

Judge Orders U.S. to Release Aaron Swartz’s Secret Service File - HoochTHX
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/07/swartz-foia/?cid=9593124
A federal judge in Washington, D.C. on Friday ordered the government to promptly start releasing thousands of pages of Secret Service documents about the late activist and coder Aaron Swartz, following months of roadblocks and delays
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phaus
This might be a good thing, but since the government has the option to release
100% redacted documents, the Secret Service hasn't really been ordered to
release anything other than a stack of black pieces of paper. If they release
more than that, it's because they either want to, or don't care.

[http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/page/department-justice-
black...](http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/page/department-justice-black-mark-
aclu-19152996)

~~~
joering2
Maybe they can, BUT they won't.

You see, as The President of The United States of America pledged: if he gets
elected, he will create the most transparent administration in the history of
the USA!

So long story short, they will not redact anything.

~~~
gwern
I can't tell whether you're being completely clueless or hilariously sarcastic
& witty.

~~~
ChuckMcM
I'm betting on the latter, and like gin & tonic with a spritz of bitters.

------
D9u
_...files located outside the agency’s headquarters that contain several
thousand additional pages..._

Several thousand pages? For one person who is obviously not a terrorist?

This is the sort of thing that the US government would point out in other
nations as being unacceptable while I was growing up...

Now we're the bad guys.

~~~
tome
> This is the sort of thing that the US government would point out in other
> nations as being unacceptable while I was growing up...

This seems unlikely to be a recent phenomenon, what with McCarthyism and all.

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unimpressive
I've wondered this for a while, and a web search was not forthcoming, so I'll
ask here:

How do you properly redact a physical paper document? I would imagine that
black sharpie doesn't cut it.

~~~
pudquick
Where I work, the physical document is first scanned into an electronic form
(multipage formats like TIFF or PDF, usually). The electronic document is then
imported into a proprietary redaction program (there's quite a few on the
market, most copier/scanner vendors have an offering).

It then assists with the initial redaction by performing OCR on the content,
allowing you to quickly search for sensitive information. The software
provides built-in tools for blacking out sensitive sections of the document -
some even provide configurable overlays/stamps on the blackouts for why that
section was redacted.

Then one or more humans manually go over the documents to make sure that
nothing was missed. When they are happy with the results, the document is
finalized into a TIFF or PDF document with the pages flattened into single
image objects (so you can't just delete the black boxes - they are now part of
the embedded image).

The original documents do not need to be harmed in any way, they just need to
be able to be scanned to start the process.

Conversion to an image format helps to ensure that if the source was an
electronic document that sensitive original source metadata or proprietary
document format binary blobs don't inadvertently leak redacted information. If
a physical copy is required, you just print it.

~~~
ben1040
>When they are happy with the results, the document is finalized into a TIFF
or PDF document with the pages flattened into single image objects (so you
can't just delete the black boxes - they are now part of the embedded image).

And if you fail to do that, you get this (original link is gone, but here's
the discussion, and the gist is the TSA released "redacted documents" where
you could just select over the blacked out areas and ctrl-C to recover the
text).

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=980465](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=980465)

------
lettergram
They need time to figure out if warrants were actually obtained prior to
gathering the information, verses just grabbing all the information via their
blanket surveillance.

------
mrt0mat0
why is everyone under the impression that they don't already have these in a
digital format? I mean.... Utah people. i think they have the storage space.
you think they're going to store all this data on americans in a digital
format, but when it comes to fbi profiles, they store them in a filing
cabinet?

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13b9f227ecf0
I love the picture. What a political agitator. He was a good little left wing
agitator and was fatally shocked to learn that when you're not serving the
agenda you can get bit.

~~~
PavlovsCat
On the other hand, serving it WILL get you bit. It takes out a chunk of your
personality right away, and then there is the agenda itself, which is an
omnivore.

You know, given the choice.. even being a face that is trampled on by a boot,
forever, is better than becoming a boot, forever.

~~~
jacquesm
You probably got downvoted due to reading comprehension issues. Fixed it as
much as I could :)

~~~
PavlovsCat
Thanks :) Moral high ground is usually a lame "argument", but in response to
physical high ground it's good enough I guess, and why not jump to the general
case right away, especially at the bottom of a thread ^^ There are (so many)
games that really _are_ won by not playing them, Schadenfreude is self-injury,
and what people mistake with power is often just a web of desires and fears.
So in conclusion, may all beings come to know themselves and achieve
enlightenment, and find a pair shoes they really like.

~~~
w_t_payne
I'll take the ones with the hob-nails on the bottom.

