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Foreign Data Unsafe From US Patriot Act, Says American Law Firm
natecochrane writes "A prestigious law firm warns non-U.S. businesses their data is unsafe from costly and invasive raids by American law enforcement even if they host their data in their own countries. The wide interpretation of the USA Patriot Act ensures U.S. cops can legally demand data from almost anyone, anywhere for any reason and countries and their citizens are largely powerless to resist. The advice has resonance with the arrest this week of Kim 'Dotcom' on alleged copyright violations in the U.S."
Well, that demand doesn't need to be answered.
That depends, one of the charges against him was money laundering, if said laundering was used to fund terrorism (yes, that is a huge stretch by any imagination...), the Patriot act would apply...
Law enforcement (Federal and Local) have been known to stretch the facts to get what they want though...
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
"countries and their citizens are largely powerless to resist"
They need a nation-sized Rape-aXe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-rape_device#Rape-aXe
Why does a bully have power over others? Because others don't put up a fight.
So, bascially they take took FATCA and expanded the idea to get a worldwide power to get data on anyone. nice.
"Largely powerless to resist"... what a load of trash. Just let them try, and see what kind of "powerless resistance" comes back at them. These are fascist laws.. and here in Europe, we've learned a lesson or two on that subject which makes us less inclined to raise our right arm to the furher again.
So if US cops "demands" Iran hand over the details of their nuclear scientist's e-mail traffic it is just going to happen?
I call bullshit. The only reason they'd be able to acquire such data would be if the host country agreed to let it happen. That would be a problem with the host country's lack of privacy protection for their own citizens, and has little to do with the patriot act itself.
Team America: World Police
Intended as satire. Used instead as guidebook.
Because the US hasn't nuked anyone in over half a century, and doesn't appear to show any inclination to. They have, however, seized data from New Zealand in the last week or so, and are currently trying to extradite a British citizen for actions that occurred solely within the UK and were already deemed not to constitute a crime under British law.
The real State of the Union is very weak. The US debt is bigger than ever, the liberties of people are weaker than ever, the government is more powerful in terms of what it can do to individuals (and even citizens of other countries) than ever.
The economy of USA (and Europe) are weak and getting weaker, the inflation is higher and getting higher, the wars are long and getting longer, the corruption - meddling of government in business and as a corollary meddling of business in government is enormous. Iran and India are now trading oil for gold, and in USA people who show the obvious illegitimacy of government power are thrown to jail - political prisoners.
Do not forget.
Government is supposed to be there to protect your liberties and freedoms, but this does not mean to protect your liberties and freedoms against other non-government civilians.
Government is inherently evil, but it must exist to occupy the space where otherwise the evil would exist that didn't have public legitimacy on its side.
The point of government is to exist to occupy space of where the inherent evil lives and to protect the individuals from the inherent evil that occupies that space. Now, whether it is realistic to expect some entity to occupy space of evil and not turn evil itself ... (and my argument goes further, but I am not going there in this discussion), but basically government exists to protect people FROM ITSELF.
It is the government force that we are all vulnerable to. Other individuals and companies - that's a private matter.
Now governments failed people completely, including the court system, the Supreme Court in USA as well, so this just shows how inherent the evil is and how it permeates into whatever entity that is occupying that space.
But the Constitution is law above government, and government broke that law long ago and it continues to brake it every day. Government protecting people from government does not mean that government must protect people from other people.
The theory of government and understanding of government is completely flawed.
The system that exists to supposedly protect people from crime should not be the same and must not be conspiring with the system that exists to occupy the space of evil government power.
Once you mix together the system of government, which is supposed to provide you with freedoms from itself, and you mix it with system that may be set up to provide you with security from other individuals, you end up with a government system that has the tools and the will to destroy your liberties.
The separation of power (legislative, judicial, executive) in government is not done correctly and that's where the fault in current government theory shows itself.
You can't handle the truth.
MegaUpload maintained a large nexus in the US, which is what exposed them to prosecution. We can disagree about the extradition (not particularly in favor of it myself, but it is probably legal under treaty), but if an American citizen set up a business with a nexus in NZ or Germany that severely broke their copyright laws, they would be fair game the moment they set foot on their territory or of a sympathetic state's territory. Let's not conflate these issues. They're bad enough on their own.
