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TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

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Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#121

Post by Agathos »

gcb wrote: post #113
B_ wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intentionally making your data inaccessible (by encryption or otherwise) without a means of recovering it to attempt to prevent it being used against you in court could be considered destruction of evidence. If convicted of that, expect far more than a few days in jail, depending on how annoyed the judge is with you.

Having lost the key for several of my spare drivers in the closet... How can that power abuse you describe be avoided on innocents?

Explain to the jury that you lost the key before you knew there was a criminal investigation. It only becomes illegal afterward.

Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#123

Post by mbreese »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #83
pilom wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good summary, the only difference between this and the house key example is that you can "forget" the password. When you "forget" there is nothing they can do besides say you are unstable and hold you in contempt of court.

True, and shredding a key would be no different than shredding evidence. You could be charged with destroying evidence but not the crime the evidence supported.

I dot think you'd be charged with destroying evidence, because that would be assuming that there would be evidence. Instead, I suspect you'd be charged with contempt or obstruction of justice, or something along those lines. Otherwise, yes, I think you're right.

Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#124

Post by Duff »

marshray wrote: post #114
B_ wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intentionally making your data inaccessible (by encryption or otherwise) without a means of recovering it to attempt to prevent it being used against you in court could be considered destruction of evidence. If convicted of that, expect far more than a few days in jail, depending on how annoyed the judge is with you.

But it wasn't evidence when you encrypted it, right?

Typically, you are in trouble when you destroy evidence when you has reasonable cause to believe that it is evidence.

If I delete all of my email today, I'm not committing a crime. But if I find out that my company is being sued for breach of a contract that I was working on, deleting email becomes suspicious.

Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#125

Post by mbreese »

gcb wrote: post #116
ptomato wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not one either, but laws against self-incrimination do not mean you can withhold/destroy evidence.

No one is withhold/destroying evidence in that case. it's there for anyone to see... encrypted. Can I go to federal prison if the police ask to me translate some paper in foreign language I happen to have in my pocket and i refuse/don't know the language?

No, you couldn't be compelled to translate a document in a foreign language. The police have another way to get the information - ask someone else who knows the language to do it. You would be making their job harder, but not impossible. In the case of an encryption key, you might be the only one that can assist the investigation. So you'd be hindering it. At least that's how I'd see it.

Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#126

Post by Estragon »

coreyja wrote: post #96

This may have been posted below as I did not read every comment but isn't impossible to prove that the file is a TrueCrypt volume to begin with? Couldn't you just claim it was a corrupt computer file that contained random data? How can they ask you for something that they have no proof even exists? There is no proof the file is a TrueCrypt volume so there is no way to prove there is even a password to find.

Evidence of it being mounted could exist, for instance in his shell history.

Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#127

Post by sorbus »

maratd wrote: post #107
wisty wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Questionable" is the key point here. We can't be sure if the defence holds water until it has been thoroughly tested in court. As for shadow volumes, that's a whole other kettle of fish. I'm sure it won't be quite that simple - if your VLC history has a link to /shadow-volume/pirate_movie.avi then they may be able to compel you to decrypt it.

That's not what it would look like. VLC would have a link to D:\pirate_movie.avi but when you decrypt the volume, all it shows is a bunch of text files on D:\ ... because the password provided is a trigger for the software to show a bunch of text files, not your pirated movie collection. Granted, if we were working for the prosecutor we would be able to put 2 and 2 together ... but ... these are the same morons who j…

> these are the same morons who just a few days ago grabbed an entire rack instead of one server, not being able to tell the difference.

The FBI agents who did that are very much not prosecutors (and we still don't know why the FBI did that; it may have been intentional).

Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#129

Post by sorbus »

AretNCarlsen wrote: post #118
burgerbrain wrote: post #13

This is why you always have TrueCrypt use multiple volumes. This is exactly what plausible deniability is for.

That would be perjury, though. You are now a Lying Guy, not just a Fifth Amendment Guy, and no amendment will be able to save you if they figure out that you gave a hidden volume password and claimed it as the "real" and only password. I'm not saying plausible deniability is bad, just that it would be better not to rely on technical arms races to protect fundamental rights. The Passive Aggressive Award will go to the…

You generally give them the non-hidden volume password, not the hidden volume password. This is because, unless you tell them so (or they see you using it, or have spyware on your system, etc.), there is absolutely no way to prove the existence of a hidden volume from looking at the file. There's also no way to prove that a truecrypt file does not contain a hidden volume, which leads to some interesting problems if people catch on to the existence and usage of hidden volumes (I recommend creating a hidden volume in any encrypted container just so that you can show that there's nothing hidden in it. Truecrypt doesn't support more than one hidden volume in a single file, right?).

