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It is two crimes: 1. Alerting a country to secret actions taken by a third party government (my nation of citizenship, the US, definitely has rules against tha

It is two crimes: 1. Alerting a country to secret actions taken by a third party government (my nation of citizenship, the US, definitely has rules against that) 2. Passing money to commit a crime. See money laundering. Honestly, the second crime seems aggravated and stupid. Just pass random digits in an API call if you want to tell Israel you did something.

sebzim4500 1y ago
I'm not disputing that the company would be breaking the law by doing this. That's not what fraud is though.
- Retric 1y ago
  Fraud is intentional deception + criminal intent. The deception comes from using payments as a code instead of say an encrypted channel.
  - gmueckl 1y ago
    IANAL, but all criminal definitions of fraud that I am aware of require an intention to harm to a victim. It's kind of hard to argue that sending money fulfills this criteria.
    - Retric 1y ago
      Americans get legal protections for their private health data because the disclosure of such information is considered harmful. Other countries provide legal protections for other bits of information because disclosure of that information is considered harmful to the individual, it’s that protection they are trying to breach which thus harms the person.
      - gmueckl 1y ago
        How is this related to the fraud discussion in this thread? Illegal disckosure of confidential information is usually handled by a separate legal framework.
        Retric 1y ago
        Stuff is generally also fraud rather than only being fraud. We don’t know the details of what else happened so we can’t say what other crimes occurred. Same deal as most illegal things public companies do also being SEC violations.
      - immibis 1y ago
        The other person is saying that disclosure of health data in violation of HIPAA wouldn't be fraud. It would be a HIPAA violation, not fraud.
        Retric 1y ago
        The same action can break multiple laws. Unlawful discharge of a firearm is a crime, but it can also kill someone and thus break a different law. https://www.azleg.gov/ars/13/03107.htm https://www.azleg.gov/ars/13/03107.htm Here we don’t know which specific laws were broken because we lack details, but the companies definitely signed a contract agreeing to commit fraud. Anyway, the comment I responded to had “require an intention to harm to a victim” it’s that aspect I was addressing. My point was the transmission of information itself can be harmful to someone other than the recipient of that information. So the same act fulfills both aspects of fraud (deception + criminal intent), and also breaks some other law.
        Spooky23 1y ago
        It depends on the context. I’ve gathered evidence to support prosecution of an individual disclosing PHI who was doing so to facilitate criminal acts.
    - adriand 1y ago
      The harm is not to the recipient of the funds in this case, but to the investigating authorities, who have had the secrecy of their subpoena compromised. There is wide latitude in the criminal code to charge financial crimes. This reminds me a bit of Trump's hush money conviction. IIRC, a central issue was how the payment was categorized in his books. In this case, there would be a record of this payment to Israel in the books, but the true nature of the payment would be concealed. IANAL, but I believe that is legally problematic.
      - dlubarov 1y ago
        The investigating authorities aren't being defrauded though; making someone's job harder isn't fraud. Google or Amazon could be committing other crimes,[1] but not fraud. [1] If they actually violated a gag order, which realistically they won't. In all likelihood there's language to ensure they're not forced to commit crimes. Even if that wasn't explicit, the illegality doctrine covers them anyway, and they can just ignore any provisions which would require them to commit crimes.
        coldtea 1y ago
        >The investigating authorities aren't being defrauded though; making someone's job harder isn't fraud. It can very well be, and it's called obstruction of justice. Though in this case, the real crime is treason. Those companies collaborate with a foreign government against their own.
