Author Topic: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop  (Read 12644 times)

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Offline El Barto

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Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« on: January 25, 2012, 06:10:04 PM »
https://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/01/judge-orders-laptop-decryption/
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A judge on Monday ordered a Colorado woman to decrypt her laptop computer so prosecutors can use the files against her in a criminal case.

The defendant, accused of bank fraud, had unsuccessfully argued that being forced to do so violates the Fifth Amendment’s protection against compelled self-incrimination.

“I conclude that the Fifth Amendment is not implicated by requiring production of the unencrypted contents of the Toshiba Satellite M305 laptop computer,” Colorado U.S. District Judge Robert Blackburn ruled Monday. (.pdf)

The authorities seized the laptop from defendant Ramona Fricosu in 2010 with a court warrant while investigating financial fraud.

The case is being closely watched (.pdf) by civil rights groups, as the issue has never been squarely weighed in on by the Supreme Court.

Full disk encryption is an option built into the latest flavors of Windows, Mac OS and Linux, and well-designed encryption protocols used with a long passphrase can take decades to break, even with massive computing power.

The government had argued that there was no Fifth Amendment breach, and that it might “require significant resources and may harm the subject computer” if the authorities tried to crack the encryption.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Patricia Davies said in a court filing (.pdf) that if Judge Blackburn did not rule against the woman, that would amount to “a concession to her and potential criminals (be it in child exploitation, national security, terrorism, financial crimes or drug trafficking cases) that encrypting all inculpatory digital evidence will serve to defeat the efforts of law enforcement officers to obtain such evidence through judicially authorized search warrants, and thus make their prosecution impossible.”

A factually similar dispute involving child pornography ended with a Vermont federal judge ordering the defendant to decrypt the hard drive of his laptop. While that case never reached the Supreme Court, it differed from the Fricosu matter because U.S. border agents already knew there was child porn on the computer because they saw it while the computer was running during a 2006 routine stop along the Canadian border.

The judge in the Colorado case said there was plenty of evidence — a jailhouse recording of the defendant — that the laptop might contain information the authorities were seeking.

The judge ordered Fricosu to surrender an unencrypted hard drive by Feb. 21. The judge added that the government is precluded “from using Ms. Fricosu’s act of production of the unencrypted hard drive against her in any prosecution.”

Fucking fascinating---I love it. 

My biggest question would be,  does the 5th amendment,  which last I check still exists,  apply to handing over incriminating evidence?  If it is applicable here,  can a judge hold her in contempt for failing to do so (seems improbable). 

Even more interesting,  what if she nuked the password?  One of the neat tricks for getting encrypted gear through border checks is to use a long, random string,  mail it to yourself back home,  and tell the customs Jackass "I won't know the password until a letter arrives in a few days, jackass."  The extension of that would be to keep it in a file and shred said file if The Man comes a knocking.  It's quite possible that the password is completely unrecoverable.  Then what?

One of the redeeming things about being cursed with interesting times is that we get fun disputes like this one to ponder. 
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Offline Fiery Winds

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #1 on: January 25, 2012, 06:48:06 PM »
At first I was against this, but now that I think about it, it makes sense.  I think the key is that there is probable cause that there is incriminating evidence on the computer. 

For an analogy, if police have PC that you have something illegal in your home, they get a warrant to search your house.  You can either let them in (decrypt the files) or they'll knock the door down (crack the encryption). 

Since the second option here isn't feasible, the authorities are finding themselves in the unusual position of saying, "open the door or else".  I'm interested to see what the consequences would/will be for refusing to comply. 

Offline Dr. DTVT

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #2 on: January 25, 2012, 07:37:12 PM »
Yeah, I think I'm with the government on this.  It's not self-incrimination.  They have the location of the evidence, they just need a key.  I was going to post the same analogy as Fiery Winds.
     

Offline PowerSlave

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #3 on: January 25, 2012, 07:50:42 PM »
"... nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself..."

