Facebook Gave Police Teenager's DMs in Abortion Prosecution(forbes.com)
forbes.com
Facebook Gave Police Teenager's DMs in Abortion Prosecution
https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2022/08/08/facebook-abortion-teen-dms/
408 comments
The battle to get large tech companies to respect user privacy has been fought and lost (at least in the US). Systems are explicitly built that provide portals for the government to look into people's "private" data, often without any active oversight by employees of the company itself.
I'd be the first to line up to support some kind of action to change that, but at this point every large company is so closely intertwined with the State that it's a lost cause. Building out new systems that respect privacy and users is the action item here, not raging at Facebook for Facebooking.
I'd be the first to line up to support some kind of action to change that, but at this point every large company is so closely intertwined with the State that it's a lost cause. Building out new systems that respect privacy and users is the action item here, not raging at Facebook for Facebooking.
It's also to recognize that what the Supreme Court did wasn't strike down Roe v Wade. Specifically, they struck down the idea that people do not have a right to privacy from the Constitution; thus, everything flowing from that decision is no longer supported (abortion, interracial marriage, LGBQ, etc). While some judges may attempt to argue that warrant is needed, SCOTUS has all but formally stated that "secure in your possessions" applies solely to warrants for physical items on your property. SCOTUS will likely overrule lower courts on cases. Thus, anything a company can know will be handed over.
While abortion is the hot topic, other religious purity tests will be coming, like if you have ever visited LGBQ topics. Get yourself out of the cloud. If you are minority likely to be targeted by American Christian Nationalists, do it sooner than later. Many states still have sodomy laws that haven't been just enforced.
While abortion is the hot topic, other religious purity tests will be coming, like if you have ever visited LGBQ topics. Get yourself out of the cloud. If you are minority likely to be targeted by American Christian Nationalists, do it sooner than later. Many states still have sodomy laws that haven't been just enforced.
> While some judges may attempt to argue that warrant is needed
Not sure I follow. In the case we are discussing here, Police had a warrant. Are there known cases of firms handing over personal communications without a warrant?
Not sure I follow. In the case we are discussing here, Police had a warrant. Are there known cases of firms handing over personal communications without a warrant?
how can the data portals built by these billion dollar advertising corps verify the warrants?
are they reviewed by humans? is it enough to upload a blank PDF? or there is simply a checkbox with the label "i have a warrant, sure, sure"?
because in practice it could be any of these. then if there is something in the data, then law enforcement gets a warrant after the fact. how would we know?
are they reviewed by humans? is it enough to upload a blank PDF? or there is simply a checkbox with the label "i have a warrant, sure, sure"?
because in practice it could be any of these. then if there is something in the data, then law enforcement gets a warrant after the fact. how would we know?
Problem is that laws against surveillance aren't worth the paper they are printed on. Most constitutions prohibit surveillance, but a case of abortion is quickly elevated to a matter of national security.
In my opinion we need to scrap any exemptions to state surveillance attempts. Authorities don't act responsibly here and it is very likely that former and current governments also leverage these mechanisms for political prosecution. To provide security classical investigations remain as a tool. Access to data is convenient, but protecting this data serves a higher purpose and provides security itself. The privacy <-> security dichotomy is bad propaganda and FUD.
In my opinion we need to scrap any exemptions to state surveillance attempts. Authorities don't act responsibly here and it is very likely that former and current governments also leverage these mechanisms for political prosecution. To provide security classical investigations remain as a tool. Access to data is convenient, but protecting this data serves a higher purpose and provides security itself. The privacy <-> security dichotomy is bad propaganda and FUD.
I think putting this story as an argument for abortion and arguing that this is not “universally crime” is hurting “pro-choice” movement since this type of abortion will not be legal even in California.
Let’s focus on real problem: this poor kid needed to wait for 22 weeks. She was probably scared, intimidated, abused, and nobody was there to help. And sure Facebook is guilty here.
Let’s focus on real problem: this poor kid needed to wait for 22 weeks. She was probably scared, intimidated, abused, and nobody was there to help. And sure Facebook is guilty here.
What do you mean "universally considered a crime"? Would that universe just be the state that Facebook is incorporated? It seemed probable that a crime that broke Nebraska state law was committed, and that is what the Nebraska police were looking into.
Facebook is not a Nebraska company, and the user being in a separate state would make this an interstate commerce issue. Facebook would be justified (I'd personally say it's their duty to) in refusing, and letting it bubble up into the courts and let the federal government decide.
That's pretty much how it works - you file a subpoena from a foreign jurisdiction, and then the state court helps forward it, for example see Delaware § 4311
> not universally considered a crime it
That doesn't make a difference for me, and most likely for many other people who are against late-stage abortions too. Not all of us are globalists.
If you consider the concrete facts of this particular case [1] (instead of framing it as an abstract privacy or healthcare issue), I think you'd have some sympathy with people who don't find it acceptable.
[1]: https://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/nor...
That doesn't make a difference for me, and most likely for many other people who are against late-stage abortions too. Not all of us are globalists.
If you consider the concrete facts of this particular case [1] (instead of framing it as an abstract privacy or healthcare issue), I think you'd have some sympathy with people who don't find it acceptable.
[1]: https://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/nor...
If you’re not a globalist then wouldn’t you agree that Nebraska shouldn’t have jurisdiction to subpoena companies that aren’t incorporated in Nebraska? Your argument seems pro globalism
There are soooo many reasons why using state lines cannot protect you from a criminal case.
Firstly, Facebook clearly operates in Nebraska, and is thus subject to its jurisdiction.
Incorporation (in Delaware) is for corporate covernance, not for dodging local laws.
Firstly, Facebook clearly operates in Nebraska, and is thus subject to its jurisdiction.
Incorporation (in Delaware) is for corporate covernance, not for dodging local laws.
No, Nebraska is part of the United States.
But Facebook isn’t incorporated in Nebraska
Yes, but the people in question are from Nebraska.
But their data isn't in Nebraska.
If a person is accused of a crime in Georgia, and the person had a safe deposit box in Maine, the Maine bank doesn't have to immediately give Georgia police their possessions.
If a person is accused of a crime in Georgia, and the person had a safe deposit box in Maine, the Maine bank doesn't have to immediately give Georgia police their possessions.
Facebook has data centers in Nebraska, so it's possible that their data is in Nebraska.
But even if not, because Facebook has a physical presence in Nebraska, it is subject to Nebraska law.
But even if not, because Facebook has a physical presence in Nebraska, it is subject to Nebraska law.
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The real issue I have is that Facebook keeps an unencrypted copy of everyone's DMs stored and just waiting to be handed to the government. I understand it's how they make money, and that they've done it forever, but man, I guess using Signal has spoiled me. It's so weird to me that most people are completely unaware or unworried that their "private" conversations aren't private in the slightest.
Genuine question: At any point, Signal could slip some code into their App Store or Google Play app which lets their servers ask for your DMs in plaintext. For all we know, they have already done so. It seems like the threat model is to assume the client is 100% trustworthy but the servers are potentially untrustworthy; why does this model make sense? Shouldn't we assume that the clients are also untrustworthy unless we have built them from source ourselves or gotten the binaries from a trusted party?
This always confused me with all the E2EE hype.
This always confused me with all the E2EE hype.
> Shouldn't we assume that the clients are also untrustworthy unless we have built them from source ourselves or gotten the binaries from a trusted party?
This is why Signal's client codebases is open source. In principle, a qualified engineer can review it and confirm (to some degree of confidence) that Signal is not lying about its E2EE claims.
The next step is trusting the compiled version of the program. In the abstract, you have no reason to do this, except that you also have no reason to trust any third party (including random third-party-store builds). You don't have any particular reason to trust your own builds either, thanks to RoTT[1]. In practice this makes the official build the most trustworthy, since they're the only party that's actually officially claiming properties about the client in an official capacity (and therefore potentially liable if those claims are false).
The "formal" solution is maybe something like Binary Transparency[2], or verifiable builds. But the end-user ergonomics of those solutions are still being worked out.
[1]: https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rdriley/487/papers/Thompson_1984_Ref...
