111–120 of 248 posts
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IANAL, but grand juries do a lot of work before the charges are filled. For example, they check whether there's a probable cause for a search warrant.
Do you know how grand juries are selected? I find it weird that I've been selected for a trial jury a bunch of times but never a grand jury.
Facebook isn't doing anything worse than what Acxiom and other data brokers have been doing for decades. None of it is criminal without any general purpose data protection laws. This is just pitchfork populism.
Because other people are doing bad things, it's OK for Facebook to do bad things.
I'm not sure that's how the law works.
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Attorney here! Violation of a consent decree can result in criminal contempt-of-court charges. See 18 U.S.C. section 401 ( https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/401 ). See also United States v. Schine, 125 F. Supp. 734 (W.D.N.Y. 1954).
Sure, it can result in a criminal charge, but it is not in and of itself a crime. So, investigating them for breach of consent decree is not a 'criminal investigation'.
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It started after Facebook started getting blamed for landing Trump in the White House, and the pile-on has increased steadily since then. I’m no fan of FB’s extensive use of dark patterns, but the concerted attack on FB is meant as pressure so that Zuck agrees to let FB be used as a great firewall. Thank you, Zuck, for resisting the pressure if indeed you have. It will only increase as 2020 approaches.
Who in particular is trying to set up a great firewall-type situation in the US? That doesn't seem like a legitimate risk to me.
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Criminal charges assume intent, and it's very hard to think that facebook as a company had intent of committing identity fraud.
Crimes do not always require intent. It depends on what the statute says specifically.
Facebook has been milking data piracy, harvesting and monetizing personal data for a decade.
They thought nobody would ever challenge them.
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Crimes do not always require intent. It depends on what the statute says specifically.
Yes, there're such crimes, but there aren't so many of them.
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Sure, it can result in a criminal charge, but it is not in and of itself a crime. So, investigating them for breach of consent decree is not a 'criminal investigation'.
Bluntly speaking, you are totally, completely wrong. You can't imprison someone in the U.S. unless that person is reasonably suspected of a crime or has committed one. The code in question allows for such imprisonment - that's why it's called "criminal contempt."
I didn't say otherwise.
> The code in question allows for such imprisonment - that's why it's called "criminal contempt."
I don't disagree. What I said is that breach of a consent decree is not necessarily a case of criminal contempt. And whether or not it does rise to the level of criminality will be determined by the judge, not the investigators. Therefore, referring to it as a 'criminal investigation' does not make sense if the investigation is strictly investigating breach of a consent decree.
Facebook isn't doing anything worse than what Acxiom and other data brokers have been doing for decades. None of it is criminal without any general purpose data protection laws. This is just pitchfork populism.
Facebook isn't doing anything worse than what Acxiom and other data brokers have been doing for decades Because other people are doing bad things, it's OK for Facebook to do bad things. I'm not sure that's how the law works.
That's literally how the law works. What "bad things" we prohibit people from doing is determined by law.
We don't have laws regulating the gathering and trade of data on populations or individuals.