Sounds like the government is forcing her to be a witness against herself by making her provide evidence against herself. It's the government's burden to gather evidence to prove someone guilty. Not for them to demand you provide it for them. Isn't that at the heart of that line of the amendment in the first place?
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Offline Orbert

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #4 on: January 25, 2012, 08:10:49 PM »
I'm interested to see what the consequences would/will be for refusing to comply. 

She'll get tossed in jail for contempt of court.  Her only hope at that point will be finding a lawyer who can convince the judge that this falls under the Fifth Amendment.  It's a tough call.

Offline orcus116

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #5 on: January 25, 2012, 08:15:07 PM »
"... nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself..."

Sounds like the government is forcing her to be a witness against herself by making her provide evidence against herself. It's the government's burden to gather evidence to prove someone guilty. Not for them to demand you provide it for them. Isn't that at the heart of that line of the amendment in the first place?

Gotta agree with this.

Offline GuineaPig

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #6 on: January 25, 2012, 08:26:23 PM »
"... nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself..."

Sounds like the government is forcing her to be a witness against herself by making her provide evidence against herself. It's the government's burden to gather evidence to prove someone guilty. Not for them to demand you provide it for them. Isn't that at the heart of that line of the amendment in the first place?

If someone is hiding evidence in a safe they own, the cops can get a warrant.  Don't see how this is fundamentally any different.
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Offline El Barto

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #7 on: January 25, 2012, 08:26:42 PM »
While I don't think it's what Madison had in mind, a nifty consequence of the fifth amendment is that in FW's analogy,  you can tell the cop to break the door down because you're not going to do his job for him.  Johnny will then break it down and search your house.  Same thing applies here.  Encryption's not an impenetrable fortress.  Amazingly tough,  but crackable in theory.  Not sure why she should be compelled to aid them in their investigation when they technically can proceed without her.

As for whether or not this actually falls under self incrimination,  that appears to be undecided.  As I understand it,  a person can be compelled to fork over the key to the safe in their bedroom.  However,  the key is a physical object.  I don't believe it's been established that they can demand that the same person fork over the combination to the padlock.  Presumably it's never come up since combination locks don't really impede Johnny too much in his work.  Yet the combination is a product of the person's mind.  That makes it a different situation.
« Last Edit: January 25, 2012, 09:00:03 PM by El Barto »
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Offline PowerSlave

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #8 on: January 25, 2012, 09:04:41 PM »
"... nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself..."

Sounds like the government is forcing her to be a witness against herself by making her provide evidence against herself. It's the government's burden to gather evidence to prove someone guilty. Not for them to demand you provide it for them. Isn't that at the heart of that line of the amendment in the first place?

If someone is hiding evidence in a safe they own, the cops can get a warrant.  Don't see how this is fundamentally any different.

Because the cops will then enter your house with the warrant, locate the safe and find a way to crack it. If they can't crack it then tough shit for piggy. They can scream to a jury that there is evidence in the safe until they're blue in the face but, until they prove it it doesn't mean a thing. And, as we already know from reading the 5th, you can not be compelled to deliver evidence against yourself and that's what this judge is ordering this woman to do. It's a direct violation of her civil rights.
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Offline Progmetty

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #9 on: January 26, 2012, 01:36:15 AM »
Even more interesting,  what if she nuked the password?  One of the neat tricks for getting encrypted gear through border checks is to use a long, random string,  mail it to yourself back home,  and tell the customs Jackass "I won't know the password until a letter arrives in a few days, jackass."  The extension of that would be to keep it in a file and shred said file if The Man comes a knocking.  It's quite possible that the password is completely unrecoverable.  Then what?

