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Sklyarov Clarifies Circumstances of Release, Testimony
*ZiggyP0P* writes: "We remember hearing how Dmitry was let off and released (so he can finally go home) but how he had to cooperate with the government in the prosecution of his employer as a plea bargain. Turns out that this was all a lie by the Justice Dept. Skylarov has released his own statements which explain what exactly happened. He has entered into no legal plea bargain and he is still employed by Elcomsoft (even though the justice dept called him his former employer)."
I'm glad for the opportunity to see exactly where they lied, though. Thanks, Dmitry.
-Legion
Turns out that this was all a lie by the Justice Dept...
Why is it that, when it's the Government's word versus some cracker's, everyone always wants to believe the cracker? Doesn't the Justice Department have a lot more to lose by lying about this?
And if we really think our own government is so evil, why are we still here?
Spin spin spin. It looks like the gov't is backpedaling fast and putting on spin in hopes it will all go away.
"Cooperate" probably means he agreed to take their phone calls.
Some junior D.A. probably wanted to make a career on a "big, bad, Russian hacker" and found out real life isn't like a Hollywood movie.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Can he sue for being wrongfully imprisoned? I mean, he was jailed for 5 months, does he get some kind of reparation for his trouble?
No sig for you.
sounds to me like the gov't is just trying to cover what they finaly realised to be a big mistake on their part... now they need to make it look like they are going easy on him out of sympathy or his "cooperation."
i also remember in another article (can't remember where), his employer even offered to stand trial in his stead if they released dimitry... i found that to be quite admirable myself
I believe sex is highly over rated... unless it involves me
If the statement by Skylarov is indeed the "Fact" then he should have a very good case for Defamation charges against the US government. Hope they file this is a Russian court so any claims agains the company will have a local offset. The DOJ made a mistake but they can't admit to that. Anyone found it poetic Justice that Adobe was barred from selling InSIde due to Patent Infringements.
Help fight continental drift.
Is how they are trying to use this crap to "teach" a lesson. Know your rights!!!!
I think that Neo said it best:
"How bout I give you the finger and you give me my phone call."
I still think the biggest punk in the whole process is Adobe...they backed out of the process in order to save some face on thier own knowing full well it was too late to stop the prosecution. grrr....
Lying and withholding the truth are separated by a thin line - so what if the government lied? big deal and theres no Santa Claus - wait ask the govt. if theres one - maybe JD is holding him ? You never know ha? ~Atari2600
In a recent article in an English magazine 'Linux Format', it had a sort of guide to the dmca, what it meant etc, some of the things it went on about was that if Sklyarov was released, it could mean that the DMCA could be removed from US law, also being an infingement of the US's first amendment (freedom of speech)
Mostly though, i think most people should be thinking, 'WHAT HAPPENS NOW'.
What is the next direction for the goverment, and the anti-DMCA people (people with common sense) and where will this put the SSSCA.
Before Dmitry was detained, who had heard of Elcomsoft? Apparently, they had sold very few copies of their software. Not that they'd asked for it, but now they've got more publicity than they could have paid for. I wonder if sales are picking up too? Could it be that Adobe's strategy has completely backfired?
Is Russia an extridition treaty country (IANAL)?
I was just wondering, when he goes back to Russia, and Dmitry and his employer decide that the USA has no legal authority over them, and the Russian government agrees, would he still come back to the USA for a trial?
Seems like a viable option to me, if possible.
Any ideas?
Turns out that this was all a lie by the Justice Dept.
What exactly was a lie? He did enter into an agreement. The government never said that he admitted guilt. Sure, they screwed up the employment status, but that is likely a minor oversight, not a lie. Much more minor than slashdot's "lie", saying that he agreed to testify against Elcomsoft.
The FULL TEXT of the document regarding Skylarov
Further, deponent sayeth not (at least in this message ...)
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
Everytime I read yet another update to this semingly never-ending ordeal, one thing that remains constant is what a wonderful employer Elcomsoft must be to work for. They've stood by Dmitry's side beginning with day one, they're still hanging in there fighting for him, and their CEO even offered himself up in a bizarre "hostage exchange" scenario.
I hope all of the employees of Adobe are truly embarrassed about this.
Maybe I am putting words in your mouth that you never meant but it seems to me that going back to the "Source" is not quite valid. The issue at hand is the perception that he had admitted "wrongdoing" that is perpetrated by the DOJ / Press release. We have seen again and again the government's refusal to protect its citizen, let alone a foreigner, from its own misconduct. This got to stop.
Help fight continental drift.
This actually means two things
1.Dimitry will not face any charges, nor will have a felony record.
