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Judge orders Google to turn over a full year of actor’s data

353 points by nkurz 7y ago

milesward 7y ago
That dude better get another garage for the tape library they're gonna have to send...
0xADADA 7y ago
I (and we should all) act as if this could happen to anyone. Essentially that the state can deputize any company to snitch on the digital ephemera that constitutes our daily lives, but especially those that we are deeply engaged: Google, Facebook, Lyft, Amazon. As such, we should not self-censor, but instead disengage from these proxy-cops and move to more distributed spaces.
- kryogen1c 7y ago
  >the state can deputize any company to snitch on the digital ephemera that constitutes our daily lives this is not true, but in the way that makes your point much, much worse. In the US, case precedent is already set that digital data that you don't physically own is not yours. IANAL, but my understanding is that the standards for digital search-and-seizure are lower for cloud services, not equivalent or (god-forbid) higher.
  - abbadadda 7y ago
    Right. But I suppose the thing is under it is conveniently (for the prosecution) consolidated under one company's umbrella, so I don't think it totally invalidates OP's point. What about companies such as Proton Mail? Would they just hand over all their data? I don't know. Honestly asking.
    - dole 7y ago
      ProtonMail could, but it looks like just raw IP logging and most everything else is encrypted by design. I dunno if turning over those IP logs killed or maimed their warrant canary in the process. https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/biusm7/transparency_report_update_questions/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/biusm7/transpar... Edit: obv PM’s canary is public and has disclosed they’ve released data to the Swiss courts, but it’s pretty much as advertised; ip logging is raw but the rest is encrypted.
- abbadadda 7y ago
  Queue the Google alternative posts. This is some terrifying stuff. > not just emails but also drafted and deleted messages; any files in their Google Drive cloud storage services; any Google Voice texts, calls and contacts; search and web browsing history; and location data.
  - paxys 7y ago
    The scariest part is that this amount of data access can be very effectively weaponized to build a strong case against anyone. All of us are inadvertently breaking some law or the other all the time. If the government doesn't like you for any reason they are one court order away from blackmailing you or putting you away.
    - ars 7y ago
      > they are one court order away The implication being that the courts are corrupt? If that's the case I think you have way worse things to worry about than "data access", the courts have much greater powers than that.
      - harry8 7y ago
        The scale of it is what is of most interest. If the court gave a similar order to retrive similar amounts of physical (eg paper) information from your house, and anyone you happened to correspnd with it would be extremely notable and expensive as well as creating dramatic television pictures. Some of that is a deterrant to its abuse. "Google, fetch" the scale, ease and speed of that is worrying. How is its abuse to be stopped?
      - paxys 7y ago
        Courts may or may not be corrupt, but regardless of that it hasn't historically been very difficult for authorities to find a judge to sign off on a very wide-reaching warrant (like this very case).
        AnimalMuppet 7y ago
- drevil-v2 7y ago
  State has a duty to prosecute law breakers. This is a load bearing wall of civil society. Everywhere. Making sweeping general statements is good for riling up the mobs but I would implore HN readers to be more pragmatic about these things. Look at the context. This person sought to ignite racial tensions for personal gain. He was given a sweetheart deal. The State is going after him and those protected him. They (the State prosecutors) have every right to collect and gather evidence to build the case.
  - avs733 7y ago
    yes we have seen you know how to make this comment. Another way to look at that 'duty' is to say [The] state has a responsibility to ensure justice for all. That may seem like the same thing but vagueness is at times valuable given that life rarely satisfies the black and white dichotomies many of us would prefer.
    - drevil-v2 7y ago
      What exactly are you saying? That the State should let this one go?
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
      - avs733 7y ago
        More so that laws are a social construct. We can have a discussion about how the state should behave without using catastrophic examples to shift debates about principles and policies. The post I was responding to sees the role of the state as a absolutist binaric executor of often fuzzy laws and rules. The context of this example doesn't have any affect on whether or not that naive belief is a path to a functional and just society. Whatever happens with Smollett, or the next example, simply doesn't support a belief that every crime should be prosecuted. There was a (hamfisted but entertaining) TNG episode about this for gods sake...
  - hnuser123456 7y ago
- crocodiletears 7y ago
  I disagree on your last point. Whether it's Google, Microsoft, your ISP, a databroker, a webscraper, an unscrupulous app developer, or even your TV, I think it's safe to assume that one day or the next, every piece of content you produce, or topic you discuss will leak its way onto a major adcorp's servers. I can hardly think of anyone I know that can't attest to the experience of discussing something as a non-sequitur, only to receive ads about it shortly thereafter. Even visiting an old friend with vastly different interests, never enabling location services, or connecting to their WiFi, I've noticed vast changes in my ad regime. Decentralising your web activity can only make you less easily monetizable, but you'll never escape the panopticon, and Google can release data it got from third-parties just as easily as the data it collected itself. If you want to say something you don't want Facebook, Amazon, MS, Google, or the state to hear about, do it in the woods or a private room away from anything digital.
  - cronix 7y ago
    The other week I was out in a National Forest hiking. I was about 6 miles from the nearest Forest Service road. I took a break and sat there eating a sandwich and looked up to see a camera mounted on a tree about 4 feet from me. I imagine some hunter put it there. I'm just saying that even out in the middle of nowhere, not near any paved roads, there are still cameras watching and recording.
    - crocodiletears 7y ago
      Dishearteningly true.
    - protomyth 7y ago
      If it's for the purpose our wildlife people are going to try to do, it is for animal count and trail tracking.
    - pbhjpbhj 7y ago
      Satellite surveillance, or spy-planes/drones also might record you in the wilderness.
  - deleted 7y ago
- judge2020 7y ago
  I imagine that being distributed makes it easier to obtain the data for a person. If a court can't get data on a user from the the main server's owner, they might go after more vulnerable server owners that happened to be federated with the main server (vulnerable, as in less disposable income for lawyers).
  - bananocurrency 7y ago
    distributed !== decentralized
- ryanmccullagh 7y ago
  It’s clear you have no idea what this actor did. He staged a hate crime in Chicago and the main cook county attorney dropped the case after CPD proved it was fake. With your radical views, where do you draw the line? Will you vote to protect criminals, child abusers, rapist? All in an effort for “privacy”?
  - harry8 7y ago
    It's clear you have made up your mind without the facts. Note the Tribune's reticence to come to that conclusion based on the actual evidence? I have zero opinion about it. Separate to that this comment has absolutely nothing whatever to do with the parent comment, whether you agree with the parent or not. Rights should exist for everyone, not just everyone you happen to like. Whether this warrant has gone too far as the parent suggests and it is necessary to take countermeasures or not is the argument, not your feelings about someone accused of something which frankly have no baring on anything in such a discussion.
    - himinlomax 7y ago
      Is there anyone, anyone at all, who disputes that he made a false report?
      - harry8 7y ago
        I have little idea and care even less, myself. The source material, ie article published by the Tribune, was completely unwilling to come to that same conclusion in the story. So to me it seems more likely that it is in dispute on that basis rather than that is is indsiputable due to wholly unsupported comments here. But again it doesn't matter at ALL. It has zero relevance to this discussion. None. No really. Rights are especially important when they relate to people you dislike doing things you also dislike. That situation is exactly when you lose your rights. Like maybe think about if that's is what is happening here.
        himinlomax 7y ago
- Y-Bopinator 7y ago
  Jussie Smollet isn’t just anyone. Filing a false police report is a crime. Don’t commit crime and you’ll be fine, idiot.
- Simulacra 7y ago
  It could but it's more than likely not. In this case a crime was committed and possibly covered up. As much as I agree with you to move to distributed spaces and increased privacy, I think Google has an obligation to comply here.
- auiya 7y ago
