So what they want, is a master key, so they can unlock any iPhone whenever and wherever they want, without a big hassle.
No, no, no, no. All they want is a key to this one phone. Honest. That such a key would also work to unlock every other similar phone is pure coincidence. That wasn't their intention. Really. Though now that you mention it... when we are done here, we have this stack of seized iPhones we want to talk about.
As much as I'd prefer Apple to win, their argument that Congress NOT passing a law is the same as Congress passing the opposite law is a bit silly. The fact that Congress didn't pass a law making cardboard legal is NOT the same as Congress passing a law making cardboard illegal.
Bad analogy or strawman. Congress has never had a bill brought before it to legalize cardboard that I know of, and on the very off chance it has, it was killed for being a joke, not on the merits. This means there is no information about how Congress feels about the legality of cardboard, and certainly nothing to indicate Congress feels cardboard should be illegal. Also, the default is for such things to be legal for citizens, so by not passing a law to prohibit it, it defaults to legal.
On the other hand, Congress has debated legislation related to the issues in this case and therefore has a record of choosing not to enact such police authority, so it can be directly inferred that Congress has chosen NOT to give this ability to the police. And for such police powers, the default is typically that they have no more power than a regular citizen, and in some ways less, unless that power has been granted them by a law, and in this case it has not.
I think this is a great idea, but I don't think they can do it now until this situation is settled in the court. Not doing what the government has taken them to court on is one thing, but making what they are wanting harder while it isn't settled is obstruction of justice (I'm not a lawyer so the charge may not be exact but you get the idea).
Since this "is only seeking access to Farook's phone and no one else's", then as long as whatever Apple does doesn't affect "this one phone" it wouldn't be a legal problem since they aren't making what this court wants harder.
The political ramifications though, are left as an exercise for the reader.
I don't know if you know the answer to this or not, but if someone leaves their iPhone sitting around can anyone pick it up, enter the incorrect PIN 10 times, and destroy all of the data on it?
If the phone has that feature enabled (not the default), the answer is yes.
In order to proceed with a lawsuit, you have to show that you have standing. Without harm (any amount of damages), you don't have standing to sue. So this ruling is NOT about how much, instead it is about if ANY harm occurred.
You are correct. Courts generally require the demonstration of harm to prove standing, so if you can't demonstrate that harm has occurred, then you can't proceed. Theoretical possible future harm is normally not enough, as the defendants here tried to argue was the case, though the judge decided differently (hence why it is news). This problem comes up a lot in lawsuits.
One example I dealt with recently is with a wrongful foreclosure in a non-judicial state. The company foreclosing couldn't show they were the successor in interest to the note, in fact there is another company that thinks they are, but the first company initiated foreclosure proceedings anyway. The court said since the homeowner hasn't yet been harmed, they had no standing to contest the foreclosure. It is only after their home is taken away that they will have standing to go to court, but with quiet title automatically given to the new owners, their home of 20 years is gone, and all they can then sue for is compensation for the harm done.
A normal update does require you to unlock the phone to accept the update. They're talking about leveraging recovery mode which can be used to force load an image onto a phone that might be otherwise unusable. See here - https://support.apple.com/en-u...
Yes. That's the exact Apple support page that worries me. It says "iTunes will try to reinstall iOS without erasing your data." Updating iOS in this way needs to either require my passcode or erase my data. I expect that it will in a future version version of hardware (because only doing it in software isn't enough).
I have gone through this process, so can speak from experience. My wife changed her passcode, then promptly forgot the new one. The only option according to Apple is to reinstall. But if the phone is previously synced to a computer, it has exchanged cookies that allow the computer to still access the phone's contents (this is one of the reasons why the FBI wanted to find that hard disk). When I did the reinstall, it first read the contents out like a normal backup, then installed a fresh OS, then restored the data from the backup. I think this is what they mean by "try to reinstall iOS without erasing your data." It does get erased, but is restored, so effectively not erased.
About six months later she did the same thing, except this time, she tried rebooting the phone. When I hooked it to the computer, the system was unable to access the phone, so the restore could only put back the data saved during the latest backup (about a month before). She was bummed since she lives off her phone's calendar and doesn't trust it backing up to iCloud.
