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Tor Project Sued Over a Revenge Porn Business That Used Its Service
redletterdave writes: The Tor Project has been sued in the state of Texas over a revenge porn website that used its free encrypted communications service. The plaintiff in the case — Shelby Conklin, a criminal justice major at the University of North Texas — alleges a revenge porn site called Pinkmeth "gained unauthorized access to nude photographs" she owned and posted them to the internet. She also said Tor, which The Economist once called "a dark corner of the web," was involved in an active "civil conspiracy" with Pinkmeth because the revenge porn website used the anonymous communications service to prevent others from tracking its location.
Texas has "the Internets" these days? Did they wire up the trailer parks?
See Subject.
They set the standards for the TCP/IP protocol, the one used by the packets which conspired with the Tor network to move data around untraceably!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Safe Harbor. Case thrown out. The end.
Better go after Bill Gates too for making software available that can view said porn.
On the Tor darknet are sites which host and trade enormous amounts of child porn, and one which specializes in leaked nude photos of celebrities, some of which have been successfully removed from the web. If it were legally possible to sue the Tor project over .onion sites, it would have been done a looooong time ago.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
The only one not at fault here must be her.
In breaking news, Microsoft will be sued by the state of New York for authoring and distributing the malicious software called Excel. Investors on Wall Street have used this nefarious software to destroy the world economy while raking in billions of dollars for themselves.
Better add DARPA and Jon Postel as codefendants. I hear they came up with this thing called TCP/IP, which aids and abets people like Tor putting together anonymous networks in the first place; it's a clear case of collusion...
Bonus Points: I hear DARPA has deep pockets...
Screw the Service, Screw the Encryption, Sue them all!
Sho us yer boobies!
I'm looking at her pictures right now. Unfortunately Pinkmeth is SLOW right now. Might have something to do with all the fuzz about it. :-)
So if they go after Tor for a service someone else provided using Tor, isn't that like going after gun manufacturers for the murders their products help commit? Not trying to start a flame war or anything but this seems kinda close to that notion to me. I'd have a really good laugh if Texas set some legal standard for going after gun manufacturers in the US with this.
I don't think she has a case against tor at all because its already been ruled ISPs cannot nor even web sites cant be held responsible for what's its users do or upload. I can be wrong though as im not a lawyer, just recollecting what I've already read in the news. But the web site \owner and its users who uploaded are in sit deep trouble. Don't be a dick just delete the images you know you never had permission to broadcast.
Jack of all trades,master of none
In the age of the internet, don't take nude pics.
Looking like an idiot is not the way to do it
Because, seriously, how frequently does this lesson have to be retaught?
Was "revenge porn" non-existant before Tor? I don't see how this (or any other similar) case has any merit whatsoever. Sue the one(s) who masterminded the criminal act(s). I mean, I know I'm preaching to the choir here... but it's like suing AT&T for providing phone lines to someone who recorded phone sex conversations with their spouse and released them after they split up. It's like suing Sony for providing the video camera to Paris Hilton. Lame, lame lame. Ignorant, shortsighted, lame.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
It is no great news that Texas has a warped political and legal system. The danger is that this nonsense might actually work in a Texas court room. Tor has no part in this in my opinion. If she has a gripe it is with the person that stole the pics.
I was hit with a baseball bat made from wood harvested from a tree that grew from a seedling planted by an earth-day participant. Earth-day organizers conspired to grow trees in an obvious conspiracy that must have included the 7 year-old at a little league game who lost his grip and threw said wooden bat. Sounds like a RICO case to me.
I can't say much about the merit of the case or common sense, but considering radar jammer manufacturers can be held accountable for miss-use (intended abuse of the law) its at least possible that the case will go to trial. The significant note of the case (if it continues) will be if TOR is designed to facilitate breaking the law or if it has enough legal uses to be considered incidental support, like the internet, air, electricity, etc...
Bye!
Don't want your nudes to end up in public? Don't take nudes that you wouldn't want the public to see. Then you can be a true victim. The whole concept of "revenge porn," insofar as it applies to nudes and porn freely made and disseminated, is ever so much "I want my freedom.... but I don't want my choices to have consequences of which I don't approve."
We have a term for that behavior. It's called behaving like a child.
Couldn't happen to a nicer asshole. Don't pick up the soap Ray.
