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Feds: We're Pulling Data From 100 Phones Seized During Trump Inauguration (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: In new filings, prosecutors told a court in Washington, DC that within the coming weeks, they expect to extract all data from the seized cellphones of more than 100 allegedly violent protesters arrested during the inauguration of President Donald Trump. Prosecutors also said that this search is validated by recently issued warrants. The court filing, which was first reported Wednesday by BuzzFeed News, states that approximately half of the protestors prosecuted with rioting or inciting a riot had their phones taken by authorities. Prosecutors hope to uncover any evidence relevant to the case. Under normal judicial procedures, the feds have vowed to share such data with defense attorneys and to delete all irrelevant data. "All of the Rioter Cell Phones were locked, which requires more time-sensitive efforts to try to obtain the data," Jennifer Kerkhoff, an assistant United States attorney, wrote. Such phone extraction is common by law enforcement nationwide using hardware and software created by Cellebrite and other similar firms. Pulling data off phones is likely more difficult under fully updated iPhones and Android devices.

30 of 233 comments (clear)

  1. So, the gist of it is... by Powercntrl · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...if you're going to a protest, bring a burner phone. Bonus points if you set the wallpaper to goatse.

    --

    ---
    DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
    1. Re:So, the gist of it is... by Shatrat · · Score: 4, Insightful

      But the entire point of going to the protest is to put selfies of it up on social media to impress your friends and piss off that one uncle.

      --
      09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
    2. Re:So, the gist of it is... by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Insightful

      or don't bring one at all..

      Then how are you going to coordinate the riot?

    3. Re:So, the gist of it is... by HornWumpus · · Score: 2

      Some way that doesn't leave an electronic trail that will make conspiracy charges easy peasy?

      This couldn't happen to a bigger group of assholes, so good.

      --
      John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
    4. Re:So, the gist of it is... by swb · · Score: 5, Interesting

      More than a burner, they should coordinate their burners. Load them up with tantalizing information that wastes a ton of investigation time, but being careful not to have any actual prosecutor conspiracies.

      Use burners with known weaknesses or backdoors and set them up with passcodes or weak encryption so they look legitimate but are easily broken with diagnostic software.

      Emails about stuff supposedly buried in parks, or sunk in lakes at specific GPS coordinates. Treasure-map fantasies. Rent a storage space and decorate it with Independence Day decorations, but make it sound like it's full of anarchist equipment.

      Bonus points if you can capture video streams of the Feds digging up a park or walking into a storage locker filled with decorations.

      If you did it right, they might get tired of grabbing phones with the idea that they won't know which ones have real solid info and which ones will leave them chasing their tails.

    5. Re:So, the gist of it is... by future+assassin · · Score: 3, Interesting

      or don't bring one at all..

      Then how are you going to coordinate the riot?

      I should ask my mom how they coordinated these protests in the black pre mobile phone ages http://www.lubin82.pl/fotograf... I was (9) at those, still have the smell of tear gas show up once in a while when I smell certain chemicals.

      --
      by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
    6. Re: So, the gist of it is... by stjobe · · Score: 2

      Republic, not democracy.

      Those terms are not mutually exclusive. The US is a federal presidential constitutional republic, but that does not mean it isn't also a democracy - i.e. a government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives.

      There are precious few direct democracies in the world, Switzerland perhaps counts since they do tend to have nation-wide votes on issues more often than other countries, but most western countries- including the US - are representative democracies. Apart from that they can be monarchies (UK, Sweden), republics (US, France), or some other form of state; but they are all of them democracies.

      --
      "Total destruction the only solution" - Bob Marley
    7. Re: So, the gist of it is... by HornWumpus · · Score: 2

      So far the prosecutors record is 3/6 (for felonies). Two weren't the brightest bulbs, the third got real unlucky. That's not counting people I met subsequent to their involvement with courts. Couldn't begin to calculate my 'got away with it total', depends on how you count the counts.

      It would be fair to say: I don't have an excessive respect for the law. Also mild case of explosive pyromania as a teen (nothing bigger than two kilos of explosive). I know I've dodged some bullets, once spotted 'shiney shoes' on the way up to the Sierra and detoured (pre 215). Garden was fine, there was a flash of mutual recognition (they saw me 'see them') but I didn't lead them anywhere. I think they were looking for tweak labs, not gardens in any case. It's kind of obvious tweak is not my drug of choice, people my age that do tweak look like they're 3/4 dead already.

      Even as a kid: I've walked out of parties when people started getting ready to take pictures of felonious activities.

      The asshats mistake in this case was allowing themselves to be used as props. Never allow yourself to be a pawn in somebody else's conspiracy. Keep your mouth shut, never record details, watch your use of tech. They did everything exactly wrong, to say nothing of being misinformed idiots in the first place.

      --
      John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
    8. Re:So, the gist of it is... by ichthus · · Score: 2

      Or, make sure that when George Soros hires you to protest, he also provides you with a phone.

      --
      sig: sauer
    9. Re:So, the gist of it is... by HornWumpus · · Score: 2, Informative

      The leading Birther was Hillary, during the 2008 primary. But don't let facts get in the way of a good rant.

