Guilt by association is much more a social construct, than a legal one.
The bar for legal consequences is expected to be much higher than mere association.
It has never been perfect, nor uniformly applied in all circumstances, but it is and should remain a nominal goal of the justice system. For that to no longer be considered the case, even in a casual conversation like this, is a devastating shift of the Overton window towards authoritarianism as the norm.
From my understanding, guilt by association is quite valid legally when it comes to Tor exit nodes, due to the fact that other people’s traffic appears as your traffic.
It may not literally be guilt by association, but they’re two parts of the same whole in this case, right or wrong.
Guilt by association: if a group of three approaches another in a confrontation, and one person punches another then would all three be seen as violent?
>Guilt by association is much more a social construct, than a legal one.
Turning this sentence up and down, and still fail to get what it tries to convey. Law is social construct per definition, isn’t it?
>It has never been perfect, nor uniformly applied in all circumstances, but it is and should remain a nominal goal of the justice system.
No? Like, at best it is just going to pretend to be so. Then it’s actually all ruled by ambitious sociopath manipulators that take The Prince as bedtime reading, either right from the start or as soon as they can unleash their master plan.
Can anyone point to any jurisdiction in the world which puts equal duties and rights with actual associated material/logistical means on every single citizen? If no, we might be free to conclude that justice and equality are words on frontispiece of the theater, not how the leviathan is planning to actually process.
All that said, not everyone is Aaron Schwartz. Even supposing it’s only to maintain the façade, institutions do also have to act against some criminal outside of their own ruling castes.
The source for that article was a single cop in a single country (Spain) making an off-handed comment. The way it’s been spun as a universal concept in Europe by all of the Android blogs is misleading.
Yes. I think that one comment was a flash in the pan about a particular moment in time from an officer involved in a very specific type of drug trafficking prosecutions.
There's a big difference between being the user of something (Pixel/GrapheneOS, though I find these as weird comparisons given) and being an operator of something.
Operating an exit node is by definition you acting in the distribution of such activity (legal or not).
The part that should really enrage you is the way people will selectively understand this based on whether they agree or disagree with the context.
If some electronics repair guy repairing vehicle ECUs in bulk who doesn't ask questions but has an inkling that they're gonna get used for emissions laws violations got rolled up on by the feds for refusing to go out of his way to help them out HN would find all sorts of ways to cheer and justify it.
As someone who works in this industry: we do ECU modification and repair and as such, have regular contact with the EPA. Our products all align with all required emissions regulation and testing, which is why we're allowed to continue selling them. If the EPA says jump, we ask how high.
I say this because this cultural vibe of government agencies kicking in your door for doing innocuous shit needs to die already, that is simply not how this happens. We get letters, we get calls, VERY occasionally we get visits and said visits are scheduled weeks, sometimes months in advance. We always cooperate and the relationship, therefore, is not adversarial.
Honestly we have way more fucking problems with huckster vendors trying to fuck us out of a few extra dollars on parts than anything to do with the big scary government.
While we're at it, fuck coal rollers with a cactus.
For any given issue, subject, industry or niche there is always a you. And you are the enablers. Multiply by every equivalent idiot and niche and that's how you get the world in which some guy gets whacked for running a tor node.
If not that it would be some other niche, maybe some guy importing gray market power equipment to the chagrin of the branded dealers would be getting whacked. If not that then it's the amish farmers getting whacked over one of their many "in letter but not spirit" compliance measures.
Yeah, in every case the letters of the law are broad enough to nail these sorts of people but that's not an outcome the general public wants except for the occasional zealot on any given subject. And the equivalent enablers would be endorsing it just as you are now.
And at the end of the day your behavior (you plural) undermines the legitimacy of these institutions and the government they serve because these are outcomes that nobody wants, but single industry enforcement enough of a back burner issue that elections mostly don't get won and lost over them so the fire just keeps smoldering year after year (fed by our tax dollars, of course).