[2]: https://developers.google.com/android/binary_transparency
This is why Signal's client codebases is open source. In principle, a qualified engineer can review it and confirm (to some degree of confidence) that Signal is not lying about its E2EE claims.
The next step is trusting the compiled version of the program. In the abstract, you have no reason to do this, except that you also have no reason to trust any third party (including random third-party-store builds). You don't have any particular reason to trust your own builds either, thanks to RoTT[1]. In practice this makes the official build the most trustworthy, since they're the only party that's actually officially claiming properties about the client in an official capacity (and therefore potentially liable if those claims are false).
The "formal" solution is maybe something like Binary Transparency[2], or verifiable builds. But the end-user ergonomics of those solutions are still being worked out.
[1]: https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rdriley/487/papers/Thompson_1984_Ref...
[2]: https://developers.google.com/android/binary_transparency
Right. But that means, in my eyes, that Signal's official builds are _exactly as untrustworthy_ as Signal's server is; if I couldn't trust Signal if they said they didn't log non-E2EE messages, I don't see why I can trust Signal when they say they don't have a way to retrieve plaintext messages from their client build. If we're talking about liability if claims are false, I should be fine using any chat platform which claims to not log messages, right?
The RoTT thing isn't that relevant IMO; if we're under an RoTT-style attack, everything is off. But crucially, that's a different threat model; I can trust my compiler independently from Signal. I don't feel like I can trust Signal's client independently from Signal's server; either Signal as a whole is trustworthy, or they're not.
Now I agree that if we had some kind of verifiable or reproducible builds, E2EE would make sense. If anyone could download Signal's source code, build it, and verify that the binary is identical, we would have the "normal" FOSS defenses, where we could assume that some security researcher would do that now and then.
The RoTT thing isn't that relevant IMO; if we're under an RoTT-style attack, everything is off. But crucially, that's a different threat model; I can trust my compiler independently from Signal. I don't feel like I can trust Signal's client independently from Signal's server; either Signal as a whole is trustworthy, or they're not.
Now I agree that if we had some kind of verifiable or reproducible builds, E2EE would make sense. If anyone could download Signal's source code, build it, and verify that the binary is identical, we would have the "normal" FOSS defenses, where we could assume that some security researcher would do that now and then.
> If we're talking about liability if claims are false, I should be fine using any chat platform which claims to not log messages, right?
It's a fine point, but I'd argue that Signal's promises are still "worth more" than a competitor who merely promises to not log without any technical backing: the latter is a purely social promise, while the latter is a social promise rooted in a cryptographic claim that, with the right skills, you could verify.
The RoTT threat model (which I agree is extreme!) is really not that far off: when you download the official Signal app, you're trusting, modulo the integrity of the app store, that Signal has either backdoored everyone or nobody. In other words: they would need to deliver the weakness to all users, increasing the risk of discovery, or to none of them. Binary transparency makes that gamble riskier still, by forcing Signal (or the app store) to publish signatures for each build before clients accept them for installation.
Computers will never perfectly eliminate the latent social trust required when running someone else's code, which we all do even when we run any code at all (even our own). But Signal's current model is about as good as it gets for laypeople: you can verify the source, and the parts you can't verify require significant malicious investment and/or exposure risk. For the more (potentially rightfully?) paranoid among us, building from source and comparing the binaries is about as good as it gets for now.
It's a fine point, but I'd argue that Signal's promises are still "worth more" than a competitor who merely promises to not log without any technical backing: the latter is a purely social promise, while the latter is a social promise rooted in a cryptographic claim that, with the right skills, you could verify.
The RoTT threat model (which I agree is extreme!) is really not that far off: when you download the official Signal app, you're trusting, modulo the integrity of the app store, that Signal has either backdoored everyone or nobody. In other words: they would need to deliver the weakness to all users, increasing the risk of discovery, or to none of them. Binary transparency makes that gamble riskier still, by forcing Signal (or the app store) to publish signatures for each build before clients accept them for installation.
Computers will never perfectly eliminate the latent social trust required when running someone else's code, which we all do even when we run any code at all (even our own). But Signal's current model is about as good as it gets for laypeople: you can verify the source, and the parts you can't verify require significant malicious investment and/or exposure risk. For the more (potentially rightfully?) paranoid among us, building from source and comparing the binaries is about as good as it gets for now.
> the latter is a social promise rooted in a cryptographic claim that, with the right skills, you could verify.
How would one do that? Do you mean if you literally decompiled the binary and read through the machine code and built up a solid understanding of what everything does (and did this after every app update)? Or is there something more practical you're referring to?
> when you download the official Signal app, you're trusting, modulo the integrity of the app store, that Signal has either backdoored everyone or nobody
The way I imagine this attack working, Signal would have code in everyone's app which lets the server ask for DMs, but the server would only ask for DMs when there's a reason to do so (such as when a government requests it). That way, yes, everyone is backdoored, but there's no suspicious network traffic or anything which would give it away. I'd say Signal can be pretty confident that nobody will read through the machine code and make a solid enough mental model of how the entire system works to notice such a backdoor.
How would one do that? Do you mean if you literally decompiled the binary and read through the machine code and built up a solid understanding of what everything does (and did this after every app update)? Or is there something more practical you're referring to?
> when you download the official Signal app, you're trusting, modulo the integrity of the app store, that Signal has either backdoored everyone or nobody
The way I imagine this attack working, Signal would have code in everyone's app which lets the server ask for DMs, but the server would only ask for DMs when there's a reason to do so (such as when a government requests it). That way, yes, everyone is backdoored, but there's no suspicious network traffic or anything which would give it away. I'd say Signal can be pretty confident that nobody will read through the machine code and make a solid enough mental model of how the entire system works to notice such a backdoor.
> Or is there something more practical you're referring to?
I would probably compile the reference source and use BinDiff[1] (or a handful of other tools) to compare it with the official binary. I've used BinDiff successfully for similar purposes in the past; it's also a popular tool for finding N-days after patches go out.
Signal could patch in that kind of backdoor, sure. But it's still globally disclosed in that case: you're revealing your backdoor to every prospective reverse engineer (there's a lot of them!), even if you only selectively enable it. Signal can probably be about as confident that nobody is reading their machine code as Chrome can, which is to say not confident.
And note: you don't need a solid enough mental model of how the system works at the machine level. You only need a differential understanding of what the public code says and what the machine code does, which is much easier.
Is it possible? Sure. But it's much, much higher risk and visibility than every other technique available to nation-state adversaries.
[1]: https://www.zynamics.com/bindiff.html
I would probably compile the reference source and use BinDiff[1] (or a handful of other tools) to compare it with the official binary. I've used BinDiff successfully for similar purposes in the past; it's also a popular tool for finding N-days after patches go out.
Signal could patch in that kind of backdoor, sure. But it's still globally disclosed in that case: you're revealing your backdoor to every prospective reverse engineer (there's a lot of them!), even if you only selectively enable it. Signal can probably be about as confident that nobody is reading their machine code as Chrome can, which is to say not confident.
And note: you don't need a solid enough mental model of how the system works at the machine level. You only need a differential understanding of what the public code says and what the machine code does, which is much easier.
Is it possible? Sure. But it's much, much higher risk and visibility than every other technique available to nation-state adversaries.
[1]: https://www.zynamics.com/bindiff.html
Telegram, widely hated on HN, years ago I think published how to verify their builds.
Yes, on iOS you'll need a jailbroken device to do it but it was doable.
(Writing in past tense since I haven't checked lately.)
Edit:
unlike WhatsApp, Telegram never was caught pants down uploading unencrypted data to Google with a wink wink, nudge nudge agreement.
And they never got caught uploading data to Facebook directly" from the endpoint "for security before sending it end-to-end encrypted between endpoints.
Oh, and they never got caught sending unencrypted data over the https port. (When normally extremely pedantic HN-ers write that Telegram sends data unencrypted, it means it is not end-to-end encrypted, not that it is plain text. Again contrary to what WhatsApp was caught doing.)
Disclaimer: I use Telegram myself, recommend Signal short term and I'm actively looking for a better solution for the future. Current bets: Matrix for group chats and I am also (probably too) excited about nostr for future social networking.
