's graduate school of international and public affairs the during the 2009-10 academic year. She has had protected person status in Canada since last August.
She first started noticing some "funny things" going on around the time of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's visit to China in December 2009, when she was involved in demonstrations and an online petition. "My e-mails started to be irregular," she says. "There were lost e-mail messages." When people signed the online petition, their names didn't appear. Friends told her that when they opened her Gmail messages, their computers slowed down noticeably.
Hou, a 41-year-old Chinese dissident who has lived in Ottawa since June 2009, is convinced that agents of the government of China are monitoring and blocking her e-mail and telephone communications.
While she can't prove her allegations, she can offer up a long list of circumstantial evidence to support her claims. Based on her dissident status and documented attacks by China-based hackers, security experts say hers is a credible story.
Alex Neve, secretary general of Amnesty International Canada, says Chinese monitoring of human rights activists in this country is a "well-known and notorious pattern."
Hou is a "high-profile, outspoken human rights activist who has some real credibility because she's freshly out of China, has first-hand experience with human rights violations and is quite well connected to a number of known human rights activists still inside China," Neve says.
"So it does not surprise me at all that she could be, would be or was targeted for some sort of hacking or computer surveillance by the Chinese authorities."
But Ron Deibert, the director of the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab, which in 2009 uncovered GhostNet, a cyberspy ring based in China that was gathering intelligence in more than 100 countries, counsels caution when assessing cases such as Hou's.
"There are so many people who read about issues of espionage or information-based attacks and jump immediately to the extreme conclusion," Deibert says.
For her part, Hou says "Canadian authorities" are interested in her experiences, and have interviewed her three times about them. She decided to go public to warn Canadians about what she calls China's "silent cyber war."
"The Canadian public is just sleeping while, as we Chinese say, a tiger's sleeping next to you. People should wake up. This country is slipping into danger," she says. "When I came to Canada, I thought I'd be safe. I don't feel safe anymore. I feel like I'm in China."
Hou first got involved in human rights and political activism in China while attending Sichuan University in 1989, the year of the Tiananmen Square massacre. In 2003, she founded and led a now-defunct human rights group in Beijing. She's now director of the human rights committee of the Democratic Party of China, an exiled opposition party.
While in China, she was arrested and detained many times, most recently at the time of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, when she was imprisoned for 18 days for her involvement in human rights protests.
When she became pregnant late that year, she managed, with help from some Canadian friends, to leave China for a teaching job at the University of Ottawa. She gave birth a month later and taught courses in human rights and political activism in China at the university's graduate school of international and public affairs the during the 2009-10 academic year. She has had protected person status in Canada since last August.
She first started noticing some "funny things" going on around the time of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's visit to China in December 2009, when she was involved in demonstrations and an online petition. "My e-mails started to be irregular," she says. "There were lost e-mail messages." When people signed the online petition, their names didn't appear. Friends told her that when they opened her Gmail messages, their computers slowed down noticeably.
Google Inc., which owns Gmail, told Hou at the time that the problem was with her computer. But the company has since accused Chinese authorities of interfering with its Gmail, leading to access problems.
Last May, Hou travelled to Toronto to have her computer examined by Greg Walton, a computer security expert who worked for Citizen Lab on the GhostNet project. According to Hou, Walton told her the computer was heavily hacked and was communicating with dozens of IP addresses, including some in China.
Walton, now based in London, England, agrees there were "anomalies" in the network traffic. "However, the traffic was almost entirely consistent with common malware to which all Internet users are exposed, associated with cyber criminals motivated by profit rather than the targeting of political dissidents."
Despite his failure to find anything linked to Chinese spying on Hou's computer, Walton says "credible sources within the investigations community have repeatedly indicated that there has been growing unease about the surveillance of dissidents in Canada."
In an e-mail to the Citizen, an official at the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa said allegations that the Chinese government supports hacking are "groundless and with ulterior motives."
"The Chinese government has consistently been firmly opposing any illegal activities that sabotage the Internet and computer networks, including computer hacking," the official wrote, adding that China's government "is ready to work with countries to counter hacking and other forms of Internet crime."