The patriot act and all these powers were granted to the government to fight the war... to hunt down the terrorists and snuff them out. That was the point.
To that end, I don't think many people would have a problem with the powers IF they used them expressly for that purpose and no other. Sadly, government being run by people and people being people... the power is abused... frequently. My favorite is the guy that got his ex-wife on a terror/no-fly list so she couldn't fly out of town. There are other examples but few are that petty.
The patriot act needs to be rescinded. It has done most of the work it was put in place to do in the first place. We're pulling our troops back... it's time to retire the act. By all means, let the CIA still go hunting for bad guys. It was foolish ever to chain them. That didn't happen until the Clinton Administration and that point is by some credited as being one of the things that allowed 9/11 to happen in the first place. But the legal authorities granted by the patriot act beyond letting the CIA do it's job should be retired.
As to data not being legally safe in other countries... US law has no effect on foreign countries. They don't have to comply unless they wish to comply. In which case it has more to do with what those countries wish then the US.
Really, if you're afraid for your data... fear the NSA... they don't bother with warrants and never have... not their game. They get the information because they can not because they have a right. I don't especially fear them though... they're always after bigger fish then little ol' me.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
"...however, the governments of those same countries (with the exception of a few like Iran, Venezuela, cuba etc) all want to be in the US governments good graces, and will in many cases give up way to much power to the US to remain in the US's good graces.."
US have nukes. Lots of then.
Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
It looks like there is a great business opportunity here - set up cloud services and guarantee in writing that (a) no data will be hosted in the USA, it's protectorates, or in extremely US-friendly countries (England, Canada), and (b) you won't turn over data to any US authority under any circumstance.
Pax Romana's a bitch, but not if you're Rome.
Dear American User:
We are very sorry, but your government is behaving like a spoiled child that thinks it can get it's way by screaming and kicking it's feet. While normally we would not be terribly concerned by this childish display, we are annoyed that you, the parents, are not doing anything to bring them under control.
As a result, you will not be permitted to utilize our service until you rein in your spoiled brat government and teach them proper manners, and how to act like a world citizen.
Thank you.
"Name of Service"
[End Of Line]
so does Russia, Britain, France, Israel and North Korea. they don't go around insisting that their laws apply to foreign firms with foreign data in foreign sovereignties.
the US is just lost the plot on internationalisation - they might have realised there are places outside the US borders, now they need to understand that those places *aren't* America.
I swear most of America's politicians and lawyers are about as mature as a 6 year old - not yet understanding that the world consists of people other than themselves.
Let's be sure to always write it PATRIOT so people know it's a acronym and hopefully ask questions. Seems like every bill is given a nifty acronym or backronym, usually with the intent of glossing over how horrid these bills are. I could propose a "Cats Underwater Teeth Extraction" bill, and call it the "CUTE" bill and nobody would be the wiser. You wouldn't vote against something "Cute" would you?
Worse is the more common case; the actual bill title seems perversely the opposite of what the bill accomplishes. "Clear Skies Initiative/Act", anyone?
Ironically, we're involved in the same debate, but in reverse.
We are involved in an 'outsourced email' discussion, and some companies (ie: G-something) say, quite literally, "we can't tell you what countries your data will be in, only which ones it won't be in". When pressed on how they come up with that, they say "well, it's not in the ones where we don't have datacenters".
Other companies (ie: M-something) have ITAR certified solutions that assure you it's US datacenters and US citizens.
I can understand Canada not warning their citizens about other countries' laws, but as a US entity involved in R&D we have the same concerns. Hey, at least they're OUR laws and OUR courts we can challenge them in.
Unfortunately, even this is not enough. The non-US company would have to ensure any and all contact with the US is prevented, to ensure that there is not even a crack of a sliver of the door to US jurisdiction.
The question here is how compliant the local government is when the US asserts jurisdiction. If you live in a country that likes to suck up to the US, like most western countries, you may be out of luck even with a local company.
