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EFF: Cisco Shouldn't Get Off the Hook For Aiding Torture In China (eff.org)
itwbennett writes: In a lawsuit in Northern California that was dismissed in 2014, Falun Gong practitioners alleged that Cisco Systems built a security system, dubbed "Golden Shield," for the Chinese government knowing it would be used to track and persecute members of the religious minority. That case is being appealed, and on Monday the EFF, Privacy International and free-speech group Article 19 filed a brief that supports the appeal. Many U.S. and European companies sell technology to regimes that violate human rights, and if this case goes to trial and Cisco loses, they may think twice, said EFF Staff Attorney Sophia Cope. "In a lot of instances, these companies are selling directly to the government, and they know exactly what is going to be happening," Cope said.
this is just ridiculous.
What's next?
Someone intentionally runs down another person with their car and Ford gets sued?
Ginsu gets sued because some nutso housewife decided to stab her spouse and their spawns?
The local water company gets sued when someone drowns someone in a bath tub, because after all, the water company provided the water....
They won't think twice. They've already considered the risk case and built the probable legal loss into the cost of the product.
The only way to even dream of making companies not do this is to make the decision makers and eventually the shareholders liable for crimes against humanity personally, without the possibility of the corporation buying off the government as they do for such things now.
Of course the government in question is broke and corrupt to the point where turning away billions in bribes (sorry I mean legal penalties) won't even occur, never mind actually happening.
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
Then it should go to jail.
Not the CEO of course, because he and his board has the corporate shield, but the company itself. Massive fines/tarrifs/penalties.
I remember Putin seizing control from Yeltsin. He then turned to taking over the TV stations...and brought in an US company to manage them.
"Capitists will sell us the rope with which to hang them." Communism or post-communism standard dictatorship, they just want the power.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Considering practically every major open source software project is released to the world at large with full knowledge that some bad people will do some bad things with the software, then I'm sure the 100% non-hypocritical EFF will be happy to attack every single open source project that has been misused.
Or, to put things more "practically", the EFF is probably making all this noise because they want a nice "donation" from Cisco and the check hasn't arrived in the mail yet.
Slashdot no longer has a logo graphic in the upper-left corner of the page. What's the problem?
I agree that Cisco shouldn't be allowed to do this, but you can't retroactively make something illegal, and courts aren't legislatures. If you want to make something illegal, pass a law. You can't just sue someone for doing something you don't like.
If you make a statement to your water company that you intend to kill hostages by drowning them in your pool and they come out and add a water main and turn it up with knowledge of your intent, then they are aiding that intent. The problem is companies that sell overseas don't always sell to the bad actors directly. Just like we bought titanium through a dummy corporation from Russia to build the SR71 use to spy on them, most of these companies sell their products to someone who has money or through partners and really don't know or can't control how their products are used. It is very similar to car companies being libel for all automobile deaths, or plastic companies being held to account for all people killed by plastic bags either intentionally or unintentionally. We are getting into a ridiculously litigious society where there need to be walls built against these kinds of frivolous lawsuits, and the walls need to be built on uncommon sense, otherwise to say this will have chilling effects goes without saying.
Imagine having to sign 200 pages of paperwork to buy a a golf ball and that golf ball costing three hundred dollars because the golf ball company wants to insure you won't kill anyone with it, give it to babies, sell it to a pyromaniac, dispose of it in an environmentally impacting way or give it to anyone without transfer of the legal indemnification such that you don't give it to an astronaut who takes it to the ISS, then takes it on a space walk, drops it, and then ten years later it decays in orbit, crashes into a huge satellite triggering its thrusters to fire and crashing it into the ISS which cause it to spin out of control and smash into a few more satellites taking out all communications and turning LEO into a death zone. Then ten months later debris falls from space and crashes into a freeway taking out a tanker truck full of toxic gas killing five hundred people in a mall nearby and suddenly the golf ball company is guilty of mass murder, terrorist attacks, destroying governments satellites, war crimes and causing the stock market to crash.
How long until we hear the news about a backdoor in Cisco equipment now that the Juniper and Fortinet ones have surfaced?
Let's make a trade. We'll agree that Cisco is a money grubbing enterprise that doesn't have a soul and is a sellout in exchange for not having that )(!@)#! Shen Yun crap every year.
Deal?
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
They probably like the json license. Its disliked in the whole free software and open source community, not even google likes it even though its infamous clause sounds so similar to their former motto.
Is it "freedom" to try to tell Cisco -- retroactively -- who they can and can't do business with? Shouldn't Cisco be free to sell electronic equipment to whomever will pay? Should Cisco be neutral and sell to everyone, or should Cisco discriminate? Why is this any of this the EFF's business at all?
W and Dick got off the hook. Why should elected officials have a different standard than CEOs?
I was hoping Bernie S. would have the gonads to re-open those investigations.
Table-ized A.I.
does that go for all the weapons sales too?
The USA violates human rights, should companies be on the hook for that too if they sell any equipment to any U.S. government agencies.
This is a sad example of people trying to selectively export their laws, values and culture and impose sanctions by the back door via retroactive punitive measures on a 3rd party. If this is how they choose to go about this there is no end to the jeopardy for companies merely trying to compete in the global market and ultimately it will hurt Californian companies and help foreign competition.