  > the [US] state can deputize any [US-incorporated] company to snitch FTFY. I don't believe they have the same legal authorities to compel companies incorporated outside of their country jurisdiction to do the same, correct me if I'm wrong. This isn't the same as a sharing agreement done as a diplomatic quid-pro-quo however, which I'm sure also happens.
vuln 7y ago
When convenience comes back to bite you in the ass. I’m interested to see if and what Google releases and if there would be any different if Apple was asked to release the same information. Does the “Ad” company have more data on an individual versus the “privacy” company? Or does it actually depend on the user opting in to give this data to said company?
- deadmutex 7y ago
  From what I can tell in the news, Apple will share data if ordered to -- “WE GAVE THEM ALL OF THE DATA IN OUR POSSESSION,” SAYS APPLE from (https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/7/21054836/fbi-iphone-unlock-apple-encryption-debate-pensacola-ios-security https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/7/21054836/fbi-iphone-unlock...) The iPhone unlocking for the mass shooter was slightly different -- FBI wanted them to create a new tool (that did not exist) to unlock an existing phone.
alexfromapex 7y ago
Highly disturbing that the court is allowed to request that much data without any legal restrictions [on privacy].
- munk-a 7y ago
  I don't know why you think there aren't any legal restrictions - this wasn't a random LEO going cowboy and trying to hack into google, a judge directly ordered this action and signed onto the warrants.
  - alexfromapex 7y ago
    I mean as far as privacy is concerned. They were able to request all text messages, documents, location data, voicemails without any stipulation that they were relevant to the case.
    - ceejayoz 7y ago
      Well, yeah. They have to go through them to determine if they're relevant. Same reason a physical search warrant will let the cops seize a vaguely defined bunch of stuff from your house. In particularly sensitive cases, the judge may appoint an official to be a go-between between the evidence and the prosecution. For example: https://miami.cbslocal.com/2018/04/26/special-master-evidence-seized-michael-cohen/ https://miami.cbslocal.com/2018/04/26/special-master-evidenc...
    - dragonwriter 7y ago
      The court order is the determination that the information has enough probability of being relevant that it needs to be turned over to be reviewed.
- akiselev 7y ago
  The courts are the legal restriction. The way in which the evidence collected can be challenge in the appellate courts.
  - 7y ago
munk-a 7y ago
Things like this are why I think that as time goes on storing PII is going to be seen as a cost rather than a benefit to companies... It'll take several rounds of public outcry to shift the mindset though.
deleted 7y ago
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buboard 7y ago
at what point does this projection of judicial power against individuals in the name of safety (whose safety? whats really at stake here even?) become terrorism?
- AlohaFractal 7y ago
  Right after taxes become theft but before abortion becomes murder.
- guelo 7y ago
  A bit of an aside. Terrorism is a useless word now besides its propaganda value. The USA just declares whoever they don't like to be a terrorist, like how they just did to Iran's army, and now apparently they can legally assassinate any Iranian soldier. What's funny is Iran wants in on this propaganda game now, they designated the US army as terrorists.
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    I don't think it makes a whole lot of sense to talk about "assassinating" soldiers any more than "terrorist attacks" on them. Those are things done to civilians by definition. We certainly don't want to promote the idea that "collateral damage" is necessary for a military operation to be ethical. I think terrorism has a perfectly good definition - political lobbying/influence "by other means" than conventional politics, i.e. attacking and terrorizing civilians. Doesn't matter who does it or how exactly. Maybe the US government doesn't exactly use that definition, but that doesn't mean there is no such thing as terrorism.
    - guelo 7y ago
      If we killed some European general that was visiting some European country you would say that we had assassinated him.
      - perl4ever 7y ago
        "Visiting...some European country" So, that's who this general was, an Iranian visiting some Iranian country? Was he there to see the fjords? Anyway, telling me what I would think or say is unacceptable in a civil conversation. If I write something, you can assume I mean it, or you can disengage if you think I'm trolling. If you're going to take my comments as justifying US actions, perhaps they can be taken that way, but they may apply to retaliation as well, no? Is there much of a gray area with military personnel in Iraq right now, who aren't Iraqis?
m0zg 7y ago
I (rhetorically) wonder why the title does not contain the "actor's" name. But then again, we all know why that is.
- keanzu 7y ago
  Full title -> Jussie Smollett investigation: Judge orders Google to turn over a full year of the actor’s data as part of special prosecutor probe Too long for HN? Unknown. The title reads fine in the Chicago Tribune.
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    HN's subject limit is 80 characters. TRONC's head runs 133.
- nl 7y ago
  The title is "Jussie Smollett investigation: Judge orders Google to turn over a full year of the actor’s data as part of special prosecutor probe" which seems to include the the actor's name? But then again, we all know why that is. I don't know who Jussie Smollett is (other than this story) and I'm completely in the dark what this is supposed to be implying. Maybe you are seeing headline optimisation? Is that what this is implying? Edit: Or do you mean the HN headline? The current headline here is "Judge orders Google to turn over a full year of actor’s data" which seems completely reasonable given the length restrictions. Again - what are you implying? Is there some legal restriction on knowing his name?
  - m0zg 7y ago
    Unless you lived in a cave in Afghanistan for the entirety of 2019 there's no way you don't know what I'm "implying".
    - lostmyoldone 7y ago
      There's folk from all over the world here, I don't have a clue either. I could probably Google a bit and figure it out. However, I still. believe that legibility of arguments or opinion is the responsibility of the author, not the reader.
zadokshi 7y ago
Is this different in any practical sense to an old fashioned request for physical paper documents? The only difference I can think of is traditionally documents are destroyed after they are no longer needed. Now they can see “deleted” documents and document change history. i.e. emails stored locally on a personal or company server can be permanently destroyed. Traditional email systems won’t have a change history of the email writing process) (I imagine all sorts of games could be played by lawyers with access to this additional types of information.)
- keanzu 7y ago
  Quality of the record keeping is vastly higher. Imagine a subpoena for every paper mail you sent in a year. You can't get that from the US Postal service.
  - Spooky23 7y ago
    USPS has been storing images of all envelopes delivered for many years now. Prior to that, it was possible to have that information manually logged. If you corresponded with people in a Warsaw Pact country in the 1960s, that mail was recorded and sometimes opened.
    - keanzu 7y ago
      Knowing a letter was delivered by USPS doesn't yield the contents. The state would have to subpoena each individual recipient - and they may have destroyed or lost the letter. It would only be equivalent if every letter was opened and recorded so that all the contents would later be available because this subpoena covers not just emails but also drafted and deleted messages; any files in their Google Drive cloud storage services; any Google Voice texts. This isn't metadata the government is coming for, it is the full content.
      - Daneel_ 7y ago
        Sometimes the contents almost don't matter. For example, if you saw multiple letters from an oncology department to a household, followed by letters from government departments and a funeral home, it wouldn't be hard to figure out what was going on. It's the exact same problem with phone metadata. The connections can be made to tell the story, and are even easier to manipulate into whatever narrative the prosecution wants to sell. In my example, you probably thought "person has cancer, household receives letters from the government post-death, bill from the funeral home", which is exactly how it could be sold. But it could just as easily be "person beating cancer, household receives government forms related to healthcare subsidies, funeral home letter was a condolence letter sent one year after the death of their parent." This is why metadata is so dangerous, it's far too easy to spin.
deleted 7y ago
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deleted 7y ago
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robocat 7y ago
On the flip side of the loss of privacy: location and similar data can be used as a solid alibi if you are accused incorrectly. How many people have been silently tagged as innocent because of their data stored? That said, ersonally I find the loss of privacy abhorrent, especially because I have fuck all rights in the US (not a citizen, so the US government and US corporations can abuse my personal information with very little recourse from me or my own government).