You might have better protection from abuse of US jurisdiction in a country like Russia (not too friendly with the US, and still powerful enough to be not easily bullied). Of course, you better avoid angering the local bigwigs ;-)
C - the footgun of programming languages
While the US is out and about signing treaties and agreements with foreign governments that allow us to seize foreign files and evidence you can bet that we are giving other nations the right to do the same within the US. If that were not true we could never get them to sign those treaties and agreements. One issue where this has come to light in the past is in outrageous and deliderate gouging on international phone calls. You make a call to a nation in Africa for twelve minutes and get a phone bill with $3,000 for that one call. You refuse to pay and your local phone company gets involved and cuts you off as they are forced to honor reciprical arrangements.
No treaty or agreement should have any effect upon US citizens within our own borders.
nobody expected the Spanish opposition.
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
You took the dictionary meaning of the word, when gp post was talking more about the label. Politics is all about corrupting the meaning of words so they don't apply any more. Orwell taught us that, if you didn't learn it anywhere else.
"U.S. conservatives" are more than happy with this type of thing. Looking at voting history, the "U.S. conservatives" typically vote for such things en masse, with maybe a few consistent dissenters like Ron Paul. The liberals vote for it too, but support is more spotty and this group is the one that goes on record with opposition sound bites.
Basically, Republicans will vote for anythng that gives police or military more power, because they appear to believe in small government everywhere but the military. And they would grant the military and/or police the authorization to go into your bedroom and make sure you're not having gay sex, sex for pleasure, using contraception, or doing anythhg that makes them feel "icky". That is the perspective of "U.S. conservatives".
They all want the same thing, big government, they just don't agree which parts to shrink or embiggenate.
Why are you talking about people? It's irrelevant. I don't think you know what topic we're on. If a company blurs the lines of operation such that some work is done in the United States, US law applies where that line is crossed.
If you use an Australian company that houses e-mail in a Gmail server in the US, that e-mail can be snooped. Even if no one from the US is administering that server, its physical presence is what determines the law, not the person doing the work, or which company owns it.
This is really no different from shipping something that is only illegal in the US through the US to get from Mexico to Canada. It is not allowed in the US, so it is confiscated and people probably go to prison. Or a Canada-to-Canada phone call where the wires go through some part of the US, those can be tapped if someone decides it's necessary. Sovereignity is completely irrelevant.
Sure, doing these things might cause "a bit of bother" but that will pass and back to business as usual. Don't touch the US or you will be subject to its laws in some fashion.
It's up to the people of some country to make sure they have leaders in place that recognize that their country's laws (and enforcement thereof) should come from the people of that country, not from cronies of another.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
When they have to promote something by putting the identification of certain aspects in the name, then we know the actual thing has no such aspects. There is no patriotism in the so-called patriot act.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Curious: do you also type L.A.S.E.R. and R.A.D.A.R. and so forth?
Actually both France and Germany have tried to apply their hate crime statutes to business and organizations in the United States. Virtually every country in the world has aimed to apply their gun control laws in the United States. Israel was decades ago one of the main proponents of universal jurisdiction.
The US is not alone in wanting more international law. Arguably the US is one of the countries least interested in these complex international relationships.
Why does a bully have power over others? Because others don't put up a fight.
It's a bit more than that.
The other kids in the playground can easily beat the snot out of the bully if they cooperate.
However, each and every one of them secretly dreams of being a bully himself, so they try to get on the bully's best side by being his toadies.
> "Seized data in the last week or so"
LOL! Why don't people realise that in *every* modern country *all* traffic is currently being monitored by the FBI. The US has used trade treaties and agreements to have "Lawful Intercept" (now there's a misnomer if ever there was one) equipment in the ISPs of all its trading partners. This can be used to watch packets flying around the world in real time (oops, still believe TOR can't be defeated?). The Lawful Intercept installations are recent, but the ECHELON network has been used for half a century to collect signal intelligence. Some of this signal intelligence is shared with the host countries but mostly after the Cold War it is being used to assist US businesses beat competition in the hosting country. This 'seizing of data' is not new and not particular to New Zealand (nb: I'm from New Zealand).