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Lavabit.com Owner: 'I Could Be Arrested' For Resisting Surveillance Order
Zak3056 writes "NBC News is reporting that 'The owner of an encrypted email service used by ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden said he has been threatened with criminal charges for refusing to comply with a secret surveillance order to turn over information about his customers. "I could be arrested for this action," Ladar Levison told NBC News about his decision to shut down his company, Lavabit LLC, in protest over a secret court order he had received from a federal court that is overseeing the investigation into Snowden.''"
There's no point to be made from not complying with a legitimate court order. Just comply with it. One day you could be very thankful that we have a legal system that was created to protect us. Please respect that and our fellow citizens.
simply the act of using encryption will make you a government suspect.
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6222691
Welcome my son, welcome to the machine.
Silence is a state of mime.
I hear it's actually pretty nice - decent food and opportunities for education, (might come in handy since his business is gone). And best of all you pretty much have an idea who you're getting ganked by. In the mean time, staying in the public eye will assure the feds tread carefully and just might save his a$$ - no pun intended.
"What happened here was the gradual habituation of the people, little by little, to being governed by surprise; to receiving decisions deliberated in secret; to believing that the situation was so complicated that the government had to act on information which the people could not understand, or so dangerous that, even if the people could understand it, it could not be released because of national security."
But Then It Was Too Late
At this point we are seeing evidence that both Republicans and Democrats have a limit to how much (or little) they can do or change.
Who is, then, in power of the United States if clearly not the legislative branch?
Golly gee! Ya think?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Capitalism promotes competitive, selfish activity.
Eventually, the winners realise that they can corrupt the system of government too. By hook or crook - psychology or guns.
The only effective society is one which overtly and deliberately puts a cap on power, both of the government and of private individuals, allowing enterprise to flourish while ensuring that the individuals who have benefitted contribute toward a strong infrastructure and humane society.
This is a social democracy.
The USSR sucked. The USA sucks. They were the same thing but with "apparatchik" instead of "management" to label the guys running the show. Life under either is glorious for those at the top, and a shitty struggle for the average person.
Just letting the government do this stuff without fighting is cowardly. Our grandfathers fought in WWII. We need to fight the fight at home. We need to fight this stuff. MAKE IT PUBLIC show that the U.S.A. is becoming worse the the old soviet union. We have secret laws and secret police. This is not how a democracy is supposed to work! The general populace can stay in denial if the news can be drowned out. I believe (hope) we, as a country, may wake up if these sorts of things make lots of noise.
I voted for Obama, and while I don't think the alternatives would have been any better, we need a new kind of president that will not defend these policies. Terrorism has hit every free state. It is a fact of life. We either deal with the risks of freedom or give it up to these evil bastards. (insert Franklin quote)
Get a national security letter, fight it.
Get a court order, challenge it in a higher court, rinse, repeat.
Call the ACLU
Donate to the ACLU
encrypt, encrypt, encrypt.
Don't worry my friend...
You will be next...
Why is the government bothering with secret court orders at this point? Do they think that maybe Snowden isn't aware that they are out to get him? If the government was above board with the situation, then perhaps people would be more willing to comply. Is there something in these orders that needs to be hidden from the public eye?
Just issue a regular warrant for the information. Nobody is arguing about those and they get the same results.
Unless there is more to this than is apparent.
(Although, cynical as I am, my first take on this article was not "Evil Government" but "Lavabit's Founders Are Trying To Drum Up Sympathy And Publicity For Their Next Venture". I just can't trust anyone these days ;-)
Nicholas Merrill fought this battle before.
His talk at 27C3 is very, very interesting and deserves to be more widely known. In particular, watch and listen to his explanations of how carefully he has to choose his words - right down to using "it" for the government person he has to deal with (since giving away "its" gendor could get him 10 years in jail).
All your ghosts are just false positives.
What a difference a mere few decades makes. This is exactly the type of thing that America historically mocked, derided and demonized the USSR and other "commie" or "evil" nations for doing. America is quite clearly demonstrating that their intentions are no less disingenuous.
