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They are publicly "accusing" (or putting somebody in a very specific corner) two guys. They do not have any, any idea, what has really happened. They are nothi

They are publicly "accusing" (or putting somebody in a very specific corner) two guys. They do not have any, any idea, what has really happened. They are nothing more than unethical algorithmic drones, that dig up stuff. So far, no problem. But when showing their findings in public, they have a responsibility in thinking through the possible consequences, that might arise for these two guys if the (with a by the way very high probability) are innocent. So raising the internet-pillories with possible media outlets taking these images and (not fact checking) showing them in different channels, might just destroy lives. So yeah, sit in your chair and believe this unethical bs about them not convicting anybody. Right, the internet is just a tool. As wise Uncle Ben once said: "With great power comes great responsibility." That is, what seems to be missing here. ps.: Imagine a different scenario: They dig up these images, they send it to the law enforcement agencies. They find these guys to be potential suspects. They get a fair trial. After all is said and done . These guys come out to show what they did. Something in the line of finding a security flaw at your favorite digital place.

n3rdy 14y ago
What super power does law enforcement possess that us lesser humans don't?
- blaabjerg 14y ago
  They have the super power of working within a judicial framework which forces them to be prove the suspects' guilt thoroughly before any kind of punishment can be dealt. This is not the case with vigilantes.
  - markdown 14y ago
    Doesn't America have the perp walk of shame (considered unlawful in some other developed countries)? Isn't that almost the same thing as this, just with a higher probability that the shamed person is actually guilty of the crime?
    - praptak 14y ago
      No, while obviously uncivilized and outside of civilized rules of justice, it is not the same. At the minimum, there are some named people responsible for this who you can sue or at least make a dent in their reputation if they abuse their power (see Ortiz case.) The internet crowd bears zero responsibility.
    - danielweber 14y ago
      Very good story about perp walks, and how they can be staged: http://www.popehat.com/2013/04/09/misconduct-is-only-news-when-journalists-say-it-is/ http://www.popehat.com/2013/04/09/misconduct-is-only-news-wh...
  - angersock 14y ago
    They have the super power of working within a judicial framework which forces them to be prove the suspects' guilt thoroughly before any kind of punishment can be dealt. Yeah, how about those drug offenses? Or copyright issues? Or computer fraud and abuse? Or...
    - bargl 14y ago
      Or... a witch hunt. That is what public justice is. That's why we have police. They also have the super power of getting a search warrant and going through your fucking house so that they can find real evidence not just some pictures or possibly innocent people on the internet. I don't know why I'm so pissed about these photo's but it most have something to do with the hypocrisy of HN being a group of people who hate to be watched and yet... WE are watching YOU. Seriously how are these photos any different than the government having drones? They are public? The public doesn't need to do everything and the government shouldn't be 100% open. I think this demonstrates just how bad it would be if private citizens were given the launch codes to nuclear weapons.
      - homosaur 14y ago
        Give me a break dude, there's a huge difference between taking photos at a huge public event and government drones. I can't believe this even has to be addressed. You are at a public event, you have no reasonable expectation of privacy and could not argue so in court. If you are in your backyard and your neighbor is videotaping you, then that's illegal if you have the expectation of privacy. The government can basically do the same with impunity with drones without it being illegal. See the difference?
        tripzilch 14y ago
        So, reading your post, I just wondered something, I realize it may sound stupid. Most people don't have a backyard. As soon as they get away from under their roof, they are in a public space. Does this not affect them?
        14y ago
  - stcredzero 14y ago
    > They have the super power of working within a judicial framework which forces them to be prove the suspects' guilt thoroughly before any kind of punishment can be dealt. The Presumption of Innocence is actually not directly enshrined in the US constitution, and has been relaxed or reversed by the government to serve "societal needs." http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1be5xv/til_innocent_until_proven_guilty_is_not/ http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1be5xv/til_in... Also recall this from a few years back: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/02/02/691881/-Holder-Habeas-Corpus http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/02/02/691881/-Holder-Habe...
- garethadams 14y ago
  The ability to effect justice through a legal system?
- ordinary 14y ago
  Training, experience, the requirement to follow procedures that safeguard the innocent.
  - jxi 14y ago
    Some procedures also end up safeguarding the not-so-innocent.
  - coldtea 14y ago
    >Some procedures also end up safeguarding the not-so-innocent. That's just as well. It's better to let a not-so-innocent walk, than to make an innocent pay.
    - jxi 14y ago
