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Google's Punishment? Lecture Those They Snooped On
theodp writes "When Aaron Swartz tapped into MIT's network and scooped up data from one non-profit company, the U.S. Attorney threatened him with 35 years in prison and a $1 million fine. So what kind of jail time did 38 Attorneys General threaten Google with for using its Street View cars to scoop up passwords, e-mail and other personal information by tapping into the networks of their states' unsuspecting citizens? None. In agreeing to settle the case, the NY Times reports, Google is required to police its own employees on privacy issues, lecture the public on how to fend off privacy violations like the one Google perpetrated, and forfeit about 20% of one day's net income. Given the chance, one imagines that Aaron Swartz would have happily jumped at a comparable deal."
The fine being $7 million. At least EPIC isn't as cynical and thinks the outcome was positive.
I'm going to submit this submission for the best example of 'comparing apples to oranges'.
I'll assume the submitter knew nothing about the Google situation in this case, or should I think it's just a bad troll?
Chaos, panic, disorder...my work here is done.
Google knows the kind of porn those AG's search for.
you shouldn't have any expectations of privacy.
People should take responsibility for their actions. Companies are considered persons, so they need to take responsibility for their actions as well. So far the posters here deny that principle.
Where the comparison is breaking down: It was apparently one guy in the Aaron Swartz household, and one guy in the Google company, who thought it was a good idea to get data that they shouldn't have (although in the Google case, many people ended up collection data that they shouldn't have). If you have a company with 10,000 employees, and one employee costs you 20% of a days profit, that multiplied by 10,000 would be 5000 days profit, which is a lot. (But then again, it _was_ more than one employee collecting data because one guy wrote the code).
Oh god! This is a terrible post. It's like comparing apples and oranges. These are two totally different cases... Slashdot, you are quickly becoming the worst tech news site on the Internet :(
Fines are intended to punish so the total isn't as significant as the amount relative to the means of the fined.
Google's "punishment" seems to me to be about right for the seriousness of the "crime". Swartz's was not. In fact, the penalty Swartz was threatened with was the actual result of "lobbying fees and campaign contributions" (by the MAFIAA and its ilk).
the AG offered a deal for zero (0) prison time, MIT refused to accept it.
How many people computer rooms did Google break into? none.
How many people system did they hook an unauthorized computer to? none.
How many systems did they put unauthorized software on? None.
These two case aren't remotely the same.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Sigh. Google didn't "tap into the networks". They simply recorded packets being broadcast from open wifi points, for the purpose of logging the SIDs. A side-effect of recording the packets was that if they happened to contain fragments of plaint-text communication, they could in theory have logged passwords etc. This was the fault of the developer who had been tasked with writing software to log SIDs. When Google realised that more than that had been logged, they themselves reported it to the authorities.
Bad analogy time: a national birdwatching society has a project to record birdsong in the urban streets of the country. They also end up recording the "private" arguments of couples who are shouting at each other indoors, but with the window on the street side of the house left open.
The Aaron Swartz Story is quickly becoming some new kind of Godwin's Law.
Yes, it was a horrible tragedy that everyone involved probably wishes they could do over again. No, it has nothing to do with this case.
...with prison?
They could have gone after the individual employees with threats of criminal prosecution (no, the "corporate veil" would not protect them) but that would not have gotten them any money.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
you shouldn't have any expectations of privacy.
How many unencrypted telephones are there in the world?
What happened was that after Swartz committed suicide, they US got worried that maybe Google might do the same thing so they backed off. ;-).
Yeah, that's the ticket fer sure
The real problem is that corporations have "no bodies to kick, no souls to damn" as someone eloquently said quite a long time ago.
I think you are confusing "legal" with "moral"
Clearly, collecting data that people broadcast openly into the street as if they were yelling at the top of their lungs in the middle of a crowded arena is actually exactly taking the steps required to visit a website, find a loophole, exploit and download data.
I'm not saying Swartz deserved 35 years in jail (and he wouldn't have gotten that anyway), but to pretend willfully stealing data is the same as overhearing it and recording that ... well that just make you look fucking stupid.
