FBI Issues Search Warrant To 8chan For IP Address of Shooter, Commenters (thedailybeast.com) 151
An anonymous reader quotes the Daily Beast:
The online forum where alleged Chabad of Poway shooter John Earnest shared a livestream of the shooting was served a search warrant in April for the IP and metadata information on Earnest's posts, as well as those who commented on them.
The warrant served to 8chan said the people who responded to Earnest's comments could be "potential witnesses, co-conspirators and/or individuals who are inspired" by his posting about the shooting. Similarly, according to the FBI agent who penned the warrant, there was evidence that Earnest himself was "inspired and/or educated" by other individuals posting on the forum.
The warrant served to 8chan said the people who responded to Earnest's comments could be "potential witnesses, co-conspirators and/or individuals who are inspired" by his posting about the shooting. Similarly, according to the FBI agent who penned the warrant, there was evidence that Earnest himself was "inspired and/or educated" by other individuals posting on the forum.
Fishing trip ... (Score:2)
... anyone?
Re:Fishing trip ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe, maybe not. But, I'm very confident that you didn't read the comments on 8chan and make an informed decision, but instead just accepted the propaganda that tells you that all warrants are bullshit.
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I have no interest regarding 8chan. I know it by reputation and it's a piece of shit. Why would I participate? I don't have Facebook, either, but I know how dangerous it is. 8chan, by definition is a social media. I'm not about to sign up.
I think TFS is an indication that I shouldn't, don't you?
I do know about warrants that are crafted to throw a wide net in hopes of finding something other than what's included in the narrative.
How in simple fuck do you even imagine that the FBI can prove radicalization?
The
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I have no interest regarding 8chan. I know it by reputation and it's a piece of shit. Why would I participate? I don't have Facebook, either, but I know how dangerous it is. 8chan, by definition is a social media. I'm not about to sign up.
8chan is only a piece of shit because it allows the maximum extent of objectionable speech under law. That does draw without a doubt some serious crazies, just like any chan does(4chan, 2ch, krautchan, etc). By definition, chans are as far away from social media as you can get. Where it isn't pseudonymous(see name trips, or identifier flags based on IP address), it's fully anonymous. The warrant however is the exact same requested for correlating information as the warrant given to facebook(which isn't
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Errrr... It's not bullshit, just a simple observation. Open a forum that allows the most horrific speech possible and it will attract people who enjoy saying the most horrific things. The truth of that statement is independent upon whether or not the one who says it believes in censorship.
It is funny to me that whenever the alt-right types from 8chan and the like react to people who speak out loudly against them with threats and harassment. All just methods to censor others' speech they can't face or don't
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Alternatively if you and all your friends engage in a 24/7 smear campaign against a bar as THE place in town for white supremacists to meet they might start showing up there because they believed you.
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It is funny to me that whenever the alt-right types from 8chan and the like react to people who speak out loudly against them with threats and harassment. All just methods to censor others' speech they can't face or don't like. They only pretend to believe in free speech when it supports them and would be more than happy to censor opposing views with laws if they could.
What I find funny is that in general the alt-right types, and people who post on 8chan simply want to be left the fuck alone to do their own thing. Nobody really gave a shit until progressives started posting child porn on the site to try and get hosting pulled, or lied to their nameserver host that they were a "child porn" haven. Once that happened, those progressives and sjw-types effectively declared war, and it's been open season for the last 4 years. An old case of "one side creating the enemies tha
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So the person's reply that someone is a piece of shit for believing that 8chan is a piece of shit because they allow the maximum extent of objectionable speech is wrong, that's what. I don't believe 8chan should be shut down, and never argued for it either. You just assumed I did.
Nope. See above.
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Wait, so you refuse to see if there's any probably cause, but claim that "There's NO probably cause associated with this warrant."
You are a basic bitch. You believe propaganda so deeply that you refuse to check.
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Really you shouldn't be there at all, but you know what the fuck you are doing if you are. Do not be surprised if the FBI comes knocking on your door one day.
^This. It should be high on the "what can I do to attract the attention of law enforcement agencies today" list.
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I don't think "browsing" is the issue here.
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Warrants to demand recordings of conversations with criminals are ABSOLUTELY valid when named persons are involved.
IP addresses are names within that definition
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This would serve as a trig to all similar boards to not log the actual IP address of a visitor, maybe use a hash for it. Might of course be possible to brute force for an IPv4 address, but for IPv6 addresses it would require a different strategy. If the hash for an IPv4 is sloppy then it may even list multiple possible addresses rendering a brute force a bit of a challenge.
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The law enforcement agencies are following the law. The warrant request was not channeled to some secret court. The law enforcement agencies are seeking a warrant for information on a specific person. You cannot take away the legitimate investigative tools of the law and intelligence services and just allow criminals of all types hide their online activities. You cannot take away legitimate investigative tools because the government MIGHT abuse them. The government MIGHT do a lot of things regardless of any
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Specific person? So everyone replying to a comment is a specific person? If you shoot someone, am I aspecific person now?
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If, earlier in the day, you were cheering him on to do so, well, yes.
