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Cryptome Log Subpoenaed
PaulBu writes "Stopped by on Cryptome tonight... It seems that their logs have been subpoenaed by Massachusetts Assistant Attorney General
Chief, Corruption, Fruad (sic) &
Computer Crime Division. Cryptome's answer was that "logs of
Cryptome are deleted daily, or more often during heavy traffic, to
protect the privacy of visitors to the site." (Good job!)
See here"
Coming soon: legislation requiring access to any U.S. hosted site to be logged and stored for at least 72 hours.
Mmhmm. And so does the 4th amendment. And the Miranda rule. And . . .
Oh forget it.
This has -got- to be a troll.
The constitution protects criminals also.
This is a fundamental problem with freedom. If you want freedom, your neighbor has to expect that same freedom, even if he is a bigger criminal than you.
Of course, everyone is a felon. Most people just haven't pissed off the correct person yet.
I'll bite.
/. effect is already in force so I can't get to the article, so I can't help but wonder if theres an actual criminal investigation that these logs were needed for, or if they're looking to start one from those logs. If it is an ongoing investigation, what information would be gleaned from those logs that would possibly be helpful to them? That the person in question reads cryptome?
Who exactly are the criminals they are protecting here? people like me who read the site? Did someone pass a law while I was sleeping: "Thou Shalt Not Read Cryptome"?
This kind of behavior should definitely be considered a "chilling effect". The
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
i work with the local indypendent media center and our solution was to not log the ip addresses. the logs are still useful for diagnosing problems, but without the ip addresses they are useless for finding people.
-- john
Certainly you can disable logging or log to /dev/null in most software. You can also have a cron job that goes off and deletes the logs at regular intervals (and then tells the program to reopen the log, otherwise the file remains undeleted (but not visible) until it's closed, since the program's open is a reference count).
Thing is, you may actually want logs for some small period of time. Most site admins like to know how popular their site is, and logs are one way of doing it. Especially since logs show how many lurkers you have, and not just active posters. Another reason to keep some minimal logging going on is if you get DOS'd, since then you might have a fighting chance of getting things fixed before the attack ends.
It sounds like they have a watcher program that deletes the logs when they get too large... which makes the logs useless for the latter purpose. But you can still use them for the first purpose, which is probably all they really want in the first place.
Alternately they could just be deleting them by hand, but I doubt they're that stupid. If that was true it quickly becomes a case of illegally blocking a police investigation, ignoring a warrant, and possibly contempt of court. IANAL.
No. We're hell bent on keeping our hard-won freedom and not turning into our enemy.
You cannot have both ~100% safety and freedom at the same time.
We, as true Americans, aren't obligated to collect and archive every little drop of information about ourselves, our neighbors, and our customers on the off chance that it may someday be useful to law enforcement in solving or preventing a crime. Especially when you consider that the potential for abuse of randomly-collected information is much higher than the potential for its utility.
As has been said elsewhere, if they deleted the logs regularly (i.e., not in response to a subpoena), it would be hard to pin "obstruction of justice" on them. Naturally, IANAL and all that. But that would be like pinning an obstruction charge on a janitor for sweeping the hallways like she does every night because this time some evidence was swept up.
do you really think giving the logs of this website will stop terror? i'm sure most things are under the freedom of info act, like the smoking gun. do you think people can't use the anonymizer or some other means of obscuring their true identity? it's not a matter of self destruction. if we give up our freedoms to anyone, be it a foreign terrorist or our own government, the terrosrists have succeeded in their goal of disrupting our freedom.
But why does everyone immediately assume the gub'mint is trying to nail someone to a wall unjustly here? Sorry.. your "rights" arent being violated by someone subpoena'ing a weblog. Or what servers you log into. The internet is a public forum.. while the "copyright" on your posts/stories/pictures may revert to you, anyone may read them.
Just a fr'instance.. what if some of the info in one of the "eyeballing" pieces was obviously leaked by a defense worker on the inside, in violation of federal law? Wouldnt you _want_ that person removed from the position of spewing information that really doesnt BELONG in the public domain?
If you are worried about your IP being logged when you get into a server or access online content, dont get online.
A lot of the people here who are complaining about this are probably the same people who defend the guy who took pictures of the Spam King's house. You cannot have it both ways.
You cant have the freedoms granted by the government (laughable as they may be at times) without also following whatever rules make those freedoms a reality. Note: I am not saying those rules are always right.. but you either live within em, or work to change em. You dont thumb your nose at them, then cry when you get caught.
Maeryk
Feminine Protection? What is that? A chartreuse flame thrower?
You havn't ever actually maintained a web site, have you?
Logs typically get compressed nightly, and deleted frequently.