Yes, on iOS you'll need a jailbroken device to do it but it was doable.
(Writing in past tense since I haven't checked lately.)
Edit:
unlike WhatsApp, Telegram never was caught pants down uploading unencrypted data to Google with a wink wink, nudge nudge agreement.
And they never got caught uploading data to Facebook directly" from the endpoint "for security before sending it end-to-end encrypted between endpoints.
Oh, and they never got caught sending unencrypted data over the https port. (When normally extremely pedantic HN-ers write that Telegram sends data unencrypted, it means it is not end-to-end encrypted, not that it is plain text. Again contrary to what WhatsApp was caught doing.)
Disclaimer: I use Telegram myself, recommend Signal short term and I'm actively looking for a better solution for the future. Current bets: Matrix for group chats and I am also (probably too) excited about nostr for future social networking.
Honestly, encrypted communications for the average person, being a relatively recent development, is much weirder. Email isn't traditionally encrypted (don't bring up the mess that is PGP); IRC wasn't; neither was AIM, ICQ, or MSN; Twitter DMs aren't; XMPP isn't; before the Internet, phone calls could be wiretapped by the government. Physical mail, while not encrypted, could be considered an exception, seeing as it's illegal to open in the majority of cases.
"Private" communications have never really been that private, unless you're speaking face to face alone in a room or passing notes to each other. Not to say I'm in favor of it being that way, but that's what people have long adjusted to.
"Private" communications have never really been that private, unless you're speaking face to face alone in a room or passing notes to each other. Not to say I'm in favor of it being that way, but that's what people have long adjusted to.
Encyption isn't traditional, but neither is it traditional for common people to have records of the conversations they had with friends and family, least of all records that are possessed and preserved indefinitely by any third party. Even if you consider letter writing; letters might be intercepted by the government but even then the postal service wasn't maintaining an archive of the contents of all the letters everybody ever sent.
> Honestly, encrypted communications for the average person, being a relatively recent development, is much weirder.
Not at all. For nearly all of human history, privacy of communication was the norm with a few understood exceptions.
If you had a conversation with someone it was just about always private forever. Unless the location was bugged with microphones, but that wouldn't be the case unless you were already under investigation. Most importantly, it wasn't possible to go back in time and bug the room for a conversation last week.
Phone lines could be tapped but not all phone lines were recorded all the time, wasn't yet technically possible. So again you'd be private unless already under investigation and the tap couldn't happen retroactively.
It's only now that reality has changed dramatically and all messaged are recorded (e.g. here by facebook) and are available retroactively and across the whole population (i.e. they don't need to target someone specific, just run a query for phrases and see who pops up).
Not at all. For nearly all of human history, privacy of communication was the norm with a few understood exceptions.
If you had a conversation with someone it was just about always private forever. Unless the location was bugged with microphones, but that wouldn't be the case unless you were already under investigation. Most importantly, it wasn't possible to go back in time and bug the room for a conversation last week.
Phone lines could be tapped but not all phone lines were recorded all the time, wasn't yet technically possible. So again you'd be private unless already under investigation and the tap couldn't happen retroactively.
It's only now that reality has changed dramatically and all messaged are recorded (e.g. here by facebook) and are available retroactively and across the whole population (i.e. they don't need to target someone specific, just run a query for phrases and see who pops up).
I disagree, privacy was the norm. Never did government have as much access to communication. Even ICQ, AIM were private because government usually didn't have interest in spying here because the demographics were mostly not of interest. Today we have a protocol about a lot of things, text, locations, group memberships. Surveillance is vastly greater than anytime before with a few magnitudes.
Google also has a bunch of WhatsApp backups in Google Drive, and Apple has hundreds of millions of iCloud Backups (non-e2e, by design, preserved as an iMessage encryption backdoor for the FBI) containing everyone's iMessages (or realtime iMessage sync private keys).
It's not just Facebook that's guilty of this.
EDIT: Here's the substantiation requested: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-fbi-icloud-exclusiv...
It's not just Facebook that's guilty of this.
EDIT: Here's the substantiation requested: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-apple-fbi-icloud-exclusiv...
I get the objection to Apple's unencrypted iCloud backups, but could we present the facts without multiple exaggerations, distortions, and unsupported opinions, please?
First, no, it's not "everyone's iMessages". There has been a lot of very public discussion of this. If you don't back up your Messages to iCloud, which a lot of informed people don't do anymore, then Apple does not have that unencrypted copy.
Second, unless you have support that Apple did this "for the FBI", specifically for that reason, as opposed to it being a mix of reasons, and also involving user-support reasons, as has been widely reported, please stop repeating that unsupported claim.
And lastly, until Apple commits an offense of the nature under discussion here, let's not tar them with the same broad brush as we are justly using to tar Facebook.
First, no, it's not "everyone's iMessages". There has been a lot of very public discussion of this. If you don't back up your Messages to iCloud, which a lot of informed people don't do anymore, then Apple does not have that unencrypted copy.
Second, unless you have support that Apple did this "for the FBI", specifically for that reason, as opposed to it being a mix of reasons, and also involving user-support reasons, as has been widely reported, please stop repeating that unsupported claim.
And lastly, until Apple commits an offense of the nature under discussion here, let's not tar them with the same broad brush as we are justly using to tar Facebook.
> If you don't back up your Messages to iCloud, which a lot of informed people don't do anymore, then Apple does not have that unencrypted copy.
This is false. Apple will still have the unencrypted copies (actually, the effectively-unencrypted sync keys, as "Messages in iCloud" cross-device sync keys are the thing at issue here) because the people you iMessage with will be providing them to Apple. iCloud Backup is on by default, so approximately everyone you talk to using iMessage is escrowing their private keys to Apple.
Turning off iCloud Backup on your device does not protect your iMessages, as the backdoor exists on the devices of both conversation participants.
It's sort of like switching email providers to get away from Gmail; if everyone you send or receive emails to/from is using Gmail, Google is still getting a copy of all of your correspondence.
> Second, unless you have support that Apple did this "for the FBI", specifically for that reason, as opposed to it being a mix of reasons, and also involving user-support reasons, as has been widely reported, please stop repeating that unsupported claim.
I updated the comment with the link to the Reuters article that says they did this specifically for the FBI.
From the article:
> More than two years ago, Apple told the FBI that it planned to offer users end-to-end encryption when storing their phone data on iCloud, according to one current and three former FBI officials and one current and one former Apple employee.
> Under that plan, primarily designed to thwart hackers, Apple would no longer have a key to unlock the encrypted data, meaning it would not be able to turn material over to authorities in a readable form even under court order.
> In private talks with Apple soon after, representatives of the FBI’s cyber crime agents and its operational technology division objected to the plan, arguing it would deny them the most effective means for gaining evidence against iPhone-using suspects, the government sources said.
> When Apple spoke privately to the FBI about its work on phone security the following year, the end-to-end encryption plan had been dropped, according to the six sources. Reuters could not determine why exactly Apple dropped the plan.
> “Legal killed it, for reasons you can imagine,” another former Apple employee said he was told, without any specific mention of why the plan was dropped or if the FBI was a factor in the decision.
This is false. Apple will still have the unencrypted copies (actually, the effectively-unencrypted sync keys, as "Messages in iCloud" cross-device sync keys are the thing at issue here) because the people you iMessage with will be providing them to Apple. iCloud Backup is on by default, so approximately everyone you talk to using iMessage is escrowing their private keys to Apple.
Turning off iCloud Backup on your device does not protect your iMessages, as the backdoor exists on the devices of both conversation participants.
It's sort of like switching email providers to get away from Gmail; if everyone you send or receive emails to/from is using Gmail, Google is still getting a copy of all of your correspondence.
> Second, unless you have support that Apple did this "for the FBI", specifically for that reason, as opposed to it being a mix of reasons, and also involving user-support reasons, as has been widely reported, please stop repeating that unsupported claim.
I updated the comment with the link to the Reuters article that says they did this specifically for the FBI.
From the article:
> More than two years ago, Apple told the FBI that it planned to offer users end-to-end encryption when storing their phone data on iCloud, according to one current and three former FBI officials and one current and one former Apple employee.
