This Episode Could be Worth a Thousand Bucks to the ACLU

But I sure hope not. It's Episode 369 of the Cyberlaw Podcast

We begin the episode with a review of the massive Kaseya ransomware attack. Dave Aitel digs into the technical aspects while Paul Rosenzweig and Matthew Heiman explore the policy and political  implications. But either way, the news is bad.

The news was also bad for Gov. DeSantis's Florida 'deplatforming' law, which a Clinton appointee dispatched in a cursory opinion last week. I've been in a small minority who thinks the law, far from being a joke, is likely to survive (at least in part) if it reaches the Supreme Court. Paul challenges me to put my money where my mouth is. Details to be worked out, but if a portion of the law survives in the top court, Paul will be sending a thousand bucks to Trumpista nonprofit. If not, I'll likely be sending my money to the ACLU.

Surprisingly, our commentators mostly agree that both NSA and Tucker Carlson could be telling the truth about the claim that NSA has at least a few of Carlson's communications. Sadly, this will disappoint partisans for both, since each thinks that the other must be lying. In the process, NSA gets unaccustomed praise for its … wait for it … agile and savvy response. That's got to be a first.

Paul and I conclude that Maine, having passed in haste the strongest state facial recognition ban yet, will likely find itself repenting at leisure.

Matthew decodes Margrethe Vestager's warning to Apple against using privacy, security to limit competition.

And I mock Apple for claiming to protect privacy while making employees wear body cams to preserve the element of surprise at the next Apple product unveiling. Not to mention the 2-billion-person asterisk hanging off Apple's commitment to human rights.

Dave praises NSA for its stewardship of a popular open source reverse engineering tool, Ghidra.

And everyone has a view about cops using YouTube's crappy AI takedown engine to keep people from posting videos of their conversations with cops.

And More!

Download the 369th Episode (mp3)

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Comments

[Randal]

"The legislation now at issue was an effort to rein in social-media providers deemed too large and too liberal. Balancing the exchange of ideas among private speakers is not a legitimate governmental interest."

Seems open and shut to me.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Surprisingly, our commentators mostly agree that both NSA and Tucker Carlson could be telling the truth about the claim that NSA has at least a few of Carlson's communications."

I'm sure you're aware of how this works: When the NSA wants to conduct wiretaps against somebody it would be embarrassing to be caught targeting, (A President, a journalist...) they pick one or more nominal targets a hop or three from the real target, and then incidentally wiretap them. Since they're not only allowed to wiretap the nominal target, but everybody who communicates with the nominal target, and everybody who communicates with them, and everybody who communicates with them, too. Three hops.

I wonder what the minimum number of nominal targets they need is, to incidentally wiretap anybody they want? A million? A hundred thousand?

[Brett Bellmore]

Three degrees of separation: breaking down the NSA's 'hops' surveillance method

Oh, right: More like 300, if they pick them right.

[Greg J]

Surprisingly, our commentators mostly agree that both NSA and Tucker Carlson could be telling the truth about the claim that NSA has at least a few of Carlson's communications. Sadly, this will disappoint partisans for both, since each thinks that the other must be lying. In the process, NSA gets unaccustomed praise for its … wait for it … agile and savvy response. That's got to be a first.

Um, no.

In court you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. At best, the NSA is telling the truth and nothing but the truth, but not the whole truth.

And by doing that they're lying

Tucker says that the NSA is reading his email. The NSA says they aren't targeting him directly, but they can still read his email without targeting him directly.

So, since they issued an obviously non-responsive statement that pretends to be a responsive statement, the truth must be that they are in fact reading his email, and are lying by ommision.

Which is in no way praisworthy

[Rev. Arthur L. Kirkland]

Why does an ostensibly libertarian website continue to publish -- regularly -- this authoritarian, right-wing content?

Is this part of a swing to an "often libertarian" website featuring mostly sheepish movement conservatives in unconvincing libertarian drag? To a "libertarianish" corner of the clingerverse?

[Greg J]

Hey, look at that! Axios is reporting on the Tucker Calrson emails that the NSA leaked to them:

https://www.axios.com/tucker-carlson-putin-interview-surveillance-c9952d7c-33d7-45e9-be68-2ba4c3817f98.html

Gee, I wonder, Rev, why would people want to report on the truth? Any thoughts on that?

[Prester John]

Baker’s opinions of even innocuous, consumer-oriented privacy and security advocacy are so predictable as to be tedious.