>As someone who works in this industry
Perfect illustrative example for one of HN's favorite quotes:
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it"
>Our products all align with all required emissions regulation...the relationship, therefore, is not adversarial.
You might as well compare a medium company with an encrypted file share service to some 1-man package maintainer for software that does the same. Who is law enforcement gonna try and abuse?
>While we're at it, fuck coal rollers with a cactus.
A bunch of reactionary yokels are a symptom of the degree to which your ilk has undermined the legitimacy of the laws they violate and enforcement agencies they thumb their nose at, not the root cause. If society solves people like you the yokels will mostly go away on their own. That is what I seek.
'whacked' usually means killed. This guy was neither killed, nor jailed for 'running a tor node', but a bunch of more specifically bad, illegal shit that it would be misleading to describe this way.
The same way as describing destroying a bunch of an ex-employers data on-site causing thousands in loss is not a "workplace dispute".
> these are outcomes that nobody wants
which outcomes? these are outcomes no-one wants, but you've yet to prove they happen. It takes a lot of time to properly go through case details to determine abuse, it seems like you are very casually throwing around accusations.
> You might as well compare...
Why? they comply with the law, why does that make them 'big'? I'm sure the FBI has plenty resources to go after them, in fact, they have more to lose.
The 'one man shop' needs to comply with the law, however big or small they are.
> Who is law enforcement gonna try and abuse?
abuse? this guy says no-onw is kicking his door down, have you proof it changes for smaller setups?
they go after whoever they think is breaking the law, and not complying (providing relevant licences, proof of testing) flags you for that. Are you suggesting the small guy should fly under the radar?
> For any given issue, subject, industry or niche there is always a you. And you are the enablers. Multiply by every equivalent idiot and niche and that's how you get the world in which some guy gets whacked for running a tor node.
I am not defending at all the actions of the FBI. The FBI/CIA/NSA are overzealous law enforcement serving the will of colonial capitalism. Their history of targeting whistleblowers, activists, and technologists; like, for example, the guy running a Tor node; is well documented and deeply problematic. That same machinery has also been deployed against environmental activists, which makes the irony even more bitter that it's being cited here.
I'm defending the EPA, which in contrast, works with numerous industries, including ours, to benefit society as a whole.
The problem is this exact mindset where we insist that everything is on one massive slippery slope and there's simply no way to differentiate from proper, needed regulation, and the boot of law enforcement being deployed to fuck with the working class at scale.
We can tell the difference and it isn't difficult, it simply requires thinking which an unfortunate number of voters don't like doing.
> "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it"
Completely backwards. There is a LOT of money to be made circumventing emissions regulations, which is why almost every OEM has been caught with their hands in that particular cookie jar, either fingernail or wrist deep.
We COST ourselves money locking up those features because we agree with the regulations in place.
> A bunch of reactionary yokels are a symptom of the degree to which your ilk has undermined the legitimacy of the laws they violate and enforcement agencies they thumb their nose at, not the root cause. If society solves people like you the yokels will mostly go away on their own. That is what I seek.
Reactionary movements have existed for every time the Government says don't do anything since time immemorial. There is ALWAYS reactionaries because there is ALWAYS a segment of the population that never matures past the age of ten. The fact that they occasionally have a point is nothing but statistical likelihood; if you constantly say "no" to everything, by sheer chance, you will occasionally say no to something bad.
It's not as simple as good vs bad. Imagine if this discussion were framed in some far more gray context FBI vs EPA.
>I am not defending at all the actions of the FBI.
"I am not defending the EPA, the overzealous enforcement arm of regulatory capture, I am defending the FBI who work closely and collaboratively with many industries, including ours to benefit society as a whole"
Now, obviously that's not a serious opinion, but surely you see what I'm getting at.
>The problem is this exact mindset where we insist that everything is on one massive slippery slope and there's simply no way to differentiate from proper, needed regulation, and the boot of law enforcement being deployed to fuck with the working class at scale.