To put this in perspective, that change in password would make anything found on the phone inadmissible in any trial as it indicates the chain of custody was broken.
And you would fail the bar exam. The password change would allow the opposing side (presumably defense) to challenge the validity and source of whatever information was obtained, but it would still be admitted so that the court (judge and/or jury) can decide how much it should be trusted. Think about a person running from the cops who throws a bag during the chase, and after catching him, go back and find the bag. What they find in the bag is still admissible even though it was out of the suspect's and the police's custody for a period of time. Even if a passerby picked it up and took it, then the police later came and asked if he had it, and he gave it to them, it would still be admissible. The defense would try to argue it could have been tampered with, but would likely lose (barring some evidence of tampering or that the second person had a known grudge against the suspect).
Fair Use is an affirmative defense, meaning you admit you violated the letter of the law (used part of a copyright work without express permission), but you had a legally acceptable reason for doing so
Can you clarify that? IANAL. Fair use is stated directly in US code. My reading of the law indicates that "fair use" is not a violation of copyright. It looks like in the past it was a violation, but no longer.
There are many laws that contain exceptions, except it becomes the "offenders" responsibility to prove the exception applies to his or her situation. This is called an affirmative defense. "In an affirmative defense, the defendant may concede that he committed the alleged acts, but he proves other facts which, under the law, either justify or excuse his otherwise wrongful actions, or otherwise overcome the plaintiff's claim."
As you cited, fair use is permitted under US law, but as the original AC pointed out, the law doesn't clearly define what is and what isn't allowed under fair use (which is why it is referred to as a "doctrine"), and has been left up to the courts to draw the line. Essentially, if you use copyrighted material without express permission, then you are breaking the copyright law. If the copyright holder objects, it is then your responsibility to show that your use falls into an allowed exception, not the copyright holders to show it doesn't. Remember, in a civil case, like for copyright infringement, it is based on preponderance, not reasonable doubt, which is why the burden shifts to the user. And what the courts feel does or doesn't fall into "fair use" varies significantly, so it becomes a gamble for those involved when the usage falls into a grey zone - and it is almost all grey!
I came to post similar information. Fair Use is an affirmative defense, meaning you admit you violated the letter of the law (used part of a copyright work without express permission), but you had a legally acceptable reason for doing so. The rights holder has the legal right to claim any use is infringing, and it is up to the user to show they their usage falls within one of the allowable exceptions, such as being a short excerpt, or a parody, or a critique, etc. Where the boundaries are between a short excerpt and a long one, is left as an exercise for the jurist, as are the boundaries for the other exceptions. In this case, Sony claimed the professor used songs without permission, and they are correct, so they complained to Youtube. At that point, it became the professor's responsibility to prove his use was allowable under the law according to the fair use doctrine (note it is a doctrine and not technically a law), which he appears to have done, at least to Youtube's satisfaction.
If the auto-wipe was disabled by the user (it's on by default), then you get an ever-increasing time delay enforced by the hardware in between PIN attempts. It would take upwards of a year to brute-force a 4-digit PIN unless you get very lucky.
Actually, there is a hack for that. I saw a demonstration of a device that uses the USB interface to try a small number of PINs, then resets the device before it records the failures, then tries another small number of PINs, and so on. It takes a few hours to a day to break a 4-digit PIN. Of course, my 12 character passcode would take somewhat longer.:)
The more common way for law enforcement to break protected iPhones is to gain access to the computer the phone is synced with, since to sync they exchange cookies which allows the computer to still access the device even when locked. Of course, I saw an article about the FBI scouring a lake for a hard drive so maybe that wasn't an option in this case.
Remember judges are elected, and sometimes they can be really, really dumb.
Federal District Court judges are not elected, they are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Judge Joanna Seybert was nominated by Clinton in 1993.
In other words, this is a (probably rare) legitimate application of copyright law, that hinges on whether the music company had the right to offer the song to CBS.
Yes
Seems fairly straightforward.
I take it you haven't dealt much with the US legal system then.
If you stand on someone's private property (including their online property) and spout hatred toward them there is nothing in the law to keep them from kicking you out.
Unfortunately in your example, invoking the use of verbally spouting hatred is a red hearing. If you are standing on THEIR PROPERTY, they can kick you out no matter what you are doing or saying, or not doing or saying.