Google's mistake is that they were honest about it what they did by accident. It isn't even actually illegal to do it intentionally contrary to popular belief in most places, regardless of what this court case makes you think. The should have just kept their mouths shut. People who understand the technology don't care about what people did. The only people that care are the ones that heard Google say 'yea, we shouldn't have done that' and then they look for reasons to tear Google apart.
Swartz on the other hand took direct action to steal data for the express purpose of stealing the data. It wasn't an accident, it was intentional. That changes the punishment in and of itself from both a moral and a legal perspective. Swartz sounds (if you think you know the truth about the Swartz case, you're just ignorant) like he probably wasn't doing anything actually wrong either from a moral perspective, but from a legal one there is no question that he violated the most basic federal computer crimes law. Unauthorized access to any computer system is illegal, period, no ifs ands or buts about it. The only exception to that is if the 'access' wasn't your choice and was forced on you, such as say the perfect example ... wifi signals broadcast at you. It is not legal to steal someones data and then say 'look, I stole some of your data, fix it!'
Slashdotters may think this is the moral high ground, but it isn't. What if he'd stolen say ... a confidential database of aids patients in the area ... and then someone stole it from him or he lost his laptop ... and now that aids patient database becomes public ... Would you still be so fucking stupid as to think it was OK for him to steal data he never had any rights too in any way? What if you were in that database? What if your child, who got aids through some shitty accident like the utrarare blood transfusion instances (rare now days anyway) and suddenly he can't go to school anymore because everyone is afraid of the little kid with HIV so your kid gets isolated from everyone and can't go to school ... would it still be OK for Swartz to have stolen the data?
Swartz was unstable and depressed, stop pretending that he was an angel that was trying to protect us from the evil bad code and data leaks.
Google accidently stored and didn't immediately throw packets that BY DEFINITION THEY CAN NOT IGNORE and you act like its the same thing as intentional data theft.
Let me give you a hint, your wifi adapter ... right now ... is listening in on EVERY FREAKING SSID ON YOUR CHANNEL AND PROBABLY THE ONES NEXT TO IT AS WELL. If you have a wifi card the difference between you and Google is that Google wrote down what you threw out.
Google is not evil and Swartz wasn't your fucking hero, grow up.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
If I did that, what law would I be breaking? If I'm not obstructing the sidewalk, not going onto your property and not doing anything to bypass any privacy measures you've put in place (eg. by using a ladder to see over the fence you've put up), exactly what law would I be breaking standing there watching your house?
I think you'll find if you check that it's not a violation of any law. Only if you've taken some steps to insure privacy can I be touched for bypassing those measures. Celebrities have been fighting this for years. It's how the paparazzi get those candid photos and don't end up in jail.
From the New York Times article, "The applause was not universal, however. Consumer Watchdog, another privacy monitor and frequent Google critic, said that “asking Google to educate consumers about privacy is like asking the fox to teach the chickens how to ensure the security of their coop.”"
Their name /is/ "Google".
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
Google grabbed (small bites of) data out of the air that had been broadcast on unencrypted channels, in the process of collecting potentially useful information about networks broadcasting their SSIDs. When confronted by authorities Google investigated the allegations, found them to be true, and cooperated in isolating and destroying the data collected.
Aaron Schwartz entered onto MIT's property, hiding a laptop under a box, for the express purpose of downloading specific documents which he knew to be offered under a restricted license. When MIT added security measures to stop Mr. Schwartz, he updated his program to adapt to and circumvent the new methods and continued his (admittedly illegal) downloading. When approached by uniformed police, Mr. Schwarz ran in an attempt to avoid arrest.
Google was offered a penalty a several millions dollars (20% of own days income) and to commit its employee time to . . . what is essentially community service. Google accepted. Google was probably threatened with steeper penalties, but we won't ever know that, because Google did not try to use the press as a weapon against investigators.
Mr. Schwarz was offered a light sentence of a few months in prison, but refused because he didn't want to be branded a Felon. He was threatened with up to 35 years in prison and a fine of $1 Million dollars. Mr. Schwarz wanted to bring public pressure to bear to force the government not to hold him accountable for his actions, so he made public every offer and threat made by the prosecutors.