- frandroid 7y ago
  It should be up to the falsely-accused to allow their siphoned data to be release to create an alibi.
- lonelappde 7y ago
  They could claim you faked your alibi data. If you innocently were near a crime you could be convicted by circumstantial evidence.
- titzer 7y ago
  > location and similar data can be used as a solid alibi if you are accused incorrectly. Except you don't control them and could be faked and used to frame you. The power imbalance here is absolutely astonishing.
hiram112 7y ago
> not just emails but also drafted and deleted messages; any files in their Google Drive cloud storage services; any Google Voice texts, calls and contacts; search and web browsing history; and location data. I've always assumed my email, Drive, Voice info, calls, contact lists, etc would be obtainable by a warrant. But I wonder if Google would turn over things like browsing and search history, even if you never browsed while logged in to Google or searched, and also had explicitly turned off storing of this data in your Google privacy settings. There is no doubt in my mind that Google, through the use of 3rd party trackers from "partners", analytics, and correlation can easily match my non-logged in web history and searches with the same computer and IP used when I log into Gmail or Maps. Supposedly they don't tie this global "advertising profile" to your real identifying Google account, at least for the data provided to advertisers, but I would think it'd be trivial for Google to collect it all - every web page visited and for how long, every search you've made - and turn over the vast majority of it to the government, upon request. In other words, Google probably does know nearly everything you do online, logged in or not, at this point.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
lonelappde 7y ago
"actor" is inappropriate term here. "[Alleged] Hate crime hoaxer" is more relevant.
Johnny555 7y ago
Suddenly the inconvenience of moving to an encrypted email provider like ProtonMail doesn't sound too bad. I don't particularly have anything to hide, but I'm sure a prosecutor could find something suspicious in my emails if he looked hard enough. It wouldn't make my email completely inaccessible to the government (they could subpoena the sender), but would make it a lot less convenient to go on a fishing expedition.
- collyw 7y ago
  I was wondering about this. If I switch to Proton, but 90% of my outgoing emails go to gmail accounts, google still has 90% of my email data.
throwawaysea 7y ago
Although it is scary to have things like location data turned over, the one I worry about is 23andme.
foob4r 7y ago
degoogle as much as you can
gfody 7y ago
If Google complies would they deliver the data to the defendant so that he has the option to plead the 5th if there’s anything incriminating?
keiferski 7y ago
The deeper problem is that old laws are being used to deal with new behaviors. This inadequacy will continue to grow as human beings and computers slowly merge over the next century or two, where at some point, “your Google data” will be more-and-more equivalent to “all of your thoughts.” Those who say that this is justified because warrants were obtained seem to miss the point that state’s ability and desire to gather information has grown exponentially over time. And that’s why we need data protection laws, alternatives to Google, and other privacy measures. The philosophical concept of embodied cognition is a good place to start on this issue: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/embodied-cognition/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/embodied-cognition/
- asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
  I'd say that very much depends on why you believe the warrant process exists in the first place. I honestly don't know that much about the historical context of search warrants. Do they exist because philosophers of old believed in a right to privacy as an end unto itself? Or do they exist for some more practical reason, like because they were used for extra legal retaliation against enemies of the state, or for intimidation, or to go on fishing expeditions. Or, why does the protection from self-incrimination exist? Is it because we are concerned that the government might have access to your thoughts? Or is it because the government would torture people to get confessions, and the people wanted to remove the incentive to do so? Depending on your belief about this, you might feel differently about what should be done about this Google situation. If you believe the latter view in the second paragraph, for example, you might have no problem with the breadth of the search. In fact, you might not even have a problem with involuntary brain scans, provided they were proven accurate. As long as the rule of law is strong and the materials were used only for a defined and limited purpose, you might think it would be better if the government could compel the true personal perspective of the accused. So this really enters into questions about each individual's perspective on the purpose and value of privacy. I think it might not be accurate to say that people who say it is justified are missing the point. They might just think the point is different from what you think it is.
  - lrem 7y ago
sjcsjc 7y ago
"Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries" Does anyone have an alternative source for this story please?
- mathemancer 7y ago
  Archive link: https://web.archive.org/web/20200109053829/https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/criminal-justice/ct-jussie-smollett-special-prosecutor-investigation-20200108-j3j3p2dypvf5vbbo5jpxrvcjsq-story.html https://web.archive.org/web/20200109053829/https://www.chica...
  - jedilance 7y ago
    Thank you.
  - sjcsjc 7y ago
    Thanks very much.
ComodoHacker 7y ago
From linked article[0]: >— Cook County prosecutors drop all charges against Smollett, calling it an “appropriate resolution to this case.” >“After reviewing all of the facts and circumstances of the case, including Mr. Smollett’s volunteer service in the community and agreement to forfeit his bond to the City of Chicago, we believe this outcome is a just disposition and appropriate resolution to this case,” the statement said. WTF? Since when bribe constitutes a ground for dropping charges? 0. https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-met-cb-jussie-smollett-20190215-story.html#nt=interstitial-manual https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-met-cb-jussi...
- stonogo 7y ago
  Money has always been the only reliable way to stay out of jail. Usually you have to give it to lawyers, so it looks like they're just cutting out the middleman.
- unishark 7y ago
  That was only 10k wasn't it. The story above says the city is suing him for 130k.
  - anon73044 7y ago
    Forfeiting a bond usually means you have to pay the full amount. $100k in his case.
- rkangel 7y ago
  German law also seems to allow for it under some circumstances. Bernie Ecclestone for example: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-28656050 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-28656050
- strathmeyer 7y ago
  You aren't concerned the government can get all your data after you've pleaded guilty to something? Because I'm concerned people can't identify what a bribe is.
- jasonlotito 7y ago
guelo 7y ago
Use duckduckgo people!
plumednom 7y ago
The alt-right / white supremacists of the GOP have had a hard-on for Smollet for a year now. This is new, Trump should be proud, he has replaced first world jurisprudence with something bearing more resemblance to a banana republic. Think of it, Trump doesn't have to release his taxes, yet this jackass Smullet has to say "fuck my 4th amendment" and give 100% access to some 2-bit hustler of a judge in a highly political case being driven by white supremacists.
throwGuardian 7y ago
I believe Smollette staged this, but the state should not be allowed to simply get a year's worth of his personal data without cause. This tantamounts to unlawful search and seizure and a gross violation of his right to privacy, both guaranteed by the Constitution. As much as I disapprove of Smolette, we cannot let the state overstep it's boundaries and jurisdiction. They'll have to prove it while being compliant with the Constitution
- onetimemanytime 7y ago
  if you were a witness or had a document that proved he was/wasn't at x place, you, as an individual, would be forced to testify. Maybe this is way overbroad but odds are that Google knows what happened, either by location data or via a search. I think Google should NOT be able to keep this data so such requests are mute by definition.
  - throwGuardian 7y ago
    I have no problems with search and seizure that is backed by irrefutable "probable cause". But one year?!! Why not his entire life? The courts are stretching common sense definitions of "cause", and simply fishing for anything to nail him As for Google, while I agree with you, the reality is that their business model relies on personal data, and we're none the wiser continuing to use them despite this knowledge. How many, even within the HN community, will bother transitioning away from Google, after reading this?
    - onetimemanytime 7y ago
      They said one year because its better to have more than less. Court /lawyers should've or should push back.
      - throwGuardian 7y ago
        The entire premise of our Justice/legal system is not to nail someone at all costs, but to do it within the bounds of the law. More is obviously good for the state, but not the legal, ethical, moral way to go.
