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Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

theregister.com

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Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#31

Post by jzb »

mattmanser wrote: post #13
capableweb wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So they're name dropping Google in the title for clickbait No, Hutchinson found the documents by searching on Google for the meeting minutes. The website might have protected the place where you found the link to the meeting minutes, but the meeting minutes themselves were hosted in a directory that not only was publicly accessible if you had the URL, but also allowed Google's crawler to access it and store it. The…

Police statement from the article: He was taken into custody and later released under investigation. Following a review of all available evidence, it was determined no offences had been committed and no further action was taken So they already dropped it.

“already dropped it”

That doesn’t make it okay. Being taken into custody is something I’d consider an overreaction and frightening for a person to endure. They should’ve looked into it before moving to pick them up in the first place. If the shoe was on the other foot- an activist claiming a developer broke in to obtain info- I bet police would’ve done more research.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#32

Post by gpm »

brundolf wrote: post #28
roflc0ptic wrote: post #14

This article leaves some really crucial parts of this timeline ambiguous. These things happened in some order: 1. Guy downloads stuff from website 2. Guy publishes stuff from website 3. Stuff becomes unavailable on the website 4. Website owners go to police, report “illegal access” 5. Police arrest guy Either the police arrested him, and the company declined to inform the police that these illegally accessed files ha…

> He was taken into custody and later released under investigation. Following a review of all available evidence, it was determined no offences had been committed and no further action was taken. Sounds like the first one

This could also be "he was taken into custody, someone with a few more brain cells than average searched his computer, looked at his browser history, concluded that case 2 was the case and let him go".

I don't think we have enough information.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#33

Post by Scoundreller »

gowld wrote: post #10

This is why people say that the police are an agent of the wealthy to oppress the common people. The wealthy "file a report", and the police "take the report seriously", trampling the rights and stealing precious time of people's lives (and sometimes much worse), but the common people can not do the same to their oppressors.

Everyone involved was getting paid their salary/wage throughout this, except the victim.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#34

Post by pengaru »

gowld wrote: post #10

This is why people say that the police are an agent of the wealthy to oppress the common people. The wealthy "file a report", and the police "take the report seriously", trampling the rights and stealing precious time of people's lives (and sometimes much worse), but the common people can not do the same to their oppressors.

Considering the amount of SWATing we've seen in the news, the police are an agent of anyone capable of dialing 911, not just the wealthy.

Actually, one could argue the police are more likely to respond with greater exuberance when responding to a reported hostage situation in a mansion vs. trap house.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#35

Post by filoleg »

jzb wrote: post #31
mattmanser wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Police statement from the article: He was taken into custody and later released under investigation. Following a review of all available evidence, it was determined no offences had been committed and no further action was taken So they already dropped it.

“already dropped it” That doesn’t make it okay. Being taken into custody is something I’d consider an overreaction and frightening for a person to endure. They should’ve looked into it before moving to pick them up in the first place. If the shoe was on the other foot- an activist claiming a developer broke in to obtain info- I bet police would’ve done more research.

>That doesn’t make it okay. Being taken into custody is something I’d consider an overreaction and frightening for a person to endure.

Fully agreed. And not just that, the law enforcement officers seized his personal devices (phone + laptop) for 4 weeks and went through them.

Note: I am not sure if both phone+laptop were taken away for 4 weeks, but the article states that both were seized at one point, and explicitly mentions that the laptop was held for 4 weeks before being returned.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#36

Post by calvinmorrison »

sxp wrote: post #2

https://www.theregister.com/2021/08/10/police_raid_man_for_d... is a better article with pictures. The key bit is > The raid by four Metropolitan Police constables took place after Southwark campaigner Robert Hutchinson was reportedly accused of illegally entering a password-protected area of a website. > "I was searching in Google and found links to board meeting minutes," he told The Register. "Board reports, none…

> So they're name dropping Google in the title for clickbait when the core issue is that the website didn't properly protect its data.

The core issue is the government raided someones house for doing nothing wrong.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#37

Post by woah »

gowld wrote: post #10

This is why people say that the police are an agent of the wealthy to oppress the common people. The wealthy "file a report", and the police "take the report seriously", trampling the rights and stealing precious time of people's lives (and sometimes much worse), but the common people can not do the same to their oppressors.

Except the man arrested in this case was opposed to social housing for low income residents. What the police did was obviously wrong, but it doesn't really fit your narrative.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#38

Post by CodeWriter23 »

sxp wrote: post #2

https://www.theregister.com/2021/08/10/police_raid_man_for_d... is a better article with pictures. The key bit is > The raid by four Metropolitan Police constables took place after Southwark campaigner Robert Hutchinson was reportedly accused of illegally entering a password-protected area of a website. > "I was searching in Google and found links to board meeting minutes," he told The Register. "Board reports, none…

> So they're name dropping Google in the title for clickbait

We're talking about The Register here. Clickbait is foundational to their business model.

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#39

Post by rexreed »

dang wrote: post #4
sxp wrote: post #2

https://www.theregister.com/2021/08/10/police_raid_man_for_d... is a better article with pictures. The key bit is > The raid by four Metropolitan Police constables took place after Southwark campaigner Robert Hutchinson was reportedly accused of illegally entering a password-protected area of a website. > "I was searching in Google and found links to board meeting minutes," he told The Register. "Board reports, none…

Ok, we'll change to that from https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-58165478 . Thanks!

A Title change might be good too, because like others, I thought it was Google Docs snitching on a downloader.

A possibly more accurate title would be: "Activist raided by London police after downloading docs found on Google Search"

Re: Activist arrested by London police after downloading docs found on Google search

#40

Post by LeifCarrotson »

sxp wrote: post #2

https://www.theregister.com/2021/08/10/police_raid_man_for_d... is a better article with pictures. The key bit is > The raid by four Metropolitan Police constables took place after Southwark campaigner Robert Hutchinson was reportedly accused of illegally entering a password-protected area of a website. > "I was searching in Google and found links to board meeting minutes," he told The Register. "Board reports, none…

The law must have a different definition of "password protected area" if it can be accessed without entering a password. It's like the people who get tickets for speeding or for going through a red light while their car is parked, because their street-side parking in front of their house is in the field of view of the license plate reader.

They're denying a tautology! A document is not password protected if you can access it without a password. A person not in a vehicle cannot commit a moving traffic violation. However, the automated computer system which issues those tickets does not actually comprehend those concepts, or any concepts at all. It merely follows rigid rules to send an alert on access to a particular file, or to issue a ticket with to the owner of the license plate number identified by the camera when a speed sensor returns a value not less than the speed limit (eg. NaN).

But who is the "they" who are denying those tautologies? As we abstract more and more to automated systems, it's important to remember that these systems are as dumb as a brick. A brick connected to the Internet and with very complicated melted sand inside, but a brick nonetheless. When decisions recommended by these bricks have significant consequences, it's important to keep a human in the loop.

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