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Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

theguardian.com

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Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#371

Post by dthunt »

foobarqux wrote: post #324
vabmit wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1) A test to see how the journalist will react and to > flush out more information. I.e. force him to disclose > more information so they know what he has. I think they already know through a post event review of MicroSoft's built in auditing logs. My understanding is that Snowden was a low level Windows admin that copied stuff that was either 1) in transit through a Microsoft Sharepoint server 2) anything he could…

> Wikileaks has some of the shittiest OPSEC ever (as the Manning events showed). How did the Manning events show that?

As I recall it, one of their partner newspapers deliberately misunderstood how encryption worked, leaked their special passcode to one of the document archives, and then pointed at Wikileaks for being shitty after themselves handing the keys to the unredacted documents to the world.

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#372

Post by w_t_payne »

jacquesm wrote: post #50
grey-area wrote: post #22

The salient quote from Greenwald's article on this: They completely abused their own terrorism law for reasons having nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism: a potent reminder of how often governments lie when they claim that they need powers to stop "the terrorists", and how dangerous it is to vest unchecked power with political officials in its name. [1] This is a great example of why we should treat terrorism lik…

I wonder from how high up this order came. After all, it's not like Greenwald is going to take this lying down and that's something that they could predict quite accurately ahead of time. To abuse these powers on the partner of the journalist that is reporting the abuses is the worst tactical mistake made by any government to date, short of the diversion of a diplomats plane. Taking into account that the UK law enfor…

Given the political nature of the detention, I suspect that the action would be known about at cabinet level. It is difficult to work out if this was primarily driven by the Home Office, the Foreign Office, or the Department of Transport, given that they all have a role in border security - but the action was almost certainly proposed by a civil servant at one of these institutions - possibly acting on a request from the security services.

Given that David Miranda was transiting through the country, I would guess that the request originated from MI6, which would mean that the request was routed through the FCO, which would put William Hague in the hot-seat.

Helpfully, the Guardian has a list of senior civil servants here (although it is quite out of date):

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2011/jun/16/civil-s...

We could probably make some guesses as to which roles were involved in the decision. (Note: Civil servants only stay in a role for a limited period of time, so it is probable that the individuals named in the above list have moved on to new roles by now, and are not involved).

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#373

Post by Andrew_Quentin »

rdl wrote: post #240
rdl wrote: post #219

I'm curious exactly what you have to do in transit through the UK if detained and questioned. I'd presumably identify myself, and comply politely for a few minutes, but once it became pretty clear I was going to miss my flight, I'd want to know the various options. I have zero interest in being in the UK if in transit, so "we're going to send you back to Germany" "do it, then" is fine. Or, "you're an asshole, we're g…

Oh wow, under title 7 in the UK it is a criminal offense to refuse to answer questions for any reason during that 9 hour period. Looks like a total travel boycott of the UK is prudent. In addition to compelled disclosure of keys, it is worse than the US for this reason too.

They are not in UK though. They are in a transit zone which arguably is international land. So the UK laws would not apply.

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#374

Post by _yields »

iandanforth wrote: post #221

This is crime. The people who authorized this should be put in jail and the officers present should at least be fired. It should not be allowed that power is so easily abused, nor should written laws be so easily twisted without fear of consequence. I believe a civil disruption of the airport specifically targeting the security apparatus would be an appropriate response. To the cynics, yes, I am idealistic and, yes I…

> The people who authorized this should be put in jail

By who ?

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#375

Post by w_t_payne »

chii wrote: post #336
jacquesm wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sharp. I do think this is driven by fear and incompetence rather than malice but you could easily be right. I'd love to be a fly on the wall in the various offices dealing with the fall-out from this, especially the interface boundary between the foreign affairs and the anti-terror branches.

It'd be interesting if the "interrogation" of suspected "terrorists" have to be video-taped, and then after the fact, released publicly for scrutiny. I think audit trails and accountability (and the threat of punishment for those who abuse their power) will curtail such civil liberties abuses.

Records are usually kept. After all, that is what bureaucracies do. They keep records. Even if the government's action was technically legal, the UK legal system is pretty robust and independent, and the government is defeated in the courts all the time.

Mr Miranda should consult a qualified lawyer: There will likely be several good ones who would do the work pro bono, to explore avenues whereby he can seek redress.

At the very least, it will cost the government (significant quantities of) time and money in legal expenses, and may cause them to think twice about using such tactics in future.

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#376

Post by pjmlp »

dsuth wrote: post #319
acqq wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course they never had. The goal was to point that it's not like in the movies. He can't demand the lawyer, he can't even stay silent. A lot of things to slip the tongue during the nine hours of interrogation. Being detained under terrorist laws, it must have occurred to him that they can even throw him in Guantanamo and claim legality. Intimidation, you bet!

How do you propose they forced him to talk? They're interrogators, not torturers. It would be perfectly valid to sit there and refuse to answer questions for 9 hours, if not particularly pleasant.

They just need to play bad cop and very bad cop, most people are not prepared to deal with that kind of psychological pressure.

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#377

Post by w_t_payne »

jacquesm wrote: post #217
dsuth wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another possible pre-meditated outcome: 4) Highlight the fact that Greenwald is in an openly gay relationship in an attempt to discredit him / colour what he's saying in a personal light. Sadly, a large part of the conservative base will cling to this I think.

The conservative base in the UK? If not then how do you see the link, he was held in the UK, not the US?

The political elite in the UK has a somewhat different relationship with the "base" than the political elite in the US does. It is a much, much, much smaller country, and the difference in size makes a real difference to the way that the machinery of politics operates.

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#378

Post by eCa »

pinaceae wrote: post #369
pinaceae wrote: post #346

so this is one side of the story. no one knows what happened during that questioning, why amd how it started and how his partner acted. case in point, there was this guy who stripped naked at a TSA check a while back. you yourself can easily trigger an incident like this and escalate it. right now there is one side of the story, reported by a deeply involved, non-objective actor. if you ask a parent about what happen…

and to the downvoters - there are now emerging articles that Miranda was carrying classified information. so yeah, more sides to the story, but who gives a shit because fascism.

Is it terrorism to carry classified information?

> Terrorism: The use of violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political aims. [1]

Ok... Someone with a lot of power is too easily intimidated.

[1] http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=terrorism+definition

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#379

Post by w_t_payne »

joezydeco wrote: post #306
Amadou wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it was a coincidence that Greenwald was contacted as soon as Miranda was detained. He was not, it was 3 hours later.

Still, he was contacted. It's amazing that the owner of Lavabit can't even talk about what he can't talk about, yet Greenwald gets a mysterious phone call letting him know Miranda is in the process of being questioned?

Well, it would not be a threat unless Greenwald knows about it, would it?

Re: Detaining my partner: a failed attempt at intimidation

#380

Post by jacquesm »

rmk2 wrote: post #218
legutierr wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm kind of confused by what you consider the "general public" here. Right now, in addition to this being the top story on HN, it is is on the default reddit front page at #9 and rising. It's also on the front page of the New York times website, and also in the top three headlines at news.google.com. Google reports 25 articles most being published in the last hour. By these measures, it seems to me that a lot of peop…

Neither the BBC, Independent, The Sun nor Daily Mail report on it; q.e.d., the "general public" doesn't care. Edit: The Sun does, however, have boobs on its homepage, the Daily Mail talks about celebrities and the BBC's international site talks about Syria, Gibraltar and Usain Bolt, with its England page concerned with assisted suicide, a rider who died after a horse accident, something about climate activists and th…

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2396745/Edward-Snowd...

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/senior-mp-to-...

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