EFF have completely lost the plot.
World leaders continued to queue up to lead trade delegations to China to grab more business.
Once there, they will make brief, carefully stage-managed comments about "human rights" before getting right back down to business.
Back home, they might meet the Dali Lama in between negotiations about selling-off the latest piece of the nation's infrastructure.
What a cynical pantomime.
Meanwhile, our "friends" in China continue to prop-up the North Korean regime, and are so emboldened by Western inaction that they are now snatching dissidents off the street in Hong Kong and taking them to the mainland for *ahem* "questioning". So much for the "one country, two systems" promises.
No wonder the Taiwanese just kicked-out the KMT (who lost power for the first time EVER) for being too pro-China and "reunification".
The voters have seen the end of that film in Tibet and HK...
Oh yeah, and financed by us shipping all our manufacturing base and jobs out there, they're now constructing their own aircraft carrier, that's in addition to building and fortifying artificial islands in the South China Sea. No red flags!
So yes, let's continue to make a buck and help them out!
What if the software and systems used were open source?
Most of us probably know that IBM sold computers to Nazi Germany which were used to help keep track of stuff in their concentration. IBM knew what was going on there as Cisco knew what it was doing here. All for a buck. Trouble is, it's hard to claim to be a country that stands behind human rights while at the same time helping people specifically violate those rights. Knowing China tortures people it doesn't like, it's clear social responsibility goes out the window when it comes to profit.Yahoo gave their search engine saying "it's the law in China" around 2004 leading to the torture of 2 reporters (if my memory is correct). At a Foreign Affairs committee they got blasted by the leader, Tom Lantos (rightfully so in my opinion). The problem is, when you do business with a country that is well known to act in was contrary to what we consider ethical/moral this is inevitable. So why do we still do it? Because convenience is more valuable to us than our sense of morality. People would scream about not having their "cheap Chinese underwear" if we stopped trading with them on moral grounds. (As if we'd ever entertain doing this). If people want this to change we have to vote with ourr minds, hearts and dollars. Something we all seem to forget as we say, "shame on you" and then buy our products from people we know do things we public denounce. Something to ponder on...
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
If we're going to talk about massive electronics companies that have done things they shouldn't years ago why not hold IBM accountable too? Godwin's law would be disappointed if no one mentioned it.
Personally I think expecting massive corps that operate exclusively for the short term benefit of their shareholders to not lie cheat and steal and otherwise act badly to increase short term profits is like expecting a politician to not be influenced by lobbying. (that's what we call legalized bribery here in the US).
sirus xm merger
alltel verizon merger
att direct tv merger
VW emissions cheating
Apple price fixing, attacking realplayer with drm.
Sony rootkits.
Need I go on? They are quite happy to screw you over if it makes them an extra 10 cents at the end of the year.
It's more of a systemic problem they are setup to work this way. As they are most often run by the numbers alone.
Minimum threshold fixed. Thanks!
I don't think IBM was ever punished for working with a certain Hollerith card customer of theirs in 1930s Germany.
http://csr.cisco.com/casestudy/connecting-sichuan
It's tangential to the core issue here, but interesting to read. Aliens and ghosts, claims of levitation and healing powers. http://content.time.com/time/w...
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.
I hate it when companies say, "We like to think that our presence in China is helping to spread democracy there." Nope - not if the company is helping the Chinese government repress people.
Many U.S. and European companies sell technology to regimes that violate human rights, and if this case goes to trial and Cisco loses, they may think twice, said EFF Staff Attorney Sophia Cope.
I hope someone will compile a list of these companies and technologies, and and I hope this list is widely publicized. Boycotts and/or congressional actions against these sales might result from the list.
If someone aided the Chinese government in customizing the open source software with the specific intent to violate human rights in ways that are illegal in the US, then that person should face charges. If they produce generic software that is used by China for that purpose, that's fine. That seems to be a pretty clear distinction.
Fa Lun Gong is even less legitimate of a "religion" than Scientology. It's a cult, pure and simple, that makes up these accusations on little to no grounds. It's hard to guess at how much of what they say is actually factual given that they're a cult and their take on things is not necessarily based in reality. They would have one believe that the Chinese government has a whole division set up to farm cultists for organs or something, whereas in reality it's probably more closer to the cultists who were sentenced to death for treason (large-scale incitement to overthrow the government, causing social disarray, etc.) had their organs harvested because why waste them. It's not that easy to be sentenced to death for treason in China despite what they'll have you believe, so this would by no means be an ordinary affair.
It's hard to take them seriously since they are so detached from reality. It seems like mindless communist bashing is part of their "religious" belief system, and if one thinks about the logistics required to carry out what they claim is done one can see that it's all not very likely. Whatever legitimate complaints that they do have is distorted to the point that it is impossible to separate truth from fantasy.
Cisco have a track record. This is not the first situation like this.
A classic example is sending security guards in to drag a guy out of a courtroom in Seattle while the hearing was in session - how's that for contempt for people and the laws that are supposed to protect them?
Everybody knows how China treats their citizens. Which giant American company does NOT do business with them?