U.S. Goverment Responds to EFF's Indymedia Motion

bergwitz writes "In a response to EFF's motion to unseal, the U.S. government claims that Indymedia hard drives were seized as part of an international "criminal terrorism investigation," and thus the U.S. District Court's gag order should be upheld." This will help refresh your memory.

Comments

But your honor...

[Phoenix Rising]

... we didn't serve IndyMedia - we served RackSpace.

Ah, the complexities of an information society. According to the government, you'd better own the equipment, not just the data. Data owners apparently have no standing to sue if they aren't directly served, even if it's their data that's confiscated.

Re:But your honor...

[parliboy]

Query along those lines

In many jurisdictions (here in Texas to be sure), server leasing is considered leasing real property, just as if you leased an apartment or a car.

Now, let's say the government confiscates your leased car. Do you have standing to retrieve your car, or do you say back to the car company, "Take it up with the government"?

very sad

[DM9290]

It is sad that in the United States you apparently need special standing to request the unsealing of information for a warrant/subpoena.

In Canada, the PUBLIC is considered to have an interest every time the STATE uses its power to seize something via a warrant/subpoena and any member of the public can request the information be unsealed and has standing to do so.

On a similar theme, the public has the right to order transcripts of court proceedings for the same reason.

The process of Justice is considered to be a matter of public interest. Not simply a private matter between the state and whoever the state is screwing over.

Their argument about the MLAT treaty is persuasive however. It seems to contradict their argument about terrorism however.

Either the seizure was according to the a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) and was therefore done on behalf of another country, or it was at the behest of US authorities to protect american national security.

Does anyone know the identity of the unnamed "REQUESTING STATE"? Or is that a secret also?

Because it seems by refusing to ID the requesting state the government is also necessarily refusing to ID the authority of which specific treaty they are relying on. Pointing out the Treaty would tend to ID the requesting state (in so far as it would be a signatory)

I don't think you can rely on a treaty if you don't want to identify it to the court. that is just my hunch. Justice is called Justice for a reason.

Re: Ah, terrorism

[bhima]

You know, America is more free than some places. But it's fewer places than it was in 1980 (the year I became an American) and still fewer than in 2000 (the year I left).

And that's sad

Re:It pertains to an ongoing terrorism investigati

[DavidTC]

See, for the longest time, a few random people have been causing trouble at various protests. Just one or two. And the police have responding with force against all protesters. For some reason, even despite the police taking pictures to show the level of violence the protesters were using, the police would never go after the actual troublemakers.

Well, thanks to the internet, the protesters are taking pictures of the troublemakers and they're sticking up the pictures and saying 'Who the fuck is this person breaking this car window? If anyone knows who this is, tell us.'.

Well...they're undercover cops. Duh. Everyone suspected that, but that's what all this racket is about.

Logically, it makes no sense, if you've infiltrated an organization, and they post pictures of stuff, to say 'Hey, that's our undercover cops! Take those pictures down!'. That's just crazy. If they don't know they're undercover cops, don't tell them. If they do know, well, you're screwed anyway, pull them back in.

But these undercover cops are there to cause problems so the police can escalate the force used against the protesters. Having their faces plastered around is likely to be rather bad PR.

Except, of course, the traditional news is completely ignoring this.