> Under that plan, primarily designed to thwart hackers, Apple would no longer have a key to unlock the encrypted data, meaning it would not be able to turn material over to authorities in a readable form even under court order.
> In private talks with Apple soon after, representatives of the FBI’s cyber crime agents and its operational technology division objected to the plan, arguing it would deny them the most effective means for gaining evidence against iPhone-using suspects, the government sources said.
> When Apple spoke privately to the FBI about its work on phone security the following year, the end-to-end encryption plan had been dropped, according to the six sources. Reuters could not determine why exactly Apple dropped the plan.
> “Legal killed it, for reasons you can imagine,” another former Apple employee said he was told, without any specific mention of why the plan was dropped or if the FBI was a factor in the decision.
This story leaves out some details: https://nypost.com/2022/08/09/nebraska-mom-and-daughter-char...
> When an investigator interviewed the teen, she allegedly confirmed that she had a miscarriage after midnight on April 22, and said that she and her mother placed the fetus in a bag in the back of their van, according to the court papers.
> Jessica and Celeste also said that Barnhill, whose relationship to the two women has not been revealed, later helped them bury the fetus on his property.
> Police were led to the makeshift gravesite and unearthed the corpse, which was found to show signs of “thermal injuries,” the documents stated.
> Barnhill reportedly confirmed to the investigators that the mother and daughter had attempted to burn the fetus before putting it in the ground.
My opinion might be a bit contrarian, but I was always taught that Roe v Wade was because abortions had become so unsafe without a proper place to do them. I imagine in this case we're missing some details, because the actual abortion involved sourcing some pills that are specifically used for abortion. I don't imagine sourcing those was quick. My read on this set of circumstances is that if you put arbitrary blockers on something that someone really wants to do, it course corrects them into a very unhealthy path. In this case, the details are shocking, but not incongruent with what I have been told was the reasoning for Roe v Wade and true to other harm reduction logic.
It's awful easy to argue post-facto that she could just have given birth, but I think that ignores a lot of changes and sacrifices a woman at 17-18 years old will have to endure.
> When an investigator interviewed the teen, she allegedly confirmed that she had a miscarriage after midnight on April 22, and said that she and her mother placed the fetus in a bag in the back of their van, according to the court papers.
> Jessica and Celeste also said that Barnhill, whose relationship to the two women has not been revealed, later helped them bury the fetus on his property.
> Police were led to the makeshift gravesite and unearthed the corpse, which was found to show signs of “thermal injuries,” the documents stated.
> Barnhill reportedly confirmed to the investigators that the mother and daughter had attempted to burn the fetus before putting it in the ground.
My opinion might be a bit contrarian, but I was always taught that Roe v Wade was because abortions had become so unsafe without a proper place to do them. I imagine in this case we're missing some details, because the actual abortion involved sourcing some pills that are specifically used for abortion. I don't imagine sourcing those was quick. My read on this set of circumstances is that if you put arbitrary blockers on something that someone really wants to do, it course corrects them into a very unhealthy path. In this case, the details are shocking, but not incongruent with what I have been told was the reasoning for Roe v Wade and true to other harm reduction logic.
It's awful easy to argue post-facto that she could just have given birth, but I think that ignores a lot of changes and sacrifices a woman at 17-18 years old will have to endure.
I think it's important to keep in mind the date. On April 22, Roe was still settled law from decades ago. The leak hadn't even happened yet.
I mean that's a point, but I'm not sure especially relevant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Nebraska
also, the requirements for an abortion:
https://www.guttmacher.org/fact-sheet/state-facts-about-abor...
There's three clinics total in the entire state and quite a number of hurdles. Including one that a patient must wait 24 hours after a consultation to have the procedure performed. If a patient has to travel to the clinic, and odds are she did, that's at minimum two days but maximally four. Then there's the cost, 2-3 nights at a hotel, plus abortions can't be paid by insurance - they're now looking at several hundred dollars of out of pocket cost in a state like Nebraska. If this young woman waited to tell her mother until she was showing (or didn't know until she was showing - which at 23 weeks, and a few weeks prior, she would be) then I can see this putting them in a weird place.
My point here isn't to reason about the things that happened after the abortion, but rather to say I think the more arbitrary hurdles that are introduced the more zany the outcomes will be.
also, the requirements for an abortion:
https://www.guttmacher.org/fact-sheet/state-facts-about-abor...
There's three clinics total in the entire state and quite a number of hurdles. Including one that a patient must wait 24 hours after a consultation to have the procedure performed. If a patient has to travel to the clinic, and odds are she did, that's at minimum two days but maximally four. Then there's the cost, 2-3 nights at a hotel, plus abortions can't be paid by insurance - they're now looking at several hundred dollars of out of pocket cost in a state like Nebraska. If this young woman waited to tell her mother until she was showing (or didn't know until she was showing - which at 23 weeks, and a few weeks prior, she would be) then I can see this putting them in a weird place.
My point here isn't to reason about the things that happened after the abortion, but rather to say I think the more arbitrary hurdles that are introduced the more zany the outcomes will be.
While this case involved a search warrant, Facebook also gives information to police departments without a warrant for any case that they determine to be an "emergency". Here is the portal where the information is requested and provided:
https://www.facebook.com/records
Back when I used to have a Facebook account, Facebook provided private information from my account to a police department without a warrant for a situation that they deemed an "emergency", but that I did not. I no longer use Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/records
Back when I used to have a Facebook account, Facebook provided private information from my account to a police department without a warrant for a situation that they deemed an "emergency", but that I did not. I no longer use Facebook.
Information you post to Facebook is essentially public. Best we teach our kids that. The "privacy" safeguards are BS.
Also I think that the Nebraska law is a symptom of toxic, fascist mindset that's pervading the country - and that's more concerning to me than Facebook so easily folding (which I expected).
Also I think that the Nebraska law is a symptom of toxic, fascist mindset that's pervading the country - and that's more concerning to me than Facebook so easily folding (which I expected).
This is DMs, most people don't think of those as private, and it's unreasonable to tell people to treat DMs as public. By the same logic email, SMS, voicemail and all "essentially public".
To the police they are. Just because everyone is wrong at the same time doesn't make them less wrong.
The key going forward is to use chinese messaging services that are not beholden to US law enforcement.
... so they can blackmail some folks to make them turn over corporate secrets, facilitate money laundering, or otherwise act as spies.
Maybe still safer than a US company having the data, but not great.
Maybe still safer than a US company having the data, but not great.
Ah yes, because giving the same information to the Chinese government who don't even need a warrant to access the data is better.
The 国家安全部 isn't going to be harassing a 17 year old for a miscarriage; they neither care nor have the capability to inflict any pain on you.
If that 17 year old becomes a 30 year old with access to something sensitive the adversary wants, then the adversary might harass/blackmail that 30 year old with what they did when they were 17 years old.
Let's hope the Supreme Court will have come to its senses by then.
(Although I agree that the premise in a broader sense of trusting a Chinese company over an American one is flawed.)
(Although I agree that the premise in a broader sense of trusting a Chinese company over an American one is flawed.)
> it's unreasonable to tell people to treat DMs as public
No, it's not. People should treat unencrypted centralized service DMs as public.
TFA is the proof.
No, it's not. People should treat unencrypted centralized service DMs as public.
TFA is the proof.
Facebook DMs are public. Zuck can be personally beating his meat to your nudes - as can every other Facebook engineer.
Any other belief regarding the privacy of them is flawed and incorrect.
Any other belief regarding the privacy of them is flawed and incorrect.
I haven't worked at Facebook, but I'd be surprised if this were true. Other large companies have audit logs of employee access to user data that are actively monitored; accessing information of users without a paper trail of justification will get you fired.
While this was true in the early days, there have been audit controls in place for a long time now. FB System Abuse == you're fired.
And yes, it's well known that Zuck did abuse God-mode back in the day.
And yes, it's well known that Zuck did abuse God-mode back in the day.
Need to get more people onboard with end to end encryption and obfuscating every possible piece of data online. As other commenters have stated, the corporations that run the internet are not your friends.
