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U.S. Threatened Massive Fine To Force Yahoo To Release Data
Advocatus Diaboli writes The U.S. government threatened to fine Yahoo $250,000 a day in 2008 if it failed to comply with a broad demand to hand over user data that the company believed was unconstitutional, according to court documents unsealed Thursday that illuminate how federal officials forced American tech companies to participate in the NSA's controversial PRISM program. The documents, roughly 1,500 pages worth, outline a secret and ultimately unsuccessful legal battle by Yahoo to resist the government's demands. The company's loss required Yahoo to become one of the first to begin providing information to PRISM, a program that gave the National Security Agency extensive access to records of online communications by users of Yahoo and other U.S.-based technology firms.
I like how this is all phrased to imply that it's no longer going on and this is all a thing of the past.
It's a bad sign when these types of reports no longer invoke any sort of shock. It's a part of "Americana" now.
How can you fine someone for not cooperating in activities that the government refused to even admit existed?
Fuck the FCC, fuck the FBI, fuck the CIA, I'm living in the motherfuckin' USA.
Maybe someday this total information awareness nonsense will stop.
Thanks to the War on Drugs, it's easier to buy meth than it is to buy cold medicine!
I wonder why the constitution ever had any power at all over the laws. Why did 9/11 bring such a change in our freedoms? We were told that 9/11 was a failure attempt at removing our freedoms. Yet that's exactly what happened. We lose our freedoms all in the name of not losing our freedoms?
Happy 9/11 anniversary!
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
I'm glad I never use Yahoo.
It was outdated 10 years ago, today it's like beating a dead horse.
James Madison said it!
"If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy."
- James Madison
Our government sends arms to terrorists and cartels. Strong-arms private companies to provide private information. Declares and wages illegal wars on drugs and terror. Uses the IRS to harass anyone dissenting.
I hope Scotland gets its independence and several American states take notice.
So much for Obama's promise of a more transparent government . Thanks a lot Obama!
The judges in these kind of cases are appointed by the executive, the same branch of government they are supposed to keep in check. This is a problem because the executive has a tendency to appoint only judges with views similar to itself. So it's not surprising these judges often rule in favor of the executive.
You misspelled "illegal." HTH. HAND.
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
This is the most absured quote in the article from a former Bush era DHS "security official":
“We’re talking about trying to gather information about people who are trying to kill us and who will succeed if we don’t have robust information about their activities.”
So where exactly are all these people? Were they chatting on Yahoo mail about destroying the US? Gimme a break.
That's from 2008. You know who the guy responsible, the head of the executive branch, was at the time. Punish his party at the polls next presidential election.
A vote for democrats and/or republicans, whose parties increase the state's reach for ideological reasons and to corner the market, is a vote for more of the police state mentality, taxation, and deficit spending required to enforce it all. Don't let the left divide with stupid social justice and single issue shit, because a free country has liberty and justice FOR ALL, not state forced 'privilege' for specific castes at the expense of others (labeled as 'hate groups'), and choosing who 'wins' and who 'loses' in life based on attributes that weren't supposed to matter. Don't let the neo-right tell you that corporates care about steady jobs or lower taxes for the working class either. Ironically, those "he's worse than me" ads are perfect at showing that neither party has an objective or functional solution for what ails the country. Fuck them. The gubernatorial elections are coming up for many states. For those of you advocating 'working within system' style change, here's an opportunity. If you can, vote against both and send a message.
Terrorists did not take away our freedoms. They were only successful in killing 2,996 people and causing about $19 billion in property damage. We gave our own freedoms away.
And in more doublespeak, Obama shared this with us today:
“We carry on because as Americans we do not give in to fear. Ever."
Nope. Americans never give into fear. We also don't allow virtual strip searches at airports, we don't allow the federal government to spy on our private cellular communications, and we guarantee all political whistle-blowers immunity from criminal charges.
Of bullying.
If they decided to eat the fine and get sucked dry, they could spend every last dying breath telling everyone on the internet how injust this was. It would've gone on long enough for something to happen.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
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If it was you and I, yes it's massive. To a corporation worth $40 billion or so, not so much. Fuck Yahoo for caving.
I call it extortion. Can the federal government be prosecuted for racketeering?
And that is why metadata is so important.
