
New York City Subpoenas Twitter For Occupy Wall Street Protester Data - johnpaultitlow
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/new-york-subpoena-twitter-occupy-wallstreet.php#.T1485HYsXw4.hackernews
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freshhawk
"U.S. activists who thought Twitter was a secure way to communicate during
demonstrations may" ... be delusional?

Twitter has to comply with US law, whatever it's possible for them to
reconstruct and release about activists they can be compelled to release.
They, so far, have done a decent job of being transparent, in the US, when
they are allowed to be (things like national security letters with gag orders
mean their, and everyone else's, claims to transparency have to be taken with
a grain of salt).

How much Twitter is pushing back or not is besides the point. It's just stupid
to expect more out of Twitter than it is legally possible for them to do.

~~~
mikeryan
I kind of assumed most folks from overseas who were doing this were using Tor
+ Anonymous Twitter account.

Maybe US Agitators just aren't as savvy as their counterparts in the more
oppressive parts of the world.

~~~
freshhawk
Not always Tor, which is safe as far as I know IF you can get a Tor
connection.

Plenty have been caught and killed or tortured thanks to US tech sold to their
governments (and not using Tor level security) so I'm not sure about them
being more savvy. The consequences are certainly higher, so they probably are
more careful.

It's the domestic people who confuse me, no encryption, from a cell phone
account in their name and then thinking "Twitter will break the law to protect
me!"

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tatsuke95
Wait, I thought Twitter was going to change the world by allowing open
communications channels to circumvent tyranny? Kind of a useless tool in that
regard if it documents all your information and the company is willing to hand
it all over at a moment's notice.

Does Twitter have an official stance on this anywhere?

~~~
sneak
It's not a matter of whether they're willing or not. They're compelled to by
US federal law.

The best part is, thanks to the USA PATRIOT Act, cops don't even need a judge
or a warrant to get it anymore.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_security_letter>

From 2003 to 2006, the FBI averaged about 65,000 NSLs sent - PER YEAR.

Twitter has the username to ip+timestamp mapping, your ISP has the
ip+timestamp to name+physical address mapping.

~~~
eli
This was a subpoena, not an NSL.

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gee_totes
IANAL, but can someone explain what information might be gained via this
subpoena to build a case?

To me, it seems like the information from twitter would be useful in building
a conspiracy case, but since this guy was only charged with Failure to Obey,
Blocking Traffic, and Prohibited Use of Roadway, I don't see how information
from his twitter account will help prove those charges. (Unless of course, he
tweeted: "I'm blocking the roadway and disobeying police!")

~~~
jrockway
So they can keep him in jail for an extra couple hours by charging him with
"Conspiracy to fail to obey, Conspiracy to block traffic, and Conspiracy to
... uh ... prohibited use of roadway."

~~~
rhizome
Free markets can be a loophole around civil liberties, that's why the US
Presidential administrations like to go this route.

------
guelo
For American protestors it would be better if Silicon Valley were located in
an Arab country. Just like it is helpful for Arab protestors that Silicon
Valley is located in America.

~~~
orblivion
Well, there is lots of silicon lying around at least.

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Steveism
It's troubling that this type of data gathering doesn't require a warrant. The
American Government can't expect oppressive countries to clean up their act
when the example they set is to bypass civil liberties whenever possible.

~~~
bunderbunder
If what you mean to argue is that this data gathering needed to be done under
court supervision, well, it was. A subpoena is the type of court supervision
process that is applicable in this case. What the subpoena means is that an
attorney got a court order compelling a party to provide evidence.

Warrants are also issued by the courts, but they do something different: They
permit law enforcement officials (not attorneys) to perform acts that would
normally be illegal in order to gather evidence.

~~~
citizens
I haven't bothered to verify the claim but the article states:

"a law called the Stored Communications Act allows authorities to seek data
like this without a search warrant"

~~~
bunderbunder
Did some more looking into it.