Let us compare this to a third group - the civil rights marchers of the 1960s in Selma. There, a group of citizens gathered on the public way and attempted to commit a completely legal act -- walking to their state capital together. The police ordered the crowd to disperse, and then began beating them with clubs, releasing attack dogs on them, and attacking them with water cannons. Many were hospitalized. John Lewis, the march organizer, was beaten with a club - receiving an injury to the head that caused his skull to fracture, then placed in jail and charged with a nuisance offense. This day has been named "bloody Sunday" because of the breadth and severity of the injuries inflicted by the police on law abiding citizens.
See the differences?
I am so sick of hearing how evil Google was for recording information that other people forcefully put out into public airwaves. I know there are going to be plenty of bad analogies, so let me attempt to preempt them with a good analogy. If you go through the effort of acquiring a bullhorn to communicate with other members in your household and then proceed to pollute public airwaves with your personal information using this bullhorn, you have absolutely zero expectations of privacy. It really is as simple as that. If you don't like this, then you have many options: takes 30 seconds to set up a damn password, use https connections when possible, or use a wired connection! Once you put something out there, you can't take it back, so exercise some damn personal responsibility if you hold any expectations of privacy.
Nor would it have been likely to produce criminal convictions, since recording unencrypted broadcasts that may happen to contain, e.g., passwords is not a crime.
Here is a couple of further examples. HSBC almost certainly laundered terrorist money. They were fined 1.9 billion dollars. That is like 1% of market cap. OTOH, a few years ago the leaders of Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development were put in jail for a long time and had to forfeit most of their money, the prosecutor saying money is the lifeblood of terrorist organization. By this logic HSBC is responsible of countless murders of US citizens, yet they get off pretty much scott free.
Allegiance to a dominant group is also beneficial. Eric Rudolph committed a terrorist act by bombing the olympics and other premeditated and unprovoked murders. He was a fugitive for five years. He was arrested, did not turn himself in. One might think he would be charged as a terrorist, but because he was a major element in the Christian Movement, he was merely give consecutive life sentence,which allows him to spew his hate of persons who do not agree with him. OTOH, on of the beltway snipers who were not so politically motivated and were not kept hidden and supported by the Christian terrorist movement, were put to death.
Powerful friends, and good lawyers, will tend to minimize the consequences of your actions.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Well, no. That doesn't "make it legal". Its legal to start with, and the fact that there is is no law which actually criminalizes standing on a public property and observing events occurring within a nearby private dwelling is what fails to make it illegal.
GSM does use a form of encryption, although not a strong one. Which is one of the reasons I don't like to discuss sensitive topics on the phone.
Those phones are generally on a point-to-point medium. Thats not the same as shouting private info to your SO through a megaphone, and then getting upset when the neighbors hear it.
Because it takes an active effort to get that data
You apparently have no idea how promiscuous sniffing works. You set your wireless device to receive, fire up your sniffer, and anyone in range will be recorded-- kind of like if you turned on a tape recorder in the park, and someone happens to be hollering private details in the vicinity.
Sorry, in most places in the civilized world it's perfectly legal to do so. Heck, there are places where people don't mind that all that much. I remember that there was quite a lot of nice flesh to be seen through windows in Copenhagen.
What Google did is different simply because there are laws specifically prohibiting unauthorized access to computer systems, the networks being an extension and integral part of the same -- otherwise those laws would be largely moot, as you could claim that, say, injecting some broadcast DDOS traffic is "just" messing with the network and not the end nodes. Google did collect data that was meant for the end nodes, effectively gaining unauthorized access not only to people's private systems, but also those of the various service providers. Now you may argue whether those laws make sense or not, but that's a separate issue.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
The situation that is playing out was anticipated by many: The politically powerful have their proprietary information protected, because they can make government do it for them. Everyone else has no privacy.
Individual end-users don't have the ability to protect themselves. Most have no idea of encryption, much less what data is accessible to someone scanning Wifi frequencies (most people couldn't even tell you what a "frequency" is!). Even if they had the knowledge, they have limited time and resources. That doesn't make them fair game or mean they surrender their privacy rights.
Google exploited a loophole in Wifi; Schwartz exploited a loophole in a server. Both took proprietary data. What's the difference? The law, made by the politically powerful, says that the data Schwartz took was valuable and protected, while my personal data is not. I wonder what would happen if I went to Google offices and homes and collected unencrypted data; would I be arrested? Fined 20% of 1 day's net income?