nullc 7y ago
The courts and law enforcement aren't the issue here. Google is. Why do they even have this data-- deleted material, browsing histories, the content of voice calls? Why did they store it in the first place? Google can't keep all of its own internal secrets private. The fact that information on you can be extracted via a targeted court order shouldn't be your greatest concern: The fact that they possess it means that it can likely be exploited or extracted in many different ways including via dragnet surveillance and espionage.
- throwGuardian 7y ago
  Because their business model relies on your personal data? The question is not why Google has your data, it's why you chose to continue using Google despite the awareness of such a scenario happening. As someone else commented, this article should be circulated far and wide, and people need to be educated on privacy friendly alternatives like ProtonMail. Lastly, the courts and law enforcement are a problem if they knowingly overreach their limits. Protections against unlawful search and seizure and right to privacy are guaranteed by the Constitution
  - thelittleone 7y ago
    Unfortunately ending their data collection is not as simple as leaving Gmail. For example they have Google maps, analytics, recaptcha and the contents of emails sent from friends to your protonmail account.
  - buboard 7y ago
    They could at least encrypt it, storing the key in the user’s devices.
    - shadowgovt 7y ago
      That damages the user-friendliness of their offering, because users with that configuration are always one misplaced key away from losing everything with no way for Google to recover it for them (and yes, users will absolutely blame the company for this failure mode, and companies that do not offer this failure mode tend to succeed in the marketplace).
mellosouls 7y ago
Alternative article for readers in the EU: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/judge-orders-google-hand-jussie-smollett-data_n_5e16a633c5b61f7019491dd4 https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/judge-orders-google-h...
bryanrasmussen 7y ago
Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to the EU market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism.
- unishark 7y ago
  I can't read it from the US either due to having an adblocker. And even if you allow ads the paywall appears after viewing one story per day. Google the title. Others news sites have it.
  - globuous 7y ago
    I'm in the same case, it this the story ? https://edition.cnn.com/2020/01/08/us/jussie-smollett-chicago-google-search-warrant/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2020/01/08/us/jussie-smollett-chicag...
    - unishark 7y ago
      Yeah that's it. The OP removed the name from the headline for some reason.
sabujp 7y ago
this is why many companies have no record of their own internal emails/conversations over a year or two. This is to cover their own tracks in case they get sued. I wonder if there are any email services where you can actually delete your data if it's older than some period?
buboard 7y ago
What was that company that is no longer allowed to add google to their phones? Huh, sounds like they can use it as a selling point
self_awareness 7y ago
Article is unavailable in EU due to GDPR.
- aepiepaey 7y ago
  https://outline.com/SysByE https://outline.com/SysByE
lucb1e 7y ago
As I understand it, in summary: someone filed a police report, the police suspect the person staged the incident being reported (so now they're a suspect themselves) and subpoenas their data. Okay? This is news, how? Should I know the person that allegedly staged it, or is it new that a judge approves a search warrant that allows time-limited access to a suspect's data? Does it matter that they're an actor? (An overloaded term that makes the title quite unclear) And a little meta: should we change the link to something everyone can actually read or do we want to keep this discussion limited to people from certain continents?
quirkafleeg3 7y ago
I'd be far more concerned about Google having my data in the first place...
DarkWiiPlayer 7y ago
"Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to the EU market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism." It's 2020 and american websites still go the "We'd rather block you alltogether than tell you what we do with your data" route.
- aledalgrande 7y ago
  lol just checked when GDPR was announced... 2016
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - close04 7y ago
    Even a couple of years before being adopted in 2016, with interested parties being aware that it's coming and an outline of what to expect.
    - aledalgrande 7y ago
      Exactly. Not sure why people are downvoting my statement, it seems quite the ample time to come up with a solution.
      - tyingq 7y ago
        Blocking people is a solution. I don't like it either, but if your target audience is solely the US, I can see why you might decide to do that. Edit: Agreed... placating people with lies doesn't help.
        aledalgrande 7y ago
        Totally makes sense, but if you block just say "we don't serve out of US", don't bullshit with "we are coming up with a solution".
aledalgrande 7y ago
For all people writing "is this different from physical documents?" the answer is yes. You have to think a little bit further than tomorrow. This is the perfect step for a totalitarian police government like China. You don't want the government to control your money with taxes and your health with social insurance, so why do you want it to control every aspect of your private life?
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
CalRobert 7y ago
Of course, the GDPR may help to prevent the very issues outlined in this article with regards to privacy and overreach.
thrower123 7y ago
Most of this nonsense could have been dispensed with if the original prosecutors hadn't tried to make the whole thing go away when it became clear that the original narrative was fraudulent. Hate crime hoaxes are terrible, because they undermine credibility when the real thing does occur. For that he ought to be nailed to the wall.
greedo 7y ago
“If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him.”
- huntermeyer 7y ago
  "Show me the man and I'll show you the crime." - Lavrentiy Beria (Most influential of Stalin’s secret police chiefs)
justaguyhere 7y ago
What a horrible site - popups/ads all over, you close one another springs up...
dangerface 7y ago
If you are in the EU: https://archive.li/LjNKy https://archive.li/LjNKy
gundmc 7y ago
This sounds more like a fishing expedition than a typical search warrant. I expect that Google fought or is fighting this request as stated as they have for others in the past. "And if we believe a request is overly broad, we seek to narrow it -- like when we persuaded a court to drastically limit a U.S. government request for two months' of user search queries."[1] If they refused to hand over 2 months of search queries, I guarantee they didn't just hand over a full year of all user data. [1] - https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/7380434?hl=en https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/7380434...
andrei_says_ 7y ago
I imagine that for pretty much each and every one of us, a full year of data will yield something actionable by law enforcement or at least by traffic law enforcement. Who didn’t speed once (even while flowing with the rest of traffic)? If we include dhs, then who, knowingly or unknowingly (go ahead and prove that) did not spend a few moments in proximity with persons of interest? “Give me six sentences written by the most honest of men and I’ll find a reason to hang them” is more relevant than ever and I’m just imagining how much more can be found in the full surveillance trail of google services.
MatthewWilkes 7y ago
Interesting that commenters are talking about overreach with data collection. I'm not sure if that's in the article because the paper in question blocks people in the EU out of a desire not to comply with privacy laws. A little ironic.
novaleaf 7y ago
For anyone like me who didnt know about the case, this info is burried half way down the article: > Smollett reported that two men attacked him near his high-rise apartment in the Streeterville neighborhood on a frigid night last Jan. 29, slipping a noose around his neck and shouting racist and homophobic slurs. Jussie Smollett files counterclaim against Chicago saying prosecution was malicious » Smollett’s manager — whose Google account information has also been ordered turned over — called 911 to report the attack and met responding officers in the lobby of Smollett’s building. He can be seen on body camera footage reaching toward Smollett to grab the noose around his neck with disdain. “The reason I’m calling (police) is because of this s--- ,” he said. But Smollett eventually turned from victim to suspect after an intense investigation by Chicago police detectives who used two brothers’ cellphone records, internet search history and text messages to corroborate their story that the actor paid them $3,500 to stage the attack. Prosecutors alleged that Smollett staged the attack because he was unhappy with the “Empire” studio’s response to a threatening letter he received at work a week earlier. Chicago police took it a step further, accusing Smollett of faking the letter as well.
webboynews 7y ago
ITT: people feeling bad for jussie but can't say it outright because then theyd be revealed as hypocrites

