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Twitter sues U.S. government over ability to disclose surveillance orders
- kelukelugames 12y agoCan someone help me understand if this is a big deal?
- huhtenberg 12y agoIt's not. It's the reputation damage control, largely superficial.
- TD-Linux 12y agoIt's awfully expensive damage control, though.
- nullrouted 12y agoGeez, Why do people here have to be so cynical? Twitter is doing a good thing here arguing that the government saying they can't release NSL number they are restricting free speech, which is completely true. Releasing these numbers pose no threat to national security and just shows the DOJs scorched earth policy when it comes to defending their perceived powers. This is a great thing for Twitter to do and it should be praised for doing so, not be given cynical/snarky replies.
- huhtenberg 12y ago"Geez" ? Twitter is a business. Whatever they do is preceded by the expenses vs benefits analysis. In this case the only benefit is an improvement of their public reputation. They want to disassociate themselves with the state surveillance machine. However this lawsuit means an absolute zilch in terms of an actual surveillance issue. Nor does it move a needle on the very fact that there NSLs exist to begin with. It serves no public interest, it doesn't change things and it's asking not just for peanuts, it's asking for the dust off the peanuts shells. It's a farce. Just as you said - releasing these numbers is a non-issue, so the government will resist for a while and then it will yield. Everyone will cheer for Twitter and the victory, but things will remain exactly where they are now. The only reason why this lawsuit exists is to improve public's perception of Twitter. It's a PR stunt. I don't see what they should be commended for.
- nullrouted 12y agoYes "Geez" Look I get it, you don't think what Twitter is doing adds any value and thats great but in reality you are just being smug and not really adding any value to the conversation. You are just trying to spread your smug dim view of the world and you aren't really helping anything by doing so. Instead of always looking for the negative or the cynical view in things like this like "Well they are just doing this for the PR", why not look at it and say "This is awesome that a company is fighting in court to release this type of information to the public." It really will change your view of the world if you start looking at positive and will improve your life dramatically. Twitter is doing something here that they don't really have to do because they could just go along with the other big companies, follow the guidelines the government laid out and no one would say anything. They have gone further to demand to release exact numbers and more importantly are fighting to stop the government's practice of being able to gag companies in these situations. It may be a small step but it is a first step and they should be commended for it no matter the motive. Good for them and I thank them for picking this fight for all of us.
- huhtenberg 12y agoI don't follow. Are you saying that cynical views don't belong to the HN because they don't "add any value to conversation"? Did I get that right? > Instead of always looking for the negative or the cynical view in things like this like "Well they are just doing this for the PR", why not look at it and say "This is awesome that a company is fighting in court to release this type of information to the public." It really will change your view of the world if you start looking at positive and will improve your life dramatically. Patronizing, misguided, but very deep. Must be from the early Dr. Phil, right?
- stringray 12y agoI think people wanting others to tell them what is and isn't a big deal seeds some of the biggest problems in the western world.
- tetrep 12y agoI think the implication here is that kelukelugames doesn't think it's a big deal, and is asking others for input without explicitly taking a side.
- kelukelugames 12y agoI like Twitter and I think it's interesting whenever a big company sues the US government. I wanted to see everyone else's reactions.
- chc 12y agoI think people jumping to conclusions about what is or isn't a big deal is one of the biggest problems of the Internet.
- smutticus 12y agoTwitter wants to be able to say how many NSLs they've received with more preciseness. The government says they can only be vague, they want to be more precise. I think it would be a 'big deal' if Twitter and other companies started reporting the exact amount of NSLs they receive when they receive them. That would be great. Whether this lawsuit will result in that, even if Twitter wins, is not clear.
- fleitz 12y agoIf you believe that justice must not only be done but be seen to be done then yes, if you don't then it doesn't matter. But really, trials and the rule of law are so 2000.
- suprgeek 12y agoThis eminently reasonable - Basically all Twitter wants to say is we have received X requests of Y type. Right now they are restricted to broad categories 0-999, between 6 & 8 thousand etc. I thought they were going farther - that they wanted a per account notification ability; not the case.
- higherpurpose 12y agoHopefully even small such victories against NSLs will encourage more companies to sue the government for using NSLs. Or we can just push for Congress to stop renewing the Patriot Act next year.
- xnull 12y agoJust push? With the intelligence community hacking into Senators' computers to defend themselves from investigation, even admitting it, at will, with no reprimand? And have it barely scrape the news? Is it that easy? Can we just repeal bills like the Patriot Act? Look at how easy it was for Australia to invent a media blitz of fear to pass legislation allowing surveillance that has no counter terrorism purpose.
- aragot 12y agoSometimes I wonder how we're not falling on the dark side quicker. Who would oppose?
- happyscrappy 12y agoCongress will only stop renewing it if the voters demand it.