If you do accidentally tell them, it's a bad thing. Generally, you should only take advantage of this if 1) the punishment for whatever you have in the hidden volume is bad enough that the addition of perjury charges would be like adding a single spike to an atomic bomb, or 2) you are absolutely sure that they're not going to figure out the existence of it from anything you have lying around or other people.

This is not legal advice, I'm not a lawyer.

Re: TrueCrypt User Held in Contempt of Court

#130

Post by brendoncrawford »

Text of the article since the page is loading slowly...

  To anyone reading this thread-if you want a quicker response to your
  comments or questions, send them to me at:

  Matthew Bumgardner
  Santa Rosa County Jail
  P.O. Box 7129
  Milton, FL 32572

  Right now it takes about 3 weeks for a post on this forum to get to me,
  receive an answer, then have the answer sent back to my sister so she can
  post it here.

  This is Matthew Bumgardner, the one in jail. I have given this note to my
  sister so that it can be posted. Obviously I have no access to email, so this
  is the best I can do. Eventually I will get a copy of the posts in this thread
  and I will respond when I can. My sister should have already posted the letter
  I wrote. Every word is true. There are a few things I would like to add. First,
  this jail could generate some serious money for a decent civil rights attorney.
  They are already being sued for their mail policy. Inmates can only write on
  postcards. They can only send letters to attorneys, members of the media and public
  officials. If you were in here and wanted to write a family member, all you could
  send was a post card.

  The jail also denies access to legal materials. Their policy states that
  "inmates will be afforded reasonable access to the courts. This is accomplished
  by way of your attorney or public defender." This is a joke, since some inmates
  wait 6 months or moe to see their public defender. The policy goes on to state
  that pro se inmates must obtain a court order granting them pro se status in
  order to get access to the Law Library.

  I am a pro se inmate. I have obtained a Court Order granting me pro status.
  I have provided that document to the jail staff, and I am still being denied access.
  I have filed a new motion requesting an Order to allow me access to the Law Library
  and I have also written the judge. I am waiting to see what happens there. I also
  ahe a problem getting copies made. When I give my documents to the person making copies,
  I inform them that I need them returned immediately. The past two times it has taken
  several days fro the copies to be made. This is intentional. Since I am a Federal
  inmate the Government pays the jail or me to be here. They make decent money off of
  so, so there is no incentive for them to assist in my release.

  Although it may seem unnecessary to complain about the jail, it is actually important.
  The US attorney and judge that put me here knew exactly what they were doing. They
  figured that the constraints imposed by the jail would allow them to maintain their
  secrecy. They are wrong. It certainly slows things down, but I will not remain
  silent about this.

  This issue is more important that you might realize. Right now, this US
  Attorney and US District Judge think that holding people in contempt is the way to
  deal with encryption. If you read this and still do nothing, then you are telling
  them that they are right. You are telling tem that the 5th Amendment is no longer
  needed, and that they can issue supoenas that compel acts which are oppressive,
  unreasonable and not possible.

  I am not asking for my own personal army to help fight this. If you think that
  you are my army, you misunderstand this situation. I am your army in this battle.
  If you use encryption, or any password protected file, then this issue affects you.
  You could be thrown in jail and denied civil rights at the whim of the government.
  I am fighting this battle on my own, and I am willing to continue to do so. The
  outcome is going to possibly affect many more people. To me, it seems like more
  people should be getting involved.

  At the very least write the attorney and judge and tell them that what they did
  was wrong. Tell them that True Crypt can use more than just a password. Tell them
  that a password can be 64 characters long. Tell them they have no right to hold
  someone in contempt for failing to produce documents they have never seen. Tell
  them that the precedent in US vs. Hubbell and In Boucher II proves that they
  are wrong.

  The addresses are:

  David L. Goldberg
  Assistant U.S. Attorney
  21 E. Garden Street, Suite 400
  Pensacola, FL 32502

  Lacey A. Collier
  Sr. U.S. District Judge
  United States Courthouse
  One NOrth Palafax Street
  Pensacola, FL 32502

  If you don't have time to write a letter, at the very least please forward this
  to everyone you now. E-mail it to any media outlet you can think of. If enough
  people e-mail tis, a major media outlet might pick up the story.

  The Government can only do this in secrecy. If more people know about this it
  never would have happened.

  Thanks i advance for any assistance you can provide.
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