353 points by nkurz 7y ago

That dude better get another garage for the tape library they're gonna have to send...

I (and we should all) act as if this could happen to anyone. Essentially that the state can deputize any company to snitch on the digital ephemera that constitutes our daily lives, but especially those that we are deeply engaged: Google, Facebook, Lyft, Amazon. As such, we should not self-censor, but instead disengage from these proxy-cops and move to more distributed spaces.

kryogen1c 7y ago
>the state can deputize any company to snitch on the digital ephemera that constitutes our daily lives this is not true, but in the way that makes your point much, much worse. In the US, case precedent is already set that digital data that you don't physically own is not yours. IANAL, but my understanding is that the standards for digital search-and-seizure are lower for cloud services, not equivalent or (god-forbid) higher.
- abbadadda 7y ago
  Right. But I suppose the thing is under it is conveniently (for the prosecution) consolidated under one company's umbrella, so I don't think it totally invalidates OP's point. What about companies such as Proton Mail? Would they just hand over all their data? I don't know. Honestly asking.
  - dole 7y ago
    ProtonMail could, but it looks like just raw IP logging and most everything else is encrypted by design. I dunno if turning over those IP logs killed or maimed their warrant canary in the process. https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/biusm7/transparency_report_update_questions/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ProtonMail/comments/biusm7/transpar... Edit: obv PM’s canary is public and has disclosed they’ve released data to the Swiss courts, but it’s pretty much as advertised; ip logging is raw but the rest is encrypted.
abbadadda 7y ago
Queue the Google alternative posts. This is some terrifying stuff. > not just emails but also drafted and deleted messages; any files in their Google Drive cloud storage services; any Google Voice texts, calls and contacts; search and web browsing history; and location data.
- paxys 7y ago
  The scariest part is that this amount of data access can be very effectively weaponized to build a strong case against anyone. All of us are inadvertently breaking some law or the other all the time. If the government doesn't like you for any reason they are one court order away from blackmailing you or putting you away.
  - ars 7y ago
    > they are one court order away The implication being that the courts are corrupt? If that's the case I think you have way worse things to worry about than "data access", the courts have much greater powers than that.
    - harry8 7y ago
      The scale of it is what is of most interest. If the court gave a similar order to retrive similar amounts of physical (eg paper) information from your house, and anyone you happened to correspnd with it would be extremely notable and expensive as well as creating dramatic television pictures. Some of that is a deterrant to its abuse. "Google, fetch" the scale, ease and speed of that is worrying. How is its abuse to be stopped?
    - paxys 7y ago
      Courts may or may not be corrupt, but regardless of that it hasn't historically been very difficult for authorities to find a judge to sign off on a very wide-reaching warrant (like this very case).
      - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
drevil-v2 7y ago
State has a duty to prosecute law breakers. This is a load bearing wall of civil society. Everywhere. Making sweeping general statements is good for riling up the mobs but I would implore HN readers to be more pragmatic about these things. Look at the context. This person sought to ignite racial tensions for personal gain. He was given a sweetheart deal. The State is going after him and those protected him. They (the State prosecutors) have every right to collect and gather evidence to build the case.
- avs733 7y ago
  yes we have seen you know how to make this comment. Another way to look at that 'duty' is to say [The] state has a responsibility to ensure justice for all. That may seem like the same thing but vagueness is at times valuable given that life rarely satisfies the black and white dichotomies many of us would prefer.
  - drevil-v2 7y ago
    What exactly are you saying? That the State should let this one go?
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - avs733 7y ago
      More so that laws are a social construct. We can have a discussion about how the state should behave without using catastrophic examples to shift debates about principles and policies. The post I was responding to sees the role of the state as a absolutist binaric executor of often fuzzy laws and rules. The context of this example doesn't have any affect on whether or not that naive belief is a path to a functional and just society. Whatever happens with Smollett, or the next example, simply doesn't support a belief that every crime should be prosecuted. There was a (hamfisted but entertaining) TNG episode about this for gods sake...
- hnuser123456 7y ago
crocodiletears 7y ago
I disagree on your last point. Whether it's Google, Microsoft, your ISP, a databroker, a webscraper, an unscrupulous app developer, or even your TV, I think it's safe to assume that one day or the next, every piece of content you produce, or topic you discuss will leak its way onto a major adcorp's servers. I can hardly think of anyone I know that can't attest to the experience of discussing something as a non-sequitur, only to receive ads about it shortly thereafter. Even visiting an old friend with vastly different interests, never enabling location services, or connecting to their WiFi, I've noticed vast changes in my ad regime. Decentralising your web activity can only make you less easily monetizable, but you'll never escape the panopticon, and Google can release data it got from third-parties just as easily as the data it collected itself. If you want to say something you don't want Facebook, Amazon, MS, Google, or the state to hear about, do it in the woods or a private room away from anything digital.
- cronix 7y ago
  The other week I was out in a National Forest hiking. I was about 6 miles from the nearest Forest Service road. I took a break and sat there eating a sandwich and looked up to see a camera mounted on a tree about 4 feet from me. I imagine some hunter put it there. I'm just saying that even out in the middle of nowhere, not near any paved roads, there are still cameras watching and recording.
  - crocodiletears 7y ago
    Dishearteningly true.
  - protomyth 7y ago
    If it's for the purpose our wildlife people are going to try to do, it is for animal count and trail tracking.
  - pbhjpbhj 7y ago
    Satellite surveillance, or spy-planes/drones also might record you in the wilderness.
- deleted 7y ago
judge2020 7y ago
I imagine that being distributed makes it easier to obtain the data for a person. If a court can't get data on a user from the the main server's owner, they might go after more vulnerable server owners that happened to be federated with the main server (vulnerable, as in less disposable income for lawyers).
- bananocurrency 7y ago
  distributed !== decentralized
ryanmccullagh 7y ago
It’s clear you have no idea what this actor did. He staged a hate crime in Chicago and the main cook county attorney dropped the case after CPD proved it was fake. With your radical views, where do you draw the line? Will you vote to protect criminals, child abusers, rapist? All in an effort for “privacy”?
- harry8 7y ago
  It's clear you have made up your mind without the facts. Note the Tribune's reticence to come to that conclusion based on the actual evidence? I have zero opinion about it. Separate to that this comment has absolutely nothing whatever to do with the parent comment, whether you agree with the parent or not. Rights should exist for everyone, not just everyone you happen to like. Whether this warrant has gone too far as the parent suggests and it is necessary to take countermeasures or not is the argument, not your feelings about someone accused of something which frankly have no baring on anything in such a discussion.
  - himinlomax 7y ago
    Is there anyone, anyone at all, who disputes that he made a false report?
    - harry8 7y ago
      I have little idea and care even less, myself. The source material, ie article published by the Tribune, was completely unwilling to come to that same conclusion in the story. So to me it seems more likely that it is in dispute on that basis rather than that is is indsiputable due to wholly unsupported comments here. But again it doesn't matter at ALL. It has zero relevance to this discussion. None. No really. Rights are especially important when they relate to people you dislike doing things you also dislike. That situation is exactly when you lose your rights. Like maybe think about if that's is what is happening here.
      - himinlomax 7y ago
Y-Bopinator 7y ago
Jussie Smollet isn’t just anyone. Filing a false police report is a crime. Don’t commit crime and you’ll be fine, idiot.
Simulacra 7y ago
It could but it's more than likely not. In this case a crime was committed and possibly covered up. As much as I agree with you to move to distributed spaces and increased privacy, I think Google has an obligation to comply here.
auiya 7y ago
> the [US] state can deputize any [US-incorporated] company to snitch FTFY. I don't believe they have the same legal authorities to compel companies incorporated outside of their country jurisdiction to do the same, correct me if I'm wrong. This isn't the same as a sharing agreement done as a diplomatic quid-pro-quo however, which I'm sure also happens.