        dlubarov 1y ago
        > obstruction of justice Possibly, depending on intent. But even if so, obstruction of justice is not fraud. > the real crime is treason This hypothetical crime (which I'd say is highly unlikely to occur) would definitely not be treason, which has a narrow legal definition. We're not at war with Israel.
        coldtea 1y ago
        >Possibly, depending on intent. But even if so, obstruction of justice is not fraud. Sure, but it's a crime still. Not just something neutral. >This hypothetical crime (which I'd say is highly unlikely to occur) would definitely not be treason, which has a narrow legal definition. We're not at war with Israel. No, just on several on behalf of them. Which one feels should also have been part of this "narrow legal definition".
  - victorbjorklund 1y ago
    No, fraud is intentional deception to deprive a victim of a legal right or to gain from a victim unlawfully or unfairly. Who exactly here is the victim that gets it legal rights deprived or what is the gain at the expense of the victim?
    - Retric 1y ago
      IE criminal intent vs criminal activity, critically the criminal activity only needs to be intended not actually occur for it to be fraud. Specifying which criminal intent is applicable is reasonable but nothing I said was incorrect. The victims are the people being deprived of their legal protections. Not everyone agrees which information should be protected but sending information can be a form of harm. If I break into your bank, find all your financial transactions, and post it on Facebook, I have harmed you. Courts imposing gag orders over criminal or civil matters is a critical protection, and attempting to violate those gag orders is harm. The specific victims aren’t known, but they intend for there to be victims.
      - victorbjorklund 1y ago
        so which intent of benefit at the cost of which victim do you claim that Aws had when they committed the crime?
        Retric 1y ago
        The payoff for AWS is the contract itself. Ultimately, it’s Israel that benefits from this information but being paid by your employer to commit fraud in a call center counts even if you’re not getting a cut of that specific victim.
        victorbjorklund 11mo ago
        so who is the victim? who is Israel stealing money from? AWS that willingly signed the agreement?
    - deleted 1y ago
  - LorenPechtel 1y ago
    But this is a signaling system, not a meaningful transfer of money.
    - Retric 1y ago
      The signal based on private information is what’s causing the harm not the movement of money. They could cause the same harm by encoding a signal in the timing of a money transfer, or hell using carrier pidgins. I could send your username and password using similar methods, the medium doesn’t matter here but the signal and their attempt to hide it does.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
pcthrowaway 1y ago
Wouldn't just having 1000 canaries be a "legal" way to do the alerting? A government can compel Amazon to avoid notifying a target (Israel in this case) that their information has been subpoenaed, but can't compel Amazon to lie and say it hasn't sent their info. Or is the concept of a canary pretty much useless now? I'm personally one of the "activists" who is trying to avoid Amazon and Google to a practical degree, due to project Nimbus, so I'd be more than happy if their data could be accessed, and even happier to see Amazon and Google just cut ties with them altogether.
- JuniperMesos 1y ago
  And I'm personally one of the "activists" who is trying to avoid Amazon and Google to a practical degree, because they might be ordered by a foreign government (or my own government) to turn over my data to that government and be legally forbidden from saying that they have been required to do this. Or because they might succumb to activist pressure to deplatform me.
einpoklum 1y ago
> (my nation of citizenship, the US, definitely has rules against that) US rules are, unfortunately, nortoriously and outlandishly broken whenever it comes to Israel: Foreign Agent Registration Act, the Leahy Law, and probably a bunch of others as well.