I felt dumb as dirt reading this.
What is "encrypted gear"? you mean files on a computer right?
Either way why even bother making a long password and mail it to yourself when you can tell the checker that you did even if your password was 1234.
And why would someone in customs turn your laptop on and have time to search it for encrypted files AND asks you to open it without you giving them an incredibly suspicious reason to? Nobody has been abused in airports as much as I have but they never hinted they wanna see anything on the laptop, which is always with me.
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Offline yorost

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #10 on: January 26, 2012, 08:00:08 AM »
Even more interesting,  what if she nuked the password?  One of the neat tricks for getting encrypted gear through border checks is to use a long, random string,  mail it to yourself back home,  and tell the customs Jackass "I won't know the password until a letter arrives in a few days, jackass."  The extension of that would be to keep it in a file and shred said file if The Man comes a knocking.  It's quite possible that the password is completely unrecoverable.  Then what?

I felt dumb as dirt reading this.
What is "encrypted gear"? you mean files on a computer right?
Either way why even bother making a long password and mail it to yourself when you can tell the checker that you did even if your password was 1234.
And why would someone in customs turn your laptop on and have time to search it for encrypted files AND asks you to open it without you giving them an incredibly suspicious reason to? Nobody has been abused in airports as much as I have but they never hinted they wanna see anything on the laptop, which is always with me.
1234 or any relatively short password could be memorized easily.  A long one is easy to forget.  She can say without lying she doesn't know it.  Short ones are also more likely to be broken by brute force, although you don't need to have too long of one if it happens to be hard to automate entry.  ...it depends on the encryption method.  Securing information usually requires computationally difficult keys to figure out.  I think saying long just tries to capture that idea;  Being specific would require knowing more specifics.  Just a guess.

-----------------

My initial feeling was they shouldn't be allowed to order her.  ...but I think they have a point, illustrated by some of the aforementioned analogies here.  The encryption is a key to a location, not evidence itself.

Offline El Barto

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #11 on: January 26, 2012, 08:40:49 AM »
Even more interesting,  what if she nuked the password?  One of the neat tricks for getting encrypted gear through border checks is to use a long, random string,  mail it to yourself back home,  and tell the customs Jackass "I won't know the password until a letter arrives in a few days, jackass."  The extension of that would be to keep it in a file and shred said file if The Man comes a knocking.  It's quite possible that the password is completely unrecoverable.  Then what?

I felt dumb as dirt reading this.
What is "encrypted gear"? you mean files on a computer right?
Either way why even bother making a long password and mail it to yourself when you can tell the checker that you did even if your password was 1234.
And why would someone in customs turn your laptop on and have time to search it for encrypted files AND asks you to open it without you giving them an incredibly suspicious reason to? Nobody has been abused in airports as much as I have but they never hinted they wanna see anything on the laptop, which is always with me.
Well for one thing,  I don't really want to test my ability to lie vs. a trained professional's ability to tell if I'm lying.  There's a great deal to be said for plausible deniability.  As for airport checks,  I have no idea exactly when they'll search your digital belongings,  but there are enough examples floating around to suggest that they can and will.  I know the Canadians are pretty intrusive about such things.   Also,  people who're coming back from Thailand, Vietnam or Cambodia are likely to get hassled quite a bit.  I would also surmise that thumb drives are a bigger point of interest, since they're smaller and better organized than the contents of an OS.

And then of course there's Ben Gurion, where if they can't boot it up they'll take it out back and shoot it,  but you just sort of expect that from those guys. 



My initial feeling was they shouldn't be allowed to order her.  ...but I think they have a point, illustrated by some of the aforementioned analogies here.  The encryption is a key to a location, not evidence itself.
The safe analogy is somewhat tricky.  Safes don't generally alter their contents to make it useless.  It's merely a secured storage.  A completely different, yet equally apt, analogy would be a guy who invents his own language, and writes all of his records in a shorthand version of that language.  Would the court be able to force him to translate the data?  In effect, that's what's happening here since the encryption is unique to the passkey that she events herself. 

It really is a troubling thing.  I can certainly understand the notion that it would make future prosecutions incredibly difficult if we're allowed to withhold anything we can encrypt.  Yet at the same time,  that prosecution actually is difficult should really be viewed as an advantage of a free society, rather than a hindrance,  shouldn't it? 