      --
      John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
    10. Re:So, the gist of it is... by knorthern+knight · · Score: 2

      > magine if 10,000 people showed up and were 'violent enough' (not
      > that I even believe this crap) to get their phones stolen. yes, stolen,
      > not 'seized'. and they put nothing but encrypted random bytes on it.

      > the so-called authorities would spend man-years trying to get nothing.

      > imagine if it was 100k or 1M people.

      Or you may be in a similar situation, and if you're in a situation like
      That, there's only one thing you can do:

      Walk into the shrink wherever you are, just walk in, say, "Shrink, . . . you
      Can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant", and walk out.

      You know, if one person, just one person, does it, they may think he's
      Really sick and they won't take him.

      And if two people do it, in harmony, they may think they're both faggots and
      They won't take either of them.

      And if three people do it! Can you imagine three people walkin' in, singin'
      A bar of "Alice's Restaurant" and walkin' out? They may think it's an Organization!

      And can you imagine fifty people a day? I said FIFTY people a day . . .
      Walkin' in, singin' a bar of "Alice's Restaurant" and walkin' out? Friends,
      They may think it's a MOVEMENT, and that's what it is: THE ALICE'S
      RESTAURANT ANTI-MASSACREE MOVEMENT! . . . and all you gotta do to join is to
      Sing it the next time it comes around on the guitar.

      --

      I'm not repeating myself
      I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
  2. All 100 attendees by SlashDread · · Score: 5, Funny

    became violent protestors during his inauguration? WTF did the man even say?

  3. Two things: by rmdingler · · Score: 4, Funny

    All of the Rioter Cell Phones were locked, which requires more time-sensitive efforts to try to obtain the data," Jennifer Kerkhoff, an assistant United States attorney, wrote.

    Every last one of the seized phones were locked? That seems hardly representative of the general population, although I suppose "violent protesters" may indeed be more security conscious.

    Jennifer Kerkhoff. J. Kerkhoff. I mean, no surprise in her career selection of prosecuting attorney after what must've been some pretty tough early years in school.

    --
    Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

    Ernest Hemingway

    1. Re:Two things: by sound+vision · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I can't remember ever borrowing or watching someone open their phone and there wasn't a lock on it. Yes, an actual lock with some kind of code, not just "slide to unlock". Actually, and I'm really really thinking deeply now, I did see one phone without a lock on it. It was a flip phone that was owned by my mother and never used.

      I would wager that the number of unlocked phones at a violent protests is about the same as the number of flip phones. Very low, but non-zero. Will you see one in a sample of 100? Maybe, maybe not.

      Now, what may have happened to skew the sample is that people who unlocked their phones for the cops weren't arrested. Or, their phones weren't confiscated as evidence.

  4. RICO by sycodon · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Can we say RICO?

    If they can establish the violence was planned and coordinated, how many years is that?

    --
    When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
    1. Re: RICO by Zero__Kelvin · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You can say it, you just have no idea what it actually applies to, because there is absolutely zero chance that there was any racketeering involved. You seem to think RICO is about crowd mobs rather than Italian ones.

      --
      Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
    2. Re: RICO by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      " He came to power by forging a sword made of hate, fear, innuendo, lies, manipulation, false allegations, bigotry, and misogyny."

      Clinton tried to come to power by forging a sword made of hate, fear, innuendo, lies, manipulation...
      ...and false allegations OF bigotry, and misogyny.

      It was quite efficient too. She didn't win, but you DID believe her lies.

    3. Re: RICO by Salgak1 · · Score: 2

      Problem is, RICO has long been abused. A law designed to stop the Mafia and similar criminal organizations has been used to smear political opponents, prosecute anti-abortion activists, and attack corporations over alleged collusion over 'climate change'.

      It's also a favorite tool to employ when a prosecutor or law-enforcement agency wants to grab assets, under criminal AND civil forfeiture. . .

  5. You are thinking of someone else by SuperKendall · · Score: 2

    The one saying she would get on her knees if you voted the way she wanted was not Trump

    Side note: Liberals are so stupid Snopes had to actually cover this item to explain it was not a real offer....

    Snopes is going soft though; no coverage of the veracity on her level of eye contact or swallowing.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  6. Re:That's what happened at Hitler's inauguration by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Informative

    Anne Frank's diary was written long after the end of WWII, using a ballpoint pen (which wasn't invented until after WWII)

    That is holocaust denialist BS that has been debunked:

    Anne wrote the body of her diary with a fountain pen. The only things written in ballpoint pen ink are two loose notes written by someone else and put with the papers later and some page numbers written on the sheets during the compilation process.

    There is a long history of neo-Nazis trying to discredit Anne's diaries, so in 1963 her defenders tracked down the arresting officer that led the raid on their hideout. He corroborated nearly everything that Anne's father had said.

  7. Define "protest" by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Setting fires to cars and smashing windows is not a "protest".

    You would think criminals would already know to use burner phones...