But Rafal Rohozinski, chief executive of Ottawa-based SecDev Group, who worked with Citizen Lab on the GhostNet project, say Hou's allegations are credible.
"We've got plenty of precedent where these kinds of techniques have been used against inconvenient political actors," says Rohozinski, though whether the perpetrators are Chinese authorities or "patriotic hackers" is difficult to determine.
Whenever Hou communicates with people in China, "she has to work through services that invariably pick up her identifying IP address or the address of the e-mail she's using," Rohozinski says. "If someone's on a watch list, it's pretty simple to be able to identify that individual."
Wesley Wark, a security expert and visiting professor at the University of Ottawa, says there's lots of evidence that China is involved in state-sponsored efforts to "harass and survey" Chinese expatriates. "It's a big part of what the Chinese do, and they do it because they have global reach, because they are determined to monitor overseas dissident groups and individuals."
Deibert notes that Hou isn't an ordinary person. "She's someone who's connected politically to Chinese events. That puts her in a different category right off the bat."
Wark thinks the Canadian government should be meeting regularly with Chinese officials to emphasize that spying and hacking are not tolerated in Canada. "But that's not a message we've heard from recent governments. The big message is trade and better relations."
Hou acknowledges that speaking out carries risks. "I definitely am worried," she says. "I know their people are watching me. Their people maybe hate me. But I feel I have an obligation for myself, for Chinese people and for people at large, including Canadians."
dbutler@ottawacitizen.com
Last May, Hou travelled to Toronto to have her computer examined by Greg Walton, a computer security expert who worked for Citizen Lab on the GhostNet project. According to Hou, Walton told her the computer was heavily hacked and was communicating with dozens of IP addresses, including some in China.
Walton, now based in London, England, agrees there were "anomalies" in the network traffic. "However, the traffic was almost entirely consistent with common malware to which all Internet users are exposed, associated with cyber criminals motivated by profit rather than the targeting of political dissidents."
Despite his failure to find anything linked to Chinese spying on Hou's computer, Walton says "credible sources within the investigations community have repeatedly indicated that there has been growing unease about the surveillance of dissidents in Canada."
In an e-mail to the Citizen, an official at the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa said allegations that the Chinese government supports hacking are "groundless and with ulterior motives."
"The Chinese government has consistently been firmly opposing any illegal activities that sabotage the Internet and computer networks, including computer hacking," the official wrote, adding that China's government "is ready to work with countries to counter hacking and other forms of Internet crime."
But Rafal Rohozinski, chief executive of Ottawa-based SecDev Group, who worked with Citizen Lab on the GhostNet project, say Hou's allegations are credible.
"We've got plenty of precedent where these kinds of techniques have been used against inconvenient political actors," says Rohozinski, though whether the perpetrators are Chinese authorities or "patriotic hackers" is difficult to determine.
Whenever Hou communicates with people in China, "she has to work through services that invariably pick up her identifying IP address or the address of the e-mail she's using," Rohozinski says. "If someone's on a watch list, it's pretty simple to be able to identify that individual."
Wesley Wark, a security expert and visiting professor at the University of Ottawa, says there's lots of evidence that China is involved in state-sponsored efforts to "harass and survey" Chinese expatriates. "It's a big part of what the Chinese do, and they do it because they have global reach, because they are determined to monitor overseas dissident groups and individuals."
Deibert notes that Hou isn't an ordinary person. "She's someone who's connected politically to Chinese events. That puts her in a different category right off the bat."
Wark thinks the Canadian government should be meeting regularly with Chinese officials to emphasize that spying and hacking are not tolerated in Canada. "But that's not a message we've heard from recent governments. The big message is trade and better relations."
Hou acknowledges that speaking out carries risks. "I definitely am worried," she says. "I know their people are watching me. Their people maybe hate me. But I feel I have an obligation for myself, for Chinese people and for people at large, including Canadians."
dbutler@ottawacitizen.com