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Offline yorost

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #12 on: January 26, 2012, 09:10:57 AM »
It is a troubling thing to think about.  That's part of what makes it so interesting.  if we give authority a right to gather data as evidence, then encryption methods designed to prevent that possibility probably have to be considered some sort of unlawful obstruction.  That doesn't feel right, unfortunately, but is the other option to just allow an easy loophole to protect evidence that could be used against you?

I don't know how I feel, but the government does have a point.

Offline chknptpie

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #13 on: January 26, 2012, 09:12:58 AM »
Hrrrrmmmm well this is very interesting. I mostly fall on the side of the suspect here. "You can take it, but if you can't break it, not my fault".

Offline lonestar

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #14 on: January 26, 2012, 09:20:47 AM »
Fascinating case.

Offline El Barto

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #15 on: January 26, 2012, 09:32:20 AM »
Hrrrrmmmm well this is very interesting. I mostly fall on the side of the suspect here. "You can take it, but if you can't break it, not my fault".
That's actually the biggest problem with the government's position.  Technically, and as far as they can tell, they already have the evidence they sought in their possession.  They just don't understand it.  What they're asking isn't for the woman to hand over critical evidence,  but for her to translate it for them.
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Offline hefdaddy42

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #16 on: January 26, 2012, 09:48:51 AM »
I fall on the side of the defendant.  If the government can't crack her encryption, then they can't prove their case.  She shouldn't be required to give them the answer they need to convict her.  That doesn't even make sense.
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Offline Nick

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #17 on: January 26, 2012, 01:48:50 PM »
I'm with the government on this one. If files existed on a third party computer that had nothing to do with the government or the defendant and there was substantial evidence that those files could lead to a breakthrough in the case a warrant or subpoena could be issues to make that third party unencrypt the files and make them available.

As far as I'm concerned the computer just happens to belong to the lady, but it's still the case that no one is forcing a confession from her. If she complies and nothing is found it would help her. This is just a case of wanting to review potential evidence, like watching a private surveillance video as far as I'm concerned.
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Offline El Barto

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #18 on: January 26, 2012, 02:04:33 PM »
The fifth amendment is neither limited to full confessions, or contingent upon whether or not the prosecution finds the testimony useful.  You can't be forced to provide testimony against yourself,  which is what they're demanding.
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Offline Orbert

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #19 on: January 26, 2012, 04:48:10 PM »
But is providing testimony the same as providing evidence?

Offline El Barto

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #20 on: January 26, 2012, 05:16:20 PM »
But is providing testimony the same as providing evidence?
In a legal context,  I do not believe so.  The problem here is that the line separating the two is so fuzzy as to be nonexistent.  I'd say that in this case she's actually being compelled to do both.  Hence the dilemma. 
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Offline ResultsMayVary

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #21 on: January 26, 2012, 07:55:50 PM »
I fall on the side of the defendant.  If the government can't crack her encryption, then they can't prove their case.  She shouldn't be required to give them the answer they need to convict her.  That doesn't even make sense.
I'm with Hef here. Its a clear violation of her fifth amendment rights.
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Offline Nick

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #22 on: January 26, 2012, 09:27:07 PM »
If it really is then just keep her locked up until they can break the encryption. :p
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Offline XJDenton

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #23 on: January 27, 2012, 05:02:39 AM »
I fall on the side of the defendant.  If the government can't crack her encryption, then they can't prove their case.  She shouldn't be required to give them the answer they need to convict her.  That doesn't even make sense.

Pretty much this.
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Offline sylvan

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #24 on: January 27, 2012, 07:02:48 AM »
Technically, and as far as they can tell, they already have the evidence they sought in their possession.  They just don't understand it.  What they're asking isn't for the woman to hand over critical evidence,  but for her to translate it for them.

If they can't decrypt the drive, then how can they tell that they already have the evidence they are seeking?  They don't know for sure what is on the drive, if anything. 