2.Since this is not a case of testifying against Elmsoft, this means that a challenge to the DMCA is still possible, with a legitimate corporation with relatively large coffers defending itself.
So really, the tech-culture gets its day in court without any criminal reprecussions and we get a constitutional challenge to a very unconstitutional law.
Way to go, DOJ, I knew you were on our side!
http://cincyboys.blogspot.com/ Everything Cincinnati. Including the word 'Finnih'
Young man,
there's no need to feel down
Because your plane
back home can't get off the ground
I said young man,
Get comfy in your new town
There's no need to be unhappy.
Young man,
There's no place you can go
I said young man,
Until you cough up some dough
You will stay here
until you've served all your time
For your insignificant crime.
It's fun to stay in the U S of A,
Because of that old grand D M C A
For cracking DVD's,
Or an e-book or three,
You'll get jailed for eterniteeeee...
It's fun to stay in the U S of A
Because of that old grand D M C A
For proving to the world
That our encryption's a toy
You'll get jailed with all the boyyyyyyys...
-------------------------------------------------
charlton heston is more of a man than yo
They might have let him go free, but did they zip his mouth and implant a tracker bug through his navel?
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
... because I would like some fries with that, and no, to answer you question, I don't want to super size it for $0.29 more.
Oh, and did you ever finish that GED or get the hitch to your trailer home fixed?
What I'm saying is that we don't know all the conditions uder which he was released. There is probably a lot of legal mumbo-jubo going on that we don't know about.
I mean I think he was wrongly accused and all but once you get a software company and a bunch of lawyers into this you don't really know what's actually happening.
I just think that everyone is watching out for their interests here and we shold be a litte skeptacal of what anyone says.
This proves two things:
1) It must be obvious to everyone that the DMCA is unconstitutional
2) DMCA type laws are never going to go away till we attack the root of the problem, copyrights
Unless you think that we're going to conjure up a propaganda machine the size of the movie industry, or that the government will suddenly start protecting liberties again, civil disobedience is the only way to go.
So if I shave my beard I'm breaking a law in afghanistan and the next time i go there (whis is never) I can be punished.
Yes I know this doesn't apply anymore but it's an example so bare with me.
I hope all of the employees of Adobe are truly embarrassed about this.
I'm embarassed about this, because my government is making our country look like an ass.
It's one thing to accuse the government of being corrupt. It's quite another to pin the blame for this corruption on the very parties who tried to clean it up.
I'd very much appreciate you explaining each one of these incidents.
I'm very much curious what you think Janet Reno did that was wrong. The only thing I can recall is her listening to the Republican appointees in the FBI when she first took office. Thus begat Waco. Both her and President Clinton apologized for that, and cleaned house in the FBI.
What always amazes me is how ignorant, stupid and partisan Republicans are. This idiot is trying to pin the blame for Ruby Ridge on the Clinton Administration when the event occured in '92.
But I'll bet back in '92 if it had gained any news coverage this moron would have claimed we shouldn't criticize the FBI because that's not patriotic.
It makes me want to puke just thinking that my family has died protecting the rights of scum like this.
Yes. While your example no longer applies, it is a good one. If you are an infidel you will be dealt with as apropriate if they ever get hold of you. Just like if you crack american corporations software you will be dealt with when we get our hands on you. You can not expect to steal the intelectual property of US companies and get away with it. Now wether you believe that it is wrong to not have a beard or it is right to steal is quite beside the point. It is about authority. Authority comes only from power, something which neither the Taliban nor Russia posses any longer.
Yes. Partisanship is only ok if the person agrees with you, right?
what the fuck are you talking about when you say the US has jurisdiction in these matters worldwide? take your head out of your ass and consider how the US could possibly be justified--and how other countries would allow it--having jurisdiction over the acts of citizens of foreign countries in foreign countries. You do know that the United States government is a government of a single country, not the whole world, don't you?
I just think the media has their heads up their asses. There was some developement in the Skylarov case on the news the other day, and the reporter's referred to him as a "Bay Area man"! I guess he sort of his, seeing as how he's been living in California for a few months, but wouldn't it be more accurate to call him Russian?
The future isn't what it used to be.
I can't believe that after 50+ comments everyone has overlooked the most critical detail about this article. I mean, a cute chick who teaches XML and has her own blog where she talks about techie news. How rare is that?!? Has anyone found any better pictures than the one in the article on her site?
