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The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

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Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#131

Post by CapitalistCartr »

arbuge wrote: post #130

> This isn't something I'm even remotely cool with, so we ended the call a couple minutes later, and agreed to have our lawyers speak going forward. ... After that call, I asked my lawyer to reach out to their lawyer and was pretty much told that Seattle was approaching the problem as if they were pursuing Computer Fraud And Abuse (CFAA) charges. For information that they sent. Jiminey Cricket.. Not addressing the ma…

It's pretty common. My wife and I have a lawyer friend who handles small matters for us for the low, low cost of buying her meal the next time we go out. Plus I fix her (aluminum wired) electric.

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#132

Post by gdprrrr »

andersrs wrote: post #59

Companies and governments will always undermine privacy either by incompetence or because it's good for business. In every case the only party that benefits from more privacy is really the end user. So what can we as users do about this? Is there an email service that can generate unique alias addresses? just.for.bloated.govt.dept.123@xyz.com would really help but I'm guessing the big companies like Google and Micros…

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210425

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#133

Post by bxparks »

CapitalistCartr wrote: post #131
arbuge wrote: post #130

> This isn't something I'm even remotely cool with, so we ended the call a couple minutes later, and agreed to have our lawyers speak going forward. ... After that call, I asked my lawyer to reach out to their lawyer and was pretty much told that Seattle was approaching the problem as if they were pursuing Computer Fraud And Abuse (CFAA) charges. For information that they sent. Jiminey Cricket.. Not addressing the ma…

It's pretty common. My wife and I have a lawyer friend who handles small matters for us for the low, low cost of buying her meal the next time we go out. Plus I fix her (aluminum wired) electric.

There are 1.3M lawyers in the US according to the ABA. There are 250M adults in the US. I find it hard to believe that this is common (if "pretty common" means more than ~20% of adults?).

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#134

Post by rootsudo »

legitster wrote: post #127
eli wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is terrible advice based on a real misunderstanding of the law.

How so? What lawyer would insist on their client getting searched via a warrant?

Well, all of them really. Sure, no warrant you can make an attempt to drop evidence because of overzealous police/executive power if there was no consent but the idea is to require documentation and to make sure the state (in this case) crosses their T's and does their I's before they can engage in this sort of conversation. Many times, if the case is weak, or not enforceable, a judge will not sign to execute the warrant or said people that want to search will not try to get one (either knowing it wont be granted or it would be denied.)

With the warrant demand talk, I would also say that once you make the demand - you give an address where you recieve service and do not follow up or communicate anymore.

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#135

Post by plagiarist »

kelnos wrote: post #45
legitster wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They thanked me for bringing the situation to their attention and all that, but the mood of the call was as if both parties had a knife behind their back. Somewhere towards the end of the call, I asked them if it was okay to keep the emails. Why not at least ask, right? >...This isn't something I'm even remotely cool with, so we ended the call a couple minutes later, and agreed to have our lawyers speak going forwa…

I would refuse to cooperate with the third party auditor as well. No one gets to scan my hard drive without a court order. And even then, I wouldn't provide the decryption passphrase unless I was legally required to. Even though there isn't anything illegal or incriminating on my hard drive (as far as I know, anyway), I wouldn't agree to let someone violate my privacy for a mistake they made. Regardless, this whole t…

I would have to be legally compelled as well. The city may trust their auditor with my private communications and access to my financial accounts, but I do not.

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#136

Post by plagiarist »

legitster wrote: post #80
eli wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I give the uranium back and they want to search my house anyway they better have a warrant

Okay, but if you demand a warrant to confirm you don't have uranium, you can't be surprised if they are going to treat you as hostile.

I can be surprised, in fact: it is my constitutional right to not be searched and they are a government entity.

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#137

Post by jrockway »

legitster wrote: post #37
jawns wrote: post #22

The most interesting part of this story is the potential legal risk of holding onto the records that were improperly disclosed. Had the author not notified the city that they had royally screwed up by divulging far more sensitive information than they had realized, they likely would have never realized the error, and he would have been free to do whatever he liked with the data. But once he notified them of their err…

> They thanked me for bringing the situation to their attention and all that, but the mood of the call was as if both parties had a knife behind their back. Somewhere towards the end of the call, I asked them if it was okay to keep the emails. Why not at least ask, right? >...This isn't something I'm even remotely cool with, so we ended the call a couple minutes later, and agreed to have our lawyers speak going forwa…

I don't think the OP trolled them. It's their mistake, and he pointed out the mistake. "We'll hire a contractor to do whatever they want with your computer, or you go to jail." is not a fair way of resolving the situation. It cover's the mistake-maker's ass at great cost to the person who reported the mistake.

Would you ever use a computer again if someone else of unknown intent had unlimited access to it for an extended period of time? I certainly wouldn't.

The suggested remedy isn't even effective. You can't prove that you deleted something. It could all be on an SD card buried under a rock somewhere, regardless of what the consultant finds.

Frankly, given the track record of cooperation, the first offer should have been "just delete them and sign an affidavit attesting to that" which is exactly what happened.

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#138

Post by eli »

legitster wrote: post #127
eli wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is terrible advice based on a real misunderstanding of the law.

How so? What lawyer would insist on their client getting searched via a warrant?

Damn near all of them.

I would challenge you to find a defense attorney who would, in general, advise you to consent to a search even if you "have nothing to hide."

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#139

Post by db48x »

froh wrote: post #4

wow! in Europe, this request 1. From address 2. To address 3. bcc addresses 4. cc addresses 5. Time 6. Date correlates person-related information (who was in contact with whom at which date and time). storing it, let alone processing it is only admissible on a need to know basis. even if you jump through the hoop of an officer acting on behalf of Seattle is not a person any more, which is a stretch already, even then…

That’s true, but remember that these are government employees. All business that they conduct is a matter of public record by definition. They are required by our laws to maintain a record of all actions and communications, which anyone is allowed to consult. Technically they’re not supposed to use government resources for private communication, and legally they are not allowed to use _private_ communication resources for _public_ business.

Re: The City of Seattle accidentally gave me 32M emails for $40 (2018)

#140

Post by superhuzza »

bxparks wrote: post #133
CapitalistCartr wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's pretty common. My wife and I have a lawyer friend who handles small matters for us for the low, low cost of buying her meal the next time we go out. Plus I fix her (aluminum wired) electric.

There are 1.3M lawyers in the US according to the ABA. There are 250M adults in the US. I find it hard to believe that this is common (if "pretty common" means more than ~20% of adults?).

It's not like each person has a unique lawyer - One lawyer serves many clients. Especially since most people will only need legal help occasionally.

But yes I do agree, it's probably a minority of people that regularly use a specific lawyer.

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