Turns out that before the Stored Communications Act, the existing law gave
people essentially zero right to privacy with respect to electronic
communications that were stored by a third party. The pre-existing law was
basically just the 4th amendment, and traditionally you relinquish your 4th
amendment protections for any documents that you give away.

What the SCA did was to create some hurdles that had to be jumped over to
acquire this data. They're not quite as strong as the requirements one needs
to get to obtain a search warrant or anything like that, but they're a heck of
a lot stronger than what existed beforehand.

So the SCA did not, in fact, allow authorities to "seek data like this without
a search warrant." Much the opposite, really.

~~~
magicalist
Yes, the "third party doctrine." Really stupid stuff, especially in an age
where we do almost everything over networks provided by third parties with
services provided by other third parties, but our expectation is that the data
we are transmitting should be as private as if we were storing documents in
our home.

There is hope that some of this will be reversed, much like the supreme court
ruled that phone conversations were private even though they were over third
party connections, and how the SCA provides protections for things like email
and (some) sever logs.

In the meantime, the government will continue to try to stretch what it is
allowed under the third party doctrine without significant check.

Ars Technica had some good coverage last week of the Obama administration
successfully arguing that law enforcement can request cell tower connections
(giving a rough tracking of a phone's location) without a warrant:

 _The Obama administration laid out its position in a legal brief last month,
arguing that customers have "no privacy interest" in [cell-site location
records] held by a network provider. Under a legal principle known as the
"third-party doctrine," information voluntarily disclosed to a third party
ceases to enjoy Fourth Amendment protection. The government contends that this
rule applies to cell phone location data collected by a network provider._

[http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/03/obama-
admin-...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2012/03/obama-admin-wants-
warrantless-access-to-cell-phone-location-data.ars)

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waterside81
We provide social media analytics software for the intelligence community.
During the height of the Occupy movements, various 3-letter agencies were
_very_ concerned about what people were saying on Twitter and how it could be
used to organize and create trouble for authorities.

It's the double-edged sword of anything that's public & open - it can be used
for good and it can be used against you.

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noduerme
Is there, seriously, fucking nobody in that government with the brains or
decency to step back and say, "Wait a minute. This is what Iran does. This is
what Syria does. This is what the Libyan government tried to do. We cannot and
_must not_ go down the road of persecuting people for their speech or their
beliefs."

~~~
lallysingh
Nope (at least not elected), and the reason's simple: nobody smart wants to go
through that level of BS for their daily job.

~~~
rooshdi
It's a sad state of the world when those that comply with BS are considered
smart.

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jlarocco
> U.S. activists who thought Twitter was a secure way to communicate during
> demonstrations may have another thing coming.

People actually think this? I've never been a big fan of the occupy wall
street crowd, and when I hear things like this, my opinion of them just keeps
falling.

~~~
Daishiman
So you're forming an opinion of a group based on what one source claims that
group thinks without having neither evidence nor quotes? Sounds brilliant.

~~~
jlarocco
The backing evidence would be the tweets, wouldn't it? This seems to be on the
same level as those YouTube videos where the guys show themselves driving down
the highway at 120mph, and eventually get caught because of it.

My opinion of OWS was formed using information from a variety of sources. This
case is adding to an already negative perception. Perhaps this one thing
wouldn't be enough to form a negative opinion, but the collection of what I've
read about OWS has lead to a negative opinion, and this article just continues
to enforce it.

Seriously, who thinks a company in the United States isn't going to comply
with a subpoena? It's especially silly because a key issue of the protests is
excessive wealth, and Jack Dorsey, the founder of Twitter, is worth over $650
million.

~~~
smashing
I'm actually surprised they are doing this as when the OWS protesters left,
the problem literally went away. I'm not defending or criticizing the OWS
people, but the government's involvement at this point seems to be like
someone who believes they have the duty to punish people who inconvenienced
them in some way after the fact. From what I know of human nature, if the
government keeps pursuing this, the only way I think the OWS camps will
reappear in the spring when the weather warms up. It is a shame if it does
because the unemployment was dropping and I believe it was the real cause of
the OWS activities.