- xnull 12y agoVoters will only demand it if they are informed. Voters will only be informed if both social and traditional media are able to provide actionable, verifiable and non-biased reports. Media will only be able to provide quality information when political, intelligence and profit interests have less leverage than an educated purchasing public majority. Political/intelligence interests will only have have less leverage if we pass meaningful enforceable legislation to curtail the use of selective privilege, story seeding and psychological operations to achieve policy goals. Congress will only pass meaningful enforceable legislation if the voters demand it. ...
- wildwood 12y agoI think this is the first time I've seen the phrase "post Edward Snowden world", used like "post 9-11 world" has been for the last decade-plus. I hope that catches on. Edit: can't believe I got the name wrong. Fixed.
- geekpondering 12y ago<pedant> Edward. </pedant>
- jisaacks 12y agoIts Edward Snowden
- J_Darnley 12y agoNow I want to know what you said the first time around.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- uptown 12y agoI've never really understood why companies aren't able to disclose these numbers. It tells the public nothing about specific investigations. To me - it seems like the government has chosen to draw the line in the sand so far beyond where it should be, to avoid having the actual debate over corporate disclosure of more-specific information.
- Kalium 12y agoThink of it in crypto terms. If you can know when an investigation is ongoing, you can learn something useful as an adversary.
- uptown 12y agoBut "bad guys" have no way of knowing that an increment of a digit is in any way related to their actions. Also, disclosures tend to be time-delayed, further obsfucating what was actually being investigated.
- Kalium 12y agoThey don't have to know for certain. They just need enough data from multiple sources to get nervous and suddenly the whole investigation is shot.
- nitrogen 12y agoYou mean criminals might stop doing what they are doing because they know they are being investigated? Fantastic! Don't we want them to stop?
- Kalium 12y agoWe want to stop them by catching them. Them stopping and changing their operation to reduce the chances of being caught is not the desired outcome.
- erenemre 12y agoIf I understand correctly, companies cannot say "we have received X (let's say 9) requests". So, is it possible for them to say "We have NOT received 8 or 10 requests"? This clearly doesn't say how many they have received but gives a clue that they might have received 9. Please ignore me if this is silly.
- golemotron 12y agoIt's not silly but it won't work. People in the tech community typically don't see that you can't "hack the law" like it's machine or program. Judges just don't put up with it. They're adept at augmenting the law with case law that covers the loopholes.
- uncoder0 12y agoTotally, when I first started learning and caring more about the law I came up with all these clever hacks around various legal agreements and laws... Luckily for me I had friends who went to Law School to explain to me that the law is primarily about intent and most of my hacks weren't loopholes but instead plainly in the wrong and would be dealt with in court if they hadn't already through case law. I think its pretty common for hackers to look at legal agreements like a series of boolean statements that can be solved... sadly it doesn't work that way. Law is complicated :/
- click170 12y agoLaw works the way we want computer programming to work. That is to say, "Do what I meant, not what I coded". I think we get the impression that it's not that way based on our perception of corporations driving money-filled trucks through legal loopholes, but it's just not the same thing to a judge. Regardless of whether it is to you and I.
- tobinfricke 12y agoIs this true only in common law jurisdictions (most of the USA and UK), rather than civil law jurisdictions (Louisiana, Europe)?
- joeblau 12y agoWhile this is a valiant cause, I don't know what this buys Twitter in the long run. If they have the ability to disclose exact numbers, the only number that would really have any impact is 0. It would be interesting to know what, if any, this number would have on their business.
- SoftwareMaven 12y agoTwitter has said they don't get many of these requests compared to e.g. Google (not surprising, since most Twitter content is public). The difference between "0" and "0-999" in a six month period is significant. Even "2" or "3" seems very low compared to what the mind assumes "0-999" means (at least 500 and perhaps closer to 1000).
- jobu 12y agoThe government’s position, the complaint said, “forces Twitter either to engage in speech that has been preapproved by government officials or else to refrain from speaking altogether.” Isn't that the definition of censorship? I'm surprised they don't actually use that word in the lawsuit: http://www.washingtonpost.com/r/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2014/10/07/National-Security/Graphics/Complaintnew.pdf http://www.washingtonpost.com/r/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/201...
- blackaspen 12y agoSupposing the word 'censorship' isn't censored... Really happy to see more companies doing this though!
- dragonwriter 12y agoThe language they do use is familiar,I suspect from precedent that establishes a test for violation of the free speech clause. Which is probably why they use it, and not the fuzzier term censorship. A legal complaint has a different audience than a press release.
- biot 12y agoIf you present a conclusion, your opponent can claim it's an invalid conclusion based on faulty premises. However, if you only present evidence-backed facts, your opponent can't argue against the evidence and you force your opponent to reveal their hand earlier. In this case, the hand being revealed is ultimately one of national security... but by structuring the argument in this way, they are likely to avoid a prolonged argument with the government over the conclusion's validity.
