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Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

theguardian.com

311–320 of 810 posts

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#311

It's funny seeing this play out because in my personal life anytime I'm sharing a sensitive document where someone needs to see part of it but I don't want them to see the rest that's not relevant, I'll first block out/redact the text I don't want them to see (covering it, using a redacting highlighter thing, etc.), and then I'll screenshot the page and make that image a PDF. I always felt paranoid (without any real…

it's absolutely bewildering how ridiculous everything has been so far in terms of competence and this really takes the cherry on the top near Christmas too. how much lower can they go ?!

I'm not too concerned about the US. They've made their bed.

I'm more concerned with them dragging everyone else down, and someone much worse taking their place.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#312
post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

USA is still very high, so they can go much much lower, but I think they might go to some still lower places, finding them where we didn't even know such places could exist. Some ideas: - Leave NATO - Start openly supporting Russia and North Korea - Arrest whole International Criminal Court - Preventively invade China

I'm convinced slavery will be reintroduced before 2028

Slavery has never been illegal in the US. The 13th amendment leaves slavery legal as punishment for a crime. The US has the highest rate of crime punishment in the world (higher than places like North Korea), an industry that profits by selling slave labour of those punished criminals, and known ties between those who profit from selling slave labour and those who decide how many things should be crimes.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#313

It's funny seeing this play out because in my personal life anytime I'm sharing a sensitive document where someone needs to see part of it but I don't want them to see the rest that's not relevant, I'll first block out/redact the text I don't want them to see (covering it, using a redacting highlighter thing, etc.), and then I'll screenshot the page and make that image a PDF. I always felt paranoid (without any real…

If it's not done properly, and you happen at any point in the chain to put black blocks on a compressed image (and PDF do compress internal images), you are leaking some bits of information in the shadow casted by the compression algorithm : (Self-plug : https://github.com/unrealwill/jpguncrop )

And that's just in the non-adversarial simple case.

If you don't know the provenance of images you are putting black box on (for example because of a rogue employee intentionally wanting to leak them, or if the image sensor of your target had been compromised to leak some info by another team), your redaction can be rendered ineffective, as some images can be made uncroppable by construction .

(Self-plug : https://github.com/unrealwill/uncroppable )

And also be aware that compression is hiding everywhere : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compressed_sensing

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#314
post #256

Befuddling that this happened again. It’s not the first time - Paul Manafort court filing (U.S., 2019) Manafort’s lawyers filed a PDF where the “redacted” parts were basically black highlighting/boxes over live text. Reporters could recover the hidden text (e.g., via copy/paste). - TSA “Standard Operating Procedures” manual (U.S., 2009) A publicly posted TSA screening document used black rectangles that did not remov…

Follow the letter of the law, but not the spirit.

It already seems that they blacked out more than the law allowed, so following neither.

Not that it matters much what the law says if the goal is to protect the man who hands out pardons...

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#315
post #257
post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also don’t assume the mistake wasn’t intentional.

This was my initial reaction to this news. I mean think about it The Trump team knows that nobody is gonna buy whatever they put out as being the full story. Isn't this just the perfect way to make people feel like they got something they weren't supposed to see? They can increase trust in the output without having to increase trust in the source of it And as far as I've heard there hasn't been anything "unredacted"…

No, it's the opposite, it's fairly damaging. Previously they could claim, dubiously but plausible, that all redactions were about protecting victims (the only redactions allowed under the act). A lot of the "undone redactions" are solely about protecting the abusers, illegal under the law.

Whether breaking a law actually matters anymore is another question though, as crime is legal now.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#316
post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

USA is still very high, so they can go much much lower, but I think they might go to some still lower places, finding them where we didn't even know such places could exist. Some ideas: - Leave NATO - Start openly supporting Russia and North Korea - Arrest whole International Criminal Court - Preventively invade China

I'm convinced slavery will be reintroduced before 2028

It never fully went away:

https://www.hcn.org/articles/agriculture-farmers-turn-to-pri...

https://www.law.georgetown.edu/environmental-law-review/blog...

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#317
post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not the layman, at least to the best of my knowledge. Are you not aware of content that is criminal to possess? Like CP is the most common example. > I am not responsible for your actions. I've already addressed this confusion of yours - this is NOT about your responsibility for someone else's actions, but about your own actions and whether they constitute a "hack". > You are the only one using the term "hack" here…

You realize we just went from (the legal equivalent of) "I accidentally mailed you my tax return" to "I accidentally mailed you a bomb". Like yeah, it remains illegal to retain possession of said bomb irrespective of the fact that someone intentionally sent it. That is ... not at all surprising? Beyond that you're clearly just trolling at this point, going to great lengths to manufacture an argument about a term that…

> Beyond that you're clearly just trolling at this point

I think this is the greatest proof of the simultaneous validity of two different arguments. Disclaimer, I'm assuming (I think fairly) that you're in good faith.

The funny thing is, to me, the other commenter's arguments are quite clear/obvious to me and make sense. Not that your points are wrong - but... I'm 99% sure the other person isn't trolling in the slightest. Y'all are just talking across each other.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#318

What is the proper way to do this? I see a couple suggestions in the comments: 1. Draw a black box over it in image editor, save a screenshot 2. Crop the info out Are there other good ways?

PDFs do have a "burn and destroy the parts/layers below" as part of the spec meant explicitly for redaction like this. Apparently they didn't use it, I guess?

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#319

It's funny seeing this play out because in my personal life anytime I'm sharing a sensitive document where someone needs to see part of it but I don't want them to see the rest that's not relevant, I'll first block out/redact the text I don't want them to see (covering it, using a redacting highlighter thing, etc.), and then I'll screenshot the page and make that image a PDF. I always felt paranoid (without any real…

I feel the same and do the same.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's absolutely bewildering how ridiculous everything has been so far in terms of competence and this really takes the cherry on the top near Christmas too. how much lower can they go ?!

Maybe it was always part of the plan. Plausible Deniability.

Good Soldier Svejk working at the FBI decided to follow an illegal order as badly as possible.
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