vuln 7y ago

When convenience comes back to bite you in the ass. I’m interested to see if and what Google releases and if there would be any different if Apple was asked to release the same information. Does the “Ad” company have more data on an individual versus the “privacy” company? Or does it actually depend on the user opting in to give this data to said company?

deadmutex 7y ago
From what I can tell in the news, Apple will share data if ordered to -- “WE GAVE THEM ALL OF THE DATA IN OUR POSSESSION,” SAYS APPLE from (https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/7/21054836/fbi-iphone-unlock-apple-encryption-debate-pensacola-ios-security https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/7/21054836/fbi-iphone-unlock...) The iPhone unlocking for the mass shooter was slightly different -- FBI wanted them to create a new tool (that did not exist) to unlock an existing phone.

alexfromapex 7y ago

Highly disturbing that the court is allowed to request that much data without any legal restrictions [on privacy].

munk-a 7y ago
I don't know why you think there aren't any legal restrictions - this wasn't a random LEO going cowboy and trying to hack into google, a judge directly ordered this action and signed onto the warrants.
- alexfromapex 7y ago
  I mean as far as privacy is concerned. They were able to request all text messages, documents, location data, voicemails without any stipulation that they were relevant to the case.
  - ceejayoz 7y ago
    Well, yeah. They have to go through them to determine if they're relevant. Same reason a physical search warrant will let the cops seize a vaguely defined bunch of stuff from your house. In particularly sensitive cases, the judge may appoint an official to be a go-between between the evidence and the prosecution. For example: https://miami.cbslocal.com/2018/04/26/special-master-evidence-seized-michael-cohen/ https://miami.cbslocal.com/2018/04/26/special-master-evidenc...
  - dragonwriter 7y ago
    The court order is the determination that the information has enough probability of being relevant that it needs to be turned over to be reviewed.
akiselev 7y ago
The courts are the legal restriction. The way in which the evidence collected can be challenge in the appellate courts.
- 7y ago

munk-a 7y ago

Things like this are why I think that as time goes on storing PII is going to be seen as a cost rather than a benefit to companies... It'll take several rounds of public outcry to shift the mindset though.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

buboard 7y ago

at what point does this projection of judicial power against individuals in the name of safety (whose safety? whats really at stake here even?) become terrorism?

AlohaFractal 7y ago
Right after taxes become theft but before abortion becomes murder.
guelo 7y ago
A bit of an aside. Terrorism is a useless word now besides its propaganda value. The USA just declares whoever they don't like to be a terrorist, like how they just did to Iran's army, and now apparently they can legally assassinate any Iranian soldier. What's funny is Iran wants in on this propaganda game now, they designated the US army as terrorists.
- perl4ever 7y ago
  I don't think it makes a whole lot of sense to talk about "assassinating" soldiers any more than "terrorist attacks" on them. Those are things done to civilians by definition. We certainly don't want to promote the idea that "collateral damage" is necessary for a military operation to be ethical. I think terrorism has a perfectly good definition - political lobbying/influence "by other means" than conventional politics, i.e. attacking and terrorizing civilians. Doesn't matter who does it or how exactly. Maybe the US government doesn't exactly use that definition, but that doesn't mean there is no such thing as terrorism.
  - guelo 7y ago
    If we killed some European general that was visiting some European country you would say that we had assassinated him.
    - perl4ever 7y ago
      "Visiting...some European country" So, that's who this general was, an Iranian visiting some Iranian country? Was he there to see the fjords? Anyway, telling me what I would think or say is unacceptable in a civil conversation. If I write something, you can assume I mean it, or you can disengage if you think I'm trolling. If you're going to take my comments as justifying US actions, perhaps they can be taken that way, but they may apply to retaliation as well, no? Is there much of a gray area with military personnel in Iraq right now, who aren't Iraqis?

m0zg 7y ago

I (rhetorically) wonder why the title does not contain the "actor's" name. But then again, we all know why that is.

keanzu 7y ago
Full title -> Jussie Smollett investigation: Judge orders Google to turn over a full year of the actor’s data as part of special prosecutor probe Too long for HN? Unknown. The title reads fine in the Chicago Tribune.
- dredmorbius 7y ago
  HN's subject limit is 80 characters. TRONC's head runs 133.
nl 7y ago
The title is "Jussie Smollett investigation: Judge orders Google to turn over a full year of the actor’s data as part of special prosecutor probe" which seems to include the the actor's name? But then again, we all know why that is. I don't know who Jussie Smollett is (other than this story) and I'm completely in the dark what this is supposed to be implying. Maybe you are seeing headline optimisation? Is that what this is implying? Edit: Or do you mean the HN headline? The current headline here is "Judge orders Google to turn over a full year of actor’s data" which seems completely reasonable given the length restrictions. Again - what are you implying? Is there some legal restriction on knowing his name?
- m0zg 7y ago
  Unless you lived in a cave in Afghanistan for the entirety of 2019 there's no way you don't know what I'm "implying".
  - lostmyoldone 7y ago
    There's folk from all over the world here, I don't have a clue either. I could probably Google a bit and figure it out. However, I still. believe that legibility of arguments or opinion is the responsibility of the author, not the reader.

zadokshi 7y ago

Is this different in any practical sense to an old fashioned request for physical paper documents? The only difference I can think of is traditionally documents are destroyed after they are no longer needed. Now they can see “deleted” documents and document change history. i.e. emails stored locally on a personal or company server can be permanently destroyed. Traditional email systems won’t have a change history of the email writing process) (I imagine all sorts of games could be played by lawyers with access to this additional types of information.)

keanzu 7y ago
Quality of the record keeping is vastly higher. Imagine a subpoena for every paper mail you sent in a year. You can't get that from the US Postal service.
- Spooky23 7y ago
  USPS has been storing images of all envelopes delivered for many years now. Prior to that, it was possible to have that information manually logged. If you corresponded with people in a Warsaw Pact country in the 1960s, that mail was recorded and sometimes opened.
  - keanzu 7y ago
    Knowing a letter was delivered by USPS doesn't yield the contents. The state would have to subpoena each individual recipient - and they may have destroyed or lost the letter. It would only be equivalent if every letter was opened and recorded so that all the contents would later be available because this subpoena covers not just emails but also drafted and deleted messages; any files in their Google Drive cloud storage services; any Google Voice texts. This isn't metadata the government is coming for, it is the full content.
    - Daneel_ 7y ago
      Sometimes the contents almost don't matter. For example, if you saw multiple letters from an oncology department to a household, followed by letters from government departments and a funeral home, it wouldn't be hard to figure out what was going on. It's the exact same problem with phone metadata. The connections can be made to tell the story, and are even easier to manipulate into whatever narrative the prosecution wants to sell. In my example, you probably thought "person has cancer, household receives letters from the government post-death, bill from the funeral home", which is exactly how it could be sold. But it could just as easily be "person beating cancer, household receives government forms related to healthcare subsidies, funeral home letter was a condolence letter sent one year after the death of their parent." This is why metadata is so dangerous, it's far too easy to spin.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

robocat 7y ago

On the flip side of the loss of privacy: location and similar data can be used as a solid alibi if you are accused incorrectly. How many people have been silently tagged as innocent because of their data stored? That said, ersonally I find the loss of privacy abhorrent, especially because I have fuck all rights in the US (not a citizen, so the US government and US corporations can abuse my personal information with very little recourse from me or my own government).

