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I would keep in mind that the US has weird antiterror laws about assisting enemies and also laws which construe bypassing system designs as hacking. For instan

by elif 6y ago

I would keep in mind that the US has weird antiterror laws about assisting enemies and also laws which construe bypassing system designs as hacking. For instance, Virgil Griffith is being held and charged for giving a high level description of bitcoin transactions at an academic conference in North Korea. This is incredibly more specific and more technical of an act. https://www.coindesk.com/usa-v-virgil-griffith-what-we-know-and-dont-in-the-bombshell-crypto-sanctions-case https://www.coindesk.com/usa-v-virgil-griffith-what-we-know-...

x86ARMsRace 6y ago
This law is trivially easy to get on the wrong side of. Something like this would be definitely in scope of the anti-terror law you're talking about. American HN users beware.
eatbitseveryday 6y ago
Can someone who is a lawyer comment on this, please? edit: further.. how is Signal shielded (if at all) from providing services to anyone in Iran? Wouldn't they be a target in such a case? The blog post is an explicit call for assistance specifically to do so.
- iudqnolq 6y ago
  > Executive order 13722, signed by President Donald Trump in 2016, prohibits U.S. persons from exporting services to *North Korea*. Edit: You might find GitHub's description of how they handle this interesting: https://github.blog/2021-01-05-advancing-developer-freedom-github-is-fully-available-in-iran/ https://github.blog/2021-01-05-advancing-developer-freedom-g...
- nulbyte 6y ago
  Not a lawyer, but details of the sanctions are public[1], including Iran General License D-1 which covers services, software, and hardware incident to personal communications. The license has details for fee based and generally public free-of-charge services. We want Iranians to be free to communicate.[2] [1]: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/financial-sanctions/sanctions-programs-and-country-information/iran-sanctions https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/financial-sanctions/... [2]: https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sm0322 https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sm0322
AnthonyMouse 6y ago
I wonder how many First Amendment lawyers would be champing at the bit to take a case where a prosecutor was dumb enough to charge someone with a crime for assisting dissidents to communicate.
- eightails 6y ago
  Problem is that to many from the other side of the Atlantic "dissidents" look an awful lot like "terrorists".
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    Calling everybody "terrorists" is for politicians and pundits. Judges spend all day seeing through hyperbole like that.
iudqnolq 6y ago
Virgil Griffith was told not to enter North Korea by the US government, and snuck in through China anyway. He admitted to specifically talking about how to use cryptocurrencies to avoid sanctions, and admitted he knew at the time that that was illegal. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/02/nyregion/north-korea-virgil-griffin-cyptocurrency-arrest.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/02/nyregion/north-korea-virg...

by elif 6y ago

x86ARMsRace 6y ago

This law is trivially easy to get on the wrong side of. Something like this would be definitely in scope of the anti-terror law you're talking about. American HN users beware.

eatbitseveryday 6y ago

Can someone who is a lawyer comment on this, please? edit: further.. how is Signal shielded (if at all) from providing services to anyone in Iran? Wouldn't they be a target in such a case? The blog post is an explicit call for assistance specifically to do so.

iudqnolq 6y ago
> Executive order 13722, signed by President Donald Trump in 2016, prohibits U.S. persons from exporting services to *North Korea*. Edit: You might find GitHub's description of how they handle this interesting: https://github.blog/2021-01-05-advancing-developer-freedom-github-is-fully-available-in-iran/ https://github.blog/2021-01-05-advancing-developer-freedom-g...
nulbyte 6y ago
Not a lawyer, but details of the sanctions are public[1], including Iran General License D-1 which covers services, software, and hardware incident to personal communications. The license has details for fee based and generally public free-of-charge services. We want Iranians to be free to communicate.[2] [1]: https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/financial-sanctions/sanctions-programs-and-country-information/iran-sanctions https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/financial-sanctions/... [2]: https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sm0322 https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/sm0322

AnthonyMouse 6y ago

I wonder how many First Amendment lawyers would be champing at the bit to take a case where a prosecutor was dumb enough to charge someone with a crime for assisting dissidents to communicate.

eightails 6y ago
Problem is that to many from the other side of the Atlantic "dissidents" look an awful lot like "terrorists".
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago
  Calling everybody "terrorists" is for politicians and pundits. Judges spend all day seeing through hyperbole like that.

iudqnolq 6y ago

Virgil Griffith was told not to enter North Korea by the US government, and snuck in through China anyway. He admitted to specifically talking about how to use cryptocurrencies to avoid sanctions, and admitted he knew at the time that that was illegal. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/02/nyregion/north-korea-virgil-griffin-cyptocurrency-arrest.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/02/nyregion/north-korea-virg...