      That doesn't mean we should settle for that. I don't see why we can't have our cake and eat it too. You need a mix of strict procedures, but also lawless vigilantes. Only having strict procedures leads corruption/loopholes which leads to lots of criminals getting away needlessly. The strict procedures keep the vigilantes in check, and the vigilantes keep the people who foil the system in check.
      - coldtea 14y ago
        >You need a mix of strict procedures, but also lawless vigilantes. The very notion of justice in civilized western societies is that you DON'T need "lawless vigilantes". And they ain't that good either. All their allure comes from BS movies, TV shows and comic books. In real life "lawless vigilantes" are more like Southern lynching mobs.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- coldtea 14y ago
  The superpower of not making the images of suspects they spot public until further investigation and judicial approval.
- gbog 14y ago
  > What super power does law enforcement possess that us lesser humans don't? You're playing the foll, right? If not, then I'll tell you why. Instead of going to your neighbours house and beat him with a baseball bat when you suspect his kids did pee in your rosebuds, you should report to the police and ask for a reparation. Why? Because we live in a society, not in a hurd. The guy with the most muscles is not supposed to be more right than the guy with less, or in a wheelchair. The way to do this is to agree together to not use force and let an institution use force, thusly forming a "social contrat", which you have already signed at your birth. And what if you don;t agree with this contract? You woould need to go in another place, but all of them places have such contracts, you'll be sorry to hear.
- bargl 14y ago
  Warrants, training, 40+ hours a week doing exactly this, rules to operate under (which of course are broken but that isn't the point of a rule now is it), the actual evidence from the explosion, bomb analysis tools, the ability to pull peoples records... What do we have? A shit ton of people and photos of people with backpacks. This is great if you give it privately to the police so they can go out and use the rest of their tools to find stuff, but there is a reason why they don't announce their "suspects" to the public.
- _pmf_ 14y ago
  > What super power does law enforcement possess that us lesser humans don't? You're completely right. Everything was much better when the mob could just perform justice with a rope and a tree.
- roc 14y ago
  Legal liability. Everything else flows from that. They can't be careless and ruin lives; they're on the hook for what they do. But a bunch of people on a forum? Will they even feel responsible for their individual small part of participation in a thread that ruins someone's life? It's very similar, psychologically, to a mob. And that's why it's so dangerous.
  - jellicle 14y ago
    But your assessment of legal liability is completely wrong. Law enforcement has absolutely zero legal liability for anything they do in the course of their job. Anything. This is well-settled law. On the other hand the forum mob is legally liable for their actions. So if your sole criterion was legal liability, we should expect greater care, consideration and accuracy from the forum mob than from law enforcement members.
    - roc 14y ago
      It certainly isn't perfect, but the liability is there. Particularly the organizational liability. People's careers get ruined when they screw up. They certainly don't get promoted for leaving cities on the hook for massive payouts. (Hatfill won 4.6M from the justice department. Koon and Powell did time in federal prison.) Whose livelihood is threatened by participating in a 4chan thread pseudonymously?
    - rayiner 14y ago
      > Law enforcement has absolutely zero legal liability for anything they do in the course of their job. Anything. This is well-settled law. That's not actually true, random internet anecdotes aside.http://www.columbia.edu/itc/journalism/cases/katrina/Human%20Rights%20Watch/uspohtml/uspo30.htm http://www.columbia.edu/itc/journalism/cases/katrina/Human%2...
      - jellicle 14y ago
        The city may choose to settle civil claims against it. The officer is not at risk. Which is a point made extensively in your link, actually.
GHFigs 14y ago
They are publicly "accusing" (or putting somebody in a very specific corner) two guys. FYI: This submission is just some images pulled off a thread of idle speculation that somebody posted to Tumblr. It's not some kind of organized campaign claiming to have found the people responsible.
- jotaass 14y ago
  Yes, but now is on the front page of Hacker News. They may just have ruined this guy's life, even if they didn't mean it. And based on what? The pictures prove nothing. In fact, they're not even suspicious! "Backpack seems to be missing"? The picture only shows his head! This is bad, and very wrong.
  - GHFigs 14y ago
    Oh, please. It's on the front page of Hacker News because Hacker News is full of credulous idiots, not because talking about pictures is bad or wrong.
    - mistercow 14y ago
      Almost every top level comment is people being skeptical and urging caution. What were you saying about credulous idiots?
      - scarmig 14y ago
        Well, someone's upvoting, and I'm guessing it isn't the cautious skeptics.
        mistercow 14y ago
        Upvoting doesn't necessarily mean that you think that these are the guys responsible. It just means you think this is interesting. And it is.
      - GHFigs 14y ago
orochi235 14y ago
"They are nothing more than unethical algorithmic drones, that dig up stuff." I fail to see how this is more applicable to the average 4chan viewer than it is to the average human being.
- awj 14y ago
  Indeed. It's almost like it would be a good idea to have people dedicated to performing this function. Make it their job. Give them training. Give them oversight.