How exactly does one differentiate at the margin?
>We can tell the difference and it isn't difficult, it simply requires thinking which an unfortunate number of voters don't like doing.
Anything we give power to for good gets co-opted by interests that can't stand garner support on their own because such interests must find things that have good marketing and credibility to advance their causes under.
Furthermore, this failure mode is basically the story of our time. Tons of out institutions suffer from this sort of co-option by entrenched interests, big business interests, etc, etc.
>Reactionary movements have existed for every time the Government says don't do anything
And their existence can be used as a canary. I don't see a lot of people making complaining about or simping for the <shuffles cards> Office of weights and measure or <shuffles cards> state fire marshall's office. Those sort of functions aren't questionable so they don't have pushback arising out of basically nowhere and they don't need constant simpin to fight that pushback like micromanaging what people do with their cars after sale (EPA) and breaking encryption (FBI and friends) does
Now, obviously that's a bullshit statement, but surely you see the reflection.
The whole premise is flawed. We can't just pick "things" for government to enforce or do. That doesn't scale to a nation of 300+mil.
>there is ALWAYS reactionaries because there is ALWAYS a segment of the population that never matures past the age of ten.
I'd ask if you saw the irony in calling the reactionaries ten year olds immediately after thinking you can cherry pick which enforcement beurocracies are good(ish) and bad(ish) as if that's not too subjective of a task to be tractable, say nothing of the fact that they all influence each other, draw from the same talent pools at the higher levels, etc, etc.
>Pretty sure the questions start and end with “was it illegal”.
Disclaimer: I don't have any skin in this game or association with any government, any law enforcement agency, nor do I know the person discussed or (at least as far as I know) anyone who knows that person. And IANAL.
IIUC (and I may not), the guy was on probation[0], which is release from or in lieu of prison.
If someone is on probation, they are still under the authority of the (in this case Federal) judicial/prison authority which sentenced them.
It is (whether you think it's right or not) normal for restrictions to be placed upon those on probation, including random drug tests, restrictions on certain types of behavior (this is often related to the crime(s) for which they've been convicted).
Often, this also provides for warrantless searches and other privacy-invading stuff as part of the probation agreement. I'd note that (again, IIUC) that the convicted person must agree to the terms of probation or they will have to go to (or not be released from) prison to serve their (remaining) sentence.
Violation of the terms of probation (as is clearly defined in probation agreements) may result in imprisonment to complete the sentence imposed by the court after trial or (as it was in this case) a plea bargain.
I am unfamiliar with the case at hand, but sending someone to (or back to) prison for violating probation is the stick which (presumably) keeps people from re-offending and/or violating the terms of their probation, at least until they complete the term of probation.
Context plays a crucial role, especially within the Judeo-Christian tradition. So much so that it serves as a foundation for the design of the modern legal system.
>> But this should be a cautionary warning of what might also happen anyone if you associate with things that are perceived as criminal in nature.
Opioid painkillers are associated with “things that are criminal in nature” because a certain segment of every society does and will suck, nearly no matter what.
Does this mean that everybody in pain should just suffer and let their education, career, and family be taken from them before their time?
>But this should be a cautionary warning of what might also happen to anyone if you associate with things that are perceived as criminal in nature.
This would come off lot more legit if the current elected US president wasn't a convicted rapist and constantly promoting crypto along with his acolytes like Elon Musk.
Guilt by association is much more a social construct, than a legal one.
The bar for legal consequences is expected to be much higher than mere association.
It has never been perfect, nor uniformly applied in all circumstances, but it is and should remain a nominal goal of the justice system. For that to no longer be considered the case, even in a casual conversation like this, is a devastating shift of the Overton window towards authoritarianism as the norm.
Limits on association and limits on technology use are standard fare when on probation for a felony CFAA conviction.