frandroid 7y ago
It should be up to the falsely-accused to allow their siphoned data to be release to create an alibi.
lonelappde 7y ago
They could claim you faked your alibi data. If you innocently were near a crime you could be convicted by circumstantial evidence.
titzer 7y ago
> location and similar data can be used as a solid alibi if you are accused incorrectly. Except you don't control them and could be faked and used to frame you. The power imbalance here is absolutely astonishing.

hiram112 7y ago

> not just emails but also drafted and deleted messages; any files in their Google Drive cloud storage services; any Google Voice texts, calls and contacts; search and web browsing history; and location data. I've always assumed my email, Drive, Voice info, calls, contact lists, etc would be obtainable by a warrant. But I wonder if Google would turn over things like browsing and search history, even if you never browsed while logged in to Google or searched, and also had explicitly turned off storing of this data in your Google privacy settings. There is no doubt in my mind that Google, through the use of 3rd party trackers from "partners", analytics, and correlation can easily match my non-logged in web history and searches with the same computer and IP used when I log into Gmail or Maps. Supposedly they don't tie this global "advertising profile" to your real identifying Google account, at least for the data provided to advertisers, but I would think it'd be trivial for Google to collect it all - every web page visited and for how long, every search you've made - and turn over the vast majority of it to the government, upon request. In other words, Google probably does know nearly everything you do online, logged in or not, at this point.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

lonelappde 7y ago

"actor" is inappropriate term here. "[Alleged] Hate crime hoaxer" is more relevant.

Johnny555 7y ago

Suddenly the inconvenience of moving to an encrypted email provider like ProtonMail doesn't sound too bad. I don't particularly have anything to hide, but I'm sure a prosecutor could find something suspicious in my emails if he looked hard enough. It wouldn't make my email completely inaccessible to the government (they could subpoena the sender), but would make it a lot less convenient to go on a fishing expedition.

collyw 7y ago
I was wondering about this. If I switch to Proton, but 90% of my outgoing emails go to gmail accounts, google still has 90% of my email data.

throwawaysea 7y ago

Although it is scary to have things like location data turned over, the one I worry about is 23andme.

foob4r 7y ago

degoogle as much as you can

gfody 7y ago

If Google complies would they deliver the data to the defendant so that he has the option to plead the 5th if there’s anything incriminating?

keiferski 7y ago

The deeper problem is that old laws are being used to deal with new behaviors. This inadequacy will continue to grow as human beings and computers slowly merge over the next century or two, where at some point, “your Google data” will be more-and-more equivalent to “all of your thoughts.” Those who say that this is justified because warrants were obtained seem to miss the point that state’s ability and desire to gather information has grown exponentially over time. And that’s why we need data protection laws, alternatives to Google, and other privacy measures. The philosophical concept of embodied cognition is a good place to start on this issue: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/embodied-cognition/ https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/embodied-cognition/

asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
I'd say that very much depends on why you believe the warrant process exists in the first place. I honestly don't know that much about the historical context of search warrants. Do they exist because philosophers of old believed in a right to privacy as an end unto itself? Or do they exist for some more practical reason, like because they were used for extra legal retaliation against enemies of the state, or for intimidation, or to go on fishing expeditions. Or, why does the protection from self-incrimination exist? Is it because we are concerned that the government might have access to your thoughts? Or is it because the government would torture people to get confessions, and the people wanted to remove the incentive to do so? Depending on your belief about this, you might feel differently about what should be done about this Google situation. If you believe the latter view in the second paragraph, for example, you might have no problem with the breadth of the search. In fact, you might not even have a problem with involuntary brain scans, provided they were proven accurate. As long as the rule of law is strong and the materials were used only for a defined and limited purpose, you might think it would be better if the government could compel the true personal perspective of the accused. So this really enters into questions about each individual's perspective on the purpose and value of privacy. I think it might not be accurate to say that people who say it is justified are missing the point. They might just think the point is different from what you think it is.
- lrem 7y ago

sjcsjc 7y ago

"Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries" Does anyone have an alternative source for this story please?

mathemancer 7y ago
Archive link: https://web.archive.org/web/20200109053829/https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/criminal-justice/ct-jussie-smollett-special-prosecutor-investigation-20200108-j3j3p2dypvf5vbbo5jpxrvcjsq-story.html https://web.archive.org/web/20200109053829/https://www.chica...
- jedilance 7y ago
  Thank you.
- sjcsjc 7y ago
  Thanks very much.

ComodoHacker 7y ago

From linked article[0]: >— Cook County prosecutors drop all charges against Smollett, calling it an “appropriate resolution to this case.” >“After reviewing all of the facts and circumstances of the case, including Mr. Smollett’s volunteer service in the community and agreement to forfeit his bond to the City of Chicago, we believe this outcome is a just disposition and appropriate resolution to this case,” the statement said. WTF? Since when bribe constitutes a ground for dropping charges? 0. https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-met-cb-jussie-smollett-20190215-story.html#nt=interstitial-manual https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/breaking/ct-met-cb-jussi...

stonogo 7y ago
Money has always been the only reliable way to stay out of jail. Usually you have to give it to lawyers, so it looks like they're just cutting out the middleman.
unishark 7y ago
That was only 10k wasn't it. The story above says the city is suing him for 130k.
- anon73044 7y ago
  Forfeiting a bond usually means you have to pay the full amount. $100k in his case.
rkangel 7y ago
German law also seems to allow for it under some circumstances. Bernie Ecclestone for example: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-28656050 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-28656050
strathmeyer 7y ago
You aren't concerned the government can get all your data after you've pleaded guilty to something? Because I'm concerned people can't identify what a bribe is.
jasonlotito 7y ago

guelo 7y ago

Use duckduckgo people!

plumednom 7y ago

The alt-right / white supremacists of the GOP have had a hard-on for Smollet for a year now. This is new, Trump should be proud, he has replaced first world jurisprudence with something bearing more resemblance to a banana republic. Think of it, Trump doesn't have to release his taxes, yet this jackass Smullet has to say "fuck my 4th amendment" and give 100% access to some 2-bit hustler of a judge in a highly political case being driven by white supremacists.

throwGuardian 7y ago

I believe Smollette staged this, but the state should not be allowed to simply get a year's worth of his personal data without cause. This tantamounts to unlawful search and seizure and a gross violation of his right to privacy, both guaranteed by the Constitution. As much as I disapprove of Smolette, we cannot let the state overstep it's boundaries and jurisdiction. They'll have to prove it while being compliant with the Constitution

onetimemanytime 7y ago
if you were a witness or had a document that proved he was/wasn't at x place, you, as an individual, would be forced to testify. Maybe this is way overbroad but odds are that Google knows what happened, either by location data or via a search. I think Google should NOT be able to keep this data so such requests are mute by definition.
- throwGuardian 7y ago
  I have no problems with search and seizure that is backed by irrefutable "probable cause". But one year?!! Why not his entire life? The courts are stretching common sense definitions of "cause", and simply fishing for anything to nail him As for Google, while I agree with you, the reality is that their business model relies on personal data, and we're none the wiser continuing to use them despite this knowledge. How many, even within the HN community, will bother transitioning away from Google, after reading this?
  - onetimemanytime 7y ago
    They said one year because its better to have more than less. Court /lawyers should've or should push back.
    - throwGuardian 7y ago
      The entire premise of our Justice/legal system is not to nail someone at all costs, but to do it within the bounds of the law. More is obviously good for the state, but not the legal, ethical, moral way to go.