n3rdy 14y ago

What super power does law enforcement possess that us lesser humans don't?

blaabjerg 14y ago
They have the super power of working within a judicial framework which forces them to be prove the suspects' guilt thoroughly before any kind of punishment can be dealt. This is not the case with vigilantes.
- markdown 14y ago
  Doesn't America have the perp walk of shame (considered unlawful in some other developed countries)? Isn't that almost the same thing as this, just with a higher probability that the shamed person is actually guilty of the crime?
  - praptak 14y ago
    No, while obviously uncivilized and outside of civilized rules of justice, it is not the same. At the minimum, there are some named people responsible for this who you can sue or at least make a dent in their reputation if they abuse their power (see Ortiz case.) The internet crowd bears zero responsibility.
  - danielweber 14y ago
    Very good story about perp walks, and how they can be staged: http://www.popehat.com/2013/04/09/misconduct-is-only-news-when-journalists-say-it-is/ http://www.popehat.com/2013/04/09/misconduct-is-only-news-wh...
- angersock 14y ago
  They have the super power of working within a judicial framework which forces them to be prove the suspects' guilt thoroughly before any kind of punishment can be dealt. Yeah, how about those drug offenses? Or copyright issues? Or computer fraud and abuse? Or...
  - bargl 14y ago
    Or... a witch hunt. That is what public justice is. That's why we have police. They also have the super power of getting a search warrant and going through your fucking house so that they can find real evidence not just some pictures or possibly innocent people on the internet. I don't know why I'm so pissed about these photo's but it most have something to do with the hypocrisy of HN being a group of people who hate to be watched and yet... WE are watching YOU. Seriously how are these photos any different than the government having drones? They are public? The public doesn't need to do everything and the government shouldn't be 100% open. I think this demonstrates just how bad it would be if private citizens were given the launch codes to nuclear weapons.
    - homosaur 14y ago
      Give me a break dude, there's a huge difference between taking photos at a huge public event and government drones. I can't believe this even has to be addressed. You are at a public event, you have no reasonable expectation of privacy and could not argue so in court. If you are in your backyard and your neighbor is videotaping you, then that's illegal if you have the expectation of privacy. The government can basically do the same with impunity with drones without it being illegal. See the difference?
      - tripzilch 14y ago
        So, reading your post, I just wondered something, I realize it may sound stupid. Most people don't have a backyard. As soon as they get away from under their roof, they are in a public space. Does this not affect them?
        14y ago
- stcredzero 14y ago
  > They have the super power of working within a judicial framework which forces them to be prove the suspects' guilt thoroughly before any kind of punishment can be dealt. The Presumption of Innocence is actually not directly enshrined in the US constitution, and has been relaxed or reversed by the government to serve "societal needs." http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1be5xv/til_innocent_until_proven_guilty_is_not/ http://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1be5xv/til_in... Also recall this from a few years back: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/02/02/691881/-Holder-Habeas-Corpus http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/02/02/691881/-Holder-Habe...
garethadams 14y ago
The ability to effect justice through a legal system?
ordinary 14y ago
Training, experience, the requirement to follow procedures that safeguard the innocent.
- jxi 14y ago
  Some procedures also end up safeguarding the not-so-innocent.
- coldtea 14y ago
  >Some procedures also end up safeguarding the not-so-innocent. That's just as well. It's better to let a not-so-innocent walk, than to make an innocent pay.
  - jxi 14y ago
    That doesn't mean we should settle for that. I don't see why we can't have our cake and eat it too. You need a mix of strict procedures, but also lawless vigilantes. Only having strict procedures leads corruption/loopholes which leads to lots of criminals getting away needlessly. The strict procedures keep the vigilantes in check, and the vigilantes keep the people who foil the system in check.
    - coldtea 14y ago
      >You need a mix of strict procedures, but also lawless vigilantes. The very notion of justice in civilized western societies is that you DON'T need "lawless vigilantes". And they ain't that good either. All their allure comes from BS movies, TV shows and comic books. In real life "lawless vigilantes" are more like Southern lynching mobs.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
coldtea 14y ago
The superpower of not making the images of suspects they spot public until further investigation and judicial approval.
gbog 14y ago
> What super power does law enforcement possess that us lesser humans don't? You're playing the foll, right? If not, then I'll tell you why. Instead of going to your neighbours house and beat him with a baseball bat when you suspect his kids did pee in your rosebuds, you should report to the police and ask for a reparation. Why? Because we live in a society, not in a hurd. The guy with the most muscles is not supposed to be more right than the guy with less, or in a wheelchair. The way to do this is to agree together to not use force and let an institution use force, thusly forming a "social contrat", which you have already signed at your birth. And what if you don;t agree with this contract? You woould need to go in another place, but all of them places have such contracts, you'll be sorry to hear.
bargl 14y ago
Warrants, training, 40+ hours a week doing exactly this, rules to operate under (which of course are broken but that isn't the point of a rule now is it), the actual evidence from the explosion, bomb analysis tools, the ability to pull peoples records... What do we have? A shit ton of people and photos of people with backpacks. This is great if you give it privately to the police so they can go out and use the rest of their tools to find stuff, but there is a reason why they don't announce their "suspects" to the public.
_pmf_ 14y ago
> What super power does law enforcement possess that us lesser humans don't? You're completely right. Everything was much better when the mob could just perform justice with a rope and a tree.
roc 14y ago
Legal liability. Everything else flows from that. They can't be careless and ruin lives; they're on the hook for what they do. But a bunch of people on a forum? Will they even feel responsible for their individual small part of participation in a thread that ruins someone's life? It's very similar, psychologically, to a mob. And that's why it's so dangerous.
- jellicle 14y ago
  But your assessment of legal liability is completely wrong. Law enforcement has absolutely zero legal liability for anything they do in the course of their job. Anything. This is well-settled law. On the other hand the forum mob is legally liable for their actions. So if your sole criterion was legal liability, we should expect greater care, consideration and accuracy from the forum mob than from law enforcement members.
  - roc 14y ago
    It certainly isn't perfect, but the liability is there. Particularly the organizational liability. People's careers get ruined when they screw up. They certainly don't get promoted for leaving cities on the hook for massive payouts. (Hatfill won 4.6M from the justice department. Koon and Powell did time in federal prison.) Whose livelihood is threatened by participating in a 4chan thread pseudonymously?
  - rayiner 14y ago
    > Law enforcement has absolutely zero legal liability for anything they do in the course of their job. Anything. This is well-settled law. That's not actually true, random internet anecdotes aside.http://www.columbia.edu/itc/journalism/cases/katrina/Human%20Rights%20Watch/uspohtml/uspo30.htm http://www.columbia.edu/itc/journalism/cases/katrina/Human%2...
    - jellicle 14y ago
      The city may choose to settle civil claims against it. The officer is not at risk. Which is a point made extensively in your link, actually.

