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Google handed over years of e-mails belonging to WikiLeaks chatroom admin

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Re: Google handed over years of e-mails belonging to WikiLeaks chatroom admin

#81

Post by superuser2 »

betterunix wrote: post #70
superuser2 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evidence tampering is a federal felony. In this case it doesn't matter how well you covered your tracks - if they can prove you rigged a failsafe, you're going to jail anyway.

I think it might be hard to prove the evidence tampering charge. It is not at all unreasonable to claim that you were trying to protect important secrets from criminals who might break into your home or office. To put it another way, this is not an illegal device: http://www.ironkey.com/en-US/secure-portable-storage/250-per...

If you had video confirmation that it was the police who tripped your alarm before firing a degausser, that would be pretty cut and dried. If it were automatic, maybe not.

Re: Google handed over years of e-mails belonging to WikiLeaks chatroom admin

#82

Post by iSnow »

d4nt wrote: post #44
iSnow wrote: post #39

Why for heaven's sake does anyone who does anything that might piss of a government use GMail or any hosted mail provider? This is far beyond me.

The definition of "anyone who does anything that might piss off a government" includes a lot of people. What if I become a political activist in 20 years time, I might well piss of a future government, should I stop using gmail now in case that happens?

Not now, but exactly at that point in time.

Re: Google handed over years of e-mails belonging to WikiLeaks chatroom admin

#83

Post by Zigurd »

rayiner wrote: post #52
betterunix wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By not having such broad categories of things to be seized. It is not "specific" to seize "every email message he sent to anyone ever."

"betterunix's g-mail account" is plenty specific as a "place to be searched" and "e-mails" is plenty specific as "things to be seized." If you printed out every letter you've ever sent to someone and put it in a filing cabinet, it would be totally fair game for a warrant to get the contents of the filing cabinet. Or if you kept them on a hard drive, it would be totally fair game to get a warrant to get the hard drive…

How is "everything in the computer" different from "everything in the house?" Or are we now writing search warrants for "everything in the house?"

Re: Google handed over years of e-mails belonging to WikiLeaks chatroom admin

#84

Post by rayiner »

Zigurd wrote: post #83
rayiner wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"betterunix's g-mail account" is plenty specific as a "place to be searched" and "e-mails" is plenty specific as "things to be seized." If you printed out every letter you've ever sent to someone and put it in a filing cabinet, it would be totally fair game for a warrant to get the contents of the filing cabinet. Or if you kept them on a hard drive, it would be totally fair game to get a warrant to get the hard drive…

How is "everything in the computer" different from "everything in the house?" Or are we now writing search warrants for "everything in the house?"

Because a computer is a small self-contained thing that you can often fit in a bag? That's my point about information consolidation: the law is rooted in the physical (and necessarily so). You can wax philosophical about "virtual spaces" but at the end of the day a hard drive is a small physical object that is treated the same as any other small physical object.

Re: Google handed over years of e-mails belonging to WikiLeaks chatroom admin

#85

Post by Zigurd »

rayiner wrote: post #84
Zigurd wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is "everything in the computer" different from "everything in the house?" Or are we now writing search warrants for "everything in the house?"

Because a computer is a small self-contained thing that you can often fit in a bag? That's my point about information consolidation: the law is rooted in the physical (and necessarily so). You can wax philosophical about "virtual spaces" but at the end of the day a hard drive is a small physical object that is treated the same as any other small physical object.

You are evading the question: "Everything in the house" is obviously not specific enough. And here is where the evasion comes in: The problem is not the size of the container. Does a search warrant even ask you to describe the container? No. It asks you to describe the thing to be seized.

If H&R Block had Whitey Bulger's tax returns, would the warrant be required to describe those documents, or, would all of the small, baggable disk drives at their data center be subject to seizure?

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