-If "evidence" is on the the drive, they obviously are not in posession of said evidence, or they would use it.  Plainly stating that evidence is likely on there is not the same as incriminating evidence actually being there.  That would be for the authorites to prove.
-She knows where the "evidence" supposedly is and the authorites cannot get to it.
-She cannot be forced to give up information that would self incriminate.

What else is there?

Offline Vivace

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #25 on: January 27, 2012, 08:38:56 AM »
At first I was against this, but now that I think about it, it makes sense.  I think the key is that there is probable cause that there is incriminating evidence on the computer. 

For an analogy, if police have PC that you have something illegal in your home, they get a warrant to search your house.  You can either let them in (decrypt the files) or they'll knock the door down (crack the encryption). 

Since the second option here isn't feasible, the authorities are finding themselves in the unusual position of saying, "open the door or else".  I'm interested to see what the consequences would/will be for refusing to comply.

Excellent analogy and it is exactly where I find myself on this.
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Offline kirksnosehair

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #26 on: January 27, 2012, 02:58:46 PM »
Since I work for one of the most well-respected criminal defense attorneys in the United States, I'm sending him this and asking him for an opinion.    This is the guy I will be asking.

I will post it here when he replies.



Offline Scheavo

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #27 on: January 27, 2012, 09:25:26 PM »
The portion of the Bill of Rights which is relevant:

Quote
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized
....
nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself,

The "self incrimination" clause in the Constitution protects your ability to not stand witness against yourself. It does not mean that you cannot ever self incriminate yourself, or that you are fully protected from ever leading to evidence which incriminates you. As Barto points out, you are forced to hand over a key for a safe in a search warrant, and the encryption is perfectly analogous to a key. That kind of protection simply does not apply here, as we're not talking about a trial, taking witness, or anything like that. The closest comparison would be search warrants. The man doesn't have the right to go into your home and search around for incriminating evidence, at will, but he certainty does have the right to get a search warrant to look for evidence.




Offline El Barto

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #28 on: January 27, 2012, 09:48:38 PM »
As I also pointed out,  this isn't entirely analogous to the safe/key, either.  It's closer to a combination lock,  and I don't know that it's ever been established you can be compelled to disclose a combination.  Like I said,  it's probably never come up before.  But aside from the safe metaphor,  it's also pretty similar to the created language that I referred to.  Can you be compelled to teach the prosecution a shorthand you conjured up for your bookkeeping activities?  It's the same situation,  where the evidence is already in their possession, yet inaccessible without revealing testimony from the defendant.  In either case,  you're being asked to produce the contents of your own mind.
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Offline chknptpie

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #29 on: January 28, 2012, 09:32:06 AM »
As Barto points out, you are forced to hand over a key for a safe in a search warrant

Whether it be a key or a combination to a lock... I didn't realize that you could be given a warrant for such things. I thought warrants were for search and seizure. If they don't find it, oh well.

Offline Scheavo

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #30 on: January 28, 2012, 11:44:24 AM »
In either case,  you're being asked to produce the contents of your own mind.

But can it really be made analogous to being a witness against yourself? I just don't think it can be. The constitution doesn't protect you from keeping silent on the contents of your own mind, it keeps you protected from taking the stand, in a trial, and verbally incriminating yourself. Without ever having studied this exact issue, I'd be willing to wager that this is in the constitution to protect against torture and forced false testimonials, and was never intended to be able to let a women hide and forever keep information away from prosecutors, even though it's technically in their possession. Let's not forget that the Bill of Rights was penned well before any conception of computers was existent, nor, I'm sure, a very secure way of locking out information from the outside world. 

Of course, you can't actually force the women to spill the beans. She'll be found in contempt though, and I doubt the Supreme Court (especially this Supreme Court) will side with the woman.