The problem is not communism, not capitalism nor any other -ism. The problem is that the powerful will never satiate their craving for more power. Power absolutely despises being proven wrong and it will continue its scourge at all costs to cover up and misdirect conceptions.
This is what evil does when it's backed into a corner.
He should spill the beans on the entire thing. Publish all the details. What we have here is a failure to resist, and no good can come from that. It just makes the death march to the slaughterhouse is little less uncomfortable, but it's a death march regardless.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Are those customers (who will be spied upon anyway with or without your help) worth your entire life?
Not those customers, but the freedom of all American citizens, yes.
Capitalism promotes... ...The USSR sucked. The USA sucks. They were the same thing but with "apparatchik" instead of "management" to label the guys running the show. Life under either is glorious for those at the top, and a shitty struggle for the average person.
I really enjoyed your post. I haven't seen that notion presented in exactly that way before, and it really hangs together. Makes me think, and I couldn't ask for more than that.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Why the straw man about some type of government being incorruptible?
My point was that everything is corruptible, so don't allow any single entity to become so powerful that corruption of or by it can ruin a society.
Terrorism is nothing new. People have died from violent acts of insurgents since the beginning of history. The fact is, that terrorism is statistically insignificant as a cause of death. It has always been that way and it hasn't changed much. The leading cause of death "related to terrorism" is trying to fight it. Thousands of soldiers and civilians have gotten hurt and killed in "the war on terrorism" in situations that would not have occurred if this "war" hadn't been fought.
The leading cause of loss of freedom is fighting terrorism. There is no war. Stop calling it a war. There are clear definitions of what a war is and it has to be between two or more countries, or it has to be a "civil war" in which two or more parts of the same country go to war amongst themselves. Terrorism is nothing new and you're feeding it by giving it the attention it's after. The terrorists achieve more of their goals by this "war on terrorism" than they would if they were to be successful just a bit more often than they are now and we would ignore them. You can't fight this sort of terrorism anyway, since it's using every "freedom right" we want so much for ourselves, which our forefathers fought for so hard. If we give up those rights, we have nothing left to fight for and the terrorists have won.
The more you fight terrorism, the worse the situation gets. Let it go and enjoy your freedom. Don't spend money, lives and freedom on it. I'm not saying you should stop trying to prevent attacks, but you should stop giving up freedom and privacy for it.
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
Capitalism promotes competitive, selfish activity.
Eventually, the winners realise that they can corrupt the system of government too. By hook or crook - psychology or guns.
The only effective society is one which overtly and deliberately puts a cap on power, both of the government and of private individuals, allowing enterprise to flourish while ensuring that the individuals who have benefitted contribute toward a strong infrastructure and humane society.
This is a social democracy.
The USSR sucked. The USA sucks. They were the same thing but with "apparatchik" instead of "management" to label the guys running the show. Life under either is glorious for those at the top, and a shitty struggle for the average person.
People have to take responsibility as well.
Do I dislike the way the USA is headed? Yes.
Do I blame a large percentage of the US population for not paying attention and allowing themselves to become and then remain willfully ignorant? Yes.
The USA is not yet at the point where the USSR was, and it's not yet too late for change...but if it doesn't happen soon it may never happen at all.
Wake up America, or lose everything you care about.
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
But people *don't* stick to their ideals, which is why you need a balance of power - in the pragmatic sense, not the idealistic sense. A social democratic country tries to achieve a balance.
It is not related to capitalism per se, but to any system which bases itself on some extreme ideal - communism, capitalism, pacifism, fascism, whatever.
That's simply not how it works.
The Root CA creates a self-signed certificate. This is the 'axiom of trust', you have to import this and trust it.
Then there are subsidiary certificates are that are SIGNED by the Root CA.
What this means is the Root CA attests that the public key in the
certificate truly belongs to the Entity named in the certificate.
The Root CA NEVER SEES INTERMEDIATE PRIVATE KEYS.
