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FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

torrentfreak.com

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Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#41

I assume that when the FBI sends a request to a tech company about a user, they probably also contact lots of other tech companies too about the same user... Which raises the question: Where is the Google notification about the FBI request... How about the Facebook notification? The VK or OK notification? How about the Twitter notification? Did these tech companies hand over data without notice, even though the order…

> I assume that when the FBI sends a request to a tech company about a user, they probably also contact lots of other tech companies too about the same user...

You assume a lot. I know it’s fun to pontificate about dragnet surveillance, but in general when issuing / granting a warrant there has to be some kind of specific target and scope. In this case it’s likely the FBI knew the Sci-Hub founder was using iCloud email and so they could get a warrant for that specific account for a specific time range.

Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the FBI can use the Russia thing on a presidential candidate, they can use it on anybody.

Not just a presidential candidate, but a president. Did you know that after all those years of investigations, all those years of the house intelligence committee chairman and others insisting that there was "ample evidence" that Trump colluded with Putin to hack the election... in the end, The Mueller report admitted that no evidence was ever found to substantiate Trump or his associates or campaign ever working wit…

It's not just that - some people will still, today, insist that Trump was working with Russia. When you point out that investigations found nothing, they point to some random minor finding as if that vindicates them. It's genuinely concerning.

Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has always been subject to US law, and as such, was always required to provide information that they do have access to. If it's in iCloud, most of it can be extracted by the law enforcement with court order. Nothing changed between now and the San Bernardino case. The difference was that FBI wanted Apple to compromise device encryption, which capability does _not_ exist now.

So why hasn't end-to-end encryption been utilized for years with the storage of email and other files, like they do with iMessage content?

The hardest thing about a service trying to end-to-end encrypt an email, is that any given email service provider only controls one end.

Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#45

Who have vested interests in stopping something like sci-hub?

this company: https://www.linkedin.com/company/elsevier

And the American Chemical Society that has never liked open science unless they can make money out of it.

Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#46
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have to do everything on a phone.

Even if you use pen and paper it can still be subpoenaed.

Harder if you don't know that the paper exists and it is not in US controlled territories.

Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#47
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple has always bragged about iMessage content being end-to-end encrypted, and thus inaccessible even to Apple. Why aren't they doing the same with email and other files, like other providers? (ProtonMail, to name one example)

It is technically impossible to end-to-end encrypt email.

Not technically. You'd just have to apply encryption at a higher level

Send email bodies encrypted to base64 along with a public key fingerprint, then receiver's client would decrypt if it had the private key for that fingerprint

But this isn't compelling enough to get a network effect to topple in-browser gmail

Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if the file contents are accessible. Why isn't end-to-end encryption utilized for storage of email on Apple's servers, the same way they do for iMessaging?

Because 99.9999999% of emails are not encrypted before being sent.

True. But I’m not talking about end-to-end between sender and receiver. I’m just talking about using public key encryption to encrypt received contents with one key and decrypt with another. There are a lot of technical challenges - particularly with maintaining compatibility with email clients - but it can be done.

The inability of MTAs to negotiate and utilize any kind of SSL-style encryption when relaying messages is also a gross travesty in the year 2021.

Re: FBI Has Gained Access to Sci-Hub Founder's Apple Account, Email Claims

#49

They did this to Rudy Guilliani too. FBI was going into his iCloud for over a year. What makes it more egregious was that Guilliani was Trump's lawyer during the impeachment. So the government was both prosecuting him, and spying on his defence's lawyers private emails with his client. If they can do it to a presidents lawyer with no consequences. They can do it to anyone.

> They can do it to anyone.

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

I fully expect that any American, involved in half the shit that drunk found his way into, would also be under double top secret surveillance.

That's reality Jack.

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