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DOJ, MIT, JSTOR Seek Anonymity In Swartz Case
theodp writes "Responding to an earlier request by the estate of Aaron Swartz to disclose the names of those involved in the events leading to Aaron's suicide, counsel for MIT snippily told the Court, "The Swartz Estate was not a party to the criminal case, and therefore it is unclear how it has standing, or any legally cognizable interest, to petition for the modification of the Protective Order concerning others' documents." In motions filed on slow-news-day Good Friday (MIT's on spring break), the DOJ, MIT, and JSTOR all insisted on anonymity for those involved in the Swartz case, arguing that redacting of names was a must, citing threats posed by Anonymous and LulzSec, a badly-photoshopped postcard sent to Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen Heymann and another sent to his Harvard Prof father, cake frosting, a gun hoax, and e-mail sent to MIT. From the DOJ filing: 'I also informed him [Swartz estate lawyer] that whatever additional public benefit might exist by disclosing certain names was, in this case, outweighed by the risk to those individuals of becoming targets of threats, harassment and abuse.' From the MIT filing: 'The publication of MIT's documents in unredacted form could lead to further, more targeted, and more dangerous threats and attacks...The death of Mr. Swartz has created a very volatile atmosphere.' From the JSTOR filing: 'The supercharged nature of the public debate about this case, including hacking incidents, gun hoaxes and threatening messages, gives JSTOR and its employees legitimate concern for their safety and privacy.'"
Only we are allowed to name names and ruin lives.
Good-bye
If they're innocent they have nothing to fear, right?
Lets have every name, every detail, all of it. Beaurocrats like to hide behind their organisations, which enables every manner of abuse. Haul these insects out into the light, overturn the rocks. A man is dead, there must be accountability. They need to learn that they are personally responsible for their own decisions.
We have a right to know who decided to do that. It's our money being shot out of their legal gun.
"...become targets of threats, harassment and abuse..."
God God, is somebody dragging them into police stations, questioning them for hours, threatening them with 30 years in jail?
Because those actions would be threats, harassment, and abuse indeed.
I say, put their names out there for all to see, and let Anonymous make a bonfire out of their pathetic lives.
It'll serve as a warning to others who believe it's right to unfairly destroy other peoples lives.
"Destroy peoples' lives; and have your life destroyed in turn." It would be a powerful message in poetic justice.
Yeah, that'd be nice.
Unfortunately, far too many people think they have an absolute right to whatever they feel "justice" might be. If that means torching someone's house because they handed over an access log, then someone will likely do it. Maybe some investigator's family will have their whole social calendar thrown up on 4chan for public discussion, or a JSTOR programmer suddenly finds he owes $5,000,000 on a resort home in Dubai. This is the sad world we live in today, where people believe that it's not only feasible, but indeed desirable to seek vigilante justice.
It's ironic that today, just and fair trials are so common that they don't make the news, but the injustices and scandals reported in the media are what shape people's opinions of the government.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
The moment you give government anonymity, it turns around and gives you tyranny, because it is no longer accountable.
Fucking cowards
Not as blind as a world without accountability. It's always the same story, whole organisations mess up or turn on lone individuals, then when the smoke clears there's mysteriously nobody to blame. That manager moved to another department, this clerk is not available for comment. Bring the beaurocrats to heel, I say.
Good, let's have their names and we'll reward them.
No? Then, not guilty. Anyone that offs themselves is solely responsibly for that act.
So if I lock you in my basement and threaten to torture you for the next ten years, and you find a way to kill yourself, nobody should ask me any questions. Your death was your own fault in that instance, right? I grant it's an exaggerated analogy, but it refutes your fallacy concisely. Somebody contributed to threatening an American citizen with decade(s) of prison time over essentially mild internet mischief, and I for one would like to know who is to be held accountable for that.
It's ironic that today, just and fair trials are so common that they don't make the news, but the injustices and scandals reported in the media are what shape people's opinions of the government.
Given how powerful the government is against the individual, shouldn't it be the concern of everyone when the government commits injustices? Or, should it only be a big deal when the boot is on your own throat?
