PGP, kiddie porn and the Fifth
p2pnet news | Freedom:- PGP – Pretty Good Privacy computer encryption – is indeed pretty good.
It has US Homeland Security agents stymied.
A Canadian suspected of having child pornography on his laptop has presented Americans with a Fifth Amendment dilemma —- should (or can?) he be forced to revealed his password so police can look for evidence that may ultimately be used against him?
Tha man, Sebastien Boucher, lives in Vermont and according to Associated Press, "For now, the law’s on Boucher’s side: A federal magistrate here has ruled that forcing Boucher to surrender the password would be unconstitutional."
Boucher and his father were returning from Quebec to their home in Derry, Vermont, when they were pulled over for secondary inspection south of Sherbrooke, says the Ottawa Citizen, which broke the story last month.
A US border guard noticed the laptop and the hard-drive had some 34,000 images, an affidavit said, including one titled ‘Two year old being raped during diaper change’.
"The border guard asked Mr. Boucher if his computer contained child pornography," says the story. "He said he didn’t know, because he hadn’t had a chance to check his temporary Internet files" and, " Throughout the questioning, Mr. Boucher showed signs of nervousness, the affidavit said.
"The border guard called in Agent Mark Curtis from the Department of Homeland Security. He examined the computer and, he said, found several images of adult pornography and animated child porn. Mr. Boucher was read his Miranda rights."
With Boucher looking on, Curtis examined more files and at least one other video allegedly depicting sex acts involving what appeared to be pre-teen girls, says the Ottawa Citizen, continuing Boucher said he downloaded porn from newsgroups and, "sometimes unknowingly downloads files with child pornography," but deleted them, the affidavit said.
Curtis, "seized the computer, turned if off, and Mr. Boucher was arrested," the story says, but when American investigators tried to copy of the hard-drive they couldn’t because the hard drive was encrypted with Pretty Good Privacy.
"Without the password, the potentially incriminating files on his disk drive could not be viewed and key evidence against Mr. Boucher was inaccessible," says the Ottawa Citizen, and, "To open it up, the grand jury issued a subpoena to compel Mr. Boucher to provide the password. In response, Mr. Boucher’s lawyers filed a motion contending that forcing him to give up his password would violate his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination."
OK, investigators said, Boucher could enter the password himself without them knowing what it was and they could then examine the hard drive but, "Judge Jerome Niedermeier of the Vermont District Court "It’s a very, very interesting and novel question, and the courts have never really dealt with it," AP has EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) Lee Tien saying.
The right to keep a password secret is a, "linchpin of the digital age" and encryption is, "really the only way you can secure information against prying eyes," he said. "If it’s too easy to compel people to produce their crypto keys, it’s not much of a protection."
Boucher is free on the condition he does not leave Vermont or New Hampshire, adds the Ottawa Citizen.
Also See:
Associated Press – Encrypted Laptop Poses Legal Dilemma, February 7, 2008
Ottawa Citizen – Porn, passwords and rights in the Internet age, January 13, 2008
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February 8th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
Regardless of whether or not he’s guilty, I don’t like the idea that customs agents would go snooping through someone’s computer, without any provocation.
February 8th, 2008 at 3:35 pm
You can thank mr bush for that. Take his example and encrypt everything possible
February 8th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
I also dont think border gaurds should be able to look through your computer. What if they find 1000 mp3s on there? Are they gonn ask if they were ubtained legally or illegally. Same with any files on teh computer. Its like crossing the border with a diary. Should they be aloud to read it?
I know when gamers or people involved with torrents and stuff cross the border to go to meetings and conventions they usually have there computer wiped clean so they dont have cracked copies or hacked games and such.
But border gaurds have no reason to look through a laptop or any type of media device.
February 9th, 2008 at 1:00 am
I am AGAINST kiddie porn, but I have over 1,000 bit military encryption invented by my ex-fbi friend. I also have 700 bits stacked in the 1,000 bits. 700 Bits uses 3 algorithms, 1,000 dits uses triple PEAS encryption invented by my followers.
Why Cause I’m the greatest DATA Archiver in the world. I even know Karote and CIA chip chop style fighting tactics.
I am REX-A-GON, the greatest archiver in the world, oh did I mention I have over 60GB in all MySQL versions from 6.0 to 1.0.
I also have super powerful erasing software, I erase over 40 overwrites but I am not paranoid, I have supreme encryption not available to the masses.
I have over 500GB in archived data, and more incoming, I am a Archiving God.
and my assistant encryptic Jedi and he taught me the master of cryptology.
The army would have to threaten to kill the world to make surender the password, cause I rather commit suiciude then giveup my password, like the terrorists, and teens say, I Will Die for my beliefs.
February 9th, 2008 at 1:03 am
Also I am not a terrorist though but I stand by what I say, I rather blow myself up/Shoot myself/Take poison pills then give the FBI my password.
They may have attacked the Sacred Library of Alexandria but they won’t bring down my Library of DATA.
Feel the wraith of my DATA Power! Feel the power of REX-A-GON
February 9th, 2008 at 1:19 am
How dare you. I am a great archiver of Power.
someday I will have petabytes of archived data and you will all bow to me
February 9th, 2008 at 2:59 am
“sometimes unknowingly downloads files with child pornography,” but deleted them, the affidavit said.
See what if you weren’t trying to download child pornography, but it gets downloaded to your computer.
They can’t just arrest people. He deleted it because he thought that stuff was illegal and filthy.
I would delete that filth too if I download regular legit porn and it got mixed in there.
They need more evidence, and encrypting your computer is not criminal, he might just be paranoid cause there are a few hackers like the RIAA that wants to export child porn onto peoples computers, I actually know someone this happened to, he never was a molester, I knew him, and all the sudden he told me they accused him of child porn, and he said he gets some junk in his cache and he can’t control what goes in there.
Hackers Must Die! they can’t put junk in innocent peoples computers to get people arrested
February 9th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
i think you mean black hat hackers (sometimes called crackers), most hackers out there are really nice, intelligent people, working with hardware and software, a hacker is a really misused word nowadays considering how much the term has evolved since the early days of computing.
February 10th, 2008 at 6:43 am
By some definitions, Thomas Edison was one of the greatest hackers that ever lived….
February 11th, 2008 at 6:10 am
Rex-A-Gon forgot to mention that he’s very, very modest…
I’m interested to see where this goes, it carries big connotations.