The issues do however get more complex if the property is intended to be publicly accessible, like a store or restaurant, and the reason for kicking the person out is their inclusion in a legally protected group (race, ethnicity, religion, gender, handicapped, etc), but what they are saying isn't in any of those categories (though people often try to spin it into such a claim, like saying they were denouncing police harassment of [pick some group] and their being ejected is because they are part of that group, not because they were being loud, annoying, harassing, blocking aisles, not buying anything, etc).
5. The way the DMCA is written it doesn't matter how pathetic or useless the lock is, merely that someone tried to digitally protect it.
So, don't forget that defeating this flimsy javascript, is (according to a law bought and paid for by the copyright cartel) just the same as defeating crypto or breaking a physical lock.
Nope. You installed NoScript, or had javascript turned off due to annoying pop-ups, either done for legitimate reasons, then when you visited the site in question saw something you liked and copy/pasted it. No warning appeared. The fact that a "protection mechanism" was applied, but it only did anything when a subset (even if majority) of people went there, means they would have no valid recourse against you. Unless, perhaps, you were stupid enough to brag about how you got around their protections, but probably not even then.
It would be like putting a loud and irritating noise-maker outside your door and therefore believe anyone who ignored it, covered their ears, or wore earplugs were actively defeating it, but then crying foul and suing when deaf people still came by since they didn't know it was there, or people did cover their ears since they thought the noise was an error by you. The judge would chuckle a little, look at you, and say dismissed.
Just because you can defeat it won't protect you from copyright claims.
As the saying goes, you can sue for anything, so you can't protect yourself from someone making a claim. But in this case, their claim would fall flat and be dismissed in about one legal step.
And on August 10, 1996, a failure of one high-voltage power line caused a cascade failure that took out power to seven western US states, two Canadian provinces, and parts of Baja California. People think that to have a big effect an attacker would need to take out a lot of points, but a small number of strategic hits, perhaps as small as one, can do a very disproportionate amount of damage.
People will pick the statistic that works best for their situation, including placing restrictions to limit the numbers to a hand-picked subset which they will then toss freely (without clarification of the applied caveats), and make it seem their numbers apply to the general case even though they don't.
This is actually the exact same thing advertisers do all the time. Try watching a commercial and then ask yourself what they really said versus what they wanted you to think they said. ("None proven better" = we're all the same, often used for medicines; "Most powerful engine in its class" = what is "its class? Who are they comparing it against"; "Best fuel economy in its class" - did you know a PT Cruiser used to be considered an SUV by its manufacturer so it was being compared against Ford Expeditions and Chevy Suburbans for fuel economy?; etc.)
Also, you seem to be unaware of this, but there is no "Right to hit and run without consequence."
Blatant strawman. I never said that, nor do I believe it.
No. It's the old "Don't be a shitbag who hits and runs, and you've got nothing to fear" mentality.
If you never do hit-and-run, you have nothing to fear? No worries about your car constantly reporting its location to the cell provider which can be accessed by law enforcement, or lawyers in lawsuits, or hackers, or sold ("anonymized" of course) to others, or be intercepted and tracked, or...? No innocent person has ever suffered negative consequences due to information being misconstrued, or misrepresented, or just wrong? So "you've got nothing to fear"?
Most people don't have a problem with technology that catches people who committed actual crimes, that have actual victims
So I assume you will be the first one to volunteer for government cameras to be installed in every room of your house? And be proud to be always wearing a GPS tracker for Mr. Gov? And to install software for the government to monitor all communications from your devices before they get encrypted? I am sure if people did that, the technology would be very effective at catching people that commit actual crimes against actual victims. Am I missing something?
especially when it was the result of a system performing as advertised when a person chose to have that system installed.
Given that this thread is about the privacy implications of such technology, and not this specific crime, this comment is off-topic. But even so, are you sure it was a separately paid option, and not part of a common package, or a standard feature of that model of car, or not on an automatic first month/quarter/year free so it is automatically on? Are you sure she knew about it before it activated, and if so, that it would send her GPS location automatically, and not perhaps just establish a phone call with a response person? The problem is people tend to know about the advantages of features since that is what the makers tout, but they normally don't know about the consequences since the makers try to hide those, and the general population doesn't have the tech background to figure it out themselves. Holding up a case of the technology causing a person to be caught breaking the law doesn't dismiss all the privacy concerns that also come with the same technology.