I'm not arguing for vigilante justice, rather I'm arguing for full disclosure of who is involved in acts of injustice. Such disclosure is the only effective way of discouraging such abuses in the future. Perhaps if the government was seen as being transparent in such cases and effectively policing itself there were be much less risk of vigilante justice occurring in the first place.
Their last update (outside a useless editorial) was last October, and this is the very type of issue they should be pursuing.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
So if I lock you in my basement and threaten to torture you for the next ten years, and you find a way to kill yourself, nobody should ask me any questions. Your death was your own fault in that instance, right?
In that case then no because multiple laws were broken by you.
In the swartz case, by contrast, multiple laws were broken by swartz and prosecutors did nothing wrong so the cause of swartz death is his and his alone.
Sure, why don't we just abandon our laws and due process and solve every problem by lynch mobs.
Just and fair trials are actually exceptionally rare, in part because actual trials are quite rare. The system is entirely based on pressuring defendants into plea-bargains, regardless of their innocence.
In 1990, around 85% of federal prosecutions resulted in a plea-bargain, while 15% went to trial. Today, about 97% of federal prosecutions result in a plea-bargain, and only 3% go to trial. It's not because 97% of people charged are guilty, but because prosecutors make it abundantly clear that you had better take their plea-bargain if you know what's good for you.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.
John 3:19
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
I am not religious, but i do remember something from the bible: Who pulls a knife, from a knife dies.
No pun intended.
I say, put their names out there for all to see, and let Anonymous make a bonfire out of their pathetic lives.
The very fact that this kind of idiotic thinking is out there justifies the request for anonymity.
Sure, why don't we just abandon our laws and due process and solve every problem by lynch mobs.
There are some, who believe this has already happened, except it's autocratic instead of democratic mob doing the lynchings.
Anyway, your "let's solve everything by lynch mobs" is kinda bad argument. "If being obese is so bad, then let's starve everyone to death!"
And to be clear about it, I don't approve any kind of lynch mobs. People should be held accountable, tried and acquitted or punished, by due process. If this does not work in some country, mere lynch mob isn't going to solve anything.
Just like the abortion doctors who hide their names and addresses so their houses don't get blown up, right?
It was a "very volatile atmosphere" before Shwartz killed himself. These people were destroying a life in order to justify their egos, further their careers, avoid suffering through cognitive dissonance, and avoid treating a person as anything other than a thing. Everyone here should come forward and face the music, not to mention lose their jobs. False secrecy like this will only bait the hacktivists.
Here's to losing my Karma Bonus again....
Really? No wrong committed? The same people who threatened with 35 years something that alternately could be convicted with only 6 months, if only he assuaded their pride by proclaiming himself guilty?
They threatened a man with 70 times the supposedly appropriate punishment -- he'd have to go to jail WITHOUT a trial, if he didn't want that threat against him.
So either they were willing to help a man escape 34.5 years of a just punishment, or they were willing to penalize a man with an additional 34.5 years that he didn't deserve. Which one is it?
FUCK your plea-bargaining system, and anyone who defends it. You put to jail people who never had a trial, by merely SCARING them with a hundredfold vengeance if they dare proclaim their innocence. Anyone who doesn't DEMAND that your horrid and villainous plea-bargain system changes is complicit to such crimes.
Lynch mobs are about as much "due process" as plea-bargains are. "Hey, let's threaten you with 35 years in jail, so you'll be willing to forfeit your right to a trial and go to jail without one!"
Not being criminally responsible for Swartz's suicide doesn't mean that there weren't inappropriate actions taken that, at the very least, are of public interest.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
And we already know who did that. Anonymity would only protect the victims of Swartz from getting caught in the crossfire.
Mobs are uncontrollable. Once they start to rage, you won't be able to constrain them to a select few cases.
They deserve threats, harassment, and abuse. God knows de facto power structures and corruption will prevent any of the individuals involved from being brought to adequate justice within the bounds of the law. If people could trust that the right thing will be done, they wouldn't feel so compelled to do it themselves.
