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Archive.org Defeats FBI's Demand For User Information

Posted by timothy on from the brewster-kahle-you're-my-hero dept.

eldavojohn writes "Although we don't know what they were after due to the settlement, a gag order was just released that kept Internet Archive member Brewster Kahle quiet. The FBI had issued a national security letter to them under the Patriot Act. Kahle fought it. Hard. The EFF came to the aid of his lawyers and what resulted was one of the only three times an NSL has been challenged: all three have been rescinded. The FBI agreed to open some of the court files now for it to be public. The ACLU added, 'That makes you wonder about the the hundreds of thousands of NSLs that haven't been challenged.'"

11 of 224 comments (clear)

  1. It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Change by gnutoo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    A five year prison term might be preferable to experiences like this, especially when ratting out the FBI can save hundreds of thousands of innocent people from further constitutional abuse. I can not demand heroic action by others but I wish there had were more than three in the hundreds of thousands of abused citizens so far. Innocent people going to jail for protecting privacy of other innocent people would shut this monster program down fast.

    Vote for anyone but Republicans in 2008 and vote out everyone who had anything to do with the poorly named Patriot act.

  2. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That would be everyone in government of that time, except for Russ Feingold.

  3. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by Rycross · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Vote for anyone but Republicans in 2008 and vote out everyone who had anything to do with the poorly named Patriot act.

    Personally, the voting record is more important to me than whether they have an R or D beside their name. If that means that I'm voting in Republicans then so be it. I'd rather have a Republican who refused to vote for the Patriot Act than a Democrat who dropped to his knees and pucked up to the Bush administration. Not that there are many Republicans who fit that description...

  4. So much for telco immunity by KingSkippus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Boy, I'm sure the telcos are hating this. This story shows once and for all that "the government told me to" is not a valid excuse for violating civil rights.

  5. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by NewbieProgrammerMan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That would be everyone in government of that time, except for Russ Feingold. ...and Ron Paul. I'm sure the very act of mentioning his name on Slashdot endangers my karma, but what the hell.
    --
    [b.belong('us') for b in bases if b.owner() == 'you']
  6. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by rho · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Resist the temptation to make this partisan. Democrats were perfectly willing to vote for the PATRIOT Act and then try to excuse their complicity after the fact. That is not a commendable act.

    --
    Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
  7. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by niko9 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    A five year prison term might be preferable to experiences like this, especially when ratting out the FBI can save hundreds of thousands of innocent people from further constitutional abuse. I can not demand heroic action by others but I wish there had were more than three in the hundreds of thousands of abused citizens so far. Innocent people going to jail for protecting privacy of other innocent people would shut this monster program down fast.


    Vote for anyone but Republicans in 2008 and vote out everyone who had anything to do with the poorly named Patriot act.

    You had me right up until "Vote for anyone but Republicans...

    Us against them. Good over evil. With or against us. Sheep think in those terms.

    The emotional rhetoric from politicians never ends and their simple minded constituents emulate that behavior instead of engaging in critical thinking.

    You do realize that there were PLENTY of Democrats that had voted for the Patriot Act. Hell, IIRC 99% of Congress didn't even read the God damn thing!

  8. A true Patriot - protecting our freedom by FromTheAir · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The greatest threat to our nation is secret police powers because it allows a small group of people to take control of the government and eliminate any opposition. It is a much greater threat than any of the fictional threats.

    Allowing small group of people that benefit disproportionably to the many, to create an indentured servitude is not patriotic, fighting it is. The maintaining of the separation of powers, protecting the Bill of Rights, and the Constitution as well as defending them is the is the ultimate Patriotic Act.

    It is time for transfer of power from the few to the many, the wise (conservative) and those that value freedom (liberal), and those that value both, (party free independents for collective control).

    Laws of changed such that we have become cattle simply to be herded and this is most unpatriotic.

    --
    "an infinite player that has lost his finite mind" ~Infinite Play the Movie (it blends with reality)
  9. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by Urza9814 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That's why you vote for Obama. Clinton supported the PATRIOT act. Clinton supported the war. Obama was against both of those. I was honestly planning on voting Libertarian, because I can't bring myself to vote for anyone who supports the PATRIOT act and all this other crap...but Obama fits that quite well.

  10. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by OldFish · · Score: 5, Insightful

    See the Patriot Act for what it was in historical terms: a reactionary measure passed and supported by representatives of a hurting, angry nation. Considering the national mood at the time, it was the "right" thing to do: Americans were more than happy to give up essential liberties for Bush's promise of temporary security. His approval ratings set new historical record highs in the weeks immediately following the 9/11 attacks and the start of the Afghan war. You are being naive. Passage of the Act was actively exploitative of a shocked and fearful nation. It was a massive power grab timed to take advantage of a disoriented country. You are too easy on the perpetrators of the anti-Constitution Patriot Act.
  11. Re:It's time for Civil Disobedience and Regime Cha by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The vast majority of teachers are garbage, they can blame the system if they want, but given the strength of the teachers union again they need to look inward. For what they accomplish on average, they're overpaid.
    The failures of American education have nothing to do with the teachers. Thousands of teachers enter the field excited about what they are doing, and love it at first. Unfortunately, within a couple of years of dealing with the shit for brains asshats that make up the majority of their classes, it becomes apparent to them that they are not being paid to educate the children, they are being paid to keep them in one place and make sure they don't get into too much trouble. Hoping for anything more is foolish - you can't force children to value education when they are surrounded by a culture that considers smart people to be geek losers and football players to be heroes.

    Make no mistake - the teachers unions have nothing to do with it. The students are more than capable of fucking it up all on their own, and tend to take pleasure in doing so.

    [BTW, nope, I'm not a teacher, so this rant is not self serving at all; I'm just a product of and a witness to the system, and to me the educations that kids receive these days matches quite well what society considers to be "just right" - a generation of retard parents gives rise to a generation of retard kids, and anyone smarter than that average level of retardation has to really fight the system]