I've maintained sites that literally filled GBs of disk with log data. And it gets much more expensive (CPU cost) to process huge files. Typically, you end up picking some time frame which you compress the files at, and maintain a regular deletion cycle.
Of course you would also create reports for management and marketing, but those reports contain very few specific details like IPs, and lots of details about counts per page/directory/product item.
You really can't maintain an interesting site without frequent log deletion. I'm surprised they took the "protect the privacy of our users" route- it would be a Bad Thing [TM] to have someone get a court ruling made that websites must save all logs for a period of 5 years or something equally insane.
Anyone worth their salt who is doing anything bad is using a proxy anyway.
Never trust an atom. They make up everything.
Yeah....just turn off logging!
I don't know what the world would be like without evil, but I sure as hell would be willing to give it a shot before tossing the idea out the window. I find that most people who say that good doesn't exist without evil really mean, "I only appreciate my good fortune in contrast to the misery of others."
I presume then that you specifically exclude your log files from your nightly backups then, cos if you don't and your log files are on your backup tapes then you might have broken the law.
You do perform daily backups? No?
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Shouldn't we as true Americans
True americans value their freedom. A police state is not free.
BTW 9/11 was not the result of a lack of information problem. They had all the information they needed to stop it. 9/11 was the direct result of a failure by the FBI use properly use the information they already had. Do a little research on what we knew and when. You'll learn that we had all the info we needed to catch these guys.
The current wave of laws and privacy invasions, have just about nothing to do with preventing terrorism. They are thinly veiled ways of using the fears of unwitting Americans (like you) to give up their freedoms, so they have more power and you have less.
Try not to be such a dolt. How exactly are your server logs going to prevent another 9/11? You're going to have to stretch your imagination pretty far to come up with a way your server logs could have stopped 9/11. Now ask yourself: What other things could these server logs be used for? In the case of a site like cryptome.org, you can think of a lot of shady things the gov't could do once it gets its hands one them, most of them a lot more plausible than stopping another 9/11.
You are an embarassment to true americans. Do you think Columbus, the pilgrims, the pioneers, etc. were as terrified as you? No, they wanted freedom and were willing to risk a little safety to have it.
A supreme court judge once said that the safest societies in the world are totalitarian dictatorships.
Life is too short to proofread.
Just one comment here ... while I agree that there is no "right" that says "Thou shall not to be logged when you visit my site" (the equivalent would be someone writing down the names of every person who entered their home), rights in general are _not_ granted by the government. The Constitution takes the position that certain rights are inalienable and it's the governments job to protect, not grant, our freedoms. Unfortunately, 9/11 has granted free reign to the other line of thought.
i know i'm coming in way late here, but JYA pays for cryptome traffic out of pocket. it's his hobby (or mission, the point is that he doesn't get recompensated for it).
so don't lay waste to his site if you don't have an interest. it's coming straight out of his wallet.
Just raise the taxes on crack.
gpinzone writes:
"That's the price you pay for living in a "free" society. Deal with it...the founding fathers did."
<div class="sarcasm">
Yeah, because the founding fathers never would have done anything under, say, a pseudonym.
</div>
My
Limekiller
No, I actually would call that a Monochrome World.
You don't seem to understand what the word color means. I'll define it for you "That aspect of things that is caused by differing qualities of the light reflected or emitted by them, definable in terms of the observer or of the light" .... In a world that has all the same color, then technically there would be no color, only shades of the same tone, unless you are now saying that "similar and differ" are the same definition.
This is the definition of the word Monochrome "having or appearing to have only one color "... It can also mean, different shades of the same color, which also applies since we are talking about the color red, which takes light to be visble to us.
Shouldn't we as true Americans be ready to assist in every way we can to prevent future 9/11's? If my providing logs could even prevent one little terrorist attack I would do it in a minute.
Long ago our founding fathers were forced to decide for those they led, which is more important life or freedom? The answer was sewn onto early flags and raised as a battle cry "Give me liberty or give me death" We must remember they were yelling that against a very powerful enemy who could indeed give either of those. However the combined spirit of all early americans (with a lot of unacknowledged help from natives) was able to fight off british rule. So, should I be willing to let the govt. read my logs, tap my phone etc...
Hell, no!
Not it wasn't. 9/11 was a direct result of US foreign policy, most of which the US population is completely obvious to. They don't teach it in school, and there aren't any movies about it, so you can all be forgiven for this lack of knowledge. More so now that Bush has flat out lied to you and said the old classic "they hate freedom and democracy".
The USA (amoung other countries) has started, aided and funded coups and wars that resulted in democratically elected governments being replaced with ruthless dictators. Who do you think got Saddam into power? Then sold him masses of tanks and the equipment to build weapons of mass distruction (the idea being he'd be attacking the Iranians)? Who is aiding Israel in the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinions from their own homes? Who put the vicious Saudi government in power, and is defending them right now with your tanks, troops and finances? This is what the terrorists don't like, and they have said this many times.