You can have a private key on a smart card that never, ever
leaves the smartcard and still get your cert signed.
You are very confused.
Which specific outlier are you complaining about please?
Wake up America, or lose everything you care about.
Oh god, is something going to happen to Game of Thrones?!
...social democracy....
The mere use of those two words, especially together, caused almost half of the USA readership to disregard your post.
cheers,
The development of the USSR is an interesting one, and one that is a showcase of how good intentions are easily perverted into the most heinous reality, provided that power hungry megalomaniacs are allowed to rule. Sadly, it is the power hungry megalomaniac that WANTS to rule.
The USSR started as a hope for a "worker's paradise", and in Marx' theory, it sure is. People worked hard towards that goal because they were promised a glorious future, and they believed it. By and by, they noticed that nothing gets better, or that it does only for the few on top, and the rest was a tyranny that tried hard to keep up the status quo, i.e. the good life for the "party people" and the struggle for the rest, until it just couldn't be propped up anymore.
Now replace the promise of the glorious future for everyone with the promise that you, too, can be rich if you work hard, and by and by people noticing that working does not get you rich, and I wonder if I really imagine the parallels here.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I know this is probably wouldn't fly, but what the hell:
When you sign up for a service the service provider agrees to send you an email every day that says:
"By government order your materials or service with us is under surveillance and/or investigation, we are required to turn over all the data we have about you."
Then when the government does send your service provider a notice to look at your stuff and it includes one of those gag orders that says you can not inform the target of the surveillance, the daily emails have to stop.
You as a customer can then deduce whatever you want to about the cessation of the daily notice emails.
Wax on, wax off baby!
> The USSR sucked. The USA sucks.
Ummmm, actual measurements of wealth and longevity disagreed. This is a meme lodged in your head that is not in accordance with reality. You should go about fixing it.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
All that's missing is establishing a People's Court and we're set.
(Please read the Wikipedia article before invoking Godwin)
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Considering the USA had nearly a century and a half head start, I wouldn't expect the USSR to have come close to catching up with it. And yet we're talking about differences in life expectancy of a few years, and very nearly irrelevant definitions of "wealth" when we contrast the models of service provision.
For example, when I lived in the US, I was able to earn a lot more money than in the UK. But it was worth a lot less, as private insurance is an inefficient rip-off vs British healthcare and social safety net. There's really little opportunity for comfort in the US except for a small proportion of people: the majority work far more hours than are needed to sustain a decent lifestyle for the whole country. Western continental Europe does so much better.
I have a brief personal experience with the end of the USSR, and my family worked for a car firm which did business there under Khrushchev. Sure, it sucked too, but not in the terrific way caricatured by Western propaganda.
So, it's a "meme" which I've lodged in my head based on personal experience - and a concerted attempt to enjoy and appreciate both extremes. And that's before we bring in the experiences of everyone else.
The pulpit's across the street, luv.
Yup, they're giving you the same dragon to chase. At least the religious types were clever enough to only make promises about what happens after death...
No, it is the inevitable consequence of asking the government to regulate ever more economic activity (from certain perspectives, everything you do is economic activity) in the name of protecting the people from "corporate interests". Inevitably as the government gathers more power to itself, the only way to accumulate wealth is through government intervention. Those who have wealth use it to acquire connections allowing them to control where the government intervention occurs. Those who have political power use it to acquire wealth. In time, these two groups merge. At which point the economy begins to collapse, as more and more of society's wealth and political power becomes concentrated in the hands of an ever smaller group of people. These people act to prevent others from acquiring wealth or political power, which leads to the economy gradually becoming less and less productive.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
if his company was incorporated, he cannot be charged with anything on a personal matter. if he dissolves his company, they cant do anything to him (legally). i doubt they care about legality though, because they are a ridiculous government organization that answers to noone. honestly what i suggest is to encrypt everything in some ridiculous encryption that the NSA would take decades breaking, then hand it over fully encrypted without the key. as he is handing over the data, he is complying with the order to hand over the data.