From my understanding, guilt by association is quite valid legally when it comes to Tor exit nodes, due to the fact that other people’s traffic appears as your traffic.
It may not literally be guilt by association, but they’re two parts of the same whole in this case, right or wrong.
Guilt by association: if a group of three approaches another in a confrontation, and one person punches another then would all three be seen as violent?
>Guilt by association is much more a social construct, than a legal one.
Turning this sentence up and down, and still fail to get what it tries to convey. Law is social construct per definition, isn’t it?
>It has never been perfect, nor uniformly applied in all circumstances, but it is and should remain a nominal goal of the justice system.
No? Like, at best it is just going to pretend to be so. Then it’s actually all ruled by ambitious sociopath manipulators that take The Prince as bedtime reading, either right from the start or as soon as they can unleash their master plan.
Can anyone point to any jurisdiction in the world which puts equal duties and rights with actual associated material/logistical means on every single citizen? If no, we might be free to conclude that justice and equality are words on frontispiece of the theater, not how the leviathan is planning to actually process.
All that said, not everyone is Aaron Schwartz. Even supposing it’s only to maintain the façade, institutions do also have to act against some criminal outside of their own ruling castes.
By this logic, anyone who has had a Google Pixel and or is running GrapheneOS is guilty by association, right?
Just wanted to understand your point.
> By this logic, anyone who has had a Google Pixel and or is running GrapheneOS is guilty by association, right?
Yup. https://www.androidauthority.com/google-pixel-organized-crim...
The source for that article was a single cop in a single country (Spain) making an off-handed comment. The way it’s been spun as a universal concept in Europe by all of the Android blogs is misleading.
Would you predict that GrapheneOS will still be completely legal in 10 years in Spain?
Yes. I think that one comment was a flash in the pan about a particular moment in time from an officer involved in a very specific type of drug trafficking prosecutions.
There's a big difference between being the user of something (Pixel/GrapheneOS, though I find these as weird comparisons given) and being an operator of something.
Operating an exit node is by definition you acting in the distribution of such activity (legal or not).
The part that should really enrage you is the way people will selectively understand this based on whether they agree or disagree with the context.
If some electronics repair guy repairing vehicle ECUs in bulk who doesn't ask questions but has an inkling that they're gonna get used for emissions laws violations got rolled up on by the feds for refusing to go out of his way to help them out HN would find all sorts of ways to cheer and justify it.
But when they do it to a tor node it's bad.
As someone who works in this industry: we do ECU modification and repair and as such, have regular contact with the EPA. Our products all align with all required emissions regulation and testing, which is why we're allowed to continue selling them. If the EPA says jump, we ask how high.
I say this because this cultural vibe of government agencies kicking in your door for doing innocuous shit needs to die already, that is simply not how this happens. We get letters, we get calls, VERY occasionally we get visits and said visits are scheduled weeks, sometimes months in advance. We always cooperate and the relationship, therefore, is not adversarial.
Honestly we have way more fucking problems with huckster vendors trying to fuck us out of a few extra dollars on parts than anything to do with the big scary government.
While we're at it, fuck coal rollers with a cactus.
You, you are an instance of the problem.
For any given issue, subject, industry or niche there is always a you. And you are the enablers. Multiply by every equivalent idiot and niche and that's how you get the world in which some guy gets whacked for running a tor node.
If not that it would be some other niche, maybe some guy importing gray market power equipment to the chagrin of the branded dealers would be getting whacked. If not that then it's the amish farmers getting whacked over one of their many "in letter but not spirit" compliance measures.
Yeah, in every case the letters of the law are broad enough to nail these sorts of people but that's not an outcome the general public wants except for the occasional zealot on any given subject. And the equivalent enablers would be endorsing it just as you are now.
And at the end of the day your behavior (you plural) undermines the legitimacy of these institutions and the government they serve because these are outcomes that nobody wants, but single industry enforcement enough of a back burner issue that elections mostly don't get won and lost over them so the fire just keeps smoldering year after year (fed by our tax dollars, of course).