This person did something illegal, the car did was it was programmed to do, and they got caught. Show me an example, real-world, where a car calls the authorities and the person is unjustly imprisoned as a result.
It's complete hyperbole to call this "If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear". It's not the same thing at all.
The thread was about living "in a world where our own cars, our own online history, our credit data, all snitch on us", which somebody responded with "I'm happy to keep on paying whatever it costs to repair my increasingly-clanky old SUV. At least it's not spying on me; it's actually mine". They are talking about the loss of privacy such monitoring technology causes, and other such consequences, not the criminal actions of this lady. While snitch can mean to disclose criminal or immoral activity, its dictionary definition is "to snatch or steal; pilfer; to turn informer; tattle", and I think the meaning of 'spying' is self-explanatory. A car that tells Ford that I have been using a non-Ford service center for my oil changes is "snitching" on me. A car that tells the cell phone company, and therefore anyone with access to their records, where it is at all times, via cell tower logs is "snitching" on me (you do realize this feature works by having an always-on cell phone system in the car, right?) Whether what I am doing is legal, or illegal, it is still snitching, and destroying a facet of my privacy. Just because the person in this story was caught by a technology she may or may not have understood or agreed to (see article about how it is a standard feature now on Fords and the EU will make it mandatory on cars there) doesn't mean there are not other concerns about such technologies "in a world where our own cars, our own online history, our credit data, all snitch on us".
Having my car travel records tell my wife I went to such-and-such store the week before Christmas might ruin the surprise. Having her see the credit card charge for the honeymoon cruise I was hoping to surprise her with, oh well, too bad? Typing a website on the computer and having it suggest/autocomplete to another site about how to escape an abusive relationship, not good for the abused partner.
Now, instead of a significant other, how about a nosy government, or ISP/cell provider willing to sell you out for a few bucks from advertisers. You are suddenly getting junk mail for that little (LEGAL) problem you have, and now everyone in the house knows too. Too bad you checked the agenda for the AA meeting while at work, since now they are getting junk mail sent to you at your work address about that problem too. Oh, you were in the neighborhood where a crime occurred around the same time (according to your car), sounds like probable cause, better come down the station for a few hours while we ask you some questions. Don't worry, you will get it all settled (maybe), and lose a few hours of your life. After all, you didn't do anything illegal, did you?
But don't worry, since I can't show "an example, real-world, where a car calls the authorities and the person is unjustly imprisoned as a result", there must be nothing to worry about "in a world where our own cars, our own online history, our credit data, all snitch on us", right? No innocent person has ever gone to jail or prison on misleading circumstantial evidence, right? Or been tasered or shot, right? Right?
Still sound like hyperbole?
BTW: My vehicle is older than Mars Saxman's, and probably has five times+ as many miles as yours (assuming national averages). I actually like being able to work on my own car, and it's cool to refer to the mileage by what fraction of a million it is. Having it not snitch is a side-benefit.
This is one of the reasons I'm happy to keep on paying whatever it costs to repair my increasingly-clanky old SUV.
Because it's such a bummer to do a hit and run and get caught.
Ah, the "If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear" mentality.
How has that worked out for everyone who has lived under governments that have pushed that line? Or parents? Or significant-others? Or bosses? Or law-enforcement? Or any other authority figure?
Wanting privacy and doing something illegal are not the same thing. The trick is figuring out how to prevent the latter without sacrificing the former.
Slashdot Mirror
So what they want, is a master key, so they can unlock any iPhone whenever and wherever they want, without a big hassle.
No, no, no, no. All they want is a key to this one phone. Honest. That such a key would also work to unlock every other similar phone is pure coincidence. That wasn't their intention. Really. Though now that you mention it ... when we are done here, we have this stack of seized iPhones we want to talk about.
Better also mention the entire pedigree of all the other software used in it. What about the TCP stack and the university that developed it?
And in other news:
Defense network "DARPANET" used to install malware! News at 11!
