I can't imagine that it costs very much to host a warrant canary. They had one, and took it down. So arguably they've either been pressured, or have decided that it was sending the wrong message about them. "Meh, who cares?" doesn't seem very likely to me, given their history and image.
Silent Circle removes warrant canary
161–170 of 197 posts
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
These kinds of comments are explicitly off limits on HN. You can't accuse people of shilling, or of "playing PR", or otherwise commenting in bad faith. If you believe someone is doing that and have evidence , you mail hn@ycombinator.com and let them handle it. What you don't do is chase people off threads with accusations about it. Don't take my word for it. I'm just another commenter. Use the search box at the botto…
That search doesn't return any hits.
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
Eh, I'm not so sure he's endangering anything. He's only staking his personal reputation, that's what "I only speak for myself" means. If it comes out that the company does what he says he doesn't see them do, then hes only burning himself; not the company. Worst case scenario he gets fired and someone else will hire him. It isn't like he works for the NSA. Good software developers are hard to find and bleeding infor…
That's true. The only way that he or his company could truly be hurt is if Silent Circle did get a NSL and he admitted to it publicly. If they got a NSL and he lied about it, no harm will come to him. Or if he's telling the truth, obviously.
> The only way that he or his company could truly be hurt is if Silent Circle did get a NSL and he admitted to it publicly.
At which point we are talking civil disobedience, so worrying about whether that will land them in trouble with management is missing the point by a mile and a half.
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#164I'm not sure what usefulness removing the warrant canary would be without receiving an NSL.. Are you suggesting that your company acts in bad practice regarding warrant canaries? You really shouldn't be playing PR for your company unless that's your job.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12039815 and marked it off-topic.
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#165I'm not sure what usefulness removing the warrant canary would be without receiving an NSL.. Are you suggesting that your company acts in bad practice regarding warrant canaries? You really shouldn't be playing PR for your company unless that's your job.
Alright, I'll leave the thread.
Please don't. People posting about situations they personally know about produce much of the best content on HN. I'm sorry you got attacked for it, but I'm sure that's not representative of the readership here.
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#166>I think American authorities can tell the difference between what they do and the Stasi. Of course they can, they're protecting their nations chosen way of life, while the Stasi were oppressing citizens who dared resist the status quo. The difference is clear.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12038870 and marked it off-topic.
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#167Members of the US military swear to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, including domestic ones. Just because your family members might be oathbreakers doesn't mean everyone in the military is.
> Just because your family members might be oathbreakers
Personal attacks (which attacking someone's family is) are not allowed on Hacker News. Please don't do this again.
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12038978 and marked it off-topic.
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a great way to end up in prison. That said, civil disobedience has been used in the past to great effect.
>That's a great way to end up in prison easy there, cowboy, this isn't East Germany just yet. I think American authorities can tell the difference between what they do and the Stasi. As in, I actually, literally think they can tell the difference. Nobody will be ending up in prison for posting the above. Seriously. Show me a judge who'll do that. You don't get a 4-year philosophy degree before getting a JD in America…
Can you put your money where your mouth is ? Like, can you put an Ethereum "contract" or something that says you bet $5k or more that nobody in the US in the next 5 years will be charged for using a warrant canary ? Suppose there were a way to contract that, would you bet that way ?
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Can the government compel my speech ? Can the government compel me to make false statements ? These are interesting questions, but I'm not at all sure the answer is not 'yes' to both of them, under the right circumstances. The Fifth Amendment would not seem to imply (there's no criminal proceeding, and not necessarily any risk of self-incrimination) and the First Amendment, while applicable, would not necessarily p…
Freedom of speech entails the freedom to speak only your mind. No one has a valid claim to compel your speech. What sufficiently dire circumstance can there be where a government would have the right to compel speech? I think the 13th amendment would come into play here as well.
At least in the US, there are certainly circumstances where the government can compel speech, though in most cases they can't. There is a lot of case law on the subject. It's mostly in the commercial realm (think cigarette labels) but not entirely (think Jehovah's Witness school children who don't want to salute the flag). I'm not aware of a compelled speech case balancing national security interests against first amendment interests as this would be.
Re: Silent Circle removes warrant canary
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, I guess at some level, I think NSLs violate the spirit of the law. Thus, it is worth examining the issue. I particularly like the above structure because it separates the hiring of the firm from the disclosure of the NSL to the firm. In fact, you might choose to never actually disclose the NSL to the hired firm! Since the firm doesn't necessarily know the reason they're being engaged, they're not making a discl…
> an organization like the EFF could make it a policy to publicly disclose when they've been hired or terminated by a client I've worked at EFF for a long time and I don't believe EFF could adopt such a policy as a matter of prudence -- or legal ethics. I can tell you that there are many reasons that lawyers will regard the existence of conversations, client intake, consultations, and representation relationships as…
I might go with something like this:
"We, corporation X, hereby declare as a matter of public record that our counsel of choice in any criminal proceeding pertaining to a NSL is the EFF. This notice constitutes prior informed consent to any advertisement featuring us as a client of the EFF should we chose to retain them."