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Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

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Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#71

Post by derekp7 »

gamblor956 wrote: post #64
lixtra wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So who from the federal government is charged for their part of the crime?

ICE didn't commit a crime...It is not illegal for government agencies to request information from individuals or companies. Nor did Motel 6 for that matter. It was hit with a civil lawsuit...

This is where the laws need to be tightened -- people tend to not know what their rights or obligations are, and have to rely on expensive professionals to advise them (and it can still go wrong). When a government agent makes a request, often it can come across as a demand, with the implication that your are required by law to comply (they can even lie to you to get you to comply).

Now in the case of a large business, I would expect that they have the resources to figure out when to comply or when to ask for a warrant. But individuals have a harder time -- imagine getting sued by your employer for complying with a TSA agent's demand that you open your laptop for them to search through, then you get sued or fired because of that. It should always be illegal for a government official to imply that you are required to do something, if that isn't the case (and make it clear that there is no penalty, such as not being to board your plane, for not complying).

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#72

Post by tantalor »

gamblor956 wrote: post #64
lixtra wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So who from the federal government is charged for their part of the crime?

ICE didn't commit a crime...It is not illegal for government agencies to request information from individuals or companies. Nor did Motel 6 for that matter. It was hit with a civil lawsuit...

Not illegal, sure, but the lack of warrant may (should) mean the information is inadmissible in court. It's no different than if they stole it.

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#73

Post by omegaworks »

paulddraper wrote: post #60
bradlys wrote: post #15

Why would ICE run "latino-sounding" names through and not just all names through whatever ICE database they're cross-referencing? Did they get a 10,000 page print out instead of a spreadsheet file? (why not Scan + OCR + cross reference with database - would be way faster) Just seems like ICE employees are only targeting latinos... intentionally. And that's the most bothering part of this to me. We're cool with Swedes…

> We're cool with Swedes overstaying their welcome... I think it has less to do with "being cool with Swedes", and more to do with the fact that illegal immigrants are -- statistically speaking -- overwhelming Hispanic, and anyone identifying illegals will have better results among Hispanics. I don't think anyone is more cool with a Swede conducting a terrorist attack than an Arab. Rather, any tenancy to profile Arab…

>I merely assert that the motivations for racial profiling stems more from actual statistics and cost-benefit analysis than intrinsic irrational racism as I think you suggest.

That doesn't make racial profiling any more ethical or correct. The evidence is so overwhelming that intrinsic irrational racism is part of the reason why it is done. That evidence includes direct rhetoric of the current administration.

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#74

Post by code_duck »

nostromo wrote: post #24

This is... strange. When the federal government comes asking for your help, I think it's pretty normal for people to provide that help. In a just world, if the government asks for something inappropriately, then the party at fault is the government. (In other words, Washington should sue ICE, not Motel 6.) If we want companies to require a subpoena to share information with the federal government (and personally I do…

Isn’t it your duty to protect the privacy of your data and your customers regardless of who is requesting data? I thought companies like Twitter and Google routinely rebuffed requests for information from government agencies and opposed restrictive rules, e.g. in China, and are praised for it. The concept of resisting government requests for information is well established.

If the police called and asked for my customer list, I’d check whether they had that authority and many other issues before turning it over. I think we had an article on here earlier about ‘second order thinking’ that would cover that... getting an invasive request from the government, and fulfilling it regardless of consequences because you want to ‘help’ or consider them to be like Mom and Dad is first order thinking.

I’m no expert, but it seems increasingly common to have state laws that oppose or are stricter than federal laws, and you do have to be aware of all laws for your jurisdiction down to the county and city. Especially in any voluntary action, you have to consider whether it violates other laws or duties, and if they weren’t legally compelled to do this t was voluntary.

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#75

Post by shawnz »

dragonwriter wrote: post #17
whoopdedo wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It certainly wasn't ethical So someone can act unethically, reap the benefits of it, be caught red-handed, and suffer no consequences. Sounds like a loophole in the justice system to me. More to the point, now that we've seen it happen once what has been done to prevent it from happening again?

> So someone can act unethically, reap the benefits of it, be caught red-handed, and suffer no consequences. > Sounds like a loophole in the justice system to me. No, it's the fundamental distinction between what is illegal and what is unethical, which is a bit more than a “loophole”. It may be that it should be illegal for ICE to ask for certain information outside of the circumstances where it has a warrant, and th…

The parent is not claiming that it's illegal, just that it ought to be. I was the one who was suggesting (wrongly, apparently) that it might be illegal.

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#76

Post by YeahSureWhyNot »

YeahSureWhyNot wrote: post #59
wan23 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, it's not 1 million of anyone entering the country illegally every year.

70k arrested for illegal border crossing in march only. I would say it's definitely more than a million if you count the ones who didn't get arrested

its funny how other members upvote the comment that contains a fact from a CBP website and HN mods come in and downvote it. Dear liberal SV people, facts don't disappear just because you downplay them, ask your favorite Hillary:) edit: im assuming its mods downvoting because points go down by 3 but up by 1 at a time

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#77

Post by linuxdude314 »

I'm really surprised at the amount of people defending the actions of ICE and Motel 6 in this instance. ICE has clearly demonstrated tactics that are anti-immigrant (legal or otherwise).

How quick some are to forget the importance of immigration in the startup community!

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#78

Post by vkou »

scarejunba wrote: post #13
mey wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How was it illegal for ICE to request the data? It certainly wasn't ethical, but what is right and what is legal are not the same thing. Hell it sounds like the only law broken according to the article was a Washington State consumer protection law. Hence the settlement is against Motel 6 and not against ICE.

Honestly it feels like it should be illegal. If a cop or a cop-simulacrum walks up to me and says "You're going to jail unless you give me this" I'm probably going to give them that. I don't want to go to jail and I know they'll cook something up about resisting arrest if I don't play along.

If a cop walks up to you, and says: "You're going to jail, unless you kill Bob," that's one thing.

If a cop walks up to you, and says: "Could you do me a favor, and kill Bob for me?" - that's an entirely different thing.

Motel 6 was not coerced into breaking the law. It voluntarily broke the law.

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#79

Post by maccio92 »

omegaworks wrote: post #67
ErikVandeWater wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But stopping terrorism is not the only purpose of ICE.

Enumerate those other purposes? Is one of them to privilege a white majority? Perhaps there's a reason so many call to abolish the institution.

It's in the damn name. Immigration enforcement. We have a legal immigration process in this country, many try to come here illegally. Without a border, you have no country.

Re: Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE

#80

Post by toomuchtodo »

linuxdude314 wrote: post #77

I'm really surprised at the amount of people defending the actions of ICE and Motel 6 in this instance. ICE has clearly demonstrated tactics that are anti-immigrant (legal or otherwise). How quick some are to forget the importance of immigration in the startup community!

You can support immigration in the startup community but not support illegal immigration. Of course ICE is going to target illegal immigrants; it’s part of their mandate. This doesn’t excuse ICE exceeding their authority, which requires a patch via legislation.

China, India, Canada, and Mexico (countries with large populations and those that border the US) would all give me the boot if I tried to illegally immigrate there (and rightfully so). Sovereignty and the rule of law are important.

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