No Right to Privacy When Your Computer Is Repaired 853
Billosaur writes "ZDNet's Police Blotter bring us the interesting story of a Pennsylvania man who brought his computer into Circuit City to have a DVD burner installed on his computer and wound up being arrested for having child pornography on his hard drive. Circuit City employees discovered the child pornography while perusing Kenneth Sodomsky's hard drive for files to test the burner, then proceeded to call the police, who arrested Sodomsky and confiscated the computer. Sodomsky's lawyer argued in court that the Circuit City techs had no right to go rifling through the hard drive, and the trial court agreed, but prosecutors appealed and the appeals court overturned the lower court's decision, based on the fact that Sodomsky had consented to the installation of the DVD drive."
This happened to me... (Score:4, Interesting)
how far reaching is privacy? (Score:5, Interesting)
Its like crying privacy rights if I ask a plumber to come fix my kitchen sink, I take off to run errands, and when I get back I am arrested for having murdered victims in my bedroom. Did the plumber violate my privacy and thus charges be thrown out?
Someone with legal knowledge please clear this up.
Legal computer repair? (Score:5, Interesting)
So, could you offer a bonded "secure" computer repair service through attorneys?
Re:Legal computer repair? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Ultimately.... (Score:2, Interesting)
I was going to use my last mod point to mark this insightful but I wanted to post in the discussion.
If you're stupid enough to load up your computer with child porn and take it in to the local kids at circuit city then you deserve to get caught - sure they'll punish him for kiddy porn but we can think of it as someone being punished for his own stupidity.
That said, we had a guy come into the computer store where I was working a summer job once. He looked like the stereotypical pedophile. He ordered a computer that was very bizarre - lots and lots of disks. That computer came back for the installation of a CD burner or some such and of course we happened to turn it on to do a test burn. He'd set it up to auto-load paintshop in thumbnail mode and we got an eyeful of all the guys "teen" porn. Not sure if it was legal or not but we just handed it to the boss and said "deal with it". I don't know what actually came of that.
He'll probably end up winning the privacy argument because consenting to installing a DVD drive is not consenting to having some local kid go through your personal files. He'll probably end up trying the tact of "but i had other things on there that are personal like banking records" or "i didn't put it there, the kids at the shop must have done it, really they must have, prove they didn't".
I guess it's his own fault really for not getting some smart mate to come round and do it instead and watching like a hawk to make sure he wasn't discovered.
Encryption is a double edged sword. In this case nobody would have noticed except for a few large files that they ended up burning to DVD and taking away. They wouldn't have been able to do anything with them and probably would have tossed the DVD in the bin unknowingly.
Encryption draws attention to you, particularly if you get into the habit of passing around large encrypted files. They can't do anything on that basis alone because there are legitimate uses for passing around encrypted files (perhaps I'm emailing my tax summary documents to my accountant) but they will certainly flag you as interesting if they ever see encrypted content.
There are laws in several countries now (UK, notably) that allow them to lock you up if you refuse to supply the key so that they can decrypt content they found. You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't in some places, really.
Re:Legal computer repair? (Score:2, Interesting)
find -name "*.jpg" (Score:2, Interesting)
Sure they did !
I'm willing to bet that the first "diagnostic" these guys do when a PC comes in is search all drives for image files. They must have quite the collection by now.
This raises the question: what was to stop them from copying the incriminating files, and then "discovering" them on the hard drive of the next customer who dicks them around ? Could that have even been what happened in this case ?
Re:Idiot... (Score:2, Interesting)
They rifled through the drives of every customer they had, in search of porn and juicy personal stuff. This time they happened to stumble across something illegal. Evidence such as this should be inadmissible because it encourages professionals to engage in privacy breach of all kinds in the hope of 'accidentally stumble across' illegal material.
Do you want your plumber rifling through your closet in search of drugs?
Re:Yeah right... (Score:2, Interesting)
"The court also noted that the technicians weren't randomly perusing the drive for contraband, but instead were testing its functioning in a "commercially accepted manner."
playing back a video (see article for context) going to help testing an installed drive? The only (far fetched) theory I could come up with, would be testing DVD playback software they installed with the burner; but c'mon, IF the staff were seriously going to test the drive, they would have burned c:\boot.ini or c:\windows or $any-other-folder-within-2-clicks-reach and then test the playback software with the latest porn flic on DVD laying around in their lab. I highly doubt someone would go through the trouble of searching for specific file types (videos/jpegs) if it weren't for harvesting data. I'm under the impression those 'technicians' simply haven't learned from the Geek Squad incident. Nonetheless in the end they did the right thing and hopefully that guy gets what he deserves.
Re:how far reaching is privacy? (Score:1, Interesting)
Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Article 12.
"No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks."
Re:This is a funny excerpt (Score:2, Interesting)
It is not the result I'm quibbling with, but the rationale. The court is arguing (as are you) that because the defendant did nothing to protect his privacy he had no expectation of privacy. My argument is that it is precisely where I do not protect my privacy that I expect it the most, because I simply don't expect others to look there. E.g, just because I don't lock my door doesn't mean that I have no expectation that the public at large is going to stay out. The court's statement that by renaming the files he would have protected his privacy is ridiculous from this point of view. The court is saying that by showing that he did expect the service technicians to look at his media files he would have established an expectation of privacy in those files.
