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Laptop Destroyed Over Snowden Leaks Is Now an Art Exhibit
An anonymous reader sends word that a busted MacBook Air and a Western Digital hard drive that once held Snowden revelations are going on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. "The remains of computer hardware which had contained the Guardian's London trove of Snowden documents – and which was destroyed on the rather spiteful demands of GCHQ personnel – have gone on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum. While the frankly unremarkable remnants of a MacBook Air are uninteresting in and of themselves – who among us has not taken an angle grinder to an errant machine? – the causes of the MacBook Air's destruction are seemingly interesting enough to merit those remnants being considered art and subsequently included in V&A's new exhibition about 'the museum as a public space and the role of public institutions in contemporary life.' Disconcertingly titled All of This Belongs to You, the exhibition is to include 'three specially curated displays,' among which is Ways to be Secret, which will examine what the curators describe as 'the contradiction between our concern for online privacy and our obsession with sharing via social media.'"
You seem to be saying that they ordered the guardian employees to destroy the laptops to keep the information secret, I think even they knew that destroying these few copies wouldn't really do anything to curtail its distribution. At the very least their actions were a act of spite against others airing their dirty laundry. They may also have been a threat, kind of like a mob goon keying your car or forcing you to steal under threat of injury/death. In either case leaving the laptop with their victims would help drive home their anger, in hindsight I'm sure they wished they had simply taken the laptops as the act has become less of a threat and more of a rallying cry.
http://www.theguardian.com/wor...
I recall this being a thing with law enforcement in England. I have read stories of police seizing people's computers for various investigation reasons and then returning them in ruined states, even when no charges are filed or the party is exonerated. So it could simply be part of the LEO culture there, destroying people's computers when they annoy you is just a socially accepted (within agencies) way to thumb their nose at citizens.