##Summerschool in Croatia

Disclaimer

This is my version of events. I do not claim absolute truth nor impartial observation powers. I strongly believe that everyone has their own version of the truth, which was already described very neatly by Plato’s allegory of the cave. I do not make any claims about the feelings or thoughts of others, I only report what I saw and experienced.

End of disclaimer

Isis states on Twitter that they prefers to use they/their as pronouns. Since I am respectful to anyone who asks me to use certain pronouns, I chose to use they/their throughout my story to describe Isis. Isis had two partners present in Croatia, which I will denote with John and Doe to protect the privacy of people caught up in this.

This is my recollection of events and how I experienced them during the Summerschool on Real-World Crypto and Privacy held in Croatia from 6-10 June. Let me first sketch the situation. In April I tutored Jake on a formal verification class for which there was an exam in the last week of June. I convinced Jake to come to Croatia after I got my stipend, so I could tutor him there. At first he was not going to join because of conflicting travel plans, even though he had attended the summerschool in the previous year. On May 26th Security in Times of Surveillance took place in Eindhoven and Jake was supposed to give a talk. Unfortunately, he was so sick that he was not able to. The next day Jake and I met briefly and he was looking horribly sick. We mostly talked about studying for his exam and said our goodbyes. Around the same time, I was informed that Jake was not going to come to Croatia. I figured his travel plans just didn’t work out in the end and let it go. This meeting in May was the last I had seen and heard of Jake and at the start of the summerschool I was getting worried about his health and his studies. I hadn’t been online much during the week between seeing Jake and travelling to Croatia, so I hadn’t heard what was going on. This is an important detail to understand my story.

Then June came along. I was looking forward to Croatia, to see the people I considered friends, listen to great lectures and have fun in the resort where the conference was held. I flew to Croatia on Sunday the 5th of June and arrived at some time late afternoon/early evening in the resort. After checking-in and registering for the conference, I bumped into Isis and Doe in the lobby of the hotel. We had some coffee together and talked in a friendly manner. Nothing seemed wrong at that moment.

Later that evening Isis, John, Doe, many of the people present and I went to the Pirate Ship, the local cocktailbar. At some point I recalled that Isis, John and Doe were friends with Jake, so I could ask them how Jake was doing. Note that I had no clue that Jake’s travel plans had changed for a reason other than his own schedule or that Jake had resigned from Tor. When I asked Isis and their partners about Jake, something very strange happened. Isis looked really upset. They clenched their fists, was trembling and had very teary eyes. Doe suddenly disappeared; later I found out he went for a very long walk on the beach. John answered that “this is not a fun subject to talk about”, which confused me intensely. I asked if they could at least tell me if Jake was alive. Isis answered in a very surly manner “yes, he is alive”. Their reactions made me feel unwelcome and ignorant, thus I decided to mingle with others for a while.

Later, when everything cooled down a bit, I talked some more with Isis and John. At some point they decided to go back to the hotel and I joined them, since I didn’t really know how to get back. Isis and John were having a discussion amongst themselves, so I strolled along behind them, preoccupied with my own thoughts. In the hotel, on the stairs to the rooms, I heard Isis saying that they want to see it (or him) burned totally to the ground. The “it” was too quiet for me to hear clearly, and might have been “him”. John answered that a small controlled burn should be sufficient enough to reach Isis’ goal on which Isis replied that they need assurance that it (or he) cannot rise again. Isis said that if an inferno is needed, an inferno needed to be used. At this point I had no clue what/who they were talking about. I did have a funny anecdote about fires from my past and told them this. After this I reached my floor and said goodnight.

After reaching my hotel room and getting online, I finally found out what had happened to Jake and why it wasn’t a fun subject to talk about. I still did not know that Isis claimed to be one of his victims. I was shocked about the webpage. The next day, I was brought up to speed even more and started to realise how dangerous things could become.

The atmopshere at the summer school felt weird for me. People seemed upset and skipped the activities during leisure time. People separated themselves from the larger groups and the atmosphere felt tense all the time. I didn’t sleep well during the summerschool.

On Saturday, the day after the last talks, Isis, John and a couple of others were sitting with me in the lobby of the hotel. I was asked to read, check and comment on a blog John was writing. At this moment, Isis had not yet told the world that the “Forest story” on the website was their story, but it was clear to me that Isis was at least one of the stories; I suspected Isis was “Forest”; John used “Forest” as an example, apparently confirming my suspicion. This has been confirmed by Isis themself on their blog by now.

While I was helping John with his blog post, Isis was looking up German law. Isis was reading laws out loud that suggested they was trying to find out what kind of punishment there is for someone that doesn’t testify or isn’t fully truthful in their testimony or even committed perjury. Isis even asked John if he knew what would happen to a foreigner living on a visa committing perjury. I was shocked that Isis would even think about taking this kind of action in a court of law. Isis stated that they was planning on pretending to be one of the other, less grave stories, instead of testifying as Forest, if it came to a trial in Germany. Since John was using “Forest” as an example in his blog, Isis stated that they was convinced that the blog would lead back to Isis and they would be called in for questioning. If this happened, Isis would testify as one of the stories that did not include rape, since they didn’t want to tell the rape story over and over again.

Isis also looked up what would happen to Jake if found guilty in a court of law. Isis found that he would be deported and would never be able to get a visa in any European country if he got convicted of a violent crime. Isis looked very smug and happy about this fact. John said that this implied facing the (red. WikiLeaks) Grand Jury in America for Jake and that he thought that this would be too grave. Isis said that they wanted Jake to leave all the countries they might ever want to live in and that Jake would get what he deserved.

It took a couple of days before it dawned on me what Isis must have meant with burning it (or him) totally to the ground. Ever since Croatia, ever since that week, I have lived in fear of retribution if I published this information. I was scared that Isis would kill my academic career. I was scared that I would be targeted next. During my week in Croatia, Isis not only attacked Jake, but also others that didn’t take their side immediately. I still do not know what kind of consequences I can expect from Isis and Isis’ followers, but I have reached a point where I need to speak up.

Right now, I still don’t feel safe in the office where I work on my thesis. I do not know if and when Isis and their partners will retaliate and how this will play out. I do know that I have to share this story with the public out there. I feel abused, terrorised and not safe enough to visit my supervisors who have offices in the same corridor as one of Isis’ partners. I still do not know if Isis really thought I was friendly to their cause or that they convinced me of their truth, or that they expected me to relay this specific information to Jake and thereby increase his stress level even more, or that they just saw me as a tool they could use in future situations. I feel violated and stripped of my right to free speech. Writing this post is my first step to take back control.