In the article, ElcomSoft's statement about backing Skylarof, expecting nothing but the truth, etc. are just amazing. This is the second time I've read a press release from them where they condemn the US DOJ for holding the programmer and not the company employing the programmer responsible. Their press releases have all made me rethink what I thought of as good employers here in the good old US of A. Would your employer go to the mat for you? Think about it.
personally I think that the government is going to jerk around until enough people forget about this. I think in hind sight they do not want this very high profile case to go to court, likewise none of the media companies want it there either. They want this law to sit on the books for awhile and become "accepted" before anyone tries to test it. I'm sure another year from now we'll here some snippet blurb saying that the govt and elcomsoft entered into a "Plea" agreement where elcomsoft agree's not to sell the product in the US in exchange for the small slap on the wrist or "deferred" sentencing. What a joke!
"Do not be swept up in the momentum of mediocrity." - anon
"Dimitry's" program is under US copyright law a "work for hire", and therefore was not even his to begin with. It was also legal in Russia, and legal in the pre-1998 US. And, if anything, a civil, not a criminal case.
Furthermore, Dmitry's program doesn't steal anything. It has entirely legitimate uses:
1) Making a backup copy.
2) Copying your legally purchased ebook to your other desktop and laptop systems for use on them.
3) Enabling the blind to hear the ebooks be read to them.
The DMCA which Dmitry is accused of violating is blatantly Unconstitutional. A lot of people were shot, stabbed, blown up, poisoned, run over, and immolated in the US in the past year. Yet, there are no laws prohibiting without exception the manufacture or distribution of guns, knives, explosives, arsenic, cars, and gasoline.
Why then is there a law prohibiting the manufacture or distribution of a device that can circumvent ebook encryption? THERE IS ONE, BECAUSE IT WAS BOUGHT.
A government's just powers are derived from the consent of the governed. The governed only empower the gov't to act in the greater good. The DMCA doesn't even pretend to be in the greater good, its sole purpose is to give copyright hoarders ("Content Providers") unlimited control over the content they sell to the public. Control they never had before, and are not granted under the clause in the Constitution upon which copyright law is based.
Why was Dmitry arrested? "His" program was under US Copyright Law a "work for hire", and therefore he never owned it in the first place.
How I miss the mother country.
He made what is known as a "Pretrial Diversion Agreement" , and part of the agreement is that he agrees not to fault the government for any possible 6th Amemdment 'speedy trial' violations due to the postponement of prosecution during his 12 month 'supervision'.
Sorry, he got modded down to -1. Wasn't flaming you.
Good that "they" released Dmitry before the New Year.
Happy New Year (S Novyim Godom!) Dmitry, and let's hope tath the coming year will be better than this.
AC
Surely you've GOT to be kidding! Our Govt. NEVER lies !
(please mod this up as funny)
I pledge allegiance to the flag Of the Corporate States of America And to the corporations for which it stands One cartel Inhumane Motivated by greed With liberty and justice for the top 2% of wealth
I live in Texas, and I still don't think the govt did anything legally wrong at Waco. All I know is, a bunch of nutties with guns were down there plotting to eventually kill me and my family, and a bunch of govt agents got themselves shot trying to take them out before they all killed themselves.
It blew my mind how conservative talk radio immediately tried to picture these guys as, "Just peaceful, churchgoing, religious folks exercising their 2nd amendment priviliges.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
Apology accepted. Please accept mine.
I think the contents of this webpage are a bit extreme, but the USA has probably contributed (directly or indirectly) to the deaths of large numbers of people, at home and abroad, in the name of greed and control. Unfortunate, but probably true.
I hope one day the USA will return to the Constitution and lawful behavior, and perhaps even start visualizing utopia again.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
But the DOJ statement never uses the term "Plea Agreement", nor does it claim that Dmitri admitted to "wrongful" conduct.
Dmitri claims that he is not cooperating with the government.
But in the Diversion Agreement he agrees to testify if requested by the government in the case of United States v. Elcom Ltd., agrees that any statements he makes may be used against him in a prosecution for obstruction of justice or perjury, and waives most of his constitutional rights in exchange for a promise that he will not be prosecuted if he lives up to his end of the Agreement. Not cooperation?
And ElcomSoft says that Dmitri's testimony can only be supportive to their case and they only want Dmitri to tell the truth.
But of course, ElcomSoft is still a defendant facing criminal prosecution in this case, and criminal defendants always claim that when the true facts come out, they will be shown to be innocent.
So once you cut through the spin that Dmitri, ElcomSoft and the EFF (none of whom are neutral, disinterested parties in this case) put on it, the only real undisputed inaccuracy in the DOJ statement is the bit about the "former" employer. Which is probably a misreading of Dmitri's statement in the Diversion Agreement that "continuing through July 15, 2001, [he] was employed by" ElcomSoft.