More like "Hackers using network access code developed for military to compromise systems! News at 10!" (I go to bed early)
As much as I'd prefer Apple to win, their argument that Congress NOT passing a law is the same as Congress passing the opposite law is a bit silly. The fact that Congress didn't pass a law making cardboard legal is NOT the same as Congress passing a law making cardboard illegal.
Bad analogy or strawman. Congress has never had a bill brought before it to legalize cardboard that I know of, and on the very off chance it has, it was killed for being a joke, not on the merits. This means there is no information about how Congress feels about the legality of cardboard, and certainly nothing to indicate Congress feels cardboard should be illegal. Also, the default is for such things to be legal for citizens, so by not passing a law to prohibit it, it defaults to legal.
On the other hand, Congress has debated legislation related to the issues in this case and therefore has a record of choosing not to enact such police authority, so it can be directly inferred that Congress has chosen NOT to give this ability to the police. And for such police powers, the default is typically that they have no more power than a regular citizen, and in some ways less, unless that power has been granted them by a law, and in this case it has not.
I think this is a great idea, but I don't think they can do it now until this situation is settled in the court. Not doing what the government has taken them to court on is one thing, but making what they are wanting harder while it isn't settled is obstruction of justice (I'm not a lawyer so the charge may not be exact but you get the idea).
Since this "is only seeking access to Farook's phone and no one else's", then as long as whatever Apple does doesn't affect "this one phone" it wouldn't be a legal problem since they aren't making what this court wants harder.
The political ramifications though, are left as an exercise for the reader.
I don't know if you know the answer to this or not, but if someone leaves their iPhone sitting around can anyone pick it up, enter the incorrect PIN 10 times, and destroy all of the data on it?
If the phone has that feature enabled (not the default), the answer is yes.
In order to proceed with a lawsuit, you have to show that you have standing. Without harm (any amount of damages), you don't have standing to sue. So this ruling is NOT about how much, instead it is about if ANY harm occurred.
You are correct. Courts generally require the demonstration of harm to prove standing, so if you can't demonstrate that harm has occurred, then you can't proceed. Theoretical possible future harm is normally not enough, as the defendants here tried to argue was the case, though the judge decided differently (hence why it is news). This problem comes up a lot in lawsuits.
One example I dealt with recently is with a wrongful foreclosure in a non-judicial state. The company foreclosing couldn't show they were the successor in interest to the note, in fact there is another company that thinks they are, but the first company initiated foreclosure proceedings anyway. The court said since the homeowner hasn't yet been harmed, they had no standing to contest the foreclosure. It is only after their home is taken away that they will have standing to go to court, but with quiet title automatically given to the new owners, their home of 20 years is gone, and all they can then sue for is compensation for the harm done.
doesn't trust it backing up
Interesting choice of words. What alternate to a "backup" does she "trust" her data to?
Backup to a local device. Not to the cloud.
Interesting choice of editing. You removed the key words of "to iCloud".
A normal update does require you to unlock the phone to accept the update. They're talking about leveraging recovery mode which can be used to force load an image onto a phone that might be otherwise unusable. See here - https://support.apple.com/en-u...
Yes. That's the exact Apple support page that worries me. It says "iTunes will try to reinstall iOS without erasing your data." Updating iOS in this way needs to either require my passcode or erase my data. I expect that it will in a future version version of hardware (because only doing it in software isn't enough).
I have gone through this process, so can speak from experience. My wife changed her passcode, then promptly forgot the new one. The only option according to Apple is to reinstall. But if the phone is previously synced to a computer, it has exchanged cookies that allow the computer to still access the phone's contents (this is one of the reasons why the FBI wanted to find that hard disk). When I did the reinstall, it first read the contents out like a normal backup, then installed a fresh OS, then restored the data from the backup. I think this is what they mean by "try to reinstall iOS without erasing your data." It does get erased, but is restored, so effectively not erased.
About six months later she did the same thing, except this time, she tried rebooting the phone. When I hooked it to the computer, the system was unable to access the phone, so the restore could only put back the data saved during the latest backup (about a month before). She was bummed since she lives off her phone's calendar and doesn't trust it backing up to iCloud.
To put this in perspective, that change in password would make anything found on the phone inadmissible in any trial as it indicates the chain of custody was broken.