He was accused of multiple felonies, but he didn't commit a single act that was deserving of felony punishment. Fuckheads like you that hide behind the letter of the law without exercising the critical thinking of what the purpose of the law and what would be just are the lifeblood of tyranny.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
Every last MIT student should stop and protest the school. It should shut down until the people who helped to create the situation are called onto the carpet. It is my understanding that MIT wanted to stop things but were unable to stop things. But they did make a rash choice of calling in the authorities. They could have handled it differently. Some people have grown completely insensitive to the prospect of ruining the lives of others with police involvement. I blame entertainment/media saturation for turning the entire population into people as in touch with the depth of reality as "The Cable Guy."
Life is longer than 30 minutes with commercial breaks. Ruining a life is a life ruined. But with our reduced attention span, our consciences have been reduced as well.
A brilliant light extinguished itself when faced with the very credible possibility of several decades in prison.
In order to avoid repeating this kind of tragedy, it would be beneficial for society to know all of the details of the case, understand the thinking of the individuals involved, and examine their actions, so we can fully understand why the tragedy occurred, and work to avoid it in the future.
It's very simple really. Our society should be encouraging its Aaron Swartzes, not hounding them to death. This benefits all of us.
Fuck You, you cowardly pack of assholes.
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
someone will probably wikileaks the list/info then you may get your wish
As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a reference to Godwin's Law approaches 1
Control of information is probably the cornerstone of tyranny, with overly broad laws and means of perverting justice being other key elements. And you are taking it further than even the asshats behind the prosecution, who only used the threat of 35 years as a means of scaring the defendant into a plea bargain. They weren't seeking that term because you would have to be a total fucking moron to think that's appropriate.
Even if you think what he did was a bad action, it's not something deserving any prison time, and certainly not prison time in the range of decades.
This is my signature. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
You don't seem to understand the kind of "work" that Anonymous actually does. Burning down someones house? Racking up a $5 million debt in Dubai? What parallel world do you live in where that kind of thing actually happens as a result of Anonymous raids? In this one, we deal primarily with generally embarassing leaked documents and DDoS attacks. I also call into question your perceived choice of targets in another post... The JSTOR janitor having their life ruined by them? You think enough people hold the janitor personally responsible to dish out vigilante justice on him? I think you've boarded the crazy train a little too long.
You're worse than that Fox news report a few years back, showing the exploding van as a "demonstration" of their "domestic terrorism."
Wouldn't it be nice if the Feds supported due process? I mean, isn't that they're primary purpose as defenders of the Constitution? The Feds are the biggest threat to due process of any organization on the planet.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
What consequences? Trivial things that are soon forgotten like three people eating a cake outside Ortiz's house (Let 'em eat cake!)? There are no consequences at all for Federal abuse of power and cake eating events like that are probably less annoying to Ortiz than morning traffic.
Here's another person who's getting raped by the Feds:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/mar/21/barrett-brown-persecution-anonymous
But we don't hear much about it. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if this wasn't happening in every major city of the country to dozens of people. But we hear nothing about it except in rare situations. I would probably have barely noticed Schwartz if he didn't commit suicide. What we need is a central location where people can go to learn about all these types of cases.
And once we have that ... one way to hurt the Feds is in the pocketbook. And a great way to hurt them in the pocketbook, is to make these ridiculous prosecutions ridiculously expensive by helping fund a real defense in every such case ... to bury them in costs. Legal protests too -- in ways that require the Feds to spend money or waste employee time (emphasis on "legal" though). It could be like a financial DDoS for the Department of Injustice.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
A lot of posters here would like far worse considering all the calls for revolution in response to petty issues that crop up on this site. Maybe Syria isn't getting enough news coverage so people don't understand what sort of price they would have to pay.
Not every problem, but perhaps the issues of the "justice" system being broken in many cases.
If slashdot comments be believed, the majorty of posters seem to believe that we (those in the US) live in an orwellian police state.
Thats kind of what GP was talkinga bout.
Fair enough, but if the posts be believed the "major problem here" is that Schwartz was somehow goaded into suicide because he was threatened with legal consequences for having broken the law. To me, that seems kind of backwards.
This is slashdot, the solution to EVERY problem must involve a mob.