GHFigs 14y ago

They are publicly "accusing" (or putting somebody in a very specific corner) two guys. FYI: This submission is just some images pulled off a thread of idle speculation that somebody posted to Tumblr. It's not some kind of organized campaign claiming to have found the people responsible.

jotaass 14y ago
Yes, but now is on the front page of Hacker News. They may just have ruined this guy's life, even if they didn't mean it. And based on what? The pictures prove nothing. In fact, they're not even suspicious! "Backpack seems to be missing"? The picture only shows his head! This is bad, and very wrong.
- GHFigs 14y ago
  Oh, please. It's on the front page of Hacker News because Hacker News is full of credulous idiots, not because talking about pictures is bad or wrong.
  - mistercow 14y ago
    Almost every top level comment is people being skeptical and urging caution. What were you saying about credulous idiots?
    - scarmig 14y ago
      Well, someone's upvoting, and I'm guessing it isn't the cautious skeptics.
      - mistercow 14y ago
        Upvoting doesn't necessarily mean that you think that these are the guys responsible. It just means you think this is interesting. And it is.
    - GHFigs 14y ago

orochi235 14y ago

"They are nothing more than unethical algorithmic drones, that dig up stuff." I fail to see how this is more applicable to the average 4chan viewer than it is to the average human being.

awj 14y ago
Indeed. It's almost like it would be a good idea to have people dedicated to performing this function. Make it their job. Give them training. Give them oversight.