And you would fail the bar exam. The password change would allow the opposing side (presumably defense) to challenge the validity and source of whatever information was obtained, but it would still be admitted so that the court (judge and/or jury) can decide how much it should be trusted. Think about a person running from the cops who throws a bag during the chase, and after catching him, go back and find the bag. What they find in the bag is still admissible even though it was out of the suspect's and the police's custody for a period of time. Even if a passerby picked it up and took it, then the police later came and asked if he had it, and he gave it to them, it would still be admissible. The defense would try to argue it could have been tampered with, but would likely lose (barring some evidence of tampering or that the second person had a known grudge against the suspect).
Fair Use is an affirmative defense, meaning you admit you violated the letter of the law (used part of a copyright work without express permission), but you had a legally acceptable reason for doing so
Can you clarify that? IANAL. Fair use is stated directly in US code. My reading of the law indicates that "fair use" is not a violation of copyright. It looks like in the past it was a violation, but no longer.
17 U.S. Code 107 - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use
There are many laws that contain exceptions, except it becomes the "offenders" responsibility to prove the exception applies to his or her situation. This is called an affirmative defense. "In an affirmative defense, the defendant may concede that he committed the alleged acts, but he proves other facts which, under the law, either justify or excuse his otherwise wrongful actions, or otherwise overcome the plaintiff's claim."
As you cited, fair use is permitted under US law, but as the original AC pointed out, the law doesn't clearly define what is and what isn't allowed under fair use (which is why it is referred to as a "doctrine"), and has been left up to the courts to draw the line. Essentially, if you use copyrighted material without express permission, then you are breaking the copyright law. If the copyright holder objects, it is then your responsibility to show that your use falls into an allowed exception, not the copyright holders to show it doesn't. Remember, in a civil case, like for copyright infringement, it is based on preponderance, not reasonable doubt, which is why the burden shifts to the user. And what the courts feel does or doesn't fall into "fair use" varies significantly, so it becomes a gamble for those involved when the usage falls into a grey zone - and it is almost all grey!
I came to post similar information. Fair Use is an affirmative defense, meaning you admit you violated the letter of the law (used part of a copyright work without express permission), but you had a legally acceptable reason for doing so. The rights holder has the legal right to claim any use is infringing, and it is up to the user to show they their usage falls within one of the allowable exceptions, such as being a short excerpt, or a parody, or a critique, etc. Where the boundaries are between a short excerpt and a long one, is left as an exercise for the jurist, as are the boundaries for the other exceptions. In this case, Sony claimed the professor used songs without permission, and they are correct, so they complained to Youtube. At that point, it became the professor's responsibility to prove his use was allowable under the law according to the fair use doctrine (note it is a doctrine and not technically a law), which he appears to have done, at least to Youtube's satisfaction.
If the auto-wipe was disabled by the user (it's on by default), then you get an ever-increasing time delay enforced by the hardware in between PIN attempts. It would take upwards of a year to brute-force a 4-digit PIN unless you get very lucky.
Actually, there is a hack for that. I saw a demonstration of a device that uses the USB interface to try a small number of PINs, then resets the device before it records the failures, then tries another small number of PINs, and so on. It takes a few hours to a day to break a 4-digit PIN. Of course, my 12 character passcode would take somewhat longer. :)
The more common way for law enforcement to break protected iPhones is to gain access to the computer the phone is synced with, since to sync they exchange cookies which allows the computer to still access the device even when locked. Of course, I saw an article about the FBI scouring a lake for a hard drive so maybe that wasn't an option in this case.
"dismissed without prejudice" means they can re-file later.
Yes (though it might be a ~$250 court filing fee)
What district are you in? In mine, the filing fee is $400. (I know, I have filed suits in federal court - and won)
Remember judges are elected, and sometimes they can be really, really dumb.
Federal District Court judges are not elected, they are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate. Judge Joanna Seybert was nominated by Clinton in 1993.
Seems like a perfect plan. What could possibly go wrong?
In other words, this is a (probably rare) legitimate application of copyright law, that hinges on whether the music company had the right to offer the song to CBS.
Yes
Seems fairly straightforward.
I take it you haven't dealt much with the US legal system then.
