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FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

arstechnica.com

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Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#101

Post by cma »

Animats wrote: post #74

This hasn't hit mainstream media yet. It should have by now. Disappearing people is not something the US government is allowed to do. Here's Xiaofeng Wang's bio on the Indiana University site.[1] Google Scholar.[2] Archived version of home page at Indiana University.[3] If anybody has a PACER account, please check there. [1] https://alliance.iu.edu/members/member/8580.html [2] https://scholar.google.com/citations?use…

Unlike the other recent disappearances and deportations to the concentration camp in El Salvador, this one does say it was with a court order.

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#102

Post by mimsee »

rolph wrote: post #32

if you look around, you can find, reconstruct a c.v. this guy is someone you dont want the badguy to get ahold of. AI research in an adversarial context is dual purpose tech, and could easily awaken ITAR

So if AI research is dual-use tech, would an AI researcher be dual-use human, and get travel restricted because of weapons export controls. Dude is a weapon!

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#103

Post by cma »

orochimaaru wrote: post #69
tptacek wrote: post #5

The fact pattern doesn't fit well with ICE, because Indiana University cooperated with the investigation (and struck him and his wife from their pages). The track record of espionage investigations against people of Chinese origin is not great, so it's not a defense of this investigation to say that that the details rhyme with that rather than immigration.

This isn’t immigration. He’s a tenured professor and already has permanent residency at the very least. He is most likely a US citizen. FBI is most likely dealing with an espionage angle. His research field of cryptography and using it to protect genomic data probably has something to do with it. The US govt track record on stuff like this is quite abysmal with several researchers having their career and livelihood d…

Permanent green card residents have been sent to El Salvador prisons without trial in the recent stuff. This incident does say it was with a court behind it though.

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#104

Post by CodeWriter23 »

Animats wrote: post #74

This hasn't hit mainstream media yet. It should have by now. Disappearing people is not something the US government is allowed to do. Here's Xiaofeng Wang's bio on the Indiana University site.[1] Google Scholar.[2] Archived version of home page at Indiana University.[3] If anybody has a PACER account, please check there. [1] https://alliance.iu.edu/members/member/8580.html [2] https://scholar.google.com/citations?use…

Occam’s Razor suggest he was exfiltrated.

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#105

Post by lolinder »

slg wrote: post #99
lolinder wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have no evidence that Wang "was" disappeared. We know that he's nowhere to be found, that the university put him on leave weeks ago [0], and that the FBI recently searched his home. Notably, the university put him on leave weeks before the FBI searched his home. That sequence is better explained by the hypothesis that Wang vanished himself suddenly and the university called in the FBI to investigate things that th…

On the long list of problems caused by the government "disappearing" people (which they have objectively been doing lately) is that it destroys trust and therefore makes even valid legal proceedings seem more shady than they would in a world in which due process was a universal guarantee in practice. I don't fault anyone for jumping to conclusions implicating the government is in the wrong here rather than Wang.

> by the government "disappearing" anyone (which they have objectively been doing lately)

Notably, they haven't been "disappearing" people in the manner that would have to be happening here. Even the most egregious cases, which are very bad, have left a paper trail for lawyers and journalists to follow. This case is notable because no one seems to know where this man has gone.

But yes, point taken: the extrajudicial actions of ICE recently are absolutely not helping people stay calm in the face of something like this.

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#106

Post by outer_web »

mvdtnz wrote: post #77
Animats wrote: post #74

This hasn't hit mainstream media yet. It should have by now. Disappearing people is not something the US government is allowed to do. Here's Xiaofeng Wang's bio on the Indiana University site.[1] Google Scholar.[2] Archived version of home page at Indiana University.[3] If anybody has a PACER account, please check there. [1] https://alliance.iu.edu/members/member/8580.html [2] https://scholar.google.com/citations?use…

What evidence do you have that they US government disappeared him? It's just as likely that he is an escaped spy and the university wants nothing to do with him.

I believe the term is "to John McAfee".

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#108

Post by slg »

lolinder wrote: post #105
slg wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the long list of problems caused by the government "disappearing" people (which they have objectively been doing lately) is that it destroys trust and therefore makes even valid legal proceedings seem more shady than they would in a world in which due process was a universal guarantee in practice. I don't fault anyone for jumping to conclusions implicating the government is in the wrong here rather than Wang.

> by the government "disappearing" anyone (which they have objectively been doing lately) Notably, they haven't been "disappearing" people in the manner that would have to be happening here. Even the most egregious cases, which are very bad, have left a paper trail for lawyers and journalists to follow. This case is notable because no one seems to know where this man has gone. But yes, point taken: the extrajudicial…

>Even the most egregious cases, which are very bad, have left a paper trail for lawyers and journalists to follow.

How can you be confident in this? Is it possible that you are saying this because the only cases we know about are when they have happened to leave "a paper trail for lawyers and journalists to follow"?

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#109

Post by diggan »

Animats wrote: post #74

This hasn't hit mainstream media yet. It should have by now. Disappearing people is not something the US government is allowed to do. Here's Xiaofeng Wang's bio on the Indiana University site.[1] Google Scholar.[2] Archived version of home page at Indiana University.[3] If anybody has a PACER account, please check there. [1] https://alliance.iu.edu/members/member/8580.html [2] https://scholar.google.com/citations?use…

> Disappearing people is not something the US government is allowed to do

Since when? Been happening for a long time, here is just one recent-ish (2021) report:

> FFI documented 698 enforced disappearances of immigrants in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody between 2017 and 2021

https://www.freedomforimmigrants.org/news/2021/8/30/detained...

Has to be countless more that aren't documented, especially when you take the entire government into account, not just one agency.

Re: FBI raids home of prominent computer scientist who has gone incommunicado

#110

Post by dragonwriter »

mvdtnz wrote: post #40
vessenes wrote: post #16

FBI + Client Attorney present + University's data scrub + nothing on the public docket likely means FISA court, which is in theory reserved for espionage and terrorism in the US. Most University cryptographic research happens in public these days, so I have a hard time imagining a sequence of events strictly bounded by cryptography research + chinese origin that yields FISA court motions. The real thing to say here i…

What's a FISA court?

One of exactly two courts—the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) that handles initial applications for surveillance warrants under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review (FISCR) which can handles reviews of denials of applications by FISC.

These two courts are not “reserved for espionage and terrorism”, they are dedicated to assuring that limitations on impact on US persons of surveillance justified on foreign intelligence grounds are observed. They handle only warrant applications for foreign intelligence surveillance that has some US nexus, not charges/allegations of any kind, and no one targeted or impacted by such a warrant would ever get notice that proceedings were occurring, much less be represented, in these courts.

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