Suppose that I hire a repairman to come to my home and fix a part in my bathroom. They wander around a bit, go into the garage (which, stupidly, I forgot to lock) and find my stash of child porn. Did I have no expectation of privacy in my garage? What if it were a guest cottage in my backyard? I think the court gave short shrift the scope of consent given to the repair shop. Now maybe a reasonable person would or should know that media files that happen to be on one's hard drive will be inspected prior to the installation of a dvd burner. But I didn't know that, and I imagine it would be surprising in the same sense to most people as if a plumber went into their garage.
Re:Idiot... (Score:3, Interesting)
Is it just me or are people missing the issue? (Score:2, Interesting)
The list goes on. I'm tired of reading Red Herrings people! Let us discuss weather the tech was actually right and the evidence should stand instead of all these other things. I think the perp is a bad guy too, but that doesn't allow me to step all over his privacy rights.
Re:Ultimately.... (Score:4, Interesting)
I personally have such a file on my computer and there is nothing illegal on it. I certainly encourage other people to do the same, so that encryption is *not* even the slightest proof you're hiding something.
Re:Ultimately.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:"poking around for files to test the burner?" (Score:4, Interesting)
This story becomes interesting because child porn is involved. What if the files were his last 5 years' income tax returns? Do you think the member of the Geek Squad should maybe send them to the IRS if he doesn't think a 47" HDTV should be deductible?
Please. The last thing we need is self-appointed vigilantes turning in their clients, no less. I hope these guys quietly lost their jobs for "accidentally" coming across this pervert's kiddie porn. Because you know this wasn't the first time they went looking for something interesting on a customer's computer. I'd like to see what's on their personal computers.
Re:Apple care (Score:5, Interesting)
"There's at least an argument that such a law would be unconstitutional as it would make computer repair technicians into agents of the state. It's one thing if they act voluntarily to report suspicious files (like here), it's another if there's a criminal penalty for failing to do so. I'm curious and will read up on it. Thanks for the tip."
It's been the case for a while that hosting providers must, by law, report child pornography when they find it. Been there, done that, got the ncmec.org login. I don't understand why extending this to repair technicians would bring up any new constitutional issues that don't already exist. Might be one of those legal elephants in the room that nobody -- not even the ACLU -- wants to touch, as it's political suicide... would you want to be the one to go to court to defend hosting providers' rights to protect kiddy porn collectors?
Re:"poking around for files to test the burner?" (Score:3, Interesting)
Please. The last thing we need are specious slippery slope arguments and people complaining without knowing exactly what went down.
No matter how they found the porn they did and by federal law they have to report it. They don't have to report people fibbing on their taxes or if they're cheating on their wives, so even if they discovered such things on the computer they would just leave them be.
Advice from the police (Score:2, Interesting)
I as running a defrag in XP and some of file names rolling by, at the bottom of the management console, caught my eye. I stopped the defrag and noticed items in an unemptied recycle bin, so I opened it. There were plenty more files with very suggestive names. Not wanting to ruin my dreams, I didn't open anything. I shut off the box and told my manager, who called the cops. Here's what I found out from the officer that arrived.
1) If you have suspicion, report it.
2) Do not open/copy/delete/empty anything.
3) Shut down the box and wait for the law to arrive.
Once the officer arrived he took my statement and called in for a warrant to search the PC. Within 20 min.s he got a call back confirming a warrant had been issued to search the pc. The officer attached a write blocker to the drive and checked out some of the files in question. Suspicions were confirmed and the officer took the pc in custody as evidence, and had other officers sent to pick up the suspect.
All of this transpired in a matter of hours.
So if you have suspicions, just report it to your boss, and leave the box alone.
Re:Apple care (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course if the pedophile isn't caught then they wouldn't be able to prosecute accomplices.
I tend to have issues on both sides of this story. (Score:2, Interesting)
Sadly due to police screw-ups with the evidence and warrants, there was no admissible evidence. The student was released.
On the other hand I know of a man who was arrested because a drive sent for repair was found to have an image of a child.The man arrested.
Sure... you can say, download no adult images. Sure, you can say that a person is responsible for every file on their drive. But where does the penalty and the judgement show any sense of fairness or balance.
Also, while trying to avoid the conspiracy angle. We have to admit that it's pretty damned easy to get a file on a person's drive. Windows, Mac, or *nix. Add to this some of the horrifying things I've seen done in child custody cases to make one party or the other look bad... passing judgement based solely on images found on a hard drive becomes fairly weak.
In the cases above, the student trafficking had several CD masters of child pornography, but the CDs were inadmissible as they were obtained from his house with warrant, but the constraints of the warrant were badly defined and executed. In the case of the other man, it turned out that the image was found as a result of inflating an archive of what was supposed to be 250 adult images.
The legal system seems to be very direct on this. You bring one image into the court as evidence and there is no question of origin, intent, or guilt.
Personally, as a father, I have very strong opinions against Child Pornography. I also have very strong opinions about punishing the right person for the right crime.
(Figures this will either get rated -1 or flamebait. Just my $0.02.)
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Apple care (Score:5, Interesting)
Legal requirement? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Apple care (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd argue that the child porn that the burglar saw probably shouldn't be admitted as evidence. It's entirely possible that it was planted by the burglar on their way out. However, the evidence could be used to get a wiretap warrant and when the accused obtains (or tries to obtain) more child porn, the police can nab him. As a bonus, they can then get the child porn supplier as well.
It's not so much right to privacy as it is... (Score:4, Interesting)
Typically, trial and appeals courts don't examine whether or not you had a *right* to privacy. They usually examine whether "under identical circumstances, would a reasonable person expect privacy?"
In other words, if you're doing something in your un-fenced back yard, you have no "reasonable" expectation of privacy, even though you are on private property. On the other hand, if you are in your home, you do have a reasonable expectation of privacy.