In its latest attack on the free speech, the Obama Administration has secured a gag order to prevent activist-journalist Barrett Brown and his lawyers from discussing his work exposing online surveillance by the Administration. On this occasion, however, Eric Holder and the Obama Administration convinced a federal judge to go along. U.S. District Judge Sam Lindsay in Dallas Texas has issued a sweeping gag order to prevent not just Brown but his legal team from discussing the online surveillance. The Justice Department insisted on the order to protect Brown. That’s right, they insist that, if Brown discussed the abusive surveillance by the Obama Administration, it would endanger his right to a fair trial.
Federal judges have increasing issued gag orders in cases as a standard measure when it was once used only in rare cases. I have long been a critic of the orders which deny basic free speech rights and deny defendants and their counsel to answer damaging allegations in the public.
This order however is particularly problematic. Brown, 32, is facing 105 years in prison after his arrest last year. He writes on government online spying and has been a vocal critic of the Administration and its attack on privacy. The Obama Administration threw the book at him in a case that reminds many of Aaron Swartz case. Perhaps due to the blowback on the suicide of the Swartz case and criticism of his unrelenting prosecution, the Justice Department has tried to cut off Brown and his team from the media.
The court order prohibits Brown and his defense team, as well as prosecutors, from making “any statement to members of any television, radio, newspaper, magazine, internet (including, but not limited to, bloggers), or other media organization about this case, other than matters of public interest.” The reason is purportedly to protect Brown’s right to an unbiased jury. However, the order prevents him from writing about his own case. I believe such a limitation would have been viewed as inherently abusive by the Framers and tyrannical by writers like Thomas Paine.
Brown had been looking at hacked emails by Anonymous from the computer system of a private security firm, HB Gary. He wrote about an effort to destroy the reputations of WikiLeaks supporters and prominent liberal journalists and activists. In looking at other emails hacked from the private intelligence company Stratfor, Brown posted a link in a chat room that connected users to Stratfor documents. The documents included email addresses and credit card numbers belonging to Stratfor subscribers. He was charged with disseminating stolen information that simply linked to the site — a crime that could transform the Internet and radically reduce sites that challenge the government. If the Obama Administration is successful, it could prosecute anyone linked to sites containing Snowden documents or other exposed surveillance.
The Administration is complaining that Brown is working with the media to “manipulate the public through press and social media comments”. In other words, it has not been successful in suppressing discussion of a case where it could criminalize the simple act of linking to anti-government sites.
The case is extremely important to free speech and the Administration is seeking to establish a new crime that would curtail the use of the Internet to challenge it and future Presidents. It is worth following and talking about . . . except of course for Brown himself who is expected to remain silent as the Administration tries to put him away for 100 years.
Source: Guardian
Elaine,
If I recall anything about bull run…. Manassas etc….. It was the bloodiest as well as probably the only battle PGT Beauregard won for the confederacy…. I think it’s sad that the NSA is discrediting the civil war this way….IMHO…..
Revealed: The NSA’s Secret Campaign to Crack, Undermine Internet Security
by Nicole Perlroth, The New York Times, Jeff Larson, ProPublica, and Scott Shane, The New York Times
Sep. 5, 2013
http://www.propublica.org/article/the-nsas-secret-campaign-to-crack-undermine-internet-encryption
Excerpt:
What’s New Here
•The NSA has secretly and successfully worked to break many types of encryption, the widely used technology that is supposed to make it impossible to read intercepted communications.
•Referring to the NSA’s efforts, a 2010 British document stated: “Vast amounts of encrypted Internet data are now exploitable.” Another British memo said: “Those not already briefed were gobsmacked!”
•The NSA has worked with American and foreign tech companies to introduce weaknesses into commercial encryption products, allowing backdoor access to data that users believe is secure.
•The NSA has deliberately weakened the international encryption standards adopted by developers around the globe.
The National Security Agency is winning its long-running secret war on encryption, using supercomputers, technical trickery, court orders and behind-the-scenes persuasion to undermine the major tools protecting the privacy of everyday communications in the Internet age, according to newly disclosed documents.
The agency has circumvented or cracked much of the encryption, or digital scrambling, that guards global commerce and banking systems, protects sensitive data like trade secrets and medical records, and automatically secures the e-mails, Web searches, Internet chats and phone calls of Americans and others around the world, the documents show.
Many users assume — or have been assured by Internet companies — that their data is safe from prying eyes, including those of the government, and the N.S.A. wants to keep it that way. The agency treats its recent successes in deciphering protected information as among its most closely guarded secrets, restricted to those cleared for a highly classified program code-named Bullrun, according to the documents, provided by Edward J. Snowden, the former N.S.A. contractor.
US and UK spy agencies defeat privacy and security on the internet
• NSA and GCHQ unlock encryption used to protect emails, banking and medical records
• $250m-a-year US program works covertly with tech companies to insert weaknesses into products
• Security experts say programs ‘undermine the fabric of the internet’
latest story is in the Guardian
the gulag continues to descend.
Elaine M.
Part 1
http://youtu.be/bvl0pWKaZ14
Part 2
http://youtu.be/rx7OeCO88ps
There are a few things that are seriously, seriously wrong with Obama. He has sold himself on the idea that he’s not just an imperial president, he is King! And Democrats like Nancy Pelosi are following behind him as though he is the Pied Piper. What has happened to their abilities to think for themselves? What ever happened to wisdom?