If you're trying to manipulate politically a group of people, the data is already public: people voice their opinions aloud. Now, if you've got the metadata you know who influences who, and you can game that.
Reminds me of Pratchett on Nigt Watch:
"If they had been in a position to put a red spot on the heads of those people who were not friends of the Patrician, and a white spot on those who were his cronies, and a pink spot on those who were perennial waverers, then they would have seen something like a dance taking place. There were not many whites. They would have seen that there were several groups of reds, and white spots were being introduced into them in ones, or twos if the number of reds in the group was large enough. If a white left a group, he or she was effortlessly scooped up and shunted into another conversation which might contain one or two pinks but was largely red. Any conversation entirely between white spots was gently broken up with a smile and an 'oh, but now you must meet-', or was joined by several red spots. Pinks, meanwhile, were delicately passed from red group to red group until they were deeply pink, and then they were allowed to mix with other pinks of the same hue, under the supervision of a red. In short, the pinks met so many reds, and so few whites, that they probably forgot about whites at all, while the whites, constantly alone or hugely outnumbered by reds or deep pinks, appeared to be going red out of embarrassment or a desire to blend in. Lord Winder was entirely surrounded by reds, leaving the few remaining whites out in the cold"
having the U$ Dollar NOT backed by gold and silver removes all checks and balances from the government... and this is what we are left with an overbearing government that can print money at will.
Did you read the article? Yahoo tried it, and pretty much failed.
Yahoo is a public company, and did not want to have a $91 million loss in addition to their already failed everything else.
How do you have a successful business with every page redirecting to static text?
And no one uses Yahoo, at least intentionally. How the shit do they fight back with a barely captive audience?
It's almost like you took your barely functioning understanding of the economy, and applied it to a minimalistic understanding of how economics actually works.
So Yahoo takes the burden, what happens to the rest of the companies? The competition? They learn not to oppose the government. Yahoo, from the article, was the first to comply. If they did not, and died as a company, would anything be different other than fewer @yahoo.com email addresses?
This country is fucked. Move on to the next one, ASAP.
Ironic, seeing how Madison got the US into a completely unnecessary war with England.
The damage the US has done to US Tech Companies has just started. International companies are dumping American Companies even though they tried to do the right thing. Something needs to be done to reign in the US government and in particular the military and nsa.
I wonder how charges like that could be reported on legally-required documents for publicly traded companies.
"USA Federal gov't fines: $10M*
* Details not available. Ask the NSA, maybe they'll tell you."
fencepost
just a little off
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He also said the government's role is to protect the rich owner class from the poor. Which they're doing quite admirably.
The Founders spewed some really great rhetoric. But they also contradicted themselves quite regularly. It wasn't a time where being logically consistent was as important as appearing enlightened and wise at any given moment.
The general public sees through it a bit better these days, but is still suckered by colorful rhetoric fairly easily.
marching a conscripted army west of the Appalachians to fight a small group of moonshiners refusing to pay taxes on their moonshine because 'No taxation without representation' and unfavorable tax rates for individual versus commercial scale liquor production (the latter of whom could pay a large but commercial friendly flat fee, then pocket any profit above that.)
Hypocrisy may not be enshrined in the Constitution but it sure was enshrined in our founding fathers.
How naive. If the CEO did that they'd be promptly fired and replaced.
n/t
Thank you Dave Raggett
Secret program, secret law, secret agency, secret courts. How is this different from Soviet Russia again?
Woke up this morning to read about this. I know it is old news. But it got me to thinking.
In my gut, I love the USA, but when was the last time that I felt proud to be American? It has been a while.
How about others? What recent thing has the US done that made you feel proud?
It changed it because the 9/11 attacks targets the two pillars of American power: the banks and the government.
Absolutely false. Those two groups have benefited the most from the attacks, the banks and government were not targets of the attack.
Cui Bono becomes very interesting when finding out that numerous officials provided false information to the press and public about what we knew regarding the attacks. For example Bush flat out lied that we never considered such an attack, the FAA and military ran a simulation a year prior regarding the exact scenario of a plane being flown into WTC in an act of terrorism. The Secret Service also ran simulations about planes being flown into the White House prior to the attacks.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
if you can't afford to hire a hitman or assasin? just take these fucks out. they show up and threaten you into violating everyone's rights? fuck em. have them and their families killed.