(It's hard to believe that Google didn't know what they would end up with by collecting unencrypted Wifi data -- they certainly know about frequencies, encryption, and wifi. They could have saved a lot of storage if they just took SSIDs and ignored the rest. Plus they are experts; they are responsible for knowing what they are doing.)
In some places they do, in some they don't :) There's no single public decency standard. The prude U.S. has gone quite far downhill as far as western cultures go.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
If that ladder is on your property then it's not allowed. If the ladder is elsewhere then it's fine.
If your door is open then anyone can look in to see provided they don't step on your property.
Really, because GSM has bad encryption? I'm sure no one is close to you and listening to your signal.
Regardless of the encryption used, the telco has the key and just forwards the police unencrypted audio.
One time I was setting up a microphone to record someone giving a speech. The long (and broken) microphone cable acted like an antenna, picking up wireless signals, so I was recording local radio traffic instead of the speech I was trying to record. Note there was no radio receiver hooked up - just a long cord plugged into a recorder. You can even hear wireless transmissions sometimes by just having a coiled cord connected to headphones. The cord serves as antenna and the coiling of the cord tunes it to a particular frequency.
If you've ever recorded static, you've recorded someone's wireless transmission. That's why in 1934 it was explicitly made legal to receive anything broadcast - because we've all done it on accident. If it were illegal to receive what someone is transmitting, it would be illegal to connect a long cord to headphones, because that will pick up "static", which is someone's transmission (your neighbor's wifi sounds like an intermittent buzzing). So it was perfectly legal for Google to receive wifi simply because it's unavoidable. Using an answering machine according to the instructions can record your neighbor's wifi as buzzing - the telephone wiring is the antenna.
Note that the long established law does NOT allow you to DECRYPT an encrypted transmission once you receive it. That would be "circumventing technical measures" under DMCA etc. In 2001, an attempt was made to make it illegal to DISCLOSE the content of certain transmissions. Last I heard, that was being challenged at the Supreme Court.
It is almost an anthithesis to the word "justice". Consequences (punishment) depend only on two things: 1) who you are 2) whose fingers did you stomp on. Actual damages does not matter much (if at all).
If you're a big bank, corporation or some awfully rich individual with political connections, you propably get away with anything (be it drug money laundering, like HSBC, scamming an awful lot of people like in fraudclosure fiasco or stealing private e-mails and passwords en masse, like Google). If you're an ordinary folk and you anger some police mob, you're toast, whenever you did something illegal or not.
If you harm ordinary people, it will propably be ignored (try calling police when some burglar robs your house). If you stand in the way of some big fat corporation interests, your "justice" department will smash you immediately. Just ask Dotcom. Or even better - compare Google's fine for collecting Wifi data ($7m) with Google's fine for stomping on big pharma interests and displaying canadian pharmacies commercials in the US ($500m).
Now try to explain me that this is NOT a rigged system.
So Aaron Swartz did not get fairly treated by the justice system. THIS DOES NOT IMPLY THAT EVERYONE ELSE SHOULD GET THE SAME TREATMENT. The justice system is what needs to change.
Practically every cordless phone in existence.
"I have my blinds up doesn't make it legal for you to stand in the street and watch my family dress ot bathe"
says who?
don't bother. doesn't matter it's a bad comparison.
To use you, stupid, analogy a bit better.
Its akin to pulling your blinds up, and then yelling out your window that it's ok for people to watch you family bath.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It's not rigged in that you scenario doesn't really happen.
"r stealing private e-mails and passwords en masse, like Google"
asking for something from someone, and then they give it to you isn't stealing.
Dotcom committed crimes.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
but personally I think that anything being broadcast over a radio transmitter in the clear is fair game to receive, and shouldn't even count as "sniffing".
Next you're going to say I'm committing a crime by overhearing the conversation of the people sitting at the next table in a restaurant.
I am going to get naked and stand in my yard until someone looks at me. Then I am going to sue them for invading my privacy. Profit!
...I have my blinds up doesn't make it legal for you to stand in the street and watch my family dress ot bathe.
Actually, it does.
That depends on the state you did it in. Here's a list
It most certainly IS a violation of the law, in some states more than one.
Many states have laws that criminalize exactly that.
There are many places where it is not legal, including the U.K., Canada, and most States of the U.S. for a start.