There is a large number of people in the US who are authoritarian and can't help but try to get involved in other people's business to the maximum degree. They won't stop at any boundary, they are religious zealots.
There is a large number of people in the US who are authoritarian and can't help but try to get involved in other people's business to the maximum degree. They won't stop at any boundary, they are religious zealots.
If you think "religious zealots" are the only authoritarians, boy do I have news for you!
There are plenty of other ones, but religious ones are the only people who truly obsess over the actions of others.
Alternative varieties merely want to steal as many resources as possible, beyond that they don't care about the actions of others.
Alternative varieties merely want to steal as many resources as possible, beyond that they don't care about the actions of others.
>> If you think "religious zealots" are the only authoritarians, boy do I have news for you!
> There are plenty of other ones, but religious ones are the only people who truly obsess over the actions of others.
Sorry, no. I don't know how anyone could come to believe something so incorrect. For instance, the Chinese Communist Party is 1) authoritarian, 2) atheist, and 3) very obsessed over the actions of others (as shown by the massive surveillance and control apparatus it's built).
> There are plenty of other ones, but religious ones are the only people who truly obsess over the actions of others.
Sorry, no. I don't know how anyone could come to believe something so incorrect. For instance, the Chinese Communist Party is 1) authoritarian, 2) atheist, and 3) very obsessed over the actions of others (as shown by the massive surveillance and control apparatus it's built).
Because of "terrorism" etc., text messages and the like will always be subpoenable. Meta would not be able to quash a bog-standard request like this. It's only even newsworthy because it involves the rescinded right to abortion.
The lesson here is don't use unencrypted services to discuss your crimes.
The lesson here is don't use unencrypted services to discuss your crimes.
The technical solution would be to not save message contents after message delivery.
This level of corporate amorality / lawful evil reminds me of IBM during World War II.
I think the pressures and incentives in play right now are going to generally push big tech companies in that direction, arguably already have quite a bit. I expect to see a lot more of it unfortunately.
The Nazis were big fans of Big Data, too.
There was a meme a while ago about deleting menstrual tracking apps.
So many people, including folks who should know better (professors, etc) were freaking out.
I wonder if it was dreamed up in FBs PR department as a distraction.
So many people, including folks who should know better (professors, etc) were freaking out.
I wonder if it was dreamed up in FBs PR department as a distraction.
This is the exact reason why that bit was going around. These corporations are not your friends, they have no obligation to preserve your privacy, and any data you've passed along their servers now belongs to them.
People were told to delete tracking apps to stop giving those companies data. So that data can't be used against you. This girl gave Facebook data. Facebook then turned that data over to the police. That data was used against her. Exactly how people said it would be.
People were told to delete tracking apps to stop giving those companies data. So that data can't be used against you. This girl gave Facebook data. Facebook then turned that data over to the police. That data was used against her. Exactly how people said it would be.
> they have no obligation to preserve your privacy
It's not just that they have no obligation they are legally required to comply with subpoena requests and provide any and all data that an independent judge has deemed necessary.
You can't have realistically have a situation where the entire management team goes to jail for refusing to comply with them. Nor is it necessarily wrong for them to choose to respect the law even if it's a bad law.
It's not just that they have no obligation they are legally required to comply with subpoena requests and provide any and all data that an independent judge has deemed necessary.
You can't have realistically have a situation where the entire management team goes to jail for refusing to comply with them. Nor is it necessarily wrong for them to choose to respect the law even if it's a bad law.
> It's not just that they have no obligation they are legally required to comply with subpoena requests and provide any and all data that an independent judge has deemed necessary.
I have, for north of a decade, not understood why this sort of thing hasn't triggered the exact same alarms that outright government-run mass data collection and spying would—if the government can pay for the data, can strong-arm to get the data, and can subpoena the data, it's barely better that a private company is collecting it, than the government, if your concern is government mis-use of data. No one should be allowed to collect and hoard information about people the way big tech companies (and some others, like CC companies and banks) do, for exactly the same reasons that we don't want the government doing that itself.
I have, for north of a decade, not understood why this sort of thing hasn't triggered the exact same alarms that outright government-run mass data collection and spying would—if the government can pay for the data, can strong-arm to get the data, and can subpoena the data, it's barely better that a private company is collecting it, than the government, if your concern is government mis-use of data. No one should be allowed to collect and hoard information about people the way big tech companies (and some others, like CC companies and banks) do, for exactly the same reasons that we don't want the government doing that itself.
Corporations can’t force you to do any thing you don’t want to do.
Governments can kill you, and brag about it publicly.
Governments can kill you, and brag about it publicly.
The implication from the person I responded to was that telling people to delete tracking apps was a distraction or deception. That somehow it was Facebook trying to get people to funnel data through them.
But that's not what it was. The same people who were trying to get people to delete tracking apps would have also said "Don't talk about this through Meta apps" also.
It's a bit outside of what Facebook did, whether they should have complied or risked consequences, etc.
As an aside, Signal people. If you want to chat discreetly, Signal.
But that's not what it was. The same people who were trying to get people to delete tracking apps would have also said "Don't talk about this through Meta apps" also.
It's a bit outside of what Facebook did, whether they should have complied or risked consequences, etc.
As an aside, Signal people. If you want to chat discreetly, Signal.
On my own Twitter feed, there were plenty of pro-choice activists who seemed unaware message apps are the primary threat.
The idea that Twitter is a threat doesn’t go down well with the Twitter crowd.
Same is true for FB, etc.
I personally had to explain to a number of people, face to face, that whatever threat is posed by menstrual tracking apps is nothing compared to FB, Twitter, and Google.
People seemed especially suprised that Twitter was a problem.
The idea that Twitter is a threat doesn’t go down well with the Twitter crowd.
Same is true for FB, etc.
I personally had to explain to a number of people, face to face, that whatever threat is posed by menstrual tracking apps is nothing compared to FB, Twitter, and Google.
People seemed especially suprised that Twitter was a problem.
This situation proves those people were right.
That is not as farfetched as it may first appear. Recall, if you will, how every MSM outlet started extolling the abhorrence of "stealthing"(1), in unison, not long before the US reversed course and called Assange an enemy of the state and the UK police entered the embassy to grab him? Social Engineering 101.
(1)Of course, removing a condom w/o consent is abhorrent.
(1)Of course, removing a condom w/o consent is abhorrent.
Please use Signal and remember that your receiver still has a copy of your messages.
Did Facebook even know why the police had search warrant?
Presumably a warrant is signed by an actual judge. I'm not sure I want every company launching their own investigation into the underlying evidence behind a search warrant in order to determine if they should comply or not.
If we are unhappy with the warrants, we should address that at the judicial level.
If we are unhappy with the warrants, we should address that at the judicial level.
A valid question, I wondered the same.
In the US, at least in my state, search warrants have to be specific about what is being searched for, where to search for it, and when the search should occur. So I think the warrant would likely have mentioned what sorts of messages they were looking for between dates X and Y, not just that Meta was ordered to turn over the entire message history for a user.
In the US, at least in my state, search warrants have to be specific about what is being searched for, where to search for it, and when the search should occur. So I think the warrant would likely have mentioned what sorts of messages they were looking for between dates X and Y, not just that Meta was ordered to turn over the entire message history for a user.
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It is time to go back to treating the internet like it was scary and hostile, because it still is, except it now has a thick veneer of slick marketing to suggest otherwise. Young people should be counselled to stay anonymous online and shown examples like this, because zero good can come from giving personal, compromising information to a company along with your real name in this way.
I think this battle has been lost already. Pretty much all of the non-tech people I know firmly believe the "why do I need anonymity if I'm not doing anything wrong" line of thinking. The powers that be really don't like online anonymity, and the public at large just doesn't care enough to do anything. Maybe this will change some minds, but I'm doubtful it'll be enough.
> "why do I need anonymity if I'm not doing anything wrong"
These people didn't do anything wrong either:
"They Told Their Therapists Everything. Hackers Leaked It All"
A mental health startup built its business on easy-to-use technology. Patients joined in droves. Then came a catastrophic data breach.
https://www.wired.com/story/vastaamo-psychotherapy-patients-...