I wonder how charges like that could be reported on legally-required documents for publicly traded companies.
"USA Federal gov't fines: $10M*
* Details not available. Ask the NSA, maybe they'll tell you."
The Courts have dealt with similar issues. The 5th amendment requires that you not be compelled to incriminate yourself, your income taxes require you disclose income. If you are engaged in illegal business this conflicts with your 5th Amendment rights.
The courts have ruled that in such cases you are required to disclose the amount, but may claim the source as privileged information under the 5th amendment.
I suspect something similar would happen. There would be an expense line for the amount of the fine, and since they aren't allowed to talk about what its for, they would claim a 5th amendment protection.
I suspect that major shareholders and the SEC, upon seeing this would apply the Streisand Effect rapidly, but that's a different subject.
This is only 91M a year.. Totally manageable for Yahoo.. I wonder if they could have deducted it against the taxes as the cost of doing business.
IIRC, Apple did not participate in PRISM for several years until Tim Cook took over as CEO.
I wonder how charges like that could be reported on legally-required documents for publicly traded companies. "USA Federal gov't fines: $10M* * Details not available. Ask the NSA, maybe they'll tell you."
Yes, that's exactly what they should have done.
we understand that it is a normal behavior for totalitarian regime
Has the United States of America become a member of The Totalitarian Club ?
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
In order to issue a fine the action should have required the courts and appeals process up even unto the Supreme Court before any fine could be started. Frankly the loss of 4,000 people, several buildings and and three aircraft did not and does not constitute a threat to national security. The US is strong enough to take quite a few similar attacks without collapse of the nation. All that was really proven was that some clever Arab lunatics managed to do some harm. It shows that they have no real ability to mount a serious attack. Conversely we have the ability to exterminate the entire Arab region with relative ease if we like, Perhaps these people should consider the fact that the efficient way to handle them is to kill all and let God sort the good ones from the bad ones. Playing silly little battlefield games uses up money and American lives. Maybe we simply need to do a demo and just eliminate one nation down to the last living creature.
Time to purge the Internet from our lives....life was fine before it became part of the culture, it'll be just as good once it's gone. Between the psychological manipulation done by the likes of social media companies on their users, to the constant threat of "being hacked", fuck it...time to switch off and get back to outdoor activities and interacting with living people and animals.... remember when the sky was actually blue instead of hazy gray due to all the chem trails being sprayed? Everyone is looking down at their devices, too busy to notice the planes spraying poison on them and their food supply. When I was younger I ran BBSs (Bulletin Board Systems for you born after 1990) to get money to fix and customize my gocarts and dirt bikes. My $2500 Packard Bell computer was just a tool to make a little spending money, it had nothing beyond that to do with my life. Now, shut people's computers down and they will go into an angry fit as they withdraw from their addiction. Although I'm in the IT business today, I could seriously give two fucks about computers, the Internet, or anything else electronic. I could do away with all of it today. I fixed shit before Google, and I can fix shit without it now. A simpler life will add years to your life expectancy and probably let you be a little healthier and happier in the process. Switch off the wifi radios, go back to hard wires...quit cooking your cells while you sleep. There...your life has been improved. Buy me a beer and we'll call it even.
As a public company, Y! would have needed to report the fine eventually. How would that go?
"if it failed to comply with a broad demand to hand over user data that the company believed was unconstitutional,"
Fucking American idiots. Learn to write your sentences more clearly. Unbelievable.
It would have been nice to see them try that, but realistically, it would be in contempt of court to just say, it's ok we'll pay the fine, so go away. The executive would end up in jail, and someone would be appointed to tow the line. Nothing would have changed in the end.
Sounds like blackmail don't it ?
It's not quite the same thing. Disclosing that the fine is from the NSA is not incriminating. It ITSELF is the crime. In your example, revealing your source of income is not a crime. Rather it would reveal a previously committed crime. So I'm not sure that failing to reveal financial information in line with public company laws falls under the heading of not incriminating yourself, because your having paid government fines is not a crime, so you can't incriminate yourself in that way.
You could just as much argue the opposite way. Revealing financial information about public companies is required under the law. Free speech is allowed under the constitution. Therefore, the NSA can get fucked with their secrecy orders. You're still left with one legal principle against another.