sebzim4500 1y ago

I'm not disputing that the company would be breaking the law by doing this. That's not what fraud is though.

Retric 1y ago
Fraud is intentional deception + criminal intent. The deception comes from using payments as a code instead of say an encrypted channel.
- gmueckl 1y ago
  IANAL, but all criminal definitions of fraud that I am aware of require an intention to harm to a victim. It's kind of hard to argue that sending money fulfills this criteria.
  - Retric 1y ago
    Americans get legal protections for their private health data because the disclosure of such information is considered harmful. Other countries provide legal protections for other bits of information because disclosure of that information is considered harmful to the individual, it’s that protection they are trying to breach which thus harms the person.
    - gmueckl 1y ago
      How is this related to the fraud discussion in this thread? Illegal disckosure of confidential information is usually handled by a separate legal framework.
      - Retric 1y ago
        Stuff is generally also fraud rather than only being fraud. We don’t know the details of what else happened so we can’t say what other crimes occurred. Same deal as most illegal things public companies do also being SEC violations.
    - immibis 1y ago
      The other person is saying that disclosure of health data in violation of HIPAA wouldn't be fraud. It would be a HIPAA violation, not fraud.
      - Retric 1y ago
        The same action can break multiple laws. Unlawful discharge of a firearm is a crime, but it can also kill someone and thus break a different law. https://www.azleg.gov/ars/13/03107.htm https://www.azleg.gov/ars/13/03107.htm Here we don’t know which specific laws were broken because we lack details, but the companies definitely signed a contract agreeing to commit fraud. Anyway, the comment I responded to had “require an intention to harm to a victim” it’s that aspect I was addressing. My point was the transmission of information itself can be harmful to someone other than the recipient of that information. So the same act fulfills both aspects of fraud (deception + criminal intent), and also breaks some other law.
      - Spooky23 1y ago
        It depends on the context. I’ve gathered evidence to support prosecution of an individual disclosing PHI who was doing so to facilitate criminal acts.
  - adriand 1y ago
    The harm is not to the recipient of the funds in this case, but to the investigating authorities, who have had the secrecy of their subpoena compromised. There is wide latitude in the criminal code to charge financial crimes. This reminds me a bit of Trump's hush money conviction. IIRC, a central issue was how the payment was categorized in his books. In this case, there would be a record of this payment to Israel in the books, but the true nature of the payment would be concealed. IANAL, but I believe that is legally problematic.
    - dlubarov 1y ago
      The investigating authorities aren't being defrauded though; making someone's job harder isn't fraud. Google or Amazon could be committing other crimes,[1] but not fraud. [1] If they actually violated a gag order, which realistically they won't. In all likelihood there's language to ensure they're not forced to commit crimes. Even if that wasn't explicit, the illegality doctrine covers them anyway, and they can just ignore any provisions which would require them to commit crimes.
      - coldtea 1y ago
        >The investigating authorities aren't being defrauded though; making someone's job harder isn't fraud. It can very well be, and it's called obstruction of justice. Though in this case, the real crime is treason. Those companies collaborate with a foreign government against their own.
        dlubarov 1y ago
        > obstruction of justice Possibly, depending on intent. But even if so, obstruction of justice is not fraud. > the real crime is treason This hypothetical crime (which I'd say is highly unlikely to occur) would definitely not be treason, which has a narrow legal definition. We're not at war with Israel.
        coldtea 1y ago
        >Possibly, depending on intent. But even if so, obstruction of justice is not fraud. Sure, but it's a crime still. Not just something neutral. >This hypothetical crime (which I'd say is highly unlikely to occur) would definitely not be treason, which has a narrow legal definition. We're not at war with Israel. No, just on several on behalf of them. Which one feels should also have been part of this "narrow legal definition".
- victorbjorklund 1y ago
  No, fraud is intentional deception to deprive a victim of a legal right or to gain from a victim unlawfully or unfairly. Who exactly here is the victim that gets it legal rights deprived or what is the gain at the expense of the victim?
  - Retric 1y ago
    IE criminal intent vs criminal activity, critically the criminal activity only needs to be intended not actually occur for it to be fraud. Specifying which criminal intent is applicable is reasonable but nothing I said was incorrect. The victims are the people being deprived of their legal protections. Not everyone agrees which information should be protected but sending information can be a form of harm. If I break into your bank, find all your financial transactions, and post it on Facebook, I have harmed you. Courts imposing gag orders over criminal or civil matters is a critical protection, and attempting to violate those gag orders is harm. The specific victims aren’t known, but they intend for there to be victims.
    - victorbjorklund 1y ago
      so which intent of benefit at the cost of which victim do you claim that Aws had when they committed the crime?
      - Retric 1y ago
        The payoff for AWS is the contract itself. Ultimately, it’s Israel that benefits from this information but being paid by your employer to commit fraud in a call center counts even if you’re not getting a cut of that specific victim.
        victorbjorklund 11mo ago
        so who is the victim? who is Israel stealing money from? AWS that willingly signed the agreement?
  - deleted 1y ago
- LorenPechtel 1y ago
  But this is a signaling system, not a meaningful transfer of money.
  - Retric 1y ago
    The signal based on private information is what’s causing the harm not the movement of money. They could cause the same harm by encoding a signal in the timing of a money transfer, or hell using carrier pidgins. I could send your username and password using similar methods, the medium doesn’t matter here but the signal and their attempt to hide it does.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

pcthrowaway 1y ago

Wouldn't just having 1000 canaries be a "legal" way to do the alerting? A government can compel Amazon to avoid notifying a target (Israel in this case) that their information has been subpoenaed, but can't compel Amazon to lie and say it hasn't sent their info. Or is the concept of a canary pretty much useless now? I'm personally one of the "activists" who is trying to avoid Amazon and Google to a practical degree, due to project Nimbus, so I'd be more than happy if their data could be accessed, and even happier to see Amazon and Google just cut ties with them altogether.

JuniperMesos 1y ago
And I'm personally one of the "activists" who is trying to avoid Amazon and Google to a practical degree, because they might be ordered by a foreign government (or my own government) to turn over my data to that government and be legally forbidden from saying that they have been required to do this. Or because they might succumb to activist pressure to deplatform me.

einpoklum 1y ago

> (my nation of citizenship, the US, definitely has rules against that) US rules are, unfortunately, nortoriously and outlandishly broken whenever it comes to Israel: Foreign Agent Registration Act, the Leahy Law, and probably a bunch of others as well.