Oh gosh this is huuggeeeeeeeeeeee!
But this is very generic news.
Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
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Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#62It's interesting to see how leak disclosure has changed over the years. Leakers/reporters are increasingly sophisticated at maximizing the impact of their information through titrated disclosure. Someone, somewhere, is building the theory of the optimal leak.
If you want to burn your ideas into the minds of as many people as possible, the timings are probably similar to spaced repetition[1]. In other words: Lots of leaks early on; on the order of every day or two. Then taper off and only leak new stuff right before people are likely to forget you exist. If you can stretch things out for six months or so, you're embedded in the public psyche.
Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#63Is it just me or is this expose surprisingly low on American citizens? Is this one of the times when conspiracy theory could be conspiracy fact? It feels like this is an extremely selective release.
From the Reddit live thread: The Editor in Chief of Süddeutsche Zeitung responded to the lack of United States individuals in the documents, saying to "Just wait for what is coming next".
Perhaps they don't want the individuals in the initial release to be overshadowed. Everything in good time.
Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#64It's interesting to see how leak disclosure has changed over the years. Leakers/reporters are increasingly sophisticated at maximizing the impact of their information through titrated disclosure. Someone, somewhere, is building the theory of the optimal leak.
I'd be surprised if the method employed for Snowden's leak is ever topped - several of the first reveals were responded to by the USG, and then the following day the next reveal would demonstrate the response to be a lie. I don't remember the specifics of it, but I do remember wondering how long it would take the PR folks in government to realize that their spin was actually amplifying the message. I'm pretty sure it took three news cycles. It might have been less to do with masterfully predicting the media and government response, and more to do with the amount of evidence available - but it was hilarious (in the darkest way possible).
Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#65In terms of e-discovery, 2.6TB is not really all that large.
Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#66Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#67This data has been out there for a year, Vice did a piece about it a long time ago. I'm sure there are some juicy things in there, but I highly doubt it will be as explosive as some seem think it will be (especially as the stories begin to rollout over the next 14 days.)
If anything it will be an interesting insight into how tightly knit world leaders are to one another and their investments. The story does say that more data is expected to come in, about 700GBs worth...so that could be new material. However, as it stands I don't think this will cause much upheaval. It does almost read like a plot to a Stieg Larsson novel though, and I'm sure someone is going to write a terrific book about it all.
I do hope there is a lot of explosive material in here, but I do have my doubts, given the amount of time the data has been available.
Here's the Vice article from 2014. http://www.vice.com/read/evil-llc-0000524-v21n12
Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
But can't this Mossack Fonseca firm now go ahead and send a legal request to these journalists to delete these confidential documents and journalists will have to comply with it? It's just so hard to believe for me that company confidential information is not protected by any law and these leaks can happen with no punishment for those who possess this confidential information. It's a great success that this leak had…
> company confidential information is not protected by any law This is not the case. Presumably the original leaker(s) are in violation of their contracts with the company and possibly Panamanian criminal law (which I know nothing about). In some jurisdictions, there may also be statutory civil liability surrounding the subsequent losses realized as the result of the information being in the hands of these non-partie…
Aren't these documents the copyright of Mossack Fonseca? They could just sue everyone reproducing copies for copyright infringement, beyond just the original leaker breaking contract and also committing copyright infringement.
If there is no license, full rights are reserved and copyright is implied.
Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#69Re: Panama Papers - 2.6TB leak on offshore tax havens
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am not a lawyer, but as far as I know there is no US law that makes it illegal for a civilian to see something. It's important, though, that if you have a security clearance you can be fired or put in jail for reading something outside of your clearance but those laws don't apply to normal people.
It's unclear why my response is getting downvoted when other people are giving normative answers to a legal question.
> It's important, though, that if you have a security clearance you can be fired or put in jail for reading something outside of your clearance but those laws don't apply to normal people.
What happens if your clearance is secret and you are doing your job and some time later, they decide something you were working is now top secret?
Or if your clearance is secret and TS stuff is on the morning NYTimes?
I'm sure the military has all sorts of rules about this that makes no sense but a lot of non military also have these clearances. Who reads the 150 some page application in its entirety?