The constant hyper-paranoid security dragnet has turned the leaders of the United States into the evil tyrants the nation always trumpets that it was founded to resist. What a shame.
- A Yahoo! user (guess which one :))
Any company that goes along with unconstitutional acts is just as guilty, and are deserving of whatever punishment the people decide to dish out on them. Hopefully it will be civilized, but I will not shed a tear even if it's not.
This is in part because we can sense that future, even worse, shocks are coming.
Now that they have all the money AND have devalued the currency by a factor of 100 AND have all the power and control over every aspect of our lives, there is only one way for things to get better for THEM.
And that is to find ways to get rid of most of us.
People randomly pulling us over and stealing from us is designed to provoke a backlash. There will be more of it, and worse. It is time to stop using the "Welcome to the..." phrases. It is all about goodbyes now.
I come here for the love
This kind of stuff infuriates me to no end. Every time I read about a case like this I feel like I am going to explode from the anger insde.
The FISC and others claim that they have provisions in place to adequately assure rights are not violated. But our constitution already has provisions in place to protect rights. Lower laws do NOT TRUMP HIGHER LAWS! The "Protect America Act" is subject to the framework of our Constitution, not the other way around. and where a conflict arises, the higest law which is the Constitution of the United States of America, prevails.
The very concept of FISC is a violation of the rule of law and it's can't be valid by any stretch of the imagination. If valid, it in effect would completely nullify the true Judicial, and Legislative branches of our government, and every time I here it, I hear it in my head, spoken as though it is the absolute highest authority, all echoed with the arrogance in the voice of Roland Freisler.
FISC is constantly engaging in acts of insurrection and Rebellion against the United States of America. FISC is completely invalid, and subject the true rule of law and the true court system and subject to military response from the same.
If I ever receive any notice from such an entity, it will immediately be published, without regard, or response, and assistance of the true courts and law will be sought.
Just pull a Lerner... 'Shoot, we lost it.'
Americans seem to have a better chance at shaming the NFL into dealing with Ray Rice than they do at shaming the government to do something about the NSA.
Pissed off customers have the potential to lead to empty seats and lost profits. Pissed off citizens... well, you might get less votes if the "other guys" seem a little better, but the "other guys" are really part of the same system and many of the entrenched interests don't actually change when a different party is voted in.
Has the United States of America become a member of The Totalitarian Club ?
Yes. Each President has been moving in this direction more and more, but Obama has managed to overreach even more than those before him. Take the IRS, for instance. I personally know of people who have been getting involved with Tea Party politics and now are getting audited. Like their politics or not (it doesn't matter), that is totalitarianism, which means the next time a GOP'er gets in, he can do the same thing. It isn't a good time to be an American.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
Give me a break. This happend under *your* guys, W and Cheney, who brought you monstrous deficits via an illegal and immoral war of conquest (see the papers the US and the UK signed around, what, 05?), and tax breaks. Of course, you didn't get the real payback, but you imagine that Any Day Now, you'll be rich, and so they won't spy on you, or tax you....
mark
He never mentioned they were "his guys". You did. Pharmboy mentioned he had friends involved in Tea Party politics. Or are you suggesting that people only stick to their own kind? That's rather closed minded of you.
They'll sell you a keyboard and mouse combination every day for 250.000. Or a toilet seat.
As you point out, not all birds of a feather stick together. I'm not a Tea Party guy. I'm just not closed minded enough to judge a friend by their politics. If you only have friends that agree with your politics, you are probably narrow minded or take politics too seriously.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
The damage the US has done to US Tech Companies has just started. International companies are dumping American Companies even though they tried to do the right thing. Something needs to be done to reign in the US government and in particular the military and nsa.
Correct, and just starting:
http://linux-beta.slashdot.org/story/14/09/12/229243/city-of-turin-to-switch-from-windows-to-linux-and-save-6m-euros
Sure save few Euros but also don't need to worry about an NSA backdoor in Windows or some US judge claiming that European data in Europe can be grabbed because on servers owned by a US based company.
I know, getting away from Microsoft has been tried in Europe before and failed but Europeans did not have incentive of arrogant US law enforcement getting into the act. If US wants data on foreign soil, ask, nicely. Not strong arm a US company to get it for you.