    But then how would these gangsters be able to adequately send a selfie to Instagram in front of a smashed up store or burning vehicle? The cameras on burner phones suck, not to mention it would't have your Starbucks card loaded.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  8. Re:That's what happened at Hitler's inauguration by number6x · · Score: 2

    Awesome!

    Neo-Nazi B.S. de-bunked by an actual ex-Nazi!

    +1 Awesome Informative points.

  9. Missing operant term by s.petry · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The people arrested didn't seem to be the deluge of selfie taking people. The recommendation should be to simply not be violent at a protest so that you are not arrested, which results in the confiscation of your phone (and generally a good chuck of cash, and perhaps anal virginity).

    I'm probably one of the most pro Free Speech people you will ever meet. Free Speech does not include any form of violence. See the Non Aggression Principle

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  10. Re:What a letdown... by Somebody+Is+Using+My · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I really do not see that much of an issue with this.

    The government got a warrant to search the electronic devices. These devices were seized at the time of arrest. Rather than require the owners to unlock the phones - potentially violating our protected right against self-incrimination - they are using third-party software to hack the devices. The government intends - admittedly, as legally required - to share all gathered information with the defense lawyers - and are pledging to delete any information not relevant to the case.

    You can make the argument that some of the people arrested during the riots are innocent. That may be true, but irrelevant to the issue at hand: that the government is searching these devices. You might argue that the government may use the information gleaned from the devices in ways that are not covered by the warrant, and that is a legitimate worry but there is no evidence that is happening. But given that these people were arrested, we should expect the prosecutors to use all available legal means to build a case against the defendants. That they are searching the phones is as much a story if the police had gotten a warrant to seize the defendants diaries (which is to say, not much of a story) .

    The fact is, there were apparently riots during the inauguration. I am no supporter of Trump but that's just shameful; there's nothing wrong with assembly and protest but some people went beyond that. People were arrested and honestly I would expect the government to try them for their actions. There is a lot I find worrisome about Trump's government, but this is not one of them; this is a case where everything seems to be done legitimately and by-the-book.

  11. Re:That's what happened at Hitler's inauguration by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Informative

    So the original claim that she was not only at his Innauguration, but also had her diary with her, is at least two kinds of bullshit itself.

    Except that nobody claimed that. The famous diary writer at Hitler's inauguration was Joseph Goebbels. His diary is fascinating to read, and provides a huge amount of insight into the inner workings of Nazi Germany, unlike Anne's which is just the musing of a girl locked in a room.

  12. George Soros on speed dial? by erp_consultant · · Score: 2

    Obviously an organized protest. Should be interesting.

  13. Re:That's what happened at Hitler's inauguration by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Informative

    Neo-Nazi B.S. de-bunked by an actual ex-Nazi!

    Actually, most Neo-Nazi BS is best debunked by actual Nazis. "The Holocaust never happened" is thoroughly debunked by Nazi testimony at Nuremberg. The defenses fell in one of two categories:

    1. Yes, I killed people, but I was just following orders, so I am not responsible.
    2. Yes, I gave orders, but I didn't actually kill anyone myself, so I am not responsible.

    But NONE of them use the defense, or ever claimed, that the killings didn't happen, or that the death camps didn't exist. No one claimed that until many years later.

  14. Re: Or just don't violently riot. by ogdenk · · Score: 2

    No, Trump won. You're just butt-hurt because California doesn't get to decide who the president is for the rest of the United States. You seem to forget that the US is really 50 countries that decided to form a union. The Electoral College was set up to make sure one state can't exert undue influence over the rest of the US. While Clinton got more in the popular vote due to rabid idiots in a few blue states, the majority of the US did not want her ass in office.

    Gary Johnson didn't win but you don't see me trying to alter reality to make it seem like he did and it's all a big conspiracy by neo-nazi, misogynist, homophobic, transphobic, islamophobic racists.

    Perhaps the DNC shouldn't have screwed Bernie?

  15. Re: Or just don't violently riot. by Bartles · · Score: 2

    What we learned was that he probably wasn't actually stealing from the store, but rather had come back in after earlier conducting an illegal Drug Transaction, and the clerk let him walk out with a pack of cigars without paying for them. (Cutting open a cigar and rolling a joint with it is called making a "blunt", just FYI, and is most likely what he wanted them for.)

    Umm. No, that's not what happened. The only time he left the store with the cigars, he strong armed the clerk on the way out the door.

  16. Maybe not by dbIII · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Load them up with tantalizing information that wastes a ton of investigation time

    Maybe not.
    Your time gets wasted a lot as well answering questions.
    As an (old) example Steve Jackson Games employees had a lot of trouble over the "GURPS Cyberpunk" game rules after a Secret Service raid despite it being extremely obvious fantasy/SF (1990, so the computer you are using today would have been wild SF let alone cyberpunk stuff).
    http://www.sjgames.com/SS/
    Your obvious fabrication, selectively quoted, could end up resulting in serious prison time for you if it looks like somebody can get a promotion for catching conspiritators.


    Thinking about it as if you are going to be dealing with an ideal justice system is probably a very bad idea. I'd say expect less comic book more Kafka (or similar eastern european writer describing a corrupt justice system).