4 ms·

Am I the only one who got the impression that this is strange!? Why do the journalists don't share the data with the governments for free? Establishing trust t

by nisa 10y ago

Am I the only one who got the impression that this is strange!? Why do the journalists don't share the data with the governments for free? Establishing trust that the government is serious and real should be possible for them. Could the anonymous source just be a journalist who wants to profit of the data? I'm all for fighting tax avoidance but considering that most of the EU member states have an interest in the data this could be quite a sum of cash that is someone obtaining from an illegal hack. It's also not clear who benefits here. It's pretty shady isn't it? Even it's legal.

charlesdm 10y ago
In most jurisdictions (and I know this is true in Belgium), you cannot use illegally / stolen data as evidence in a trial. So there would be no point purchasing this data, because it would be thrown out in court. Maybe it could be used to pressure someone into taking some sort of settlement?
- nisa 10y ago
  In Germany, while the use of the data was still uncertain, they implemented a possibility to pay back taxes and some fee if you self-indict your tax avoidance and you would have been out of trouble. This was pretty popular and gained more money than the data they bought if I remember this correctly.
  - charlesdm 10y ago
    I believe you mean evasion. Nothing illegal about avoidance.
kuschku 10y ago
> Why do the journalists don't share the data with the governments for free? Funnily, the second largest media network responsible for this leak belongs to the German government (NDR). They cooperate with SZ all the time. So, a branch of the German government actually already has access. That leads to the question: Why don’t the governments share the data with each other for free? Or, as not even the German government itself gets access: Why doesn’t the government share the data with itself?
- nisa 10y ago
  No, you've got German public broadcasting totally wrong. NDR is not related to the government in any way. It's not even funded by taxes but they have their own agency for that in order to not meddle with political influence. They could share the data if they want with the governments but the government has no say and no way to get the data with any legal means.
  - kuschku 10y ago
    > but the government has no say and no way to get the data with any legal means. Ever looked at the members of the Rundfunkrat? In theory, it’s independent, in reality...

by nisa 10y ago

charlesdm 10y ago

In most jurisdictions (and I know this is true in Belgium), you cannot use illegally / stolen data as evidence in a trial. So there would be no point purchasing this data, because it would be thrown out in court. Maybe it could be used to pressure someone into taking some sort of settlement?

nisa 10y ago
In Germany, while the use of the data was still uncertain, they implemented a possibility to pay back taxes and some fee if you self-indict your tax avoidance and you would have been out of trouble. This was pretty popular and gained more money than the data they bought if I remember this correctly.
- charlesdm 10y ago
  I believe you mean evasion. Nothing illegal about avoidance.

kuschku 10y ago

> Why do the journalists don't share the data with the governments for free? Funnily, the second largest media network responsible for this leak belongs to the German government (NDR). They cooperate with SZ all the time. So, a branch of the German government actually already has access. That leads to the question: Why don’t the governments share the data with each other for free? Or, as not even the German government itself gets access: Why doesn’t the government share the data with itself?

nisa 10y ago
No, you've got German public broadcasting totally wrong. NDR is not related to the government in any way. It's not even funded by taxes but they have their own agency for that in order to not meddle with political influence. They could share the data if they want with the governments but the government has no say and no way to get the data with any legal means.
- kuschku 10y ago
  > but the government has no say and no way to get the data with any legal means. Ever looked at the members of the Rundfunkrat? In theory, it’s independent, in reality...