Offline hefdaddy42

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #31 on: January 28, 2012, 11:46:41 AM »
It just seems that the burden of proof is on the prosecution, not the defendant.  If they can't prove that there is evidence on the laptop, then there is no evidence on her laptop.  They can't meet the burden of proof.
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Offline Scheavo

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #32 on: January 28, 2012, 11:54:57 AM »
If they can't prove that there is evidence on the laptop, then there is no evidence on her laptop.  They can't meet the burden of proof.

Isn't that like saying because you can't prove god exists, he doesn't exist? Or that because you can't prove god doesn't' exist, he does exist?

We're not talking about this being used to somehow prove she committed bank fraud. It's about the fact that there is enough evidence to warrant a search warrant, so that proof can be gotten.

Offline El Barto

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #33 on: January 28, 2012, 12:04:08 PM »
The constitution doesn't protect you from keeping silent on the contents of your own mind, it keeps you protected from taking the stand, in a trial, and verbally incriminating yourself.
That seems like a pretty narrowly defined interpretation,  that I'm not sure is actually valid.

In any case,  here are my thoughts.  I've been reading some of the discussion elsewhere (ars techinca has a ton of good debate happening on this matter).  One of the things that's caused me the most trouble was one remark, which I'll have to paraphrase.  Somebody said that the Bill of Rights was in place to protect us all from the law,  not to help us break it.  As much as I'd like to,  I can't refute this.  It's just a clear and succinct interpretation that's almost certainly what Madison et al had in mind.  Where I depart with that interpretation is how it effects things in the future,  which as we all agree bears no resemblance to what they could have foreseen. 

Part of living in a free society is living with risk.  A happy-go-lucky schizophrenic might shoot up a political rally.  Nineteen assholes might crash planes into your office.  Creepy fucks might look at pictures they're not supposed to.  People might commit crimes which you're obligated to let them get away with.  There are reasonable things that can be done to prevent such acts,  but they all have to be weighed against the cost as they affect the rest of our freedoms.  Any of these things could be prevented,  but we'd wind up living in a society that would terrify Benito Mussolini.  Ideally,  what we want is to tailor each attempt to mitigate these occurrences to cause the least possible infringement upon liberty. 

Of course,  that's easier said than done.  There are always gray areas,  and fuzzy lines like we're seeing here.  There isn't any well defined way of handling these things; only best judgement.  In these situations,  my preference would be to try my damnedest to err on the side of freedom.  If there's a problem,  address that once it's established.  What I'm opposed to is automatically taking the heavy-handed approach,  and then trying to take back authority we gave the government later if we decide that it was too much.  That never works.  I'm looking for incremental approaches to safeguard freedom,  rather than the blunt force approach that the law and order types tend to want to start with.  One's much easier to tweak than the other.

As all of that pertains to this instance,  there's a great deal to be lost by deciding that a person can be forced to divulge information that might convict them.  Particularly if you start to apply it to very likely scenarios that will be coming in the future.  Much like the recent GPS case and AJ Sotomayer's opinion,  we need to be looking forward when establishing what is and isn't acceptable.  Personally,  I'd rather be safe than sorry.
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Offline Scheavo

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Re: Judge orders Colorado woman to unencrypt laptop
« Reply #34 on: January 28, 2012, 06:58:01 PM »
The constitution doesn't protect you from keeping silent on the contents of your own mind, it keeps you protected from taking the stand, in a trial, and verbally incriminating yourself.
That seems like a pretty narrowly defined interpretation,  that I'm not sure is actually valid.


Oh, the two spill over, and definitely in an investigation (for instance, your Miranda right to keep silent), but it's important to keep in mind just what the 5th amendment does and does not protect. Giving up an encryption key in and of itself cannot lead to you be incriminating, and it itself is not incriminating evidence.

And just to be clear, that's me giving a constitutional argument. I'm not entirely sure where I stand, I much more agree with this

Quote
Of course,  that's easier said than done.  There are always gray areas,  and fuzzy lines like we're seeing here.  There isn't any well defined way of handling these things; only best judgement.

Computers and the internet bring about more social change than humans can keep up with. It'll be a while before this, piracy, and many other digital Right concerns, are resolved.