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Google Assists In Arrest Of Indian Man
An anonymous reader writes "After a Google user posted a profane picture of the Hindu saint Shivaji, Indian authorities contacted Google to ask for his IP address. Google complied. He was arrested and is reported to have been beaten by a lathi and asked to use the same bowl to eat and to use in the toilet.
Not surprisingly, Google is a keen to play this down as Yahoo is being hauled over the coals by US Congress for handing over IP addresses and emails to the Chinese Government which resulted in a Chinese democracy activist being jailed." Readers are noting that these are 2 unrelated cases — the latter is several months old.
I don't usually complain about badly written summaries, but this one made my head explode.
Well, I'm glad that google abides by the law here in canada. Clearly their motto of 'do no evil' is region specific; on one hand, I applaud their help in stopping crime, on the other hand, I detest the violation of privacy.
I guess I'm safe so long as my government respects my rights (because google will only go as far as the government seems deem 'right')
What happened to this man is despicable. However, we need to remember that Google is a company, not a judge in a court of law. It is not their place to decide if a court-issued subpoena is "worth" complying with or not, especially not in a democratic country (eat trolls, eat!). The big question is if they were responding to a court order in the first place, or the lean of some jackass in the government.
An old-timer with old-timey ideas.
The summary mixes up two different stories. The first (techcrunch.com) link points to a story involving a guy posting "obscene" comments about Sonia Gandhi and Mahatma Gandhi, while the later link (techgoss.com) points to the story that appears in the summary (involving Shivaji). Sonia Gandhi is an Italian born Indian politician and the leader of the ruling Congress Party. Shivaji was a ruler of Maratha Empire.
Also, the Shivaji story involves a goof up by the telecom provider Airtel that provided the details of the wrong person (not using the IP in question) whereas in the other story the ISP provided the details of the actual person involved. In both stories Google revealed the IP used by the "culprit".
The motto is not "do no evil," it is "don't be evil."
Not that it really matters, "evil" is a sloppy, ill-defined, and personally relativistic concept to begin with.
And of course, having an intent doesn't guarantee the ability to realize that intent, let alone to perpetually avoid any deviation.
And of course, loudly publishing such a motto doesn't actually mean that those at the top have any intention of living up to it. The perception of benevolence is what is really useful.
He was asked? Does that mean it was optional? I don't know about this guy, but I'd lean towards "No."
This really gets to me.
Of all the British citizens sent to Guatanamo Bay, those sent back to Britain to handle have been released with no charges. There is very good evidence to say that many, if not most, held there are entirely innocent. None have yet received any form of trial, with some having been held for 6 years.
On top of this, the PATRIOT act (which has everything to do with undermining the constitution and nothing to do with true patriotism) now makes it possible to send US citizens to Gitmo.
On top of this, nearly all US phone companies are implicated in spying on US citizens illegally, allowing the FBI/CIA etc who-knows-what access to every phone call handled.
On top of this, the president wants to grant these telecoms retroactive immunity from prosecution, since he asked them to do it.
And on top of all this, Americans have the nerve to get their knickers in a twist when another American company Obeys the laws of a country in which they do business?
By all means campaign to change the attitudes of those in power in repressive countries. Please, do. But remember Google was (presumably) obeying a court order.
Is crushing a suspect's child's testicles illegal?
John Yoo: "No, [if] the President thinks he needs to do that."
Crime? You sure you want to word it that way?
What this man was convicted of may have been a crime in his country, but in the United States, Europe, Canada and most other places in the free world what he did would be protected under freedom of speech.
He was arrested for nothing more than saying something like "Fuck George Bush" or "Hillary Clinton is a stupid cunt licker" or "Barack Obama can go fuck himself" or "John McCain is an asshole." (There, equal opportunity.
Tastelss? Perhaps. Illegal? Not where I live.
My blog
They got the wrong party and roughly treated the arrested man. The idea is to send the message loud and clear, "we will get the IP address and catch you and mess you up. May this time we messed up the wrong guy, but next time, watch out." That is the logic of the Indian police who think this will reduce such incidents in the future. But what trips them up is that a savvy criminal will know how to hide his tracks, and it will always be the wrong guy who gets nabbed. But it allows the police to pretend they did something. (You might argue defacing Shivaji's picture is not criminal. But given the reaction you typically get from Muslims for defacing images of Mohammad, this reaction by the desis is quite tame. And this is a different argument anyway, nothing concerning Google)
If google had not promised anonymity to Orkut users, then it can't be held accountable. There are bigger villains in the story, the desi police, incompetent desi ISP, desi politics and the desi population in general that accepts this all.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
And while meditating their IP is 127.0.0.1 for "Truth lies within".
Homeboy ought to move to where you live. However, as he lives where he lives, the laws of where he lives were enforced, not the laws where you live. That, unfortunately, is the Way Things Are.
Never argue with a man carrying a water buffalo
Approximately 99.99% of Slashdotters can describe the Prime Directive, and how it works in a land of make believe.
A significantly lower percentage sees how it would apply in current-era Earth.
I can't understand why Google helped them, it's not like it was a big deal. Just like all the bullshit because of those Mohammed pictures over here in scandinavia, I mean who gives a fuck? It's just an imaginary fictional character anyway. Personally I'd be willing to draw 50 Mohammeds or Shivajis eating their own shit for each complaint on them. (Or Jesus for all I care, or may I say it _YOUR MOM_ to whoever reads this :D)
Who cares, it's just a picture, feel free to answer with imageshack links of your drawings of me.
Google is to blame for complying with an oppressive, anti-human-rights law, just like Yahoo is. They've stood up to the American government, I'm baffled why they wouldn't stand up to the Indian government, but it makes them no less in the wrong. There are standards for human rights, no company should obey laws that violate human rights just to operate in the country where they are violated. India SHOULD be punished for having this law on the books, and the punishment should take the form of Google's refusal to obey its laws. If the Indian government tries a reprisal against Google, then the punishment should take the form of Google ceasing to do business there.
The only argument you can make against this is that it would hurt Google's bottom line, and that's no argument at all.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
Could you title it "2 Gods, 1 Bowl"