>As someone who works in this industry
Perfect illustrative example for one of HN's favorite quotes:
"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it"
>Our products all align with all required emissions regulation...the relationship, therefore, is not adversarial.
You might as well compare a medium company with an encrypted file share service to some 1-man package maintainer for software that does the same. Who is law enforcement gonna try and abuse?
>While we're at it, fuck coal rollers with a cactus.
A bunch of reactionary yokels are a symptom of the degree to which your ilk has undermined the legitimacy of the laws they violate and enforcement agencies they thumb their nose at, not the root cause. If society solves people like you the yokels will mostly go away on their own. That is what I seek.
> gets whacked for running a tor node.
'whacked' usually means killed. This guy was neither killed, nor jailed for 'running a tor node', but a bunch of more specifically bad, illegal shit that it would be misleading to describe this way.
The same way as describing destroying a bunch of an ex-employers data on-site causing thousands in loss is not a "workplace dispute".
> these are outcomes that nobody wants
which outcomes? these are outcomes no-one wants, but you've yet to prove they happen. It takes a lot of time to properly go through case details to determine abuse, it seems like you are very casually throwing around accusations.
> You might as well compare...
Why? they comply with the law, why does that make them 'big'? I'm sure the FBI has plenty resources to go after them, in fact, they have more to lose.
The 'one man shop' needs to comply with the law, however big or small they are.
> Who is law enforcement gonna try and abuse?
abuse? this guy says no-onw is kicking his door down, have you proof it changes for smaller setups?
they go after whoever they think is breaking the law, and not complying (providing relevant licences, proof of testing) flags you for that. Are you suggesting the small guy should fly under the radar?
> For any given issue, subject, industry or niche there is always a you. And you are the enablers. Multiply by every equivalent idiot and niche and that's how you get the world in which some guy gets whacked for running a tor node.
I am not defending at all the actions of the FBI. The FBI/CIA/NSA are overzealous law enforcement serving the will of colonial capitalism. Their history of targeting whistleblowers, activists, and technologists; like, for example, the guy running a Tor node; is well documented and deeply problematic. That same machinery has also been deployed against environmental activists, which makes the irony even more bitter that it's being cited here.
I'm defending the EPA, which in contrast, works with numerous industries, including ours, to benefit society as a whole.
The problem is this exact mindset where we insist that everything is on one massive slippery slope and there's simply no way to differentiate from proper, needed regulation, and the boot of law enforcement being deployed to fuck with the working class at scale.
We can tell the difference and it isn't difficult, it simply requires thinking which an unfortunate number of voters don't like doing.
> "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it"
Completely backwards. There is a LOT of money to be made circumventing emissions regulations, which is why almost every OEM has been caught with their hands in that particular cookie jar, either fingernail or wrist deep.
We COST ourselves money locking up those features because we agree with the regulations in place.
> A bunch of reactionary yokels are a symptom of the degree to which your ilk has undermined the legitimacy of the laws they violate and enforcement agencies they thumb their nose at, not the root cause. If society solves people like you the yokels will mostly go away on their own. That is what I seek.
Reactionary movements have existed for every time the Government says don't do anything since time immemorial. There is ALWAYS reactionaries because there is ALWAYS a segment of the population that never matures past the age of ten. The fact that they occasionally have a point is nothing but statistical likelihood; if you constantly say "no" to everything, by sheer chance, you will occasionally say no to something bad.
It's not as simple as good vs bad. Imagine if this discussion were framed in some far more gray context FBI vs EPA.
>I am not defending at all the actions of the FBI.
"I am not defending the EPA, the overzealous enforcement arm of regulatory capture, I am defending the FBI who work closely and collaboratively with many industries, including ours to benefit society as a whole"
Now, obviously that's not a serious opinion, but surely you see what I'm getting at.