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Fishing trip? Perhaps it is. And they might catch some big ones. [uslegal.com]
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Wasn't in the warrant though.
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Wasn't in the warrant though.
Does that matter? Asking honestly, not a snark.
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Probably not, but they already knew the content of all the messages at the time. If those were on their face criminal I assume they would have just included it to make a stronger case for the warrant.
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Wasn't in the warrant though.
Does that matter? Asking honestly, not a snark.
It would if it was true, but the warrant is to search a place for things. It doesn't matter if the things, once found, support different charges than they were investigating. The warrant requires probable cause, and it has to state the location to be searched, and describe what will be seized. In this case, they're searching on servers for electronic records. Regardless of what crimes they uncover, the evidence they seize will be these electronic records as described in the warrant. It may turn out that the
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I assume it's just FUD and righteous indignation. Unless he can show the guy was reading messages while shooting up the synagogue of course he can't press any co-conspirator charges ... and for everything else he doesn't need their names.
I assume he just wants the Feds to go knocking on doors and scare some kids because he thinks they are reprehensible and he thinks that bending the law a bit to do so is worthy cause.
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: If your investigation has gone so far south that your only recourse is to serve internet trolls with a subpoena, you haven't done your due diligence as an investigator.
If you're investigating a suspected crime that occurred online then serving the site on which the crime occurred _is_ due diligence.
for any physical crime you have physical evidence to trace
If you supplement the physical evidence with digital evidence, you not only improve the chances of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt but can also extend the investigation to include other potential criminals that also need to be prosecuted.
The most that an imageboard could give you, assuming they did so in good faith, would be an image. Or a post link.
Bullshit. It'll also give you metadata, it'll demonstrate social networks, it'll assist in assessing alibis, it'll help with identifyi
Civics 101 (Score:1)
Can someone please explain to me how the FBI, *instead of a court*, can issue a search warrant?
Aren't those supposed to, you know, be issued by uh...JUDGES?
There's something fishy going on.
Re: Civics 101 (Score:2, Informative)
It has to do with poor editing. The original article's title states "8chan served", as in, the FBI got a warrant from a judge and served 8chan.
So trying to make this sound shady. The system is working exactly as expected. The FBI has reason to believe assailant had coconspirators and are actively searching for those people.
Re: Civics 101 (Score:4, Interesting)
They post stuff encouraging shooters to try to kill more people ("get a high score") and then in the aftermath discuss at length how they could have improved their "run". If any of them made suggestions that he used and someone was killed because of that, it makes them party to that murder. It's not like they can claim they didn't reasonably expect him to do it, since this is just the latest in a long strong of shootings by people who hung out on 8chan.
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Except in the US none of that is illegal. It doesn't make them a party of murder either, but keeping in mind with your post...they also all posted on facebook and twitter. Does that mean facebook and twitter are also culpable? No, at least not yet. 8chan is as close as you can get to "we're not a publisher, we don't curate." Vs social media platform that do indeed curate, and silence speech they don't like, or silence people that cry really loudly when their feelings get hurt.
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Not 8chan, the people who posted on 8chan.
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Not 8chan, the people who posted on 8chan.
Still protected speech in the US. The line of socially, ethical and morally objectionable speech that is perfectly fine is pretty long.
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I'm not an expert on US law, but you seem to be saying that if two people plan to commit a murder then only the one who actually goes out and kills someone is guilty of a crime. That doesn't seem right.
Re: Civics 101 (Score:2)
That constitutes conspiracy. Not public speech on a bulletin board.
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If two post a message on a board that they "want" to kill someone it's a threat. Most threats don't cross the line into being an actual threat. If they post on the message board to do it together, it becomes a conspiracy(but no prep, no crime). Now, if these people go out and buy the items and stating that this is what they're going to do then it's no longer free speech, and the conspiracy section is applied as well. This makes it an actionable threat that has to be investigated.
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What if one of them says "you should use this type of gun, and lock the doors do they can't get out, and this place is particularly vulnerable, and if you do all that you can kill more people than the last guy and become a legend"?
Seems like some fairly specific instructions on how to commit a specific crime. The back and forth seems to constitute planning something together with the expectation that one of them will carry it out.
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The standard for conspiracy is that you did something to further the conspiracy, not some sort of "prep" that you don't define.
If you talk about it and know about it and give the person a pep talk when they feel discouraged, you probably did something material to further the conspiracy.
"On a computer" is not a defense, nor is "but I only used words to do it." Free speech is not a viable defense to conspiracy charges. Free speech covers advocating for something in the abstract, it does not protect cases wher
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Becoming an object OR subject of an investigation because you are stupid and like to talk about murdering people DOES NOT VIOLATE FREE SPEECH.
Hell... If we've learned anything from the Mueller report it's that no one is above being investigated.
And while DOJ's "opinion" (not actual law nor precedent - and factually nothing but one guy's opinion on account of rampant corruption within Nixon administration) is that a sitting President can't be indicted...
Once there's something to be found on Joe Schmoe - Joe
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Context can tell you pretty clearly if something was an abstract hypothetical or not.
It seems like, if you search the server for the complete set of messages exchanged, you might discover the context.
Golly!