- neumann 12y agoThis is a fantasticly instructive comment. thanks.
- rayiner 12y ago"Censorship" isn't unconstitutional (e.g. obscenities laws). Certain kinds of censorship may be, and they have specific names.
- vijayboyapati 12y agoWould it be too gushing of me to say that Twitter is by far the most heroic of the large tech companies in the US? Good for them!
- rnovak 12y agobecause they're doing something other companies have already tried to do[1], and failed? How are they any more heroic? [1] http://www.zdnet.com/microsoft-google-v-nsa-lawsuit-to-proceed-7000020311/ http://www.zdnet.com/microsoft-google-v-nsa-lawsuit-to-proce...
- randomguy7788 12y agotheyre actually pretty late at this. google, microsoft and apple had fought for this a while ago. I'm actually disappointed in how long it took them
- monotribble 12y agoIs there precedent that backs up the legality of National Security Letters?
- ep103 12y agoI believe to date every time an individual has sued about receiving a national security letter, the government has arrange to remove the NSL gag and get the suit dropped, so as to prevent setting a precedence as to their limits or illegality. But doing that requires a constitutional lawyer, and that is expensive, so they continue to be effective gag tool.
- rrggrr 12y agoTwitter is a medium at the forefront of democracy movements worldwide. If there were any site worth standing down surveillance in pursuit of a larger foreign policy goal then I would have thought Twitter would be that site. Instead, I'm now imagining young staffers at various US agencies squirming with dumb chills as senior policy makers articulate Twitter's threat to US national security or law enforcement objectives. On the other hand, I'm hopeful these stupid decisions lead to a new generation of US policy makers who will learn something from their bosses mistakes.
- enraged_camel 12y agoThe way I like to think about it is that every stupid decision by a senior policy maker increases the chances of another Edward Snowden emerging.
- jarradhope 12y agoWell the problem is that policy making is completely institutionalized and only serves the 1%, which is why software like Ethereum is going to be so important in the future. It will democratize policy making and put it in the hands of everyone. As well as means to articulate any other form of meetings of the minds.
- SoftwareMaven 12y agoDemocratizing policy making is not a guaranteed panacea. Things like the civil rights movement don't happen as a result of democratic policy; they happen when the majority are forced to live a better way. The founders recognized pure democracy was not an ideal government, regardless of technological issues with regard to implementing it. A republic allows decisions to be made that the majority will never agree to.
- deciplex 12y agos/1%/ruling class/ Don't make them seem like a bigger deal than they really are. Most of the 1% has barely any more say in the direction of the US government than anyone else. The gaggle of assholes responsible for the plight of America couldn't fill up a small town.
- wahsd 12y agoDon't be surprised that the government prevails and the first amendment is furthermore whittled away at in an every increasing desire for our government to prove it's illegitimacy.
- 2xlbuds 12y agoI'm curious as to what would actually happen if Twitter just decided to release the exact numbers. Would they be slapped with a fine? What if they didn't pay the fine? Would they be forced to be shut down? People would not tolerate that one bit.
- chimeracoder 12y agoAlmost certainly criminal charges, and possibly (probably?) ones that "pierce the veil" (ie, go after the executives/employees personally, not [just] the corporation). Not exactly something anybody would really want to risk. (I am not a lawyer, I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice).
- 2xlbuds 12y agoWould any jury convict those people? I'd like to hope the answer is no. Again these are just rhetorical questions, I don't work for twitter.
- grecy 12y agoWho says they'd be tried in a courtroom that even has a jury. Remember, we now know there are courtrooms with no juries.
- themartorana 12y agoThey're the rooms no banker who helped cause a global economic crisis will ever see the inside of, but if you reveal that you have been required to turn over information to a secret government with a secret court against every principal of the Constitution, well... I imagine you'd know the color of the wallpaper pretty well.
- adventured 12y agoIt's not just the bankers that were spared of course, all the politicians that were partially responsible for the economic melt-down were shielded as well. From Greenspan to Clinton, nobody in D.C. was touched either. The Fed has caused more destruction of wealth in the last 20 years than all the private sector bankers in US history have combined. Not a single person from the Fed will ever, nor has ever, gotten into trouble for it. They can destroy the US economy with insane rates, QE, stimulus measures, you name it. They can debase the dollar and steal trillions in savings from average Americans. They can encourage incredibly dangerous asset inflation and speculative behavior with 'free' money policies, and nobody will ever do anything about it.
- obamasupporter 12y agoGO TWITTER!
- kruczek 12y agoOne thing I don't quite understand - why these companies won't move to other countries with better privacy? Is it only because of huge bureaucratic and logistical effort that would be required, or are there some laws which prevent "emigration" of companies, or is it that they would have to provide such data anyway, if they want to operate in US too (but then at least people in other countries would be beyond US gov's harassment)?