If you stand on someone's private property (including their online property) and spout hatred toward them there is nothing in the law to keep them from kicking you out.
Unfortunately in your example, invoking the use of verbally spouting hatred is a red hearing. If you are standing on THEIR PROPERTY, they can kick you out no matter what you are doing or saying, or not doing or saying.
The issues do however get more complex if the property is intended to be publicly accessible, like a store or restaurant, and the reason for kicking the person out is their inclusion in a legally protected group (race, ethnicity, religion, gender, handicapped, etc), but what they are saying isn't in any of those categories (though people often try to spin it into such a claim, like saying they were denouncing police harassment of [pick some group] and their being ejected is because they are part of that group, not because they were being loud, annoying, harassing, blocking aisles, not buying anything, etc).
Oh, and don't forget:
5. The way the DMCA is written it doesn't matter how pathetic or useless the lock is, merely that someone tried to digitally protect it.
So, don't forget that defeating this flimsy javascript, is (according to a law bought and paid for by the copyright cartel) just the same as defeating crypto or breaking a physical lock.
Nope. You installed NoScript, or had javascript turned off due to annoying pop-ups, either done for legitimate reasons, then when you visited the site in question saw something you liked and copy/pasted it. No warning appeared. The fact that a "protection mechanism" was applied, but it only did anything when a subset (even if majority) of people went there, means they would have no valid recourse against you. Unless, perhaps, you were stupid enough to brag about how you got around their protections, but probably not even then.
It would be like putting a loud and irritating noise-maker outside your door and therefore believe anyone who ignored it, covered their ears, or wore earplugs were actively defeating it, but then crying foul and suing when deaf people still came by since they didn't know it was there, or people did cover their ears since they thought the noise was an error by you. The judge would chuckle a little, look at you, and say dismissed.
Just because you can defeat it won't protect you from copyright claims.
As the saying goes, you can sue for anything, so you can't protect yourself from someone making a claim. But in this case, their claim would fall flat and be dismissed in about one legal step.
A big advantage of decentralization is that mass disruption is hard to pull off. http://www.rmi.org/reinventing...
And on August 10, 1996, a failure of one high-voltage power line caused a cascade failure that took out power to seven western US states, two Canadian provinces, and parts of Baja California. People think that to have a big effect an attacker would need to take out a lot of points, but a small number of strategic hits, perhaps as small as one, can do a very disproportionate amount of damage.
Here is the original complaint from the Eastern District of Virginia.
Guess I can scratch them off my list.
Yeah, this year they are on Santa's naughty list. Hope they get a lump of coal shoved up their socket.
Figures don’t lie, but liars figure.
People will pick the statistic that works best for their situation, including placing restrictions to limit the numbers to a hand-picked subset which they will then toss freely (without clarification of the applied caveats), and make it seem their numbers apply to the general case even though they don't.
This is actually the exact same thing advertisers do all the time. Try watching a commercial and then ask yourself what they really said versus what they wanted you to think they said. ("None proven better" = we're all the same, often used for medicines; "Most powerful engine in its class" = what is "its class? Who are they comparing it against"; "Best fuel economy in its class" - did you know a PT Cruiser used to be considered an SUV by its manufacturer so it was being compared against Ford Expeditions and Chevy Suburbans for fuel economy?; etc.)
Also, you seem to be unaware of this, but there is no "Right to hit and run without consequence."
Blatant strawman. I never said that, nor do I believe it.
No. It's the old "Don't be a shitbag who hits and runs, and you've got nothing to fear" mentality.
If you never do hit-and-run, you have nothing to fear? No worries about your car constantly reporting its location to the cell provider which can be accessed by law enforcement, or lawyers in lawsuits, or hackers, or sold ("anonymized" of course) to others, or be intercepted and tracked, or ...? No innocent person has ever suffered negative consequences due to information being misconstrued, or misrepresented, or just wrong? So "you've got nothing to fear"?
Most people don't have a problem with technology that catches people who committed actual crimes, that have actual victims
So I assume you will be the first one to volunteer for government cameras to be installed in every room of your house? And be proud to be always wearing a GPS tracker for Mr. Gov? And to install software for the government to monitor all communications from your devices before they get encrypted? I am sure if people did that, the technology would be very effective at catching people that commit actual crimes against actual victims. Am I missing something?
especially when it was the result of a system performing as advertised when a person chose to have that system installed.
