Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

dailydot.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 98 posts

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#61

Post by [deleted] »

rPlayer6554 wrote: post #28
__m wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds more like the American model. In Germany for example the SEK was formed after SWAT, in response to a terror attack in Munich. Unless there is some serious crime, where guns are involved, the judge won’t send a special unit. Pictures of guns drawn on unarmed people seem to be mostly coming from the US.

I've physically seen many police walking around crowded areas with assault rifles in France and Italy. Germany not as much but they do carry pistols iirc.

[deleted]

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#63

Post by brigandish »

sofixa wrote: post #16
brigandish wrote: post #5

> As they handcuffed him, his 9-year-old daughter cried in terror The police in America are well beyond the line of "citizen" police, you have the continental European model of two police forces, civil and military, and it's hard to see that there's much civil, it's more like ordinarily armed military force and a ready-for-war military force. It hasn't helped produce liberty or better enforcement in Europe, I can't s…

What are you talking about civil and military police in "continental Europe"? In most countries there's a military police which polices the military, a police which polices regular peope, sometimes a gendermerie which is sometimes nominally a part of the army under civilian control, and which is either for policing the countryside - France or for riot control/backup and special cases (e.g. a football match that requi…

> What are you talking about civil and military police in "continental Europe"?

You just outlined it yourself, take away the military's own police and you have, in your words,

1. a police which polices regular peope

and

2. sometimes a gendermerie which is sometimes nominally a part of the army

You also go on to give several examples of this system being used in continental Europe. You could've added in Spain and Italy too.

I'm really not sure why you asked the question if you're going to answer it yourself.

If you're looking for a non-continental police force which does not follow that system then you only need compare with the UK or Ireland.

> In any case, the problems with policing in Europe aren't even close to those in the US, and i don't think any of then can be attributed to hving two policing entities with different scopes.

So you say. From[1]:

> Covell was among the 87 protesters wounded when police baton-charged the Diaz school in Genoa, beating people as they cowered in their sleeping bags and planting petrol bombs to justify the raid.

> Once arrested, protesters, including five Britons, were taken to a police barracks where they were beaten again, sprayed with asphyxiating gas, threatened with rape and forced to sing fascist-era songs.

> Despite the handing out of verdicts including convictions for grievous bodily harm and falsifying evidence in two major trials, Italy's tardy justice system has ensured final appeals are yet to be heard and most sentences have been timed out by the statute of limitations. "No one has ever been arrested or gone to jail," said Massimo Pastore, a lawyer who has represented Covell and other activists.

That's not even the half of it. Do you think this is an isolated incident? Can you divorce this from militarised policing?

Perhaps you'll disagree and then answer the questions again, that would be helpful.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/12/night-police-b...

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#64

Post by FourthProtocol »

Yeah, no. There's nothing measured in the approach taken by the FBI. Data on a server is not lethal, the FBI's response was.

And while sad, I'm not surprised. I spent time at Microsoft and once in downtown Seattle I saw a kid, maybe 9 or 10, kicking a can along on the sidewalk.

Police car sees this, siren on, jumps out the car screaming like a banshee at the poor kid to stop.

I've travelled. Like, 34 countries, and I've never seen a child treated that way. It was one of the scariest things I've seen, and it made me move back to London.

And so whilst disappointed by what the FBI did here, I'm not surprised. Isn't their slogan serve and protect or something?

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#65

Post by brigandish »

jacquesm wrote: post #34
brigandish wrote: post #5

> As they handcuffed him, his 9-year-old daughter cried in terror The police in America are well beyond the line of "citizen" police, you have the continental European model of two police forces, civil and military, and it's hard to see that there's much civil, it's more like ordinarily armed military force and a ready-for-war military force. It hasn't helped produce liberty or better enforcement in Europe, I can't s…

Police in Europe is quite different from country to country, between the French, German, Spanish and say Dutch police the difference is huge. But nothing that I'm familiar with comes close to describing the police force that you apparently have as a model for the EU. Even the former SovBloc states, where the police traditionally have more problems than in the Western part of the EU in terms of corruption and having t…

Spain[1]:

> The Guardia Civil (Civil Guard) is a gendarmerie force and therefore, has a military status

> The Policía Nacional or Cuerpo Nacional de Policía (the National Police Corps, or CNP) has a civilian status

Italy[2]:

> The two main police forces in the country are the Carabinieri, the national gendarmerie, and the Polizia di Stato, the civil national police.

France[3]:

> There are two national police forces called "Police nationale" and "Gendarmerie nationale".

Need I go on? There are more, as the other comments show.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_enforcement_in_Spain

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_enforcement_in_Italy

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_enforcement_in_France

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#66

Post by brigandish »

vultour wrote: post #23
brigandish wrote: post #5

> As they handcuffed him, his 9-year-old daughter cried in terror The police in America are well beyond the line of "citizen" police, you have the continental European model of two police forces, civil and military, and it's hard to see that there's much civil, it's more like ordinarily armed military force and a ready-for-war military force. It hasn't helped produce liberty or better enforcement in Europe, I can't s…

Are you American? This assessment of European police is so wrong I can't fathom how you got it. I've never even seen an armored police vehicle.

