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Appeals Court Rolls Back Computer Privacy Guidelines
Last year we discussed news of a court ruling that established a set of guidelines for how investigators can enact search warrants involving electronically stored data. Essentially, it required authorities to specify the data for which they were searching, and to take precautions to avoid the collection of unrelated data, whether it was incriminating or not. Now, a federal appeals court has thrown out those guidelines despite agreeing with the conclusion that investigators must only collect data specified in a warrant. Instead, the ruling (PDF) leaves us with a plea for "greater vigilance on the part of judicial officers in striking the right balance between the government’s interest in law enforcement and the right of individuals to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures."
WHAT. THE. FUCK?
I know a lot of officers in various branches (police, *BI, sheriff, etc.) and count several as close friends.. but I wouldn't trust a single one of them to not go beyond the mandate of the warrant without something official binding them. The egos of most officers I have met have all been "I _am_ the law" style of bullshit that leads to people being hanged before their guilt has been proven and then "Whoops, we made a mistake. Oh well. I'm sure s/he was guilty of something." Meanwhile, the innocent person has been vilified in the news and can't do business where they live anymore.
We either need strict rules that our police officers have to follow, or we need psych evaluations to weed out the overzealous people who go too far, too fast, without consideration that someone is innocent until PROVEN guilty.
Meet the new boss?
I think the idea behind the rules was that this couldn't happen:
"Yes sir, we have reason to believe you have terrorist training manuals on your hard-disk"
*search*
"Nope, none found, but we did find some music which the RIAA might be interested in, some videos the MPAA might be interested in, a particular movie Voltage might be interested in, also you said a rude joke in a chatroom which was not properly filtered and marked for adults only"
*lawsuits to death*
But now it can :)
I don't have anything on my computer but music, email and movies. I don't break the law. I am a average citizen in this respect, and I have nothing to hide. Let them look at my computer if they like.
I don't have any weapons or drugs in my house, I still don't want a police officer to come in unasked and search the place, or look through my windows to what I have inside, or what I am doing. My computer, and the data on it, are just as much in my house as the stuff in my drawers and closets.
And anyway, I wouldn't be so sure that you don't break the law. The fact that you don't know that you break the law does not mean you don't actually break it.
Do you really know the laws? There are thousands on the books, and thousands created each year.
Do you really know what's on your computer? If you're the average citizen, then there's a high probability that your computer has been or will be compromised at some point. "Hello Mr. Smith, we have some bad news for you. After forensic examination of your hard drive, we found evidence of money laundering, child pornography, and several thousand instances of copyright violation. But don't worry. We're going to make you an offer you can't refuse.
And you would not be able to rely on the common sense of law enforcement and the criminal justice system. You see, this is an adversarial process. It's not "Innocent to proven guilty". Law enforcement is tasked with making convictions, among other things. Numbers count. There's also this other little problem, the one of "low hanging fruit", ever heard of it? It's a reference to the fact that people tend to do as little as possible, and when that expresses itself in agents of the state, e.g. law enforcement, what you end up with is the majority of their efforts are expended on two bit criminals, and unlucky stupid people that are of no real threat to any one.
Here in the U.S., if I'm not mistaken, we're at the top of the list for the number of people imprisoned as a percentage of population. This leads me to believe that we incarcerate people for a lot of petty bullshit, especially the poor.
Here we go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate
Detailed guidelines like the forth amendment? What is with these anti-American people and why do they hate freedom?
And anyway, I wouldn't be so sure that you don't break the law. The fact that you don't know that you break the law does not mean you don't actually break it.
And this is perhaps the biggest problem facing America right now: we have so many laws, it is hard to know whether or not you are actually breaking one. What we need is a wave of repeals, but no politician is brave enough to initiate such an action.
Palm trees and 8
From TFA:
Since when the job to prosecute should be easy/quick/cheap? The last I know, the principles were:
Innocent until proved guilty and better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer . Nothing in there sound to me as "first and above all, do the prosecution blind-fast".
More worrisome: the position comes from a judge...
But maybe I'm growing too old too fast already.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Do you really know the laws? There are thousands on the books, and thousands created each year.
It's hard to control a free man who is innocent of any wrongdoing. He'll just tell you to fuck off. But if you make that free man a criminal, even if he doesn't know it yet, you've got him by the balls.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
The stated goal "striking the right balance between the government's interest in law enforcement and the [constitutional] right of individuals to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures" is invalid. There can be NO COMPROMISE between an "interest" and a constitutional right, at least not one that can be established by a court directly.
If the government wants to establish a compromise, they can try passing a law and if THAT is not unconstitutional then the courts can start "balancing it" within the existing framework.
It's hard to control a free man who is innocent of any wrongdoing. He'll just tell you to fuck off. But if you make that free man a criminal, even if he doesn't know it yet, you've got him by the balls.
I think you just paraphrased Ayn Rand.
Damn! I knew I heard that somewhere before.
Besides, if the current state of affairs in the United States is any indication, she was dead right.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.