These people didn't do anything wrong either:
"They Told Their Therapists Everything. Hackers Leaked It All"
A mental health startup built its business on easy-to-use technology. Patients joined in droves. Then came a catastrophic data breach.
https://www.wired.com/story/vastaamo-psychotherapy-patients-...
I hold onto hope that an alternative system of privacy-protecting internet (e.g. Freenet) takes hold to a bigger tech-nerd audience, and then eventually bleeds out to mainstream just like the internet was doing in the early 90s. At which point, the government will be completely incapable of all the bullshit they do today, and will be as powerless over that system as they are over crypto.
> as powerless over that system as they are over crypto
I see this claim made a lot, and I don't understand it. When the canadian trucker protest (please don't make this discussion about that, I am not saying it was good or bad, I am just using it as an example) switched to crypto after the gov froze their bank accounts, the gov also froze those crypto wallets. That seems like the opposite of powerless.
I think it's really naive to think that the gov won't just be able to bully any type of new system into submission, like they always do. If there are people running the system, then those people can be coerced.
I see this claim made a lot, and I don't understand it. When the canadian trucker protest (please don't make this discussion about that, I am not saying it was good or bad, I am just using it as an example) switched to crypto after the gov froze their bank accounts, the gov also froze those crypto wallets. That seems like the opposite of powerless.
I think it's really naive to think that the gov won't just be able to bully any type of new system into submission, like they always do. If there are people running the system, then those people can be coerced.
Those crypto wallets were custodial wallets stored on a centralized service operated by a private company. Cryptocurrency can't help you if you don't use it the way you're supposed to -- that is, keeping your wallet on your own hardware with your own keys.
> Cryptocurrency can't help you if you don't use it the way you're supposed to -- that is, keeping your wallet on your own hardware with your own keys.
So for most people this can just be shortened to "Cryptocurrency can't help you".
So for most people this can just be shortened to "Cryptocurrency can't help you".
I agree, but it kinda sucks that we're about a decade into the Cryptocurrency Future and it's still too hard for random angry truckers to use it correctly
That's why we need to stop being purely defensive. Blocking trackers and personal data is not enough; browsers need to start providing "noise" to websites to render tracking/profiling results useless.
You can't use most popular online services without providing PII in the form of a phone number.
On some of the most popular ones, you can lose your account and all data/connections at any time that they demand your government ID and you refuse to provide it.
I don't use services like this, myself, but many people use these popular services as their exclusive destination on the internet.
On some of the most popular ones, you can lose your account and all data/connections at any time that they demand your government ID and you refuse to provide it.
I don't use services like this, myself, but many people use these popular services as their exclusive destination on the internet.
The major services are heavily incentivized to de-anonymize and if the opposite ever became a problem, these governments would legislate to force their way through.
It would not be enough for the young to care about anonymization. They would need to care about it far in excess of their desire to interact with common platforms, celebrities, pop culture and their peers. It is an unreasonably high demand for kids.
It would not be enough for the young to care about anonymization. They would need to care about it far in excess of their desire to interact with common platforms, celebrities, pop culture and their peers. It is an unreasonably high demand for kids.
Just a reminder, in the USA all emails older than six-months old can be read by virtually any law enforcement agency without a warrant.
This is why there was a server in the basement and everyone probably should have a server in the basement. Spam management made that almost impossible for the end-user though. We could have put spammers in prison but oddly lawmakers never decided that was a problem.
This is why there was a server in the basement and everyone probably should have a server in the basement. Spam management made that almost impossible for the end-user though. We could have put spammers in prison but oddly lawmakers never decided that was a problem.
Outright ghoulish behavior from Facebook. They didn't even put up a fight.
And for Nebraska to put this 17 year old on trial as an adult is doubly cruel.
And for Nebraska to put this 17 year old on trial as an adult is doubly cruel.
This isn't really a good case to build sympathy on. She didn't abort with a doctor's assistance, it was fairly late, and she hid the remains. This would have been illegal across most of the US.
I don't think there was anything jolly happy going through her psyche when she did that
It doesn't seem so hard to me to feel empathy towards a 17 year old girl that found out she was pregnant around the same time the Supreme Court leaked the overturning of Roe v Wade.
That's certainly not a recipe for making good decisions, and now since she's being tried as an adult she not only has to live with a criminal record, but her name being blasted all over the place while living in an abortion-hostile state.
That's certainly not a recipe for making good decisions, and now since she's being tried as an adult she not only has to live with a criminal record, but her name being blasted all over the place while living in an abortion-hostile state.
She is alleged to have aborted the fetus in April. The SCOTUS leak was in May. She was 23 weeks pregnant, she should have consulted with a doctor early in 2022. Tough to blame this on the Roe controversy when it hadn't even started yet.
This is very easy for you to say. Are you a teenage girl? Do you live in a dark-red state? Have you ever tried to consult a doctor in Nebraska about abortion?
As if deep red areas of the country are unfamiliar with abortion? They are very familiar with keeping it under the radar, but fine upstanding evangelical Christians absolutely still have abortions.
Also, there are three Planned Parenthood clinics in Omaha, Nebraska, less than two hours from Madison County. This young woman was less than a year from being legally an adult. I'd give it good odds that my 11 year old daughter could figure out she should talk to a doctor in this situation, and I sure as hell hope that by 17 she's definitely figured that out.
Also, there are three Planned Parenthood clinics in Omaha, Nebraska, less than two hours from Madison County. This young woman was less than a year from being legally an adult. I'd give it good odds that my 11 year old daughter could figure out she should talk to a doctor in this situation, and I sure as hell hope that by 17 she's definitely figured that out.
- Only 3 clinics in the state, all 2 hours away
- Only 1 clinic performs abortion at 20 weeks
- Requires a 24 hour wait period by law
- Requires parental consent under 18
- Between 16-20 weeks, costs $2500-$5000
Oh fair, I didn't follow the timeline, my mistake. Nebraska is still an abortion-hostile state though.
And in Europe.
Untrue. Abortion is legal until 40 weeks in every EU country and fully paid for by universal healthcare.
This is wildly inaccurate. Poland, an EU country, bans abortion in most cases.[0]
Many other EU countries have gestational restrictions.
[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Poland
[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Poland
I didn't have to look too hard to find that it's 22 weeks in Germany [0] (excluding exceptional cases) and seems to be fairly similar for other Western European nations.
[0] http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_stgb/englisch_stg...
[0] http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_stgb/englisch_stg...
Got a source for that? This wikipedia page says you are flat out wrong and not even remotely close to the truth: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion_in_Europe
10 weeks in Portugal
She aborted at 23 WEEKS
So sure, investigate the situation... figure out how a minor ended up pregnant and make sure that the abortion was voluntary. Perhaps fine her and place her on probation due to the circumstances, and get her mental health counseling.
But to put her on trial as an adult seems more like vengeance than justice.
But to put her on trial as an adult seems more like vengeance than justice.
Yeah the fetus was 6 months old. That's a baby at that point if it is outside of her womb. She could have easily given birth and it would have gone on to live a completely normal life. I'm pro abortion generally, but you need to do it long before the fetus is viable.
Sorry but are you really saying 'easily' and 'given birth' after eachother? Have you ever witnessed a birth? And how do you know it would have gone on to live a completely normal life? What kind of disney movie do you live in?
By easily, I meant that the baby would have good chances of survival. It wouldn't be fighting against 1% odds and require $100M expenditures in the NICU
Yes, I've witnessed a birth.
Most babies born go on to live normal lives. Do you really think I was implying I was a mindreader, and I know the baby would have a normal life, rather than just saying the odds are good?
You interpreted my comment 100% in bad faith which is pretty lame for HN. You might feel more comfortable on reddit.
Yes, I've witnessed a birth.
Most babies born go on to live normal lives. Do you really think I was implying I was a mindreader, and I know the baby would have a normal life, rather than just saying the odds are good?
You interpreted my comment 100% in bad faith which is pretty lame for HN. You might feel more comfortable on reddit.
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23 weeks is very possible to have a 100% healthy kid with modern medicine. I have very little sympathy in this case.
