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FBI Raids Security Researcher's Home
Sparr0 writes, "The FBI has raided the home of Christopher Soghoian, the grad student who created the NWA boarding pass site. Details can be found on his blog including a scanned copy of the warrant. The bad news is that he really did break the law. The good news is that Senator Charles Schumer did it first, 19 months ago, on an official government website no less. The outcome of this trial should be at least academically interesting. At best, it could result in nullifying some portion of the law(s) that the TSA operates under." Read on for Sparr0's take on what laws may apply in this case.
Boiling down some of the legalese, the charges (if any are filed) will be "conspiracy to knowingly present a false and fictitious claim upon or against the United States, or any department or agency thereof in violation of USC 18 (secs. 2, 371, 1036, 1343, 2318) and USC 49 (secs. 46314 and 46316) and 49 CFR (secs. 1540.103 and 1540.105)" (edited for brevity).
And so a corollary is that any security researcher who exposes a risk or danger is a criminal (;-))
--dave
davecb@spamcop.net
Senators have constitutional immunity for what they say in the Senate. That might extend to his official website, though Proxmire set a precedent that points in the opposite direction.
More to the point is that Bruce Schneier was pointing out the boarding pass problem in _2003_.
or making it easy for other people to do so.
I think part of his point is that it was already easy for other people to do so. Not that pointing out the obvious will probably help him much from his cell in Gitmo...
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
And that did that AFTER they were of a size of group that was not easily quietened or disappeared. Until then you HAVE to be the silent dissent that they cant put a finger on. Only after your numbers are large enough that you can put up a fight and they have to think twice before arresting you and hanging you for treason.
The founding fathers did not sign that document and then nailed a copy to the kings door when it was only 8 of them. They did that quietly and only AFTER they had sufficient strength to overcome the oppression that would be sent when they made their intentions public.
THAT is the difference. If the article's author got 30-40 researchers and professors to all stand together and say "screw you Homeland security! you give us NO security!" and then published the proof to that effect, the FBI would not have raided their homes in 24 hours, a cowardly senator would not have opened his big trap against them and the government would have had to treat them very VERY differently.
A single person is easily opressed and removed. a larger group, specifically a group that is well known is not.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
"It's probably a little bit more dangerous to live in a very free country, than one with a strict totalitarian regime who controls every movement everybody makes... but most people will take that tradeoff."
:-).
One can only hope that most people see their freedom/liberty and individual rights being slowly eroded in the name of (bogus) safety.
I don't know about you, but I have never been directly adversely affected by a terrorist or some obvious act of terrorism (not the namby-pamby kind of "terrorism" that involves nothing more than someone feeling uncomfortable or vaguely threatened).
On the other hand, the War on Terrorism, like the War on (Some) Drugs, and every other crisis the U.S. government invents to further its agenda, to the detriment of the best interests of the people and in direct opposition to its ostensible reason for being, namely to uphold the Constitution of the United States, is making my life (and quite probably that of most people reading this) worse on a regular basis.
These days, unlike when I was a teenager, the equivalent of the Gestapo goon's order, "Your papers, please!", is very real in the USA. The jackbooted thugs are not Nazi Germans, but rather TSA, BATF, DEA, EPA, and FBI agents as well as other minions of the federal government and their state and local bully boys.
Why should any average person, engaged in ordinary behavior be expected to carry ID, much less present it like a good little subject/ward of the State?
Of course, I may be out of touch...I remember when the very notion of patenting an idea was considered absurd. Software patents would have been dismissed as ludicrous. So it goes...downhill. I also remember when I could go to the airport, buy a ticket (paying with cash if that was my preference), get on a plane and travel, effectively anonymously as one's stated name was simply accepted, and arrive at my chosen destination (within the U.S., anyway); never feeling the presence of any government agency looming over me (with the remote exception being the FAA
It all boils down to this: Who do you want controlling your life (and the lives of the people you interact with on a daily basis) -- you (and them), or Big Brother armed with the latest high tech surveillance gear, weaponry and a nearly complete disregard for the Constitution?
I'll take my chances when I get on a flight to Las Vegas that some rabid anti-abortion, anti-gambling activist group has not decided to hijack the plane and crash it into Caesar's Palace as some sort of protest against all the imagined evils that it's members think Sin City represents.
I know, based on statistics and documented history, that I am far more likely to be harmed by government than I am by an organization such as Al Quaeda. Taxes taken out of my pocket to fund these government Wars on This, That, and The-Other-Thing which just happen to make me less free are definitely a threat to my well being. Are you any different?
For liberty,
Fractalzone
"You're young, you're drunk, you're in bed, you have knives; shit happens." -- Angelina Jolie