Given that this thread is about the privacy implications of such technology, and not this specific crime, this comment is off-topic. But even so, are you sure it was a separately paid option, and not part of a common package, or a standard feature of that model of car, or not on an automatic first month/quarter/year free so it is automatically on? Are you sure she knew about it before it activated, and if so, that it would send her GPS location automatically, and not perhaps just establish a phone call with a response person? The problem is people tend to know about the advantages of features since that is what the makers tout, but they normally don't know about the consequences since the makers try to hide those, and the general population doesn't have the tech background to figure it out themselves. Holding up a case of the technology causing a person to be caught breaking the law doesn't dismiss all the privacy concerns that also come with the same technology.
This person did something illegal, the car did was it was programmed to do, and they got caught. Show me an example, real-world, where a car calls the authorities and the person is unjustly imprisoned as a result.
It's complete hyperbole to call this "If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear". It's not the same thing at all.
The thread was about living "in a world where our own cars, our own online history, our credit data, all snitch on us", which somebody responded with "I'm happy to keep on paying whatever it costs to repair my increasingly-clanky old SUV. At least it's not spying on me; it's actually mine". They are talking about the loss of privacy such monitoring technology causes, and other such consequences, not the criminal actions of this lady. While snitch can mean to disclose criminal or immoral activity, its dictionary definition is "to snatch or steal; pilfer; to turn informer; tattle", and I think the meaning of 'spying' is self-explanatory. A car that tells Ford that I have been using a non-Ford service center for my oil changes is "snitching" on me. A car that tells the cell phone company, and therefore anyone with access to their records, where it is at all times, via cell tower logs is "snitching" on me (you do realize this feature works by having an always-on cell phone system in the car, right?) Whether what I am doing is legal, or illegal, it is still snitching, and destroying a facet of my privacy. Just because the person in this story was caught by a technology she may or may not have understood or agreed to (see article about how it is a standard feature now on Fords and the EU will make it mandatory on cars there) doesn't mean there are not other concerns about such technologies "in a world where our own cars, our own online history, our credit data, all snitch on us".
Having my car travel records tell my wife I went to such-and-such store the week before Christmas might ruin the surprise. Having her see the credit card charge for the honeymoon cruise I was hoping to surprise her with, oh well, too bad? Typing a website on the computer and having it suggest/autocomplete to another site about how to escape an abusive relationship, not good for the abused partner.
Now, instead of a significant other, how about a nosy government, or ISP/cell provider willing to sell you out for a few bucks from advertisers. You are suddenly getting junk mail for that little (LEGAL) problem you have, and now everyone in the house knows too. Too bad you checked the agenda for the AA meeting while at work, since now they are getting junk mail sent to you at your work address about that problem too. Oh, you were in the neighborhood where a crime occurred around the same time (according to your car), sounds like probable cause, better come down the station for a few hours while we ask you some questions. Don't worry, you will get it all settled (maybe), and lose a few hours of your life. After all, you didn't do anything illegal, did you?
But don't worry, since I can't show "an example, real-world, where a car calls the authorities and the person is unjustly imprisoned as a result", there must be nothing to worry about "in a world where our own cars, our own online history, our credit data, all snitch on us", right? No innocent person has ever gone to jail or prison on misleading circumstantial evidence, right? Or been tasered or shot, right? Right?
Still sound like hyperbole?
BTW: My vehicle is older than Mars Saxman's, and probably has five times+ as many miles as yours (assuming national averages). I actually like being able to work on my own car, and it's cool to refer to the mileage by what fraction of a million it is. Having it not snitch is a side-benefit.
This is one of the reasons I'm happy to keep on paying whatever it costs to repair my increasingly-clanky old SUV.
Because it's such a bummer to do a hit and run and get caught.
Ah, the "If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear" mentality.
How has that worked out for everyone who has lived under governments that have pushed that line? Or parents? Or significant-others? Or bosses? Or law-enforcement? Or any other authority figure?
Wanting privacy and doing something illegal are not the same thing. The trick is figuring out how to prevent the latter without sacrificing the former.