5 ms·

This just looks like standard police work? What am I missing here?

0xbadcafebee 4y ago
"Be careful, they have spooky powers" seems to be the message. As well as "there are digital fingerprints everywhere", as they also talk about ProPublica doing their own investigation.
pxmpxm 4y ago
Need to keep the story in the news cycle through 2024
- pseudolus 4y ago
  It's deeply regrettable that both sides of the political spectrum are so caught up in their particular narratives that they can't see potential erosion of civil rights that these law enforcement techniques bring about. On parts of the left, segments are grateful for these technologies because they allow for the arrest of individuals who they perceive as having attempted to overthrow democracy. Segments of the right are blinded and can't focus on the means and methods undertaken by law enforcement because they can't overcome their rage at what they perceive as an overblown and partisan response to the events of the riot.
  - xwolfi 4y ago
    What of the population living day after day in a dangerous world ? Do they prefer civil right preservation or police oversight ? I get the politicians in D.C. might have trouble to see what's in front of them, but Im unsure the population is so against it.
    - Geezus-42 4y ago
      I for one would prefer civil rights. The most dangerous people I have ever met were cops. I can protect myself from the individual non-state backed fascist.
      - amanaplanacanal 4y ago
        > I can protect myself from the individual non-state backed fascist. Perhaps you can. History has shown that most people cannot.
    - nemo44x 4y ago
      I agree. I think most people have a “if you’re not breaking the law then you have nothing to worry about” view on this. Naively trusting that whoever has authority can be trusted indefinitely. But it’s an easier point to make than an abstract view of personal liberties and protections from abusive power. Some kid (I suspect) wrote a naughty racist word on sone piece of playground equipment (easily cleaned off) and the reaction by people on an unofficial town FB group were amazing. One person called for cameras everywhere and the imprisonment of parents if their kid was recorded writing a racist or w/e word. Hell the whole defund the police thing started turning into an alternative where there are cameras everywhere. I’m pretty sure that will be the future.
  - Forge36 4y ago
    How many people need to be involved and how large the area before geofencing is used as an investigation tool? I'd set the current bar lower than the capital riots. Though how low is reasonable I don't know. I'm definitely opposed to finding a single individual, and an entire city. But I don't know how I'd feel about a single small building (say for a mass shooter event)
  - ModernMech 4y ago
    [flagged]
    - commandlinefan 4y ago
      > the Republican party Nobody even remotely affiliated with the Republican Party was involved in any actual insurrection attempt on 1/6.
      - cycrutchfield 4y ago
        “No True Republican” fallacy?
      - ModernMech 4y ago
        You should really read the bipartisan 1/6 committee report. At the very least what you say isn't true because there wouldn't have been a mob in DC on 1/6 if Trump hadn't asked them to be there. How many people travelled from around the country to be in DC on 1/6/2017? Or 2009? Everyone gets there for the 20th for the inauguration, whereas historically the 6th has been ignored. But in 2021 everyone was there on that day, at the express invitation of Trump. Don't take my word for it - you just have to look at the court proceedings for the 1/6 prosecutions, where defendant after defendant pleads that they are not at fault because they were just taking directions from the President. But what you say is further untrue because there were plenty of Republicans involved beyond that. The White House was responsible for helping organize the Stop the Steal rally, at which multiple high-ranking Republican party members spoke. Beyond that, multiple congresspeople and senators objected to certifications, not because they had any basis for their objections, but in order to delay the proceeding and give Trump time to rile the mob. State GOP lawmakers forged Certificates of the Vote electing Trump that Pence was intended to substitute for the authentic ones. GOP Senators were involved in the process to transmit these certificates to Pence in time. Giuliani was busy calling lawmakers during the insurrection imploring them to delay the vote further as the mob bore down on them. Trump sat back and refused to deploy any National Guard troops, to the point Pence had to usurp control and do it himself after waiting 3 hours. Again, read the 1/6 report. It's all in there.
      - acdha 4y ago
xwolfi 4y ago