>The problem is this exact mindset where we insist that everything is on one massive slippery slope and there's simply no way to differentiate from proper, needed regulation, and the boot of law enforcement being deployed to fuck with the working class at scale.
How exactly does one differentiate at the margin?
>We can tell the difference and it isn't difficult, it simply requires thinking which an unfortunate number of voters don't like doing.
Anything we give power to for good gets co-opted by interests that can't stand garner support on their own because such interests must find things that have good marketing and credibility to advance their causes under.
Furthermore, this failure mode is basically the story of our time. Tons of out institutions suffer from this sort of co-option by entrenched interests, big business interests, etc, etc.
>Reactionary movements have existed for every time the Government says don't do anything
And their existence can be used as a canary. I don't see a lot of people making complaining about or simping for the <shuffles cards> Office of weights and measure or <shuffles cards> state fire marshall's office. Those sort of functions aren't questionable so they don't have pushback arising out of basically nowhere and they don't need constant simpin to fight that pushback like micromanaging what people do with their cars after sale (EPA) and breaking encryption (FBI and friends) does
Now, obviously that's a bullshit statement, but surely you see the reflection.
The whole premise is flawed. We can't just pick "things" for government to enforce or do. That doesn't scale to a nation of 300+mil.
>there is ALWAYS reactionaries because there is ALWAYS a segment of the population that never matures past the age of ten.
I'd ask if you saw the irony in calling the reactionaries ten year olds immediately after thinking you can cherry pick which enforcement beurocracies are good(ish) and bad(ish) as if that's not too subjective of a task to be tractable, say nothing of the fact that they all influence each other, draw from the same talent pools at the higher levels, etc, etc.
Pretty sure the questions start and end with “was it illegal”.
>Pretty sure the questions start and end with “was it illegal”.
Disclaimer: I don't have any skin in this game or association with any government, any law enforcement agency, nor do I know the person discussed or (at least as far as I know) anyone who knows that person. And IANAL.
IIUC (and I may not), the guy was on probation[0], which is release from or in lieu of prison.
If someone is on probation, they are still under the authority of the (in this case Federal) judicial/prison authority which sentenced them.
It is (whether you think it's right or not) normal for restrictions to be placed upon those on probation, including random drug tests, restrictions on certain types of behavior (this is often related to the crime(s) for which they've been convicted).
Often, this also provides for warrantless searches and other privacy-invading stuff as part of the probation agreement. I'd note that (again, IIUC) that the convicted person must agree to the terms of probation or they will have to go to (or not be released from) prison to serve their (remaining) sentence.
Violation of the terms of probation (as is clearly defined in probation agreements) may result in imprisonment to complete the sentence imposed by the court after trial or (as it was in this case) a plea bargain.
I am unfamiliar with the case at hand, but sending someone to (or back to) prison for violating probation is the stick which (presumably) keeps people from re-offending and/or violating the terms of their probation, at least until they complete the term of probation.
[0] https://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/probation-and-...
When they do it to either it's bad.
Context plays a crucial role, especially within the Judeo-Christian tradition. So much so that it serves as a foundation for the design of the modern legal system.
>> But this should be a cautionary warning of what might also happen anyone if you associate with things that are perceived as criminal in nature.
Opioid painkillers are associated with “things that are criminal in nature” because a certain segment of every society does and will suck, nearly no matter what. Does this mean that everybody in pain should just suffer and let their education, career, and family be taken from them before their time?
>But this should be a cautionary warning of what might also happen to anyone if you associate with things that are perceived as criminal in nature.
This would come off lot more legit if the current elected US president wasn't a convicted rapist and constantly promoting crypto along with his acolytes like Elon Musk.
> current elected US president wasn't a convicted rapist
Wow did this just happen today? I can't find anything about it online
/s
Found civilly liable, not criminally convicted.
so not remotely the same thing.