First things first: enforcement of all property laws, real and virtual, are "government intervention" and "economic regulation". The law determines who owns what, when and how. (You may say: "No! My personal philosophy determines that!" but that's just the basis used for the law. It's still government regulation which enforces it.)
So, the moment you have any protections on anything beyond the person, you have government economic regulation.
At which point the game for balance of power has already begun.
Is there any alternative but recognize the police state, when every innocent citizen can be targeted for committing an estimated three felonies a day, harassed for an even greater number of costly and discretionary regulations and audits, secretly recorded, detained in secret prisons and coerced by secret court orders?
At what point does the state, with the cooperation of many people around, own you?
Regarding the first point, see Harvey Silverglate's "Three Felonies a Day," book which is "referring to the number of crimes he estimates the average American now unwittingly commits because of vague laws".
Regarding the second point, see the case of Catherine Engelbrecht as an illustration.
These comments are mine; I do not speak for my employer.
The guy never said he was host to Edward Snowden. He confirmed that there was a user account with that name, which is not the same. He also never said he got a letter from the NSA or otherwise connected the shutdown to Snowden. There's a ton of warrants he could have received that come with a gag order.
America used to be, and I repeat, USED TO BE a country which everyone looked up to., yours truly included
I came from a communist country, and I was so impressed with the United States of America that I ended up becoming a naturalized American citizen.
The place I came from there was no democracy, no human rights, no freedom and no justice, America had everything that I ever hoped for.
However, my American Dream slowly transformed into American Dismay, and finally ended up as American Disgust
From a country which cherishes and champion Human Rights, the United States becomes a country where "Human Rights" is used as a tool to criticize others
Democracy ? It sure is a convenient device to hoodwink the American voters.
Freedom ? If there is any genuine freedom left in the United States of America Mr. Ladar Levison wouldn't have to shut down Lavabit
Justice ? Can whatever that has happened to Mr. Snowden be anything remotely related to "Justice" ?
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
You appear to have overlooked the phrase "regulate EVER MORE economic activity". The key is to limit how much power to regulate economic activity the government has. Every time you ask the government to regulate more economic activity, you are increasing the probability that such government activity will result in an increase in the power and wealth of a few.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
The USSR sucked. The USA sucks. They were the same thing but with "apparatchik" instead of "management" to label the guys running the show. Life under either is glorious for those at the top, and a shitty struggle for the average person.
I would disagree that "management" is running much of anything. In most companies "management" only manages means and methods the goals are set by the system. Profit, shareholder value, and whatever supports these goals, that's the task of management.
Literally a publicly held company by law must maximize shareholder value. There is no choice and there is no person deciding this. I believe that even massively rich industrialists that get neck deep in politics, like the Kochs, don't have the power to make fundamental changes unless those changes serve the god of lucre. Even the New Deal of FDR was needed to prevent the growing tide of socialism, and therefore served the purpose of preserving the system. The only thing that has ever changed things for the better is large numbers of people organizing and taking power from the system and from the rulers.
-- QED
Considering the USA had nearly a century and a half head start,
So the USSR sprang up from nothing in the north of Eastern Europe and Northern Asia? Russia never existed?
SUSA?
USAS?
USSA?
New mod option wanted: -1 DrunkenRambling
Suppose I'm a bookstore owner and I get a court order to tell the police about any future purchases of one of my customers.
Suppose I just decide to put a "we're closed" sign on the door and go on a long vacation.
Then the police charge me with contempt of court.
I counter with "I'm not in the military, I'm not a convicted criminal serving a sentence, I'm not under a labor or personal-services contract with the police, so you (the police) can't make me go to work, that would be involuntary servitude."
I see something similar here.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
It's hard to be sure since a judge wiped his ass with the 1st amendment, but I'm guessing Lavabit was shut down to avoid participation in an on-going government spying operation against one or likely all of his customers. It strikes me that calling that a violation of his court order is constructive slavery since it would require him to continue his labors for the benefit of others against his will. It is his natural right to shut down his business even if it is inconvenient for some TLA.
