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FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

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Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#101

Post by MacsHeadroom »

ryanl0l wrote: post #90
MacsHeadroom wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably the "matter of national security" has a time limit. That said, Applebaum and Snowden have seemingly managed to get comfortable enough without returning to their country of birth.

It's obvious that the FBI isn't trying to serve a NSL here. If that's what they wanted to do, they'd have done it.

What makes you so sure? Are you an expert in serving NSLs to people who have devoted their life to enabling secrecy? What are your credentials?

If your words speak for themselves, I suspect none more than "owner of keyboard." I'd be delighted to be shown otherwise.

I remain agnostic, if not healthily paranoid- which seems to me to be the general sentiment in the comments on this post.

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#103

Post by jeffdavis »

This didn't really register with me as tyrrany. What did the FBI actually do to her?

Going around a lawyer is a good way to lose a case against her, so maybe they weren't trying to make a case against her.

Maybe they actually had some real questions that involved her expertise or knowledge she might have had.

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#104

Post by bravo22 »

MacsHeadroom wrote: post #49
praptak wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They would just serve the paper using the usual techniques for delivering legal papers to persons possibly unwilling to receive them. These techniques usually avoid identifying yourself upfront. I believe they rather want information which they cannot legally force her to divulge (otherwise see above), so they're trying their luck at intimidation.

NSL are used to compel a party to DO something to assist with, so called, matters of national security, under threat of physical force. If the letter isn't received and a person can't be physically detained then it can't compel anything, other than hiding from its possible existence To make things more difficult, the very contents of the letter itself are considered a national secret. Typical methods for serving pape…

My understanding is that the NSL is a subpoena, and therefore a request for production of documents. It does come with a gag clause however.

Government can only compel you to hand over information for third party which you possess. They can't compel you to DO something, as demonstrated by FBI v Apple recently.

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#105

Post by kordless »

Bartweiss wrote: post #68
cptskippy wrote: post #59

She lost my support at vegan gluten-free brownies . She's clearly a monster. But seriously, this really stinks. If talking to the FBI wasn't going to have negative consequences for her then why would they choose to approach her like that? The whole attitude by law enforcement that "anyone who doesn't 100% cooperate with us on our terms is an enemy and should be treated as such" really doesn't foster cooperation but i…

The part about "meeting her on the street" is particularly slimy. Declining to pass questions through a lawyer is shady, but asking a person to confirm their lawyer's identity as a trap to question them is bizarre. The whole thing reads like its either an agency involved in something unethical, or an agency so far removed from decent behavior that they no longer notice when they're menacing innocents.

These are the effects of suppressing causality. When a person or group believes the knowledge of their actions needs to be suppressed to increase the performance metrics of their actions, they literally become insane.

No government has the right to withhold information beyond a clear and reasonable timeframe. 3 months seems reasonable. 1 year is out of the question.

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#106

Post by dave_sullivan »

at-fates-hands wrote: post #97
joezydeco wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds more like a subtle way to say "we'll meet you on the street, after a SWAT team drags you out of bed at 2:00AM"

She's smart by putting this out there now. Even if they detain her for some unknown reason, she can still contact her attorney, who then alerts the local and national media and now the FBI have a firestorm of publicity they don't want. Along with several lawsuits I'm sure her attorney would file immediately. Sure, they can do that, but the repercussions are something they certainly don't want to deal with.

What if it turns out that most of these agencies don't care about negative publicity (because they can't be fired) or lawsuits (because it's not their money)? That's the part that really scares me: no transparency, no accountability, and a bunch of secretive True Believers running things. Like the Chinese government!

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#107

Post by Esau »

Kristine1975 wrote: post #94
appleflaxen wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It /is/ terrorism, but the FBI is not the agent of terror. Rather, they are reacting to terrorist boogeymen in the shadows, exactly how the terrorists want them to. Terrorism is successful when our society becomes more of an authoritarian police state.

Are they reacting to terrorism? Or are they using terrorism as a pretext to expand their powers (or to achieve whatever goal they have)?

"Or are they using terrorism as a pretext to expand their powers"

That is exactly what is happening.

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#108

Post by grecy »

at-fates-hands wrote: post #92
grecy wrote: post #64

> “But… if we happen to run into her on the street, we’re gonna be asking her some questions without you present.” Impressive for a LEO to state out loud he doesn't care about rights and due process. Like maybe he thinks he's above the law.

This is a classic psyops move on their part. Get the person thinking they're not safe anywhere, so they stop going out, stop being mobile and stick to a more confined area. Once they've determined where she is, it makes it a lot easier to get in contact with her. If she's smart, she start moving more frequently, and travel in states where they don't have field offices, avoid air travel and create a constantly moving…

Wow, what a place to live in.

Regular citizens not charged with any crime having to keep moving to hide from LEO.

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#109

Post by MacsHeadroom »

tzaman wrote: post #96

Why does everyone, including Ms. Lovecruft conclude that something is horribly wrong and that FBI wanting to speak with them means they are in deep shit? I'm by no means defending them, but to me, the whole (original) post looks overly paranoid. I'm not an American, you can speak with Police freely here in Slovenia, so maybe I understand things wrong?

For a developer of a tool frequently used to conceal "terrorism", this amount of paranoia seems healthy.

Also, no you cannot "speak with police freely" in the US. Anything you say to an officer of the law can be, and it should be assumed that it will be, used to incriminate you. To make matters worse, you can be forced to give up your right to self-incrimination by being legally compelled to divulge information which incriminates you.

In general one should never speak to police in the US. Not even as the whiteness to a crime. For a great overview of the seriousness of why one should never talk to US police, view this lecture by a professor and former criminal defense attorney: http://youtu.be/6wXkI4t7nuc

Incidentially, the American Civil Liberties Union of attorneys (ACLU) has created a series of mobile apps to record police encounters because of their tendency to be problematic for citizens. For example, https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.aclu.mobil...

Re: FBI Harassing Core Tor Developer, Demand Meeting, but Refusing to Explain Why

#110

Post by pfg »

bravo22 wrote: post #104
MacsHeadroom wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NSL are used to compel a party to DO something to assist with, so called, matters of national security, under threat of physical force. If the letter isn't received and a person can't be physically detained then it can't compel anything, other than hiding from its possible existence To make things more difficult, the very contents of the letter itself are considered a national secret. Typical methods for serving pape…

My understanding is that the NSL is a subpoena , and therefore a request for production of documents. It does come with a gag clause however. Government can only compel you to hand over information for third party which you possess. They can't compel you to DO something, as demonstrated by FBI v Apple recently.

> They can't compel you to DO something, as demonstrated by FBI v Apple recently.

In case anyone who's not familiar with the Apple case is reading this: The government didn't actually wait for the court to rule that they can't (which might or might not be the case, though my understand is that they would've probably ruled in favour of Apple), but rather withdrew the case after a third party unlocked the phone for them.

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