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If any assistance was knowingly provided to the killer, even verbal advice, under the laws of most US states the poster could be equally culpable for the murder.
It's like the getaway driver being charged for the murder in the bank robbery. Once a felony occurs everyone involved or providing assistance is a party to any crime committed. There's no free speech exception for knowingly assisting a murder.
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It's like the getaway driver being charged for the murder in the bank robbery. Once a felony occurs everyone involved or providing assistance is a party to any crime committed. There's no free speech exception for knowingly assisting a murder.
The getaway driver being charged for the murder in the bank robbery is because they've engaged in a conspiracy knowingly that was a possibility. That's heavily, very heavily covered in case law and is one of the first examples taught to people who study criminal law in the US and Canada prior to moving either into LEO or legal(lawyer) fields.
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So then every liberal encouraging illegals to evade ICE are in fact co-conspirators to an invasion.
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So then every liberal encouraging illegals to evade ICE are in fact co-conspirators to an invasion.
Has to go further to "providing material support" for example. See the case of the women who's now facing 20+ years in prison over in Europe for transporting illegals via ship. Not only did she facilitate the transportation, but worked with smugglers to transport the people *and* take a cut.
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So are we going to charge your favorite congresswoman as an accessory too since he was quoting her and committing the shooting out of his hatred for Trump's pro-jew stance?
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Sorry, which congesswoman are we talking about? I quite like the things AOC says but she wasn't in congress at the time in question.
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That's Omar. The one currently being investigated for illegal finance contributions, marriage fraud, and immigration fraud.
Re: Civics 101 (Score:1)
TFS clearly states the FBI believe someone gave materiel assistance to the assailant. They are also looking for potential witnesses, since this was livesteamed.
This information is all right there, in front of you. You must have had a rough time with reading comprehension in school.
Additionally, there is no such thing as anonymous in real life. Why do people think just because it happens "on a computer" it somehow absolves them off consequences.
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Witnesses to a video they already have? Or doesn't Facebook record the livestreams?
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Ah okay, never read the thread but that does make sense then.
Re: Civics 101 (Score:1)
I can explain how you did not bother reading the article.
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They can't. Nothing fishy.
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In the article, if you click on the 'Served a search warrant in April", it'll take you to the actual warrant.
Basically, the FBI wrote the petition for the warrant, and the judge looked it over and signed it. You can see it's signed by a female judge in San Diego (won't say name for privacy reasons, but it appears in the warrant).
Re:Civics 101 (Score:5, Informative)
They didn't. The warrant was issued by the Honorable Jill L. Burkhardt, of the US District Court. The FBI only submits the application for the search warrant. They had to prove probable cause and show evidence.
The FBI is the one to serve the search warrant however.
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Not potential or possible, probable.
"...potential witnesses, co-conspirators and/or individuals who are inspired"
Fishing trip, and no grounds for a warrant.
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If you read the warrant, pages 3 through 8 list 25 separate items of probably cause, in great detail. This is not a "fishing expedition". Here is the actual signed search warrant, you can look for
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Oh, and the 8chan stuff starts at 26, on page 9.
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Nothing there.
Cool opinion man, the courts disagreed.
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Nothing there.
Cool opinion man, the courts disagreed.
Warrants are contested at trial where the remedy is exclusion. There is no reason for a judge not to sign it whether the requirements of "probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things being seized" are met or not when the FBI wants to go fishing. Nobody can be held responsible for a bad warrant.
This goes double when parallel construction is an accepted practice so exclusion of evidence does not apply.
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If you were even accustomed to reading about legal cases you'd know that to complain about the word probable you have to define it. And what is the relevant precedent for probable cause?
All you do is wave your hands, but you never say anything. Conclusions have no weight, the reasons you provide are what get weighed.
Probable attaches to cause. It is the cause that has to be probable. The crime clearly happened. There is clearly evidence on the server. How can you even dispute that part? It is evidence relat
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8chan lawyers are the best. Did you really come all the way here and go through the trouble of making a Slashdot account just to reply with this 8chan bullshit?
I guess I should be flattered.
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So what's your learned response over social media companies(reddit, facebook, twitter, etc) banning people that are posting whistleblower information that was leaked to project veritas and breitbart, regarding internal ban and block lists along with targeting people for wrong-speech. Even when those people haven't broken the sites own rules.
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What's your learned response about cake shops who don't want to bake wedding cakes for same-sex couples?
Just switch out "cake shop" with "social media companies", and my
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Re:FBI doesn't issue warrants! (Score:3)
I feel sorry for the FBI agents... (Score:2, Insightful)
I feel sorry for the FBI agents who have to sift through 8chan posts....
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Someone made them an offer they couldn't refuse.
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If you don't have logs it is really hard to keep a server running, and secured.
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Websites still have to follow the laws of the jurisdiction their under, which means that some material needs to be kept off the service (the U.S. is one of the most lenient jurisdictions on the planet for free speech, but there *are* harsh copyright and obscenity laws). In addition there are issues that attack the usability of the service itself such as spamming.
It's not enough to just delete posts, because the posts can come faster than you can review and delete them. If you keep a log of which IP created