I think you shouldn't be immune to the observation that in calling the parent's argument "based on emotion" and "deliberate propaganda" you occuse your opponent of "promoting ... dictatorship and slavery".
Let's take a step back here. We are all geeks and we can approach governance from an engineering point of view. If I read you correctly, you're advocating a somewhat extreme social contract viewpoint in which the only legitimate function of government is to take us out of the state of nature by granting the government as minimal a monopoly on violence and power as possible. This view isn't unreasonable on its face, but there is more to it.
In any society, including humans, there is a distribution of power and resources that comes from natural survival of the fittest. The basic idea of government is to voluntarily abdicate much of this power to a central authority (where central can mean tribal, state, federal, world, etc). This creates the natural problem of a single point of attack: any group that can infiltrate the government will be able to use that centralized power for personal gain. This creates the need to impose laws on things like (1) who can serve in government (probably not felons, e.g.), (2) what limits members of government can have in their personal influence (e.g. can anybody unilaterally declare war?), (3) limitations on the influence other powerful social members have on the government (e.g. campaign funds, revolving doors) and many others. The point here is that it's a question of engineering. How do we organize the central authority so that the people have maximal freedom to do anything they want and they don't have to fear being pushed around by anyone.
Where you and your opponent disagree most is in determing the strongest threat to government infiltration. The social contract tradition, of which you seem to subscribe, was concerned primarily about landed aristocracies using the power of government to do anything they like. This was historically opposed by a class of business owners and farmers who favored a representative democracy. But in the course of history many things have changed. America has no landed aristocrats, so we no longer worry about that. Instead, it has a class of people who believe that selfishness is a positive virtue that is much more important than telling the truth or helping others. This belief flourishes in America's political structure because it is easy for such people to lie in order to gain votes but then to ignore the voters once in office. The parent believes that these people are using government to their advantage to the detriment of the vast majority of the public.
From this point of view, the "free market" rhetoric is a device to convince the population that there is a moral imperative to turn every part of society into a money-making enterprise. Naturally, if you do this you end up with something very much like what you see in, say, Boardwalk Empire or any other popular depiction of organized crime. In fact, it should be rather obvious that organized crime is only crime because there are laws that prevent business men from engaging in certain profitable businesses, such as human trafficking, drug exportation, war profiteering, and so forth. It raises the question of why any of these things is illegal in the first place.
And, quite obviously, the reason they are illegal is that in a truly free market, labor has the right to organize and the poor have the right to protest and vote. So in a free market, a government will voluntarily implement policies that limit the ways that businesses can exploit others for profit. The only way to get an "ideal" free market of the sort Milton Friedman advocates is to sneak pro-corporate laws onto the books or into the courts since naturally those laws will be opposed by anybody not directly benefited by them.
The mistake you make is that you don't see a free market as a process, you see it as a set of laws. But historically you never get that set of law
If (hypothetically -- we have no real data) it was a National Security Letter, it would have come straight from an executive branch agency with no court oversight.
It's horribly unsafe to live in a non-free society. Once the gulags are there, you can get sent away for simply offending the wrong person.
Wikipedia has an article about National Security Letters discussing precisely that lack of accountability. People have struggled and often failed to get independent legal review.
Why arrested? There is no longer an email service, thus the provisions under which the action was drafted are no longer relevant. He's not operating a clandestine email server, so there is no longer any reason to prosecute him, unless, I suppose, there is evidence of his personal wrongdoing-the activities of his clients are not his concern as the operator of a service.
If it's not broken, let's fix it till it is.
Russia existed, but it was a very different country. For that matter, the British Empire existed, too. Neither of the countries in the comparison sprang up out of nothing, but that isn't relevant to the point being made. The USSR was radically different from the government and economic system of what came before. (And although the USA was organized somewhat differently from the parliamentary democracy is broke away from, it retained much of the same system, laws, and basic concepts -- in reality, the USA had a much, much bigger head start than OP implied...)