Remember that PR works for both sides, folks.
Truthfully, I was nodding when I read your original post. Our founding fathers had the luxury to flee to a completely new continent (albiet one populated by some pesky indigenous peoples that needed wiping out). We, however, have no such luxury. When people say idiotic things like "love it or leave it" they don't think to ask "leave for where?"
Another continent ruled by ogilarchy and the same corporations as every where else? Bummer.
that you've probably watch too much Judge Judy.
Credit Card Fraud is illegal in Russia. Chances are, if something isn't illegal just about everywhere (such as murder, real theft, etc) then it probably isn't a big deal.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Child-Rape is the only law that applies to US citizens outside of the US. If you went to another country and shot somone, then came back, you wouldn't be charged with murder if it wasn't illegal in the country you were in.
Also, US law does not apply to non-US citizens when out side of the US. If dimitry Skylarov fucked a 15 year old in thailand before he came to the US he wouldn't be charged with child-rape a long with got here.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
He was in jail for a couple weeks. then they let him out on bail.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Perl is emphatically not an object-oriented language. Perl's OO features were crudely hacked in after-the-fact. This unfortunate compromise is the equivalent of trying to bolt an internal-combustion engine onto a stagecoach instead of designing an automobile from the ground up.
Too many simple tasks are pointlessly complicated. Take the simple example of creating an array whose elements are arrays. Not only does the developer need to use additional inner brackets for each element, but they must also remember to use the unique @{$a[1]} syntax when referencing. Why all the extra steps? Who knows.
Perl is notoriously impossible read and maintain. Walk into any bar frequented after-hours by veteran developers and you'll hear story after story being swapped about having to decipher brain-crushing lines of text like :" (my @parsed =$URL =~ m@(\w+)://([^/:]+)(:\d*)?([^#]*)@) || return undef;". This unreadability is in part the result of the fact that:
Perl attempts to be all things to all people and ends up being second-rate at everything.Perl is widely known as the "duct tape of the internet", and it performs superbly in this role. However, just as you cannot build a house out of duct tape alone, so attempting to turn a language that was originally developed for scrpiting brief, handy utilities into a do-all, be-all programming language will only result in the buggy, bloated, "write-only" mess that Perl has become.
Subroutine signatures, orthogonals, method access, data inheritance: this list could go on and on. But there is no real need. Its is now clear that Perl is doomed. At this very moment, Perl 6.0 is being cobbled together, with bulletins about the myriad upcoming features of the new version being issued with titles referring to the Biblical Book of the Apocalypse, the favorite text of messianic streetcorner lunatics. There is no better indicator of the deranged states of mind of the developers behind Perl than this unfortunate choice of imagery. Software developers with any interest in future employment/relevance should sieze this opportunity to attain fluency in Ruby or Python and donate their Perl books to the History Department of their local University.
Forget Skylarov, I want to know more about this beautiful and intelligent Lisa Rein person!!!
*swoon*
I predicted that he would be let go without a trial, and here is my original comment from the September slashdot thread:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=22120&cid=2371 611
(there's not supposed to be a space between the 1 and the 6)
Saw it coming.
Rich...
Ignore Alien Orders
You americans should be sick of your governments behaviour. Lying? Urging the people not to question their government? Regular people being harrased for just that thing by the Secret Service and FBI? You my freinds are living in a totalinarian police state. Enjoy living in 1984 for the rest of your life. Personally, I never cared for being forced by the government to think their way and being threatened by a federal agency to do so or "you are in line with the terrorists", but I'm in a country which is still required by law to allow it's people to question government. I'm in a country where satire against the government(and corporations) is still allowed. I'm in a country where the person who gets the most votes in an election is the winner. In short, I don't live in the USA.
It's been a long time.
I think the next thing that will happen is the whole case will be dropped. Imagine these questions from the defense...
Defense: Please tell the court what this advertisement means ( adobe's 'secure' ebook format)
Adobe: blah blah
Defense: So the defendant showed you to be engaging in false advertising? etc...
Defense: Please explain what this program does
Elmcom: Permits blind people to use ebooks...
This law is bad. Too far reaching. The gov't knows it, but knows that if it comes before the courts in a case where the defendant is not doing anything wrong ie. not breaking into or stealing stuff, they can't win. So they will do everything to not come before the courts unless they know they can win.
For the legal minds among us, a question. Do cases that don't come before the courts because of these deals and dropped charges build up jurisprudence?
Derek
People have spent years on death row in this country and haven't been reimbursed one cent. Apparently when the justice system frames you, sends you to jail, ruins your life for ever they don't even owe you an apology.
