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> […] that if you're going to take up murder as a hobby […] and right there is the problem. Nowhere in the article does it say that anybody has committed a mur

> […] that if you're going to take up murder as a hobby […] and right there is the problem. Nowhere in the article does it say that anybody has committed a murder. You are not proposing to strip privacy away from a criminal, but from a person that is suspected of a crime and might just be completely innocent. That leads to stripping privacy away from everybody.

fixermark 10y ago
> Nowhere in the article does it say that anybody has committed a murder. Article headline: Amazon refuses to let police access US murder suspect's Echo recordings. If your point is that the suspect is not a proven murderer, then yes, of course I was speaking loosely and not adhering to the legal definition of innocence until proven guilty. But in point of fact, yes, we do strip some privacy away from murder suspects when suspcicion has justified a warrant or subpoena. It's quite necessary in investigating a murder to do so, and we generally have no issue with detectives asking a person's friends, employers, etc. about their activities on and about the night of a heinous crime. The question of interest here is whether your Alexa logs should be considered "Something you told a friend" or "Something you told a lawyer / priest / spouse." The question of whether police are allowed to pry into a murder suspect's private life, indirectly, with a warrant when they are investigating a murder is well-settled common law.
- chronial 10y ago
  I would argue that the thing in your home that's listening to all your conversations is quite clearly closer to a spouse than a friend. But that is a different topic. A murder suspect is just very different from someone who has take[n] up murder as a hobby. The first description might apply to you right now without your knowing, whereas the second (hopefully ^^) clearly doesn't. > … speaking loosely and not adhering to the legal definition of innocence until proven guilty You make it sound like that is a minor detail, but it's in fact a cornerstone of a Rechtsstaat (apparently there is no English word for this? see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat).
  - fixermark 10y ago
    It's definitely not a minor detail in terms of the law, how it is applied, and the moral dimensions of same. I don't have to walk far down the street though to find people loosely throwing around terms that suggest guilt or innocence completely divorced from the legal definition. Your streets may differ from mine.

fixermark 10y ago

> Nowhere in the article does it say that anybody has committed a murder. Article headline: Amazon refuses to let police access US murder suspect's Echo recordings. If your point is that the suspect is not a proven murderer, then yes, of course I was speaking loosely and not adhering to the legal definition of innocence until proven guilty. But in point of fact, yes, we do strip some privacy away from murder suspects when suspcicion has justified a warrant or subpoena. It's quite necessary in investigating a murder to do so, and we generally have no issue with detectives asking a person's friends, employers, etc. about their activities on and about the night of a heinous crime. The question of interest here is whether your Alexa logs should be considered "Something you told a friend" or "Something you told a lawyer / priest / spouse." The question of whether police are allowed to pry into a murder suspect's private life, indirectly, with a warrant when they are investigating a murder is well-settled common law.

chronial 10y ago
I would argue that the thing in your home that's listening to all your conversations is quite clearly closer to a spouse than a friend. But that is a different topic. A murder suspect is just very different from someone who has take[n] up murder as a hobby. The first description might apply to you right now without your knowing, whereas the second (hopefully ^^) clearly doesn't. > … speaking loosely and not adhering to the legal definition of innocence until proven guilty You make it sound like that is a minor detail, but it's in fact a cornerstone of a Rechtsstaat (apparently there is no English word for this? see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat).
- fixermark 10y ago
  It's definitely not a minor detail in terms of the law, how it is applied, and the moral dimensions of same. I don't have to walk far down the street though to find people loosely throwing around terms that suggest guilt or innocence completely divorced from the legal definition. Your streets may differ from mine.