Give a man a fish ... or teach him how to fish.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
If my neighbor and I buy similar analog baby monitors and it takes a week for one of us to switch to a non-default frequency, are we now both criminals?
And if you read the statutes, it won't be a violation of the law. All of them require either a) trespassing onto the property or b) violation of a reasonable expectation of privacy. You aren't trespassing if you're standing on public property where you'd ordinarily have every right to be standing, and you aren't violating any expectation of privacy if there's nothing in the way that would provide any sort of privacy. A person doesn't have any expectation of privacy standing in front of a window where the curtains and blinds are open and there's no obstructions so they can see the sidewalk as clearly as anyone on the sidewalk could see them. Again, I note the paparazzi, if all those laws applied there'd be no candid photos in the tabloids because all the photogs would be in jail.
Consider a proper cable with a headphone style plug, like you see on microphones from Radio Shack. They won't pick up MUCH if they are less than 10 feet long.
If the recording table is 30' from the lectern, so you use a 50' cord, it can certainly pick up radio transmissions. (For that reason, professionals normally use different a type of cabling, "balanced cable", on long runs.)
If the Radio Shack style microphone is used with an adapter that converts it to use with a professional style system, that can pick up interference because the polarity on the pro system isn't standardized.
If the cable has some wear and tear on it, so the outer braid is separated from the connector, it can pick up radio interference. In fact, loose shielding braid can act as a "cat's whisker" radio receiver
If the speaking hall happens to be located right next to a high power AM transmitter, such as the style used for AM radio broadcast, with the mic turned off, you can pick up their signal even with good cables. That's a 50,000 watt transmitter next to a mic amp designed to pick up a 0.000005 volt signal.
So there are at least four different ways that microphone cable can pick up someone else's transmission, all accidentally.
When Aaron Swartz tapped into MIT's network and scooped up data from one non-profit company, the U.S. Attorney threatened him with 35 years in prison and a $1 million fine. So what kind of jail time did 38 Attorneys General threaten Google with for using its Street View cars to scoop up passwords, e-mail and other personal information by tapping into the networks of their states' unsuspecting citizens? None.
Not withstanding the fact that you can't actually put a noncorporeal being in jail, the various AG offices threatened Google with significantly way more than $1 million in fines - and in fact were ready to get court orders to force Google to turn over all of their data.
Google didn't "steal" anything. You left your proverbial dick out of your pants - Google pointed and laughed at you and now you're embarrassed. That's totally different than breaking into a network.
BZZZT!
Actually if YOU had read, you would see that at least one of them simply calls for peering into windows while on or ABOUT the property.
Doesn't sound very civilized to me :)
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
Dotcom committed crimes.
So did the New Zealand Government Communications Security Bureau.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Sniffers are passive. They recieve data that goes by them, much as my tape recorder in the park captures broadcast (public) noise. If the sniffer is capturing data, that data was never private (assuming of course you are not using other active methods, like deauths or arp poisoning or rogue APs).
"about" has a specific legal meaning here, and it isn't merely "in the vicinity of". If you were up a tree trying to gain a view over a fence, they could ding you. If you were peering through a small hole in a fence to see what you normally wouldn't be able to, they could ding you. Standing on the sidewalk where everyone normally walks? The cops might hassle you, but even they know the DA won't charge you (and if one did, any competent lawyer could get the charges dismissed in 5 minutes and get the DA a good chewing-out by the judge which is why the DA won't charge you in the first place) without something beyond just standing there.
If you don't take any steps to give yourself privacy, the law isn't going to make everyone else go out of their way to give you privacy.
Since they specifically call out peering through windows, it means any particular effort you make to look in the window. If you don't believe me, go try it and report yourself, but don't call me for bail.
And the conversation will go something like this:
"There's someone peeping through my window."
"Which window is he at?"
"He's looking in my living-room window."
"So he's at the living-room window?"
"Well, he's out on the sidewalk, but he's looking in through my window."
"He's not up at your window or on your property, then?"
"... no."
"Sir, just close your curtains so he can't see in and call us if he comes on your property. Until he does, it's a public sidewalk.".
So I guess there's no reason you shouldn't go give it a try...
There's a man on the street with a camera and a telescopic lens pointed at my underage daughter's bedroom.