nullc 7y ago

The courts and law enforcement aren't the issue here. Google is. Why do they even have this data-- deleted material, browsing histories, the content of voice calls? Why did they store it in the first place? Google can't keep all of its own internal secrets private. The fact that information on you can be extracted via a targeted court order shouldn't be your greatest concern: The fact that they possess it means that it can likely be exploited or extracted in many different ways including via dragnet surveillance and espionage.

throwGuardian 7y ago
Because their business model relies on your personal data? The question is not why Google has your data, it's why you chose to continue using Google despite the awareness of such a scenario happening. As someone else commented, this article should be circulated far and wide, and people need to be educated on privacy friendly alternatives like ProtonMail. Lastly, the courts and law enforcement are a problem if they knowingly overreach their limits. Protections against unlawful search and seizure and right to privacy are guaranteed by the Constitution
- thelittleone 7y ago
  Unfortunately ending their data collection is not as simple as leaving Gmail. For example they have Google maps, analytics, recaptcha and the contents of emails sent from friends to your protonmail account.
- buboard 7y ago
  They could at least encrypt it, storing the key in the user’s devices.
  - shadowgovt 7y ago
    That damages the user-friendliness of their offering, because users with that configuration are always one misplaced key away from losing everything with no way for Google to recover it for them (and yes, users will absolutely blame the company for this failure mode, and companies that do not offer this failure mode tend to succeed in the marketplace).

mellosouls 7y ago

Alternative article for readers in the EU: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/judge-orders-google-hand-jussie-smollett-data_n_5e16a633c5b61f7019491dd4 https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/judge-orders-google-h...

bryanrasmussen 7y ago

Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to the EU market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism.

unishark 7y ago
I can't read it from the US either due to having an adblocker. And even if you allow ads the paywall appears after viewing one story per day. Google the title. Others news sites have it.
- globuous 7y ago
  I'm in the same case, it this the story ? https://edition.cnn.com/2020/01/08/us/jussie-smollett-chicago-google-search-warrant/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2020/01/08/us/jussie-smollett-chicag...
  - unishark 7y ago
    Yeah that's it. The OP removed the name from the headline for some reason.

sabujp 7y ago

this is why many companies have no record of their own internal emails/conversations over a year or two. This is to cover their own tracks in case they get sued. I wonder if there are any email services where you can actually delete your data if it's older than some period?

buboard 7y ago

What was that company that is no longer allowed to add google to their phones? Huh, sounds like they can use it as a selling point

self_awareness 7y ago

Article is unavailable in EU due to GDPR.

aepiepaey 7y ago
https://outline.com/SysByE https://outline.com/SysByE

lucb1e 7y ago

As I understand it, in summary: someone filed a police report, the police suspect the person staged the incident being reported (so now they're a suspect themselves) and subpoenas their data. Okay? This is news, how? Should I know the person that allegedly staged it, or is it new that a judge approves a search warrant that allows time-limited access to a suspect's data? Does it matter that they're an actor? (An overloaded term that makes the title quite unclear) And a little meta: should we change the link to something everyone can actually read or do we want to keep this discussion limited to people from certain continents?

quirkafleeg3 7y ago

I'd be far more concerned about Google having my data in the first place...

DarkWiiPlayer 7y ago

"Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries. We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to the EU market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism." It's 2020 and american websites still go the "We'd rather block you alltogether than tell you what we do with your data" route.

aledalgrande 7y ago
lol just checked when GDPR was announced... 2016
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- close04 7y ago
  Even a couple of years before being adopted in 2016, with interested parties being aware that it's coming and an outline of what to expect.
  - aledalgrande 7y ago
    Exactly. Not sure why people are downvoting my statement, it seems quite the ample time to come up with a solution.
    - tyingq 7y ago
      Blocking people is a solution. I don't like it either, but if your target audience is solely the US, I can see why you might decide to do that. Edit: Agreed... placating people with lies doesn't help.
      - aledalgrande 7y ago
        Totally makes sense, but if you block just say "we don't serve out of US", don't bullshit with "we are coming up with a solution".

aledalgrande 7y ago

For all people writing "is this different from physical documents?" the answer is yes. You have to think a little bit further than tomorrow. This is the perfect step for a totalitarian police government like China. You don't want the government to control your money with taxes and your health with social insurance, so why do you want it to control every aspect of your private life?

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

CalRobert 7y ago

Of course, the GDPR may help to prevent the very issues outlined in this article with regards to privacy and overreach.

thrower123 7y ago

Most of this nonsense could have been dispensed with if the original prosecutors hadn't tried to make the whole thing go away when it became clear that the original narrative was fraudulent. Hate crime hoaxes are terrible, because they undermine credibility when the real thing does occur. For that he ought to be nailed to the wall.

greedo 7y ago

“If you give me six lines written by the hand of the most honest of men, I will find something in them which will hang him.”

huntermeyer 7y ago
"Show me the man and I'll show you the crime." - Lavrentiy Beria (Most influential of Stalin’s secret police chiefs)

justaguyhere 7y ago

What a horrible site - popups/ads all over, you close one another springs up...

dangerface 7y ago

If you are in the EU: https://archive.li/LjNKy https://archive.li/LjNKy

gundmc 7y ago

This sounds more like a fishing expedition than a typical search warrant. I expect that Google fought or is fighting this request as stated as they have for others in the past. "And if we believe a request is overly broad, we seek to narrow it -- like when we persuaded a court to drastically limit a U.S. government request for two months' of user search queries."[1] If they refused to hand over 2 months of search queries, I guarantee they didn't just hand over a full year of all user data. [1] - https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/7380434?hl=en https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/7380434...

andrei_says_ 7y ago

I imagine that for pretty much each and every one of us, a full year of data will yield something actionable by law enforcement or at least by traffic law enforcement. Who didn’t speed once (even while flowing with the rest of traffic)? If we include dhs, then who, knowingly or unknowingly (go ahead and prove that) did not spend a few moments in proximity with persons of interest? “Give me six sentences written by the most honest of men and I’ll find a reason to hang them” is more relevant than ever and I’m just imagining how much more can be found in the full surveillance trail of google services.

MatthewWilkes 7y ago

Interesting that commenters are talking about overreach with data collection. I'm not sure if that's in the article because the paper in question blocks people in the EU out of a desire not to comply with privacy laws. A little ironic.

novaleaf 7y ago

For anyone like me who didnt know about the case, this info is burried half way down the article: > Smollett reported that two men attacked him near his high-rise apartment in the Streeterville neighborhood on a frigid night last Jan. 29, slipping a noose around his neck and shouting racist and homophobic slurs. Jussie Smollett files counterclaim against Chicago saying prosecution was malicious » Smollett’s manager — whose Google account information has also been ordered turned over — called 911 to report the attack and met responding officers in the lobby of Smollett’s building. He can be seen on body camera footage reaching toward Smollett to grab the noose around his neck with disdain. “The reason I’m calling (police) is because of this s--- ,” he said. But Smollett eventually turned from victim to suspect after an intense investigation by Chicago police detectives who used two brothers’ cellphone records, internet search history and text messages to corroborate their story that the actor paid them $3,500 to stage the attack. Prosecutors alleged that Smollett staged the attack because he was unhappy with the “Empire” studio’s response to a threatening letter he received at work a week earlier. Chicago police took it a step further, accusing Smollett of faking the letter as well.

webboynews 7y ago

ITT: people feeling bad for jussie but can't say it outright because then theyd be revealed as hypocrites