I'm British. Do you know what a gendarme is? Do you know how many countries have them? Did you know that the EU has a cross border gendarmerie?

> I've never even seen an armored police vehicle.

What would your personal experience have to do with the actual structure of policing in several European countries?

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#67

Post by brigandish »

mjbeswick wrote: post #35
brigandish wrote: post #5

> As they handcuffed him, his 9-year-old daughter cried in terror The police in America are well beyond the line of "citizen" police, you have the continental European model of two police forces, civil and military, and it's hard to see that there's much civil, it's more like ordinarily armed military force and a ready-for-war military force. It hasn't helped produce liberty or better enforcement in Europe, I can't s…

You clearly have no understanding of how the police work in European countries!

If you don't know that there are paramilitary police forces in Europe then you may apprise yourself of the information here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_paramilitary_organizat...

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#68

Post by brigandish »

kichimi wrote: post #19
brigandish wrote: post #5

> As they handcuffed him, his 9-year-old daughter cried in terror The police in America are well beyond the line of "citizen" police, you have the continental European model of two police forces, civil and military, and it's hard to see that there's much civil, it's more like ordinarily armed military force and a ready-for-war military force. It hasn't helped produce liberty or better enforcement in Europe, I can't s…

I think you've been seriously mislead about European police. Your description is of the heavily armed US police and not like any police force you'll hear about in Europe. The actual military police only police servicemen and have no authority over civilians, you will only find them in army towns.

I'm British, hence I'm European. The UK does not have a paramilitary police force, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal… all have paramilitary police forces. Apparently, there are more that I was unaware of.

How were you misled into not knowing that all these major powers have gendarmerie?

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#69

Post by sofixa »

brigandish wrote: post #63
sofixa wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you talking about civil and military police in "continental Europe"? In most countries there's a military police which polices the military, a police which polices regular peope, sometimes a gendermerie which is sometimes nominally a part of the army under civilian control, and which is either for policing the countryside - France or for riot control/backup and special cases (e.g. a football match that requi…

> What are you talking about civil and military police in "continental Europe"? You just outlined it yourself, take away the military's own police and you have, in your words, 1. a police which polices regular peope and 2. sometimes a gendermerie which is sometimes nominally a part of the army You also go on to give several examples of this system being used in continental Europe. You could've added in Spain and Ital…

I asked because the gendermerie in most of the listed countries ( Spain, France, Italy) is nominally a part of the military ( a military branch like the army, navy, etc.) but is run by the respective Ministry of the Interior, and has a different scope. And most of all, they aren't more heavily armed than the regular police ( maybe slightly more than municipal police officers in the places that have them, but in France i can't say there's a difference in day to day armament and etc. - the French Gendermerie have a rapid response team, and some heavier equipment for when required ( snipers, lightly armoured vehicles), unlike municipal police). So i object to the term `militarised police`, because it doesn't represent reality - gendermeries in France, Italy, Spain aren't more military-like than regular police. And the same goes for the gendermeries in Eastern Europe ( including OMON in Russia and some other ex-Soviet states) - they're trained for counter-terrorism, riot control, have nothing to do with the actual military, even nominally, and while they have slightly heavier weaponry than regular police ( lightly armoured vehicles, etc.), they don't do day-to-day policing ( and sometimes don't even have the jurisdiction for it), and are only involved when big things are happening ( massive protests or matches or w/e).

Furthermore, i object to the claim that they are somehow an issue in policing. The article you've linked says just "police", so i doubt they're talking about the Carabinieri. In France, the Gendermerie ( countryside and small towns and cities) has a better reputation with regards to violence than the Police Nationale ( which only operate in cities); i can't think of a single high-profile police violence incident where the Gendermerie were involved. And when the Police Nationale were protesting due to overworking and unpaid overtime, the Gendermerie were the ones providing protection. Apparently the Spanish Guardia Civil also has a better reputation than regular Spanish police. In recent years the French army has started doing patrols in mainland France, among potentially high-profile targets ( airports, train stations, tourist hot spots)

So if anything, having two different branches of police seems beneficial in those specific cases.

And neither type of gendermerie has anything close to the equipment the US police has.

Re: FBI raids researcher who discovered private patient data on public server (2016)

#70

Post by omginternets »

brigandish wrote: post #63
sofixa wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you talking about civil and military police in "continental Europe"? In most countries there's a military police which polices the military, a police which polices regular peope, sometimes a gendermerie which is sometimes nominally a part of the army under civilian control, and which is either for policing the countryside - France or for riot control/backup and special cases (e.g. a football match that requi…

> What are you talking about civil and military police in "continental Europe"? You just outlined it yourself, take away the military's own police and you have, in your words, 1. a police which polices regular peope and 2. sometimes a gendermerie which is sometimes nominally a part of the army You also go on to give several examples of this system being used in continental Europe. You could've added in Spain and Ital…

If you don’t understand the implications of the word “nominally”, here, then you really don’t understand anything about the gendarmerie. To compare it with the American policing model is beyond ludicrous.

This is how an armed, barricaded suspect is handled in France. Watch until the end, with captions. https://youtu.be/0Bx5PRqYAig

Post reply on HN