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Is the Outrage Over the FBI's Seattle Times Tactics a Knee-Jerk Reaction?
reifman writes The Internet's been abuzz the past 48 hours about reports the FBI distributed malware via a fake Seattle Times news website. What the agency actually did is more of an example of smart, precise law enforcement tactics. Is the outrage online an indictment of Twitter's tendency towards uninformed, knee-jerk reactions? In this age of unwarranted, unconstitutional blanket data collection by the NSA, the FBI's tactics from 2007 seem refreshing for their precision.
Not only that, but from what I can tell there was no malware. And the fake website was just a page on a website where the FBI could see the logs. They e-mailed him a link to a story. When he clicked on the link they could see the IP address which requested the story. Nothing I read says it was any more sophisticated than that. I'm not sure they'd even need a warrant to do this. It's no different then e-mailing him a phone number and looking at the caller ID when he calls it. That's not private information.
"except under oath"? Don't tell that to Mark Furhman, who perjured himself in the O.J. Simpson trial, and was fined $200, YES TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS and had ZERO days in jail.
And the 32 cops of 8 divisions who watched Rodney King be beaten to a pulp, then PERJURED their sworn reports? Not one single arrest, no fines, no jail
Cops most certainly CAN lie under oath, since it costs them nothing and they do not go to prison!
No fraud took place. Hoax, perhaps, but not fraud...
Keep trying...
So first you demand that people cite actual laws, and you refuse to accept things like "copyright infringement", "slander of title", or "defamation of character".
And then when someone cites chapter and verse of the law you reply with a wikipedia link saying it isn't correct.
No, for the law cited above it was fraud. The definition in that chapter is clear: "For the purposes of this chapter, the term “scheme or artifice to defraud” includes a scheme or artifice to deprive another of the intangible right of honest services." They were expecting the honest service of the specific newspaper. Instead they received a different service, an intentionally deceptive site that transmits something called a "computer contaminant" in the law. Chapter 63 (criminal fraud) doesn't have any of the now-common exceptions "except for law enforcement as part of an investigation". Officers can commit quite a lot of what would normally be crimes when they get court approval, but fraud is not on that list.
Their malware is covered under at least one of the variations in the state law, RCW 9A.52.110, 120, and 130. Since the government may argue it wasn't done with the intent to commit another crime (since they were intending to enforce laws but accidentally committed crimes in the process) then 110 may be out, but 120 and 130 both apply.
For copyright, you can pick quite a few different laws under title 17. Several of the exclusive rights in 106 were violated, as were 113. Their designs were protected so 1301. You can pick and choose quite a few more under Copyright as well, with a notable absence of court-authorized police action exemption.
For trademarks the newspapers have certainly trademarked their logos, names, and probably a few other distinctive elements.15 USC 1114 seems to have that covered quite thoroughly, including penalties against DNS hijacking. And thanks to 15 USC 122, they cannot claim immunity for that one.
Defamation is pretty strong since their use injures the newspaper's reputation. People will now pause and think "why should I go there since the government hijacks them"? While there is the statute, it is now the court's test that qualifies it. The four-prong test by the court is, first, a false element purported to be fact (in this case, they communicated that the false website was true), second that it was published (clearly the fact was published), third, actual fault on the person making the statement amounting to at least negligence (in fact, it amounts to the level of fraud, as covered above), and fourth, some harm to the subject of the statement (which can be shown as a harm to trust and harm to their stock). Again, there is no "official government action immunity" to commit fraud thanks to 42 USC 1983. Now if they had limited it to the very specific individuals under investigation this one might not apply as a legal intercept, but since they chose to throw a broad net and infected thousands, causing a huge impact to their brand the single authorized intercept exemption doesn't apply.
I'm sure there are many more, but while some laws make exception for court-authorized police action, these specific laws do not.
//TODO: Think of witty sig statement