If you want to stop terrorists attacking you, first learn what is being done in your name around the world, then let your politicions know that you aren't happy with them killing children to secure better access to oil, for the benefit of their corporate "sponsors". It's a much cleaner solution that asking for log file retention.
1) if I have a client request a restore of backed-up data, I bill them T&M for the procedure (especially if tapes have to be retrieved from off-site storage). Does the government ever pay for such a service?
2) If I'm subpoenaed, to what effort do I have to go to make the data usable to the prosecutor? Can I hand over a DLT? Can I print out the log files and hand over multiple reams of paper? Can I provide them the data on media without an obligation to provide them hardware to read that media (say, a really old syquest)?
This subpoena says "bring with him/her all logs recording the I.P. addresses and/or users who visited" but makes no mention of an obligation to provide them in the format most usable to the AG.
And a third thought, I'm curious as to how a Facsimile was delivered to a voice number :-)
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
Well, plus, it is just basic practice in a free society that any legal document is open to public inspection. I know some courts in America don't think this & some laws on the books go against this notion. But, at the heart of it, gag rules & secret subpoenas are for a government not by or for the people.
The exact statement was "As this subpoena is related to an ongoing criminal investigation, please do not reveal this request to any individual not necessary to comply with the supoena or to the subcriber." It is written in the cover letter, and not in the actual subpoena itself, because in public trials without a specific gag order, a piece of mail is still a piece of mail and you can show it to whomever you like. The cover letter was not marked "confidential" and the only reason cryptome would have had to comply with this friendly request to keep it on the down low would be to appease the Attorney General.
$8.95/mo web hosting
...when I used to deal with this stuff (and I was usually on the "serving" end of the subpoena), entities in other states were under no obligation to honor a subpoena from our state. Only subpoenas issued from federal courts are valid across state boundaries.
This subpoena was issued from Massachusetts for an agency in New York. Not far, but far enough.
-Scott Hutton
Which is what?
I tried to look, but it's down. It would be nice if there was some hint in the story.
Are you guilty of "destroying evidence"? Is your company? Is the furnace guy?
IANAL, but I believe intent probably matters here. If you're honestly trying your best to prevent the expected destruction of the evidence, and you fail to do so, I doubt you'd be held responsible for it. On the other hand, if the evidence is destroyed because you took a coffee break for 20 minutes after receiving the subpoena, and it was destroyed during that time, then you'd probably be in trouble. (You might even be in trouble if it wasn't possible to prevent the destruction -- not making the effort could be damning in itself.)
In the case of computer logs, if you know that the logs in question are about to be deleted by a cron job, you should take whatever steps are necessary to prevent that deletion from occurring. If you try and fail, maybe they'd still crucify you, but I rather doubt it. If you "try" but they can prove you had some passive-aggressive delays that were unnecessary, you might well be in trouble.
I don't think consulting a lawyer about the subpoena would be a defense either -- you should prevent the destruction of evidence first, then consult your lawyer about whether or not to turn over that evidence. If the delay from such a consultation results in the (foreseeable) destruction of evidence, you probably have no defense at all, if you could have prevented that destruction by acting in a timely fashion.
I think the key is knowledge of the subpoena -- if you have knowledge of it, you should act to preserve the evidence. If it is deleted through no fault of your own, and you could not have prevented that deletion after receiving the subpoena, then you're probably in the clear. In the Crematorium example, everyone would probably be in the clear. But suppose instead that the furnace guy knew of the subpoena? Then you may be in the clear for trying to preserve the evidence but the furnace guy may be in trouble for not answering the phone, hiding on a break, etc.
I believe it comes down to knowledge (of the subpoena), intent (to destroy evidence or not prevent its destruction) and ability (if it's possible to prevent the destruction). It would turn on the specific facts of the situation.
But again, I'm not a lawyer, so this certainly isn't legal advice!
Deven
"Simple things should be simple, and complex things should be possible." - Alan Kay
2. What is Cryptome doing on Verio anyway? It's a filthy spammer host.
The same thing that any client is doing on Verio -- not getting thrown off.
John hosts a lot of data which is unpopular to lot of people. An ISP which was any less reluctant to dispose of a paying customer would have tossed John some time ago.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
So how likely is it that there's a law in the works somewhere that *requires* you to keep reasonable logs? Especially with all this terrorism stuff about.
Such a requirement would not be considered onerous, and if the logs were gone, the Feds could haul you in for that.
Xix.
"Everything is adjustable, provided you have the right tools"
Don't give them any ideas!