It's a question whether standard police work should be reformed since despite all classical attempts at hiding, they were found. It questions: are the trade offs worth it? I suppose the corrolary being: what if this protest was more legitimate but the police was corrupt? I live in China myself so I find it interesting to ask this question before it's fully done and lost, even if I feel I know the answer: yes, it is worth it, and you'll never shock people with stories of criminals being founds thanks to general surveillance as much as they're shocked by unsolved horrendous crimes, so the abuses will be tolerated (or hidden thanks to the new structure of standard police work) as price to pay, when a critical mass of crimes that could have been solved will be reached. And I am sad to tell you, that trading freedom for safety is paradise, and when I left the scary city I lived in before to Hong Kong where I live now, I felt such a surprised relief at the total absence of small crimes (all citizens prints are stored on a central database for instance, all 7M of us can be found in an instant). I'm never going back, they can read my emails and track my phone.
- krapp 4y ago
  > It's a question whether standard police work should be reformed since despite all classical attempts at hiding, they were found. They discussed their plans openly on social media then streamed evidence of it after the fact. Ignoring the question of whether the ability to hide from law enforcement is a necessary component of liberty even when one has committed a crime, these guys weren't even trying very hard to cover their tracks.
  - drunkpotato 4y ago
    For the core field operatives, it seemed many had unrealistic expectations of their chance of success, and were pumped on a success-or-death mentality. In retrospect it’s easy to see why that would lead to lax operational security. Now that they neither succeeded nor died in the attempt, the evidence is easy to find.
pseudolus 4y ago
Per the story the use of geofencing is of great concern as essentially it amounts to a grant of authority to the State to undertake a search simply based on geography and not reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing. This is a significant departure from past standards for undertaking a search. See article excerpt below. 'The EFF sees the tremendous scope and power of geofence warrants as a bug, not a feature. “We believe that geofence warrants are unconstitutional because they don’t start with a suspect,” says Lynch. “They don’t rely on individualized suspicion, which is what’s required under the Fourth Amendment [to the U.S. Constitution]. In the January 6th context, it’s likely that there were many journalists whose data was provided to the police.”'
- throwaway4good 4y ago
  But "geofencing"; ie. in the form of the police asking for a list of phones which have been connected to a particular telecommunications tower has been around for decades. This is hardly news anymore.
  - pseudolus 4y ago
    It's hardly news to people who frequent sites such as HN or follow press releases issued by the EFF or the ACLU but I expect that the general population is surprised at how expansive the data harvesting efforts of law enforcement are. Additionally, the publicity surrounding the scale and scope of the operation is atypical.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
snarf21 4y ago
The police want all data, then they'll find the crimes. This goes against our country's presumption of innocence. Look at the recent case of the facial recognition and the Rockettes. A lady was trying to go to a holiday show as a private individual but was digitally black listed and kicked out as soon as she entered because she is employed by a law firm engaged in a lawsuit against MSG (who owns RCMH). I understand this is a private venue and not police but the principle is the same. She wasn't caught hacking anything or breaking in to anything she just wanted to see the dancers. The big problem with geo fence warrants is that they lead to a 1984 style big brother surveillance state. For example: should the police constantly get everyone's cell phone tower ping data and automatically issue speeding tickets for every 5 minute window someone was speeding?
- krapp 4y ago
  It doesn't go against presumption of innocence because the police don't determine legal innocence or guilt. If we get to the point where that becomes the case, where for instance anyone caught up in a geofence warrant is automatically convicted of a crime in absentia and without any other evidence, then that's obviously a problem.
  - fn-mote 4y ago
    This is technically correct and totally naive. > If we get to the point where that becomes the case [...] Then it will be far too late to do anything about it. You're obviously going to be convicted of speeding if your geolocation data shows you going 80mph for an hour on the expressway, right? Do you really want to wait until this case shows up in court to try to prevent this kind of dystopia from emerging? See the current top post about individualized suspicion.
    - mcculley 4y ago
      > You're obviously going to be convicted of speeding if your geolocation data shows you going 80mph for an hour on the expressway, right? Do you really want to wait until this case shows up in court to try to prevent this kind of dystopia from emerging? You might want to conjure up a different example. I am having trouble considering enforcement of speed limits to be dystopian.