- pjc50 12y agoHow could you run a startup outside San Francisco? /sarcasm More seriously, if you decided you could do this in (say) Switzerland, you'd have to move the company there and all of the admin staff to prevent them being suborned by the NSA. Most countries you'd want to move to have lengthy immigration procedures. The cost is huge, not just financial but cutting yourself off. Remember, if you truly annoy the intelligence agencies, you'll go on the no-fly or visa denial lists, and you'll never be able to visit your family again. Just look at Snowden. It's a political problem. No surveillance without acountability.
- adventured 12y agoUS companies of meaningful size that attempted to do so, would soon find new laws restricting their ability to leave. Congress and the President moved quickly to stop tax inversion deals recently. They'd do the exact same thing on the basis of national security were major intelligence assets to attempt to leave. The US Government will not give up the massive global information network it possesses in the way of Google / Apple / Facebook / Twitter / Yahoo / Microsoft etc. Under no circumstances will companies of this sort and value ever be allowed to crawl out from under control of the US Government.
- sophacles 12y agoBack when I was in 8th grade, there was a guy who claimed he had a girlfriend. She lived in [two towns over]. But no one believed him because they never saw her. Never got her last name. There were just claims that "she's from [town], and she's awesome". I have the same reaction to the national security theatre that we're always presented with from classified space. "Trust us there's a real threat, but you don't know about it because it's classified". They can't tell us anything about their 'constant' and 'heroic' efforts to save us from the evil monster redacted. There's no evidence presented to me. On the other hand, the real bad guys are constantly doing stuff to get in the news. So the only conclusion I have is 'national security' is the bureaucratic way of saying "my girlfriend lives two towns over".
- opendais 12y agoThis is pretty much it. I boarded a commuter plane (prop plane, less than 50 seats) last month at a small town airport. It had pre-9/11 security in place and a broken metal detector. I got a quick pat down that didn't even cover all my pockets. From there, I got on a cross country jet identical to the ones that hit NYC or the Pentagon on 9/11. It is pretty clear either: A) The government is so incompetent they can't be trusted with providing anything resembling security. B) They don't take their security theater seriously.
- sophacles 12y agoAs a person who lives in a small town with a small town airport, my self-interest implores you to not talk about that sort of thing. I really like getting out of bed at 7:15 for an 8:00 flight - getting to the airport 15 mins before departure time and being at the gate right when boarding starts is fantastic.
- opendais 12y agoI don't blame you at all. I've been trying to move to a smaller town for awhile. Massive metropolises are nice and all but I'm kinda bored of it. Would you say I am wrong tho?
- bmmayer1 12y agoThis is a good wake-up call for all those "companies shouldn't have the same first amendment rights as people" folks out there.
- drderidder 12y agoFor companies like Twitter, being based in the US seems to have become something of a liability. There's Google, Apple, et al attempting to quell international concerns with promises of better encryption... I wouldn't be surprised if one of them just up and moves their operation overseas. After all, some of the up-and-coming open-source competition is a decentralized, globally distributed organization and not under the thumb of any nation state per se. They have the luxury, I think, of cherry picking the best privacy and security policies, and can open the kimono on their source code to prove it.
- mikefonseca 12y agoBut where would these multinationals go? Haven't we seen that the arms of the US Government stretch across the globe? Wouldn't continued lobbying of the government and eventual reform be a simpler and cheaper solution?
- drderidder 12y agoIt's extremely unlikely imho that surveillance capabilities will be ceded by any of the nations that now possess them. More importantly, the trust that's been lost can't be regained even if the wheels of politics eventually grind out some kind of compromise. So waiting for a political resolution doesn't look like a great option. What I expect to happen is for the engineering community to push more secure protocols forward (for example, a rejuvenation or successor of IPsec) to guarantee more secure communication. Individual nations will then need to decide if their citizens have a right to real privacy, or just the right to be lied to about privacy. Multinational corporations have some flexibility in terms of where and how they do business, but they have to acquiesce to whatever local laws apply in the countries where they operate - with their own statement of ethics being some kind of baseline, hopefully. One protection afforded companies based in say, the EU, is that they're under less obligation to backdoor their products under threat of the US et al. That gives them a better position of trust with the EU market base. Of course, their products destined for the US market may well be customised to accommodate CALEA etc. Open source projects and foundations on the other hand operate practically outside the purview of traditional government, it seems. They're decentralized, and the source is open, so... although it has happened but it's quite hard to get a backdoor into the codebase. It will take a long time to sort out but basically I expect things like Firefox OS, Ubuntu Mobile, and self-hosted "cloud" solutions (cozy.io) to take at least some market share from proprietary predecessors.