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
Free market is market that is no manipulated by the powerful governments that have legal and or illegal authority to take away your freedoms.
Actually, a free market is a market that is not manipulated by any powerful organization. Large concentrations of economic power (e.g. monopolies) can impede the operation of free markets too. In fact, it requires government regulation to establish a free market. They cannot exist in the absence of law, and law that is enforced, to ensure their freedom. Just like individuals are not free in the absence of government -- anarchy strips away freedom from nearly everyone but the powerful few to enslave everyone else. Governments are not the only organizations that must be limited in power to protect the freedom of people, or of markets.
What you are in fact promoting is dictatorship and slavery -- you just pretend its neither when the people in charge aren't called "government".
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
In terms of creation of wealth and production, Russia had a thousand year or more head start over the American colonies.
That's why such regimes were a lot more resilient. Promises are much more believable if you cannot test the outcome and realize that you've been had.
Waitasec, I think I just understood the whole secrecy around our anti-terror justifications.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
It's so obvious that we fail to heed that warning every single time!
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
How is this new? Why are you suddenly concerned? I figured this was the norm prior to it becoming mainstream knowledge.
I want to keep saying I told you so every time I see crap like this pop up. (though I would say take it off the frontpage, its not NEWS, OR NEWS FOR NERDS). Even as much as I like making the federalist liberals eat their own shit.
I'm glad the Lavabit thing is getting a fair bit of attention. The more publicity it gets, the better outcome, we as people of the USA, will get.
Actually, I personally believe they're Bush/Cheney thugs that Obama can't get rid of.
Capitalism promotes competitive, selfish activity.
No, capitalism taps into competitive, selfish activity. With or without capitalism, humans are by nature competitive and selfish. With capitalism, that selfishness is directed into productive ends.
The only effective society is one which overtly and deliberately puts a cap on power, both of the government and of private individuals
And who caps the power of those who decide who has too much power and need to be capped? The nail that sticks up will be hammered down - sounds like a wonderful way to live.
allowing enterprise to flourish
Up until the point where it flourishes too much, and gets "capped"
What we have is a powerful industry, and a large, weak government incapable of restraining it. What you propose is a small, weak industry and a powerful government. What we need is a powerful industry, counterveiled by a powerful government.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
I wonder what a society and economy would look like if wealth was capped at $50,000,000 for companies and individuals. I have never found any study investigating this and I believe it would be an interesting read at least. Something along the lines of;
1) No individual or company may hold more than $50,000,000 worth of assets.
2) If a company reaches $50,000,001 it must split or become government property.
3) If an individual reaches $50,000,000 then all property over $50,000,000 becomes government property.
I would be interested to see what people think would happen, if anyone is keen to have a go.
I reserve the write to mangle english.
Actually, I personally believe they're Bush/Cheney thugs that Obama can't get rid of.
Then you personally are part of the problem. This mess is bipartisan. The guy on top changes for entertaining reasons every few years, but the substance never changes.
When Clinton was building the security apparatus, the Republicans were making a fuss. Then they quieted down while Bush built it even more. The Democrats made lots of noise, but they quieted down in turn when Obama was elected. That's just what I noticed since I was big enough to understand what was going on. I'm sure this has been going on since before I was born.
The whole thing is corrupt. The politicians. The party officials who choose the politicians. The administrators who run the government agencies. The media executives who sell the public in exchange for privileged access and a steady stream of vapid entertainment. But I suspect that the real problem goes deeper. I think it's just not possible to have a government over this many people with this much power, without it being corrupt. The United States needs to be dismantled.
If your vote really could count, and you wanted it to count, then you would not be voting for any of these corrupt Democrats or Republicans.
Have a nice time.
Heh.
I fixed my own Phantom...
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
I thought my answer is obvious, by extrapolation.
I am a man without mechanic or chauffeur.
I am in no elite.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
I am in no elite.
Ah! But you had to buy parts!
Wheredya get the money? And where's my left taillight?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
eBay... .co.uk!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."