Dude, calm down. You're talking to a troll that's just trying to get you riled up. I doubt he believes what he's saying, he's just having fun pushing your buttons. He's anonymous for a reason, a cowardly reason. Ignore him.
You're using that term, "victims", but it doesn't mean whatever it it is you think it means.
I say, put their names out there for all to see, and let Anonymous make a bonfire out of their pathetic lives.
I'd say that the fact that these particular individuals are being protected from answering for their actions by these corrupt private and public entities puts all of the individuals in those organizations, private and public, from top to bottom, into the target pool by their own choice in protecting these individuals. The others in those organizations not directly involved are also guilty of passively accepting such injustices by staying silent and continuing to work in and with those corrupt organizations.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
A lot of Americans think of the American Revolution when they consider revolution. In reality no American revolutionary got within a 1000 miles of the King or Imperial Parliament and the revolution morphed into a (very successful) war of separation.
Real bloody revolutions hardly ever actually resort in an improvement whereas non-bloody revolutions sometimes do result in an improvement.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
The Orwellian part might be inaccurate but the police state is quite accurate. There are millions of Americans in jail with a large percentage in jail to prop up failed business methods. Your government isn't much different then China's, alternating between progressive and conservative every 8 years though the people do have slightly more input and the capability of throwing out a (perceived) weak ruler after only 4 years.
The smart thing about Americas rulers is that they let the plebs bitch and even let them have some weapons. Note that they still have the feudal ideas of whole segments of society with diminished rights allowing a type of segregation that the honest American backs whole heartily without even considering that it is wrong that political criminals shouldn't be allowed to change things through the vote.
America is a very successful police state with the people honestly thinking they're free.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
The real bad actor in this saga is JSTOR;
This needs to be repeated until JSTOR is removed from existence.
All data is speech. All speech is Free.
Even if he had disseminated the documents, it still would not have been wrong. Disseminating Public Domain documents is everyone's right no matter how they were obtained.
All data is speech. All speech is Free.
JSTOR didn't do it. They asked DoJ to stop.
That is the lie JSTOR wants everyone to believe. While they claimed to be dropping the case, they were pushing MIT to prosecute -- repeatedly. They must have learned from Adobe's treatment of Sklyarov. Like all corporations, they want to keep their reprehensible activities out of the spotlight. This is why they are pushing for anonymity. They can hide and claim it really was not their fault. In fact, they are the principal puppet master for this whole show. And in the end, they will be seen as having no guilt. This is both the worst possible and most probable outcome.
All data is speech. All speech is Free.
It seems to me that this is the same sort of "justice" the Department of Injustice was meting out. It seems as if the old proverb "what goes around comes around" is particularly applicable in this case. What is unjust about the abusers being abused?
All data is speech. All speech is Free.
> Prosecutors can threaten all sorts of stuff, that doesnt make it A) reality or B) illegal.
Correct. It makes it C) super scary.
You think a trial is some kind of mathematical equation which somehow always spits out justice? You got the wrong branch of mathematics --- it's much, much, more like sampling a random distribution (I'm sure you'll find more than one trial lawyer who will gladly call it --- off the record -- "a crap shoot").
The whole idea that so many things should be crimes that the justice system couldn't possibly function properly if every accused held out for a trial is kind of twisted. And so is the system of blackmail into plea bargaining which currently reigns in the US.
Somebody needs to read Les Miserables.
"Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit
You put to jail people who never had a trial, by merely SCARING them with a hundredfold vengeance if they dare proclaim their innocence.
Thank you. I've changed my mind because of this.
tomorrow who's gonna fuss
What a bunch of shit
'The supercharged nature of the public debate about this case, including hacking incidents, gun hoaxes and threatening messages, gives JSTOR and its employees legitimate concern for their safety and privacy.'" What about the concern of our safety and privacy you hypocritical bastards? Theres no justice in the DOJ anymore, if there ever was...shameful.
The guy broke the law, that has consequences. Whether or not you like it, "injustice" would be if he got away with breaking laws passed by our society.
Yes, it is super scary when you break the law and the law catches up with you.
There are millions of Americans in jail with a large percentage in jail to prop up failed business methods.