That's our society!
War is necrophilia.
Man homosexuals are some sick bastards. I thought raping little boys was bad enough but this is the product of a truly vile and sick bastard.
I used to feel sympathy for their plight (after all it doesn't seem fair to discriminate agains them) but stuff like this makes me rethink those positions.
War is necrophilia.
public officials when they pass laws that violate our constitutional rights.
Why is it that congress can violate our rights all the time and pass any law that they want, with no consequence?
If congress passes a law and that law is later found to be unconstitutional, I want everyone who voted yes on that law to be put into prison for one day for each persons rights they took away. All their possessions should be confiscated and sold at auction and the proceeds given to their victims.
I want every official and policeman who enforced the unconstitutional law to be just as liable for the damages and consequences as the legislature that passed it.
The excuse that 'I was just following orders.' has been heard too many times, in too many places, to justify too many brutalities.
People should be afraid to even try to enforce a law that might even be remotely unconstitutional. Our representatives should tremble in fear that they might do something wrong that they will be imprisoned and punished for.
Not the other way around. Not the people trembling in fear that congress might pass a law that imprisons us unfairly and unjustly, until we can get that law overturned. Only to be released without even an apology, let alone to see justice against those that unfairly and unjustly imprisoned us.
Can a republic without justice stand for long? I think not.
public officials when they pass laws that violate our constitutional rights.
Why is it that congress can violate our rights all the time and pass any law that they want, with no consequence?
If congress passes a law and that law is later found to be unconstitutional, I want everyone who voted yes on that law to be put into prison for one day for each persons rights they took away. All their possessions should be confiscated and sold at auction and the proceeds given to their victims.
I want every official and policeman who enforced the unconstitutional law to be just as liable for the damages and consequences as the legislature that passed it.
The excuse that 'I was just following orders.' has been heard too many times, in too many places, to justify too many brutalities.
People should be afraid to even try to enforce a law that might even be remotely unconstitutional. Our representatives should tremble in fear that they might do something wrong that they will be imprisoned and punished for.
Not the other way around. Not the people trembling in fear that congress might pass a law that imprisons us unfairly and unjustly, until we can get that law overturned. Only to be released without even an apology, let alone to see justice against those that unfairly and unjustly imprisoned us.
Can a republic without justice stand for long? I think not.
--
PS, sorry for the double post, but slashdot seems to have a bug that if you preview your article and then submit, it replaces your subject with the default subject line. That just sucks.
Am I the only one unsettled by the ease by which this statement can be shown?
Albuquerque PC
At Waco, the BATF fills a registered firearms factory - someone's home, now dubbed `the compound' - with a poisonous incendiary gas, then lights it, then acts all surprised when it burns to the ground killing scores of people who have never weilded a weapon, including women and children.
At Oklahoma, by a stunning coincidence the BATF office is empty when demolition charges attached to the structure within the building bring it down, hardly touching buildings across the road near where a certain truck was parked, but oh dearie us, the building's creche was not empty at the time, look what that wicked bomber did.
Dmitry hardly seems to rate a mention when compared to these other than that the USDOJ have arrested and held a Russian - apparently not directly involved in the alleged crime(s) - for five months.
I doubt there are very many Slashdot readers who voted fot the sonofabush, but for those of you that did, hope your happy! Well duh, I imagine you are, we are at war, taxes are getting cut all over the place, the poor are getting poorer, hundreds and hundreds of thousands of jobs have been lost, a lying us attorney, defense spending is up and on and on.
Guess the worst recession since the depression during the Regean didnt teach you boneheads a thing. How much is enough? How many millions do you need?
See, that where's our opinion differs.
I had more the impression that they politely tiptoed back, after realizing that their disgraceful action wasn't that good in terms of public relations.
They're still the bad guys with lots of egg on their face, which just won't wash off.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
The charge that the DMCA has not yet been upheld in court, therefore what he is being charged with hasn't been proven to be a crime
yet, anyways!
So the Government lied... So Dimitry lied... I guess that cancels each other out. The main issue is that he did create a piece of software that's only purpose (once released to the public) was for the illegal decryption and reading of eBooks. I make the distinction that if he had kept the software to himself then the government would have no case. But no, in typical computer geek pseudo penis waving fashion he wanted to show off. The difference is knowing when to have self control and Dimitry did not exhibit any self control. I do not claim to be a hacker or even understand the mindset of a hacker. What I do know is that he went beyond just investigating the encryption and protection of eBooks and moved to the exploitation of its weeknesses.
Apologies accepted for flamewars? WHAT IS THIS WORLD COMING TO?