"Be careful, they have spooky powers" seems to be the message. As well as "there are digital fingerprints everywhere", as they also talk about ProPublica doing their own investigation.

pxmpxm 4y ago

Need to keep the story in the news cycle through 2024

pseudolus 4y ago
It's deeply regrettable that both sides of the political spectrum are so caught up in their particular narratives that they can't see potential erosion of civil rights that these law enforcement techniques bring about. On parts of the left, segments are grateful for these technologies because they allow for the arrest of individuals who they perceive as having attempted to overthrow democracy. Segments of the right are blinded and can't focus on the means and methods undertaken by law enforcement because they can't overcome their rage at what they perceive as an overblown and partisan response to the events of the riot.
- xwolfi 4y ago
  What of the population living day after day in a dangerous world ? Do they prefer civil right preservation or police oversight ? I get the politicians in D.C. might have trouble to see what's in front of them, but Im unsure the population is so against it.
  - Geezus-42 4y ago
    I for one would prefer civil rights. The most dangerous people I have ever met were cops. I can protect myself from the individual non-state backed fascist.
    - amanaplanacanal 4y ago
      > I can protect myself from the individual non-state backed fascist. Perhaps you can. History has shown that most people cannot.
  - nemo44x 4y ago
    I agree. I think most people have a “if you’re not breaking the law then you have nothing to worry about” view on this. Naively trusting that whoever has authority can be trusted indefinitely. But it’s an easier point to make than an abstract view of personal liberties and protections from abusive power. Some kid (I suspect) wrote a naughty racist word on sone piece of playground equipment (easily cleaned off) and the reaction by people on an unofficial town FB group were amazing. One person called for cameras everywhere and the imprisonment of parents if their kid was recorded writing a racist or w/e word. Hell the whole defund the police thing started turning into an alternative where there are cameras everywhere. I’m pretty sure that will be the future.
- Forge36 4y ago
  How many people need to be involved and how large the area before geofencing is used as an investigation tool? I'd set the current bar lower than the capital riots. Though how low is reasonable I don't know. I'm definitely opposed to finding a single individual, and an entire city. But I don't know how I'd feel about a single small building (say for a mass shooter event)
- ModernMech 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - commandlinefan 4y ago
    > the Republican party Nobody even remotely affiliated with the Republican Party was involved in any actual insurrection attempt on 1/6.
    - cycrutchfield 4y ago
      “No True Republican” fallacy?
    - ModernMech 4y ago
      You should really read the bipartisan 1/6 committee report. At the very least what you say isn't true because there wouldn't have been a mob in DC on 1/6 if Trump hadn't asked them to be there. How many people travelled from around the country to be in DC on 1/6/2017? Or 2009? Everyone gets there for the 20th for the inauguration, whereas historically the 6th has been ignored. But in 2021 everyone was there on that day, at the express invitation of Trump. Don't take my word for it - you just have to look at the court proceedings for the 1/6 prosecutions, where defendant after defendant pleads that they are not at fault because they were just taking directions from the President. But what you say is further untrue because there were plenty of Republicans involved beyond that. The White House was responsible for helping organize the Stop the Steal rally, at which multiple high-ranking Republican party members spoke. Beyond that, multiple congresspeople and senators objected to certifications, not because they had any basis for their objections, but in order to delay the proceeding and give Trump time to rile the mob. State GOP lawmakers forged Certificates of the Vote electing Trump that Pence was intended to substitute for the authentic ones. GOP Senators were involved in the process to transmit these certificates to Pence in time. Giuliani was busy calling lawmakers during the insurrection imploring them to delay the vote further as the mob bore down on them. Trump sat back and refused to deploy any National Guard troops, to the point Pence had to usurp control and do it himself after waiting 3 hours. Again, read the 1/6 report. It's all in there.
    - acdha 4y ago