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This is tragic. Women should have access to abortion, and 23 weeks is plenty, but miscarrying and burying it in the backyard needs an investigation. Just to make sure we have all the facts.
Merits of this particular case aside, as it seems like it would be a generous good faith assumption, given your general statement, in your ideal world when do we start harbouring criminal suspicions on a process that happens to between one and two thirds of all women?
23 weeks is the size of a grapefruit. 12 weeks is the size of the lime; is that small enough for you that you wouldn't put a woman going through the trauma of a miscarriage (or abortion) through criminal investigation?
Do we need to automatically assume that when a woman wants to not just flush it down the toilet like waste that is reason for suspicion?
May you never have a partner who has a miscarriage and then has to decide whether to put themselves at the mercy of the criminal system whether they go through "proper channels".
23 weeks is the size of a grapefruit. 12 weeks is the size of the lime; is that small enough for you that you wouldn't put a woman going through the trauma of a miscarriage (or abortion) through criminal investigation?
Do we need to automatically assume that when a woman wants to not just flush it down the toilet like waste that is reason for suspicion?
May you never have a partner who has a miscarriage and then has to decide whether to put themselves at the mercy of the criminal system whether they go through "proper channels".
I think your grapefruit comparison is inaccurate unless you are referring to just the head. The Mayo Clinic's guide to pregnancy lists a baby's head at 24 weeks, just the head alone, at 8.7 inches (circ), but total length heel to crown is also 12.2 inches, which is about 60% the average length of a full term baby.
23 weeks is also more or less the borderline for where we have standardized national practices for saving an extreme premature delivery. I've read studies that put viability in the NICU at week 23 anywhere from 10% on the extreme low end, to 50% on the extreme high. By week 24 that jumps to ~30-75%.
23 weeks is also more or less the borderline for where we have standardized national practices for saving an extreme premature delivery. I've read studies that put viability in the NICU at week 23 anywhere from 10% on the extreme low end, to 50% on the extreme high. By week 24 that jumps to ~30-75%.
Why do we need all the facts exactly? If it was her choice, we don't need all the facts. It is literally a part of her body.
> It is literally a part of her body.
No comment on the general issue of abortion. Question remains for those who push this line as to which body part is that? A fetus is clearly an organism growing inside of someone's body but it is not a "body part" of another organism.
No comment on the general issue of abortion. Question remains for those who push this line as to which body part is that? A fetus is clearly an organism growing inside of someone's body but it is not a "body part" of another organism.
It's a part of her umbilical cord at least, even if at the end of that umbilical is a weird collection of cells that will form a different entity. I think of it like cell division, where there is a weird process, and at some point there's kind of two organisms in one, until they separate, and then it's two different organisms (cytokinesis).
Human pregnancy is absolutely bizarre and quite dangerous. Some weird facts:
- Fertilization doesn't even happen until the 2nd or 3rd week.
- Pregnancy can occur outside of the uterus, which quickly leads to ruptured organs and death for the mother.
- 20% of pregnancies end in miscarriage.
- The fetus's cells float freely in the mother's blood plasma, which makes the mother a chimera.
- A mother's blood can develop antibodies to rhesus antigens in the baby's blood, identifying the baby as a foreign invader.
- A fetus's "coating" has genes that inhibit T-cells in the mother, which is the only way the mother's body doesn't destroy the fetus (which is an alien parasite to the mother/host).
- Fetal stem cells can travel throughout the mother to repair things - or create an immune disorder.
- Women grow an extra organ (the placenta) during pregnancy.
- During development, a female fetus develops all the eggs the adult form will carry throughout its lifetime.
- Amniotic fluid is fetus pee.
- A fetus can't survive outside the uterus before 23-25 weeks.
Human pregnancy is absolutely bizarre and quite dangerous. Some weird facts:
- Fertilization doesn't even happen until the 2nd or 3rd week.
- Pregnancy can occur outside of the uterus, which quickly leads to ruptured organs and death for the mother.
- 20% of pregnancies end in miscarriage.
- The fetus's cells float freely in the mother's blood plasma, which makes the mother a chimera.
- A mother's blood can develop antibodies to rhesus antigens in the baby's blood, identifying the baby as a foreign invader.
- A fetus's "coating" has genes that inhibit T-cells in the mother, which is the only way the mother's body doesn't destroy the fetus (which is an alien parasite to the mother/host).
- Fetal stem cells can travel throughout the mother to repair things - or create an immune disorder.
- Women grow an extra organ (the placenta) during pregnancy.
- During development, a female fetus develops all the eggs the adult form will carry throughout its lifetime.
- Amniotic fluid is fetus pee.
- A fetus can't survive outside the uterus before 23-25 weeks.
> It's a part of her umbilical cord at least, even if at the end of that umbilical is a weird collection of cells that will form a different entity. I think of it like cell division, where there is a weird process, and at some point there's kind of two organisms in one, until they separate, and then it's two different organisms (cytokinesis).
Is the umbilical part of the mother's body? "The umbilical cord develops from and contains remnants of the yolk sac and allantois. It forms by the fifth week of development, replacing the yolk sac as the source of nutrients for the embryo" per wiki. The process definitely reminds of parasitical organisms, in parts.
> Human pregnancy is absolutely bizarre
Honestly I still am having problems wrapping my head around the basic fact of existence. Reality is bizarre.
Is the umbilical part of the mother's body? "The umbilical cord develops from and contains remnants of the yolk sac and allantois. It forms by the fifth week of development, replacing the yolk sac as the source of nutrients for the embryo" per wiki. The process definitely reminds of parasitical organisms, in parts.
> Human pregnancy is absolutely bizarre
Honestly I still am having problems wrapping my head around the basic fact of existence. Reality is bizarre.
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It doesn't matter - everyone has the right to decide what they don't want inside their bodies. It doesn't matter who or what that thing belongs to.
According to the article, Nebraska currently allows abortion up to 20 weeks. So for a valid criminal case, this one either had to take place after 20 weeks or be done in violation of other regulations, like taking place at a licensed medical provider. The article mentions mother and daughter burying fetus in backyard after trying to burn it. This implies fairly large fetus that would normally be subject to medical rather than chemical abortion. All in all, this makes the situation less shocking. I may oppose criminal prosecution of cocaine users, yet I wouldn't be that shocked if Facebook provided state law enforcement with DMs between a user and a dealer.
The article says the abortion occurred at 22 weeks.
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Sickening. If FB were to selectively refuse to comply with some state subpoenas, what would be the consequences? Banning of FB in Indiana? I think that would be more of a punishment for the Boomers of Indiana than for FB.
If there is a Subpoena or Search Warrant for FB messages, FB has no choice to hand them over. However, FB should have fought like hell in the courts to not hand those messages over.
They had a choice - they can tell their lawyers to fight the subpoena/warrant in court. Possibly a long, expensive, and futile exercise, but it would signal whose side they're on. And to the surprise of (hopefully) nobody, they're not on our side at all.
Not all legal battles are long and drawn out.
Yep. The requests for data always come with a “show up to court if you don’t want to give the data”
They made a decision not to.
They made a decision not to.
Isn’t it usually: “your archivist is required to appear physically at this address: xxxx, with a physical copy of the following items: yyyy. As a courtesy to you, you can email them to Special Agent zzzz if they are in the proper format.”
So showing up (at thousands of courthouses a year) is the default. If you’re helpful (to the prosecution), we will let you do things by email.
So showing up (at thousands of courthouses a year) is the default. If you’re helpful (to the prosecution), we will let you do things by email.
They would get raided by the government and forced to comply. They literally can't refuse in this case. They could have fought it in court (and lost) but at the end they would have to produce the documents under threat of contempt and then criminal charges.
It is considered contempt of court, not sure what the punishment is in Nebraska, but that is usually something like a $500 fine and six months in jail.
Obviously you can't put FB in jail, so does that turn into a bigger fine?
Obviously you can't put FB in jail, so does that turn into a bigger fine?
Generally, there are just fines, but courts have put people from a company in contempt because they were the actual reason for contempt. For example, if the lawyers refused to produce files during discovery, the lawyers (despite working for the company) could be found in contempt and sanctioned.
They could’ve went to court and argued they don’t want to do it.
