Live data from Hacker News

Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

theguardian.com

281–290 of 810 posts

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like Russian spies being caught in the Netherlands with taxi receipts showing they took a taxi from their Moscow HQ to the airport: corrupt organizations attract/can only hire incompetent people... https://www.vice.com/en/article/russian-spies-chemical-weapo... Anyone remember how the Trump I regime had staff who couldn't figure out the lighting in the White House, or mistitled Australia's Prime Minister as Pres…

> with taxi receipts Please tell me they were saving them for expensing.

Yes.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#282
post #63

Apart from the technological and procedural question, I would love to learn why the DOJ found it important to protect Indyke. He was Epstein's lawyer, and now we learn that he was personally involved. He is not a Washington person. We expected there to be politically motivated protection of certain people, but is the DOJ just going to blanket protect anybody in the docs?

From TFA:

> [Indyke] was hired by the Parlatore Law Group in 2022, before the justice department settled the Epstein case. That firm represents the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, and previously represented Donald Trump in his defense against charges stemming from the discovery of classified government documents stored at Trump’s Florida estate.

So I don't know about "not a Washington person", but clearly connections exist to the current administration.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not the government, it's the department of justice. To name two: protection of witnesses, protection of state secrets ("the people" is not a person who can keep secrets).

Right, I’m aware of the excuses the government uses to keep secrets. But on principle, what right does the government have to keep secrets from its own people? I don’t believe we had that button at the founding, it was added somewhere along the way. I’m asking what is the justification for this, and whether in the grand scheme of things that outweighs the principle of the government not being a separate entity from t…

Should the military publish plans before the battle? Should witness protection programs be public record?

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#284

I wonder if any of this is a conscious act of resistance vs. just incompetence. And yes, I've heard of Hanlon's Razor haha https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor

Reporting is that they had a basically impossible deadline and they took lawyers off of counterintelligence work to do this. So a conscious act of resistance is possible, but it's a situation where mistakes are likely - people working very quickly trying to meet a deadline and doing work they aren't that familiar with and don't really want to be doing.

Considering the Comey, James, and Adams debacles, seems quite likely they're purged most people with a shred of competence.

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#285

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 ?!

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

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There are major differences between the Trump 1.0 and 2.0 administrations. In the Trump 1.0 administration, many of the most important officials were very competent men. One example would be then-Attorney General William Barr. Barr is contemptible, yes, but smart AF. When Barr’s DOJ released a redacted version of the Mueller Report, they printed the whole thing, made their redactions with actual ink, and then re-sca…

> made their redactions with actual ink, and then re-scanned every page That's not very competent. > going analog is foolproof Absolutely not. There are many way's to f this up. Just the smallest variation in places that have been inked twice will reveal the clear text.

> Just the smallest variation in places that have been inked twice will reveal the clear text

Sure. But anyone can visually examine this. That means everyone with situational context can directly examine the quality of the redaction.

Contrast that with a digital redation. You have to trust the tool works. Or you have to separate the folks with context from the folks with techical competence. (There is the third option of training everyone in the DoJ how to examine the inner workings of a PDF. That seems wasteful.)

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#287
post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Edit: after reading up on this it looks like attorneys have strict ethical standards to not use the information (for what little that may be worth), but the Associated Press was a third party who unredacted public court documents in a separate Facebook case. Curious. I am not a litigator but this is surprising if you found support for it. My gut was that the general obligation to be a zealous advocate for your clie…

My recollection is that it varies quite a bit between jurisdictions. The ABA's model rules require you to notify the other party when they accidentally send you something but leave unspecified what else, if anything, you might have to do.

A famous case where this came into play was one of the Infowars defamation suits. Alex Jones’s lawyer accidentally sent the families’ lawyer the full contents of a phone backup. They notified Jones’s lawyer, and gave him some time to reply. After that time elapsed, the whole dump was considered fair game.

This is the moment when that mistake was revealed in court: https://youtu.be/pgxZSBfGXUM and this is the hearing for the emergency motion to suppress that data: https://youtu.be/dKbAmNwbiMk

Re: Some Epstein file redactions are being undone

#290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"There are major differences between the Trump 1.0 and 2.0 administrations. In the Trump 1.0 administration, many of the most important officials were very competent men. One example would be then-Attorney General William Barr. Barr is contemptible, yes, but smart AF. When Barr’s DOJ released a redacted version of the Mueller Report, they printed the whole thing, made their redactions with actual ink, and then re-sca…

> William Barr. Barr is contemptible, yes, but smart AF You mean the guy who covered up for Epstein's 'suicide' and expected us morons to believe it?

> You mean the guy who covered up for Epstein's 'suicide' and expected us morons to believe it?

Let's assume that's true. How does it clash with him being "contemptible...but smart AF"?

Post reply on HN