I shudder to think what our country will be like by the time his term his term has ended. He has used his second term not to be commander in chief but to be the supreme commander of the United States.
This & other such news is making me distraught; and as I have told you before, someone with my kind of disorder cannot afford that.
On The bright side, Professor, a Ginger tiger tabby found me and adopted me. I found out from animal control that all I have to do is bring him to a shelter, and they will hold him for 3 days. If it isn’t chipped &/or no one claims him, he’s mine. He told me his name is Oscar 😉 Why after Oscar de la Renta of course. They will neuter him, give him his shots & chip him. And I will still get a gift certificate to a vet to fully check him out & still only have to pay $35. Some of my cat Twitter friends say it’s fate. I am attaching a picture of him. I think you’ll agree that he’s quite handsome. There you go. Talking about Oscar took my mind off this nasty business. And even though I intensely dislike what is happening, at least there are people like you who keep us informed. But I’m sure Big Brother Obama has his eyes closely on you as well. Too bad he no longer has the ability to ascertain a highly ethical human being. However, you are so well established & followed, it would be rather foolish to attempt to touch a hair on your valuable head. I think he realizes that for now. Let’s hope he continues to.
Love, Maggie
P.S. sometimes my bipolar disorder gives me an insight into things that other “normal” people lack. Oh, & I accidentally attached a bad picture. I haven’t learned how to unattach it yet without losing everything.
The soft side of this story begins here:
http://jonathanturley.org/2013/09/05/michigan-state-university-professor-under-fire-after-student-posted-video-of-anti-republican-rave/#comment-647256
“The Administration is complaining that Brown is working with the media to “manipulate the public through press and social media comments”.”
In other words, the administration is complaining that speech can be influential, and therefore should not be free. Stunning. This attitude is what the Constitution was supposed to protect against.
These gag orders can’t be constitutional. Will there be a Supreme Court challenge?
When we were the exemplary nations back in 1946 we would have prosecuted this Judge and Holder at the Nuremberg trials for these very actions. Google: The Judge’s Trials. Read all about it.
Seems to me that the information suggesting that this prosecution is retaliation for investigating government activity should be enough to establish that every aspect of the case and its underlying facts are “matters of public interest” without any further analysis or enquiry.
I hope that the guy can escape to a free country like Russia and spill the beans on this surveillance thing. That judge needs to say Heil Hitler when he takes the bench each day.
Blouise,
“Hmmm…” (-:
Yep. Shades of Cass Sunstein, now part of the NSA “review board”, or whatever it’s called.
http://youtu.be/P66CbRrsZQY Barrett Brown discussing his work on Let Them Talk in NYC
From the Free Barrett brown website:
http://freebarrettbrown.org/issues/
1. The right to link. The second indictment represents an attempt to criminalize linking. If we allow this to proceed, what does this mean for the rights of internet users worldwide, let alone journalists who link to primary source material? Linking is a basic function of hypertext that gets used every day. It can’t be criminalized. What kind of logic makes a linker responsible for the content and consequences of sharing, leading to false charges of identity theft and fraud?
2. Reporter’s privilege and free speech. The laptops that Barrett is charged with obstruction for concealing contained journalistic sources and work product, including a book-in-progress. The First Amendment is understood as protecting reporters from revealing confidential information or sources, but we are seeing our constitutional values eroded by DOJ investigations into national security leaks. The FBI raid which led to these charges was based on false information, and there was no crime to investigate. It was nothing more than an attempt to stifle Barrett’s reporting on the private/public partnership in surveillance concerns and inhibit his research.
3. Press and information freedom. We believe that Barrett is being persecuted because of his work exposing the activities of private security and intelligence companies that do the government’s dirty work and spy on the public. If citizens are not allowed to research the growing surveillance state, what will happen in the future to privacy, transparency and our civil liberties? His case is having chilling effects on those who would seek to shed light on corruption and abuse among government contractors.
4. Selective prosecution. We think that this case is a prime example of prosecutorial overreach. Despite Aaron Swartz’s suicide, the government is still waging an unjust war on whistleblowers, journalists, and information activists. People are being prosecuted for political acts or merely because the government doesn’t agree with them. Why is Barrett being charged when numerous other people, including established reporters, shared the same link? Moreover, why is the FBI so afraid of the speech of a 5’9″ 150lb writer as to warrant heavily armed raids on his apartment?
There was an interesting article in Rolling Stone on Brown a couple of months ago. I totally agree with the kid’s distain for the creeping fascism that’s going on in this country, but he doesn’t appear to have been the greatest point-man for any movement (save scoring shrooms/LSD at a Phish concert).
Scary case. Who would have suspected that the US Chamber of Commerce would use dirty tricks to try to get its way??
The DOJ is controlled by large banks and corporations and this case is just another piece of evidence.
I believe such a limitation would have been viewed as inherently abusive by the Framers and tyrannical by writers like Thomas Paine. -Jonathan Turley
“Inherently abusive” and “tyrannical” describes the U.S. well.
And there are the guys who want a blank check for war in Syria!