xwolfi 4y ago

It's a question whether standard police work should be reformed since despite all classical attempts at hiding, they were found. It questions: are the trade offs worth it? I suppose the corrolary being: what if this protest was more legitimate but the police was corrupt? I live in China myself so I find it interesting to ask this question before it's fully done and lost, even if I feel I know the answer: yes, it is worth it, and you'll never shock people with stories of criminals being founds thanks to general surveillance as much as they're shocked by unsolved horrendous crimes, so the abuses will be tolerated (or hidden thanks to the new structure of standard police work) as price to pay, when a critical mass of crimes that could have been solved will be reached. And I am sad to tell you, that trading freedom for safety is paradise, and when I left the scary city I lived in before to Hong Kong where I live now, I felt such a surprised relief at the total absence of small crimes (all citizens prints are stored on a central database for instance, all 7M of us can be found in an instant). I'm never going back, they can read my emails and track my phone.

krapp 4y ago
> It's a question whether standard police work should be reformed since despite all classical attempts at hiding, they were found. They discussed their plans openly on social media then streamed evidence of it after the fact. Ignoring the question of whether the ability to hide from law enforcement is a necessary component of liberty even when one has committed a crime, these guys weren't even trying very hard to cover their tracks.
- drunkpotato 4y ago
  For the core field operatives, it seemed many had unrealistic expectations of their chance of success, and were pumped on a success-or-death mentality. In retrospect it’s easy to see why that would lead to lax operational security. Now that they neither succeeded nor died in the attempt, the evidence is easy to find.

pseudolus 4y ago

Per the story the use of geofencing is of great concern as essentially it amounts to a grant of authority to the State to undertake a search simply based on geography and not reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing. This is a significant departure from past standards for undertaking a search. See article excerpt below. 'The EFF sees the tremendous scope and power of geofence warrants as a bug, not a feature. “We believe that geofence warrants are unconstitutional because they don’t start with a suspect,” says Lynch. “They don’t rely on individualized suspicion, which is what’s required under the Fourth Amendment [to the U.S. Constitution]. In the January 6th context, it’s likely that there were many journalists whose data was provided to the police.”'

throwaway4good 4y ago
But "geofencing"; ie. in the form of the police asking for a list of phones which have been connected to a particular telecommunications tower has been around for decades. This is hardly news anymore.
- pseudolus 4y ago
  It's hardly news to people who frequent sites such as HN or follow press releases issued by the EFF or the ACLU but I expect that the general population is surprised at how expansive the data harvesting efforts of law enforcement are. Additionally, the publicity surrounding the scale and scope of the operation is atypical.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

snarf21 4y ago

The police want all data, then they'll find the crimes. This goes against our country's presumption of innocence. Look at the recent case of the facial recognition and the Rockettes. A lady was trying to go to a holiday show as a private individual but was digitally black listed and kicked out as soon as she entered because she is employed by a law firm engaged in a lawsuit against MSG (who owns RCMH). I understand this is a private venue and not police but the principle is the same. She wasn't caught hacking anything or breaking in to anything she just wanted to see the dancers. The big problem with geo fence warrants is that they lead to a 1984 style big brother surveillance state. For example: should the police constantly get everyone's cell phone tower ping data and automatically issue speeding tickets for every 5 minute window someone was speeding?

krapp 4y ago
It doesn't go against presumption of innocence because the police don't determine legal innocence or guilt. If we get to the point where that becomes the case, where for instance anyone caught up in a geofence warrant is automatically convicted of a crime in absentia and without any other evidence, then that's obviously a problem.
- fn-mote 4y ago
  This is technically correct and totally naive. > If we get to the point where that becomes the case [...] Then it will be far too late to do anything about it. You're obviously going to be convicted of speeding if your geolocation data shows you going 80mph for an hour on the expressway, right? Do you really want to wait until this case shows up in court to try to prevent this kind of dystopia from emerging? See the current top post about individualized suspicion.
  - mcculley 4y ago
    > You're obviously going to be convicted of speeding if your geolocation data shows you going 80mph for an hour on the expressway, right? Do you really want to wait until this case shows up in court to try to prevent this kind of dystopia from emerging? You might want to conjure up a different example. I am having trouble considering enforcement of speed limits to be dystopian.