Of course we all know this is a connected guy so he will likely live in an apartment and get lots of good food and TV time.
THANKS for letting me know there are nude photos of you on the internet -- and where to find them! YOU are a font of information and those of us who never even knew this site existed are thankful you are too stupid to realize you just made yourself even more of a search topic. And your lawsuit will fail.
Congrats! :)
Dream as if you'll live forever.
Live as if you'll die tomorrow.
~Anonymous~
Tor isnt a service, its a technology and accompanying data protocol. There is no corporate entity or backer that "crontrols" the network or if there were, the federal government would have beaten this attorney to the punch long ago. Its like trying to sue LUKS deveopers for a hard drive that cant be read by the NSA.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Could someone please summon him? I'd like to hear his take on this.
just sayin'
Jon Postel is god.
Can you sue automakers for car crashes not caused by defect?
Can you sue gun makers for deaths?
Can you sue the financial industry for losses in the market?
Then why the hell is this any different? Hell, sue the fscking NSA for not having told you about it and stopped it.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Lets distribute these ways and sue. woohoo class action.
Have gnu, will travel.
Mr INSCOM, whatever shit you say to work against the 99% who use TOR to expose the misdeeds of the 1% who run the show.
... The University of North Texas, I mean. In my academic field, which is not related to the energy industry, we have to suffer through a tenured professor from this shitty university and his diatribes in favor of big oil. He manages to turn every conference venue and every subject into a rant about how unfairly the world treats big oil. He's kind of like the racist dentist in that one Kurt Vonnegut novel except ... he has tenure ... from the University of North Texas. I automatically tune out whenever someone from that school is involved.
Next up, AT&T is sued over a prank phone call. None of this could have happened if it weren't for those pesky kids, and the phone company!
And the electric company, and computer manufacturers, etc
You're missing the point. It's not ok, but it is a highly foreseeable consequence of taking nude photographs, much less disseminating them. You'd have to live under a rock and have a Pollyannaish view of human relations in 2014 to have no idea that this is a common consequence. Most often now, it probably happens because someone believes they are special and they won't fall victim to what so many others in their demographic have suffered. In that sense, it is precisely the sort of behavior one expects of a child because children and adolescents are almost completely incapable of believing "you're not special and it could damn well happen to you too."
Or is that next?
This seems a little like suing a typewriter manufacturer because their product defeats handwriting analysis.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Just because you cross the street does not entitle you to hit me with a car.
... as in "You've Been Served!" Anyone can file a lawsuit against anyone over anything. The first problem is finding and getting that person into the Court. For this you need Process Servers to properly serve a Notice of Hearing. Default judgement is only possible with correct service.
TFA didn't mention who she is serving but if she can find anyone, the most they could say is "Yes, I was involved in setting up Tor Long-ago and Far-Away. No possible knowledge or involvement with complaint." And the Judge will excuse them.
Pretty lame of a law-student not-to-know. Most likely a publicity stunt.
Seriously, it is good that lawsuits are happening. That will change things. For example, if a class action were to happen to target AND MICROSOFT, we would see mass changes in America over this.
BUT, when going after innocent parties, that gets old.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
So let's say I trust someone, which turns out to be mistake. I can sue that person for releasing private information that they were entrusted with during a period of trust (they break the contract, social or otherwise). However, to get that information to stop being actively dissemenated, I need to sue the distributors too (they're not going to take action till action is requested (and sometimes forced). If the distributor is hiding behind a service, I might have to sue the service to release the location of the distributor (again they won't do it till requested, and sometimes until compelled). This is not much different, except that the content is "news" due to social quibbles, and the service is not centrally owned and operating in such a manner that it makes it incredibly difficult to comply with the request to release the distributor's whereabouts.
You can cross the street without looking both ways and maybe get hit by a car. Oh, sure, you had the right of way. You're still dead, but you had the rogjt of way.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Man sues catholic church because his dad died.
Religion argument aside. That is how retarded this chick is. I'm gonna go fire up my tor browser and look at her hoo hah now that she told the world about this "pinkmeth" that I didn't know about before.
Miriam Ferguson (first female governor of TX, 1924)
Miriam Ferguson is often credited with a quote allegedly spoken in reference to bilingualism in Texas schools: “If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it ought to be good enough for the children of Texas.”