Your government isn't much different then China's, alternating between progressive and conservative every 8 years though the people do have slightly more input and the capability of throwing out a (perceived) weak ruler after only 4 years.
You sound like you have never been to the US, and also like (luckily for you) youve not been to China or seen its problems.
Heres a shortlist of differences between the two.
* In China, you can be summarily and indefinately detained and your family placed on house arrest for political speech (Liu Xiaobo)
* In China, student protests may and have been broken up by the military (Tianamen Square)
* In China, it is illegal to search for such incidents (GFW)
* In China, every cellphone call you make is tracked. Every website you visit is monitored. The state owns and controls every single method of communication. Distributing anti-government newspapers is illegal.
* In China, you are required to take an oath of atheism in order to work for the communist party. Proselytzing / speaking of religion to anyone under 18 is illegal. It is illegal to form private churches.
In the US, the only one of those you could POSSIBLY claim is bits of the "monitoring"; the US certainly does have echelon, tho its capabilities are unknown, and at the very least ISPs can refuse to turn over customer records without a warrant. In China, they dont need cooperation from the ISP; they already have the info you need as everything passes thru their filters.
Its unfortunate that a number of people ignorantly think as you do, having little experience with either country. The US has some issues, but China is currently a minefield of problems with things that are taken for granted in most western societies.
Where to begin.
The link talks about Aaron selling his website (meaning the IPR of the code and domain of Reddit.com) to Conde Naste, and so that means Aaron's a hypocrite. Also, a letter to the editor of the New Yorker says that he (the letter writer) was a journalist, depending on copyright for his salary.
Let me break it down: We (taxpayers, students/parents) pay people (professors) for the express purpose of thinking and writing (i.e., professing). That's the source of their salary, not from publishing in journals, which don't pay anything anyway. So Aaron's copying of journal articles did not mean that professor's lost their salary, that's so stupid.
Secondly, society did not pay Aaron and the gang to develop Reddit. They did so privately, and hence are entitled to private gain. Again contrast with professors. They are paid by the public, and don't deserve anything extra for publication (which is what they're paid to do anyway).
So, no, Aaron is decidedly not a hypocrite.
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
I've been to the States a few times and have spent a good part of my life within sight of the US. In response to your list,
In America the police can summarily beat or execute you by claiming resistance to arrest or just being in the way when the para-military police force kicks in your door.
In America student protests have been broken up, including students shot to death by the national guard, a form of military (Kent State)
In America you are allowed to search but often need to know the search terms as the press doesn't report to much on things like free speech zones or massive anti-war protests.
In America massive resources are put into tracking phone calls, email messages, and web site visits with the courts routinely ruling that adding cell phone or internet to something traditionally considered illegal for government to suddenly be legal.
In America it is (was?) simply illegal to belong to the Communist Party and you better be prepared to be a member of a mainstream religion to get anywhere in the main political party[ies].
While China is much worse in many ways then the USA the big difference is where they're coming from and going. China has always repressed its people to the point where they're currently the freest they have ever been whereas America was founded by people who were pissed off that their natural rights as Englishmen were being repressed and set out to come up with a system of government that recognized certain rights and now only one of the rights spelled out in the Bill of Rights is respected (3rd amendment)
That is the problem with the States, an unfounded belief that they're the freest, greatest people ever while the evidence says otherwise.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
> Yes, it is super scary when you break the law and the law catches up with you.
One wonders why, somehow, the law chose to "catch up" with Aaron, rather than 1000's of jaywalkers. It couldn't be because he had a "manifesto", could it?
You should look up the logical fallacy called "false dichotomy", the whole point of all/most of the arguments you are ignoring is that "breaking the law" is not a binary thing. If the legal system is designed to dish out results which look even approximately just, the punishments need to be in line with the crimes. Care to actually address this argument, rather than infinitely repeating "he was guilty"?
> "injustice" would be if he got away with breaking laws passed by our society
"got away"? Could you define that? Please explain what you personally think the proper penalty should be for what he did? Or is it true that you have no individual opinion, and you actually believe that in all cases, whatever "people in authority" say should be done, should actually be done? I vaguely remember a famous psychological experiment....