I bet they wouldn't have a hard time finding something to charge him with for that. Even if he was just aiming at the owl on the roof.
Unless the SSID was "Google you may connect" how are the electromagnetic waves leaking out of their house any more inviting than the photons coming off their body? Is it legal to set up a hidden camera to look up women's skirts in public places? I honestly don't know but I seriously doubt it. All those photons are freely spraying out screaming "look at me!" though. I don't think anybody will disagree that that is wrong.
Did Google record any hidden SSIDs? I bet they did. That sounds like acknowledgment you aren't welcome in a system (even if it is easily defeated).
None that have a built-in megaphone. More to the point, if anybody were stupid enough to use such a phone without some sort of cipher in place, they'd be laughed at for expecting privacy. That's the point - if a phone isn't encrypted, it's still point-to-point. Wifi is a broadcast mechanism, and the only way to secure it is encryption. Note I didn't say "effective" encryption, and Google wasn't cracking WEP.
The intent of a phone user is to keep his conversation private. The intent of a WiFi network is to broadcast traffic to all that can hear it, unless it's encrypted, in which case the intent is still to broadcast it to everybody that can hear it, but limit the understanding of it to those that have the key.
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
Google didn't use a telescopic lens. You (anyone who used an unencrypted WiFi network) projected it onto the side of their house.
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
They were definitely using high grade equipment though. I would consider a high gain antenna to be analogous to a telescopic lens.
People project photons out of places they have an expectation of privacy considering you have the right angle and the right equipment as well.
The problem isn't necessarily that Google got off easy (I'm honestly not sure how I feel about it, definitely grey area). The problem is what do you think would have happened if you or I built a machine to do this and drove around the United States? Especially if you ever drove anywhere remotely close to a government building. Don't forget to keep in mind that people have gotten pretty heavy charges brought against them for no more than typing a url into a browser which is even more so broadcast for everyone to see.
The problem is what do you think would have happened if you or I built a machine to do this and drove around the United States? Especially if you ever drove anywhere remotely close to a government building.
Like a radio scanner? People use those to the time to listen to actual live police activity, and it's perfectly legal (unless you're using that to assist with committing a crime IIRC)
Turns out that important government radio communication is encrypted so that these very same eavesdroppers can't make use of it. Not illegal to listen, nor even particularly frowned upon, they just make it impossible to do so if they want you to stop. Almost exactly the situation here.
It gets even better. I had a professor who showed that many "encrypted" government radios in fact weren't encrypted because they had misleading displays, or they were incorrectly configured, even when all the equipment was capable of it. He was listening to live drug raids and so on - tactical information that could have assisted real criminals, such as identifying features of undercover operatives and informants, identities and locations of surveillance targets, plans and locations for forthcoming takedowns, and details of executive protection operations. You know what happened to him? He got a nice paper about it. Of course it helps to be a researcher, not a guy with a "manifesto".
Don't forget to keep in mind that people have gotten pretty heavy charges brought against them for no more than typing a url into a browser which is even more so broadcast for everyone to see.
With the notable exception of child pornography (and I have an issue with criminal charges for possession for precisely this reason, but even so it's not exactly "broadcast for everyone to see"), I'm not aware of any. Citations?
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
Google passively recorded unencrypted broadcast signals. That should be legal and Google should not have received any punishment.
Swartz physically broke into a private network and was threatened with a maximum of 6 months in jail, a reasonable position for the prosecutor to take.
Of course if you're a US telephone company, the communications act of 1934 doesn't apply because you OWN the FCC.
They also own the wires and by default you're generally allowed to do whatever you want with your own property.
If you've ever recorded static, you've recorded someone's wireless transmission.
No. That is not true. Static is the Cosmic Microwave Background and is present everywhere on this planet (and theoretically the entire universe). The CMB is the leftover from the Big Bang.
http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/5264/is-x-noise-on-tv-due-to-big-bangs-background-radiation
I wanted to link to NASA but for some reason, it is not resolving for me currently. Very weird. http://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/starsgalaxies/cobe_background.html
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
Your links claim that maybe 1% of the static could be from the Big Bang. 99% is your neighbor's wifi, a radio station in Mexico, the other neighbors cordless phone, someone's cell phone conversation, etc.