There are almost no basements in Texas.
Except the one in the Alamo.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Reporting back in. Shes okay looking. not the most attractive girl in the world. Its worth looking at simply for the fact that shes being a bitch about it, but not for the body.
boring pictures - why is this a story in the first place and why assholes that obviously got to pinkmeth because of media noise about the case must post profanities there - I shall never know. People can do with their bodies what they want. If it is in their free time this should never affect their careers or relationships (this of course unless it does not reveal cheating etc). As long as no wrong doing is on the pictures they may have entertainment value but that is it. No reason to get excited. Other that now I am on the NSA terrorists list for using tor. And this is bigger story.
I'm gonna waste time trying to find her photo's Daaaaam you Streisand effect
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
In the USA, "Criminal Justice" at the undergraduate level is used as training for a career in law enforcement. Granted, if she decides on graduate school, she will likely go in to law school...
I thought I knew you people...
This article is hours old, and there's no link to the .onion address of the revenge site.
Poor Tor, it's not their fault people did nasty stuff with their service.
But yesterday, when spammers happened to use NO-IP's free service, that made NO-IP âoeshady.â
Bollocks. Millions of such photos are taken every day. It's a tiny fraction that end up on the internet because of some malicious act.
Her first interview out of lawschool. "So you uh,,, you still do the landing strip?"
Not your personal army?
http://pinkmethuylnenlz.onion/us/tx/denton/shelby-nicole-conklin/
choke on it, bitch
I don't get it. Why would anyone want to see amateur shots. No matter how good looking the subject is, it's bound to be poorly filmed, poorly lit with equally poor acting. How is this more interesting than regular porn?
Oh, and another thing, why the heck would I want to see pornographic shots of someone I know? Honestly, how does that work? You meet them on the bus and say, "so ... when did you get 'that' tattoo"?
Since she herself created the images in question, and shared them with at least one other person, does this not count as the creation of an artwork for private distribution?
By this standard Pinkmeth (and by extension Tor) are guilty of, at most, copyright infringement.
They supplied the wires for some of that data, didn't they?
Hey, folks. Label links NSFW, please. I'm in a nice cafe, and those links weren't cool to open up on a 17" monitor.
She must be suing because she has one boob shaped waaay differently than the other. I'd be pretty embarrassed too. Also, could she spackle more makeup on? Of course she could! All in all though, she doesn't have sharp knees so I guess my vote is: WANT
We all know it's you and YES you're trying to start a flamewar.
DENTON, Texas (CN) - A "revenge pornography" website gained unauthorized access to nude photographs of a woman and posted them on the Internet, the woman claims in court. ...
Shelby Conklin sued Verisign, Katz Global Media, and Pinkmeth.com, in Denton County Court.
Pinkmeth is her main target. She claims Tucson-based Katz sold "anonymous hosting" Internet services to PinkMeth, and she wants Verisign to disable the PinkMeth website.
http://www.courthousenews.com/...
-- Prepared at the direction of, or to be sent to Legal Counsel, in anticipation of litigation. Attorney Client Pri
I wish someone would sue Sony over that camera. What a horribly shitty movie. Why is it celebrity sex tapes are always so damned lame? I thought I'd never say this but porn stars really are masters of their craft!
Simple subject but it's true. The very people who would be incensed by child pornography seem ironically to be Tor's biggest defenders. You guys need to re-think how important your adult porn is to you and get on the right side.
1. How about not sending slutty photos to someone you've only known for three weeks?
2. How about learning what tor is and how they're not a fault before wasting everyone's time?
3. Find a new career because you obviously have no idea how law works.
4. People don't like landing strips anymore, shave that shit.
'Nough said?
It's not a dark corner, it's the wild west.
yet...
Going after gun companies for gun crimes and accidental shootings? There are already plenty of precedents for that, so I'm not sure why you think that'd be a new thing.
Why not sue the ISPs or the alcohol company that got her drunk enough to accept being photographed by a douchebag?
As to guns, no. It was a very big thing for awhile, but that's why the "Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act" was passed in 2005. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protection_of_Lawful_Commerce_in_Arms_Act
Particularly west of the Mississippi and excluding Californians (Californians: like Floridans except less crazy)?
Here's to hot beer, cold women, and Glaswegian kisses for all.