From: Rick Anderson <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thu, 15 Feb 2018 04:48:46 +0000

Further to this point from Jim:

> (3) What the article still does not address is the underside of her
> practices.  Whatever you think about what she's doing, an organization
> based where hers is based that *avows* that it is collecting logins
> and passwords from scientists around the world raises questions of
> information security and what's going on in the back room that I have
> not seen addressed.

I noticed that the Verge article said that Elbakyan “vociferously
denied” that Sci-Hub phishes for network credentials from university
students and faculty. In support of “vociferously denied,” it links to
this article:

https://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/2016/05/31/why-sci-hub-matters/

In that article, Elbakyan doesn’t deny phishing for credentials at
all—in fact, she wasn’t interviewed for the article and is never
directly quoted in it. This makes me wonder how many of the links in
the Verge piece that are provided to support assertions made by its
author really do support those assertions.

Elbakyan has been asked, elsewhere, whether Sci-Hub phishes for
credentials. Not only does she not “vociferously” deny it—she artfully
avoids answering the question. You can see that exchange here:

https://svpow.com/2016/02/25/does-sci-hub-phish-for-credentials/

---
Rick Anderson
Assoc. Dean for Collections & Scholarly Communication
Marriott Library, University of Utah
Desk: (801) 587-9989
Cell: (801) 721-1687
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