This is the important part:
> A Nebraska teenager is facing criminal charges alleging she aborted a fetus in violation of state law, after authorities obtained her Facebook messages using a search warrant.
Should companies disobey the law by refusing to comply with a valid search warrant from a state government in the United States?
If so, how is that any different from Uber breaking various laws?
I happen to believe that access to abortion is important (although quite a lot of people don't), but the rule of law matters too. It's not reasonable or logical to believe that it's ok for companies to break some laws but not others. So, I can't really be mad at Facebook for doing this.
> A Nebraska teenager is facing criminal charges alleging she aborted a fetus in violation of state law, after authorities obtained her Facebook messages using a search warrant.
Should companies disobey the law by refusing to comply with a valid search warrant from a state government in the United States?
If so, how is that any different from Uber breaking various laws?
I happen to believe that access to abortion is important (although quite a lot of people don't), but the rule of law matters too. It's not reasonable or logical to believe that it's ok for companies to break some laws but not others. So, I can't really be mad at Facebook for doing this.
To answer your question breaking laws designed to help people versus laws designed to persecute people are very different things. It’s all very well being in favour of the rule of law, but unjust laws are tyranny. When companies assist with tyranny, they can and should get bad press, whether that tyrrany happens in China, Russia or America. They choose where to trade, where to be registered and where to employ people.
Uber provides services at a lower cost to the consumer and lowered barriers of entry for millions of drivers compared to taxi companies entrenched by state monopolies. How is that not helping people?
A paternalistic state is as much a tyranny as a persecutory one. The only only difference is in the overt methods. The motives and thinking behind the two are the same. If you're of the view that certain laws are inherently unjust, by whom or by what standards should that distinction be made? Who watches the watchers?
Why would you think a country that dictates with whom or how one can form an economic contract would leave alone the right to bodily integrity? Individual human beings, whether representing companies or themselves, choose where to trade, register, and employ (or be employed by) people. Human beings are the ones decide to create companies, governments, and tyrannies.
You give companies far too much agency when you want to pin them as enablers of tyranny but deny them any in their contributions to personal liberty, whether political or economic. You can't have it both ways.
A paternalistic state is as much a tyranny as a persecutory one. The only only difference is in the overt methods. The motives and thinking behind the two are the same. If you're of the view that certain laws are inherently unjust, by whom or by what standards should that distinction be made? Who watches the watchers?
Why would you think a country that dictates with whom or how one can form an economic contract would leave alone the right to bodily integrity? Individual human beings, whether representing companies or themselves, choose where to trade, register, and employ (or be employed by) people. Human beings are the ones decide to create companies, governments, and tyrannies.
You give companies far too much agency when you want to pin them as enablers of tyranny but deny them any in their contributions to personal liberty, whether political or economic. You can't have it both ways.
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Many, many people do not agree with your insinuation that abortion laws are "tyrrany;" that's why laws are passed in states whose populations have determined to various degrees that abortion must not be allowed.
Even in those states, abortion enjoys wide popular support (See: The Kansas referendum), it's just that they've been gerrymandered to the point that their governments are not remotely representative of the wishes of most of their constituents.
> It's not reasonable or logical to believe that it's ok for companies to break some laws but not others.
"One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws." Martin Luther King Jr.
"One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws." Martin Luther King Jr.
William Roper: “So, now you give the Devil the benefit of law!”
Sir Thomas More: “Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?”
William Roper: “Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!”
Sir Thomas More: “Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
- Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7515521-william-roper-so-no...
In particular, I'm fairly sure everyone who bombs abortion clinics[0] tells themselves that the laws they break are the unjust ones, because who sees themselves as the villains of their own stories?
[0] https://www.vox.com/2015/12/1/9827886/abortion-clinic-attack...
Sir Thomas More: “Yes! What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?”
William Roper: “Yes, I'd cut down every law in England to do that!”
Sir Thomas More: “Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
- Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7515521-william-roper-so-no...
In particular, I'm fairly sure everyone who bombs abortion clinics[0] tells themselves that the laws they break are the unjust ones, because who sees themselves as the villains of their own stories?
[0] https://www.vox.com/2015/12/1/9827886/abortion-clinic-attack...
Disobeying a couple specifically chosen laws is very different from discarding the entire legal system.
I think the argument could be read that breaking one law would undermine all other laws as well. But I believe the essence of that dialogue is more that the ends do not justify the means instead of being a refutation of the previous idea.
Well then it's a good thing that breaking a targeted law is not "ends justify the means".
There is a difference as you might not need to compromise your ethics or your conscience if you just break the law.
Considering the people who support the bombing of abortion clinics are the ones currently making these laws and are in control because they have used the law to disenfranchise and suppress voters to be able to do so with only the support of a minority of actual legal subjects and considering that the only other party has spent the past decades sitting on its hands in malicious compliance while using civil rights as a dangling carrot for the remaining voters, maybe the US legal system is so broken this issue can't be solved by bowing down to authority? And even if it can, maybe the time frames involved to do so are so long mere submission will cost many lives and harm many more.
A wolf and a sheep can't find a mutually satisfactory agreement when it comes to whether the sheep should be eaten by the wolf. Having irreconcilable differences is all fine and dandy in a democracy as long as those differences aren't resolved against you in a way that has life-altering consequences for you.
If you value order over justice, I'm sorry but there's a name for a system like that.
A wolf and a sheep can't find a mutually satisfactory agreement when it comes to whether the sheep should be eaten by the wolf. Having irreconcilable differences is all fine and dandy in a democracy as long as those differences aren't resolved against you in a way that has life-altering consequences for you.
If you value order over justice, I'm sorry but there's a name for a system like that.
Hey I love the quote love the idea but we are actually asking not for the law to be laid flat as it were but mere civil disobedience to unjust law and acceptance of the consequences. Put up a fight.
That logic cuts both ways.
There are a lot of people in this country who genuinely believe that abortion is murder, and that's why we are in this mess in the first place. Those people believe laws that permit abortion are unjust and deeply immoral -- should they start using that as an excuse to punish people who legally obtained abortions, blockade clinics, etc.?
In a country with widely divergent religious and political views, we would end up with anarchy if everyone started disobeying laws they believed were unjust.
There are a lot of people in this country who genuinely believe that abortion is murder, and that's why we are in this mess in the first place. Those people believe laws that permit abortion are unjust and deeply immoral -- should they start using that as an excuse to punish people who legally obtained abortions, blockade clinics, etc.?
In a country with widely divergent religious and political views, we would end up with anarchy if everyone started disobeying laws they believed were unjust.
> should they start using that as an excuse to punish people who legally obtained abortions, blockade clinics, etc.?
That is exactly what many are doing.
The logic doe cut both ways. We need to protect people wherever we find them.
The rule of law is a good thing, but to pretend that it is an absolute thing is to be a party to tyranny
That is exactly what many are doing.
The logic doe cut both ways. We need to protect people wherever we find them.
The rule of law is a good thing, but to pretend that it is an absolute thing is to be a party to tyranny
One can believe abortion (or laws against abortion, for that matter) to be unjust, while also laws against vigilante violence to be just, and thus refrain from that kind of action.
One can also believe vigilante violence against people given abortions to be just, and thus justify such actions against them. In which case, the question is, "What should someone whose moral code is opposed to yours do?" Which in my opinion is a silly question.
For this to lead to anarchy, it must be the case that a significant number of people avoid causing anarchy for the sole reason of following the law for its own sake, without consideration for any punishment for violating the law.
One can also believe vigilante violence against people given abortions to be just, and thus justify such actions against them. In which case, the question is, "What should someone whose moral code is opposed to yours do?" Which in my opinion is a silly question.
For this to lead to anarchy, it must be the case that a significant number of people avoid causing anarchy for the sole reason of following the law for its own sake, without consideration for any punishment for violating the law.
> One can also believe vigilante violence against people given abortions to be just, and thus justify such actions against them. In which case, the question is, "What should someone whose moral code is opposed to yours do?" Which in my opinion is a silly question.
No, it's not a silly question. It is the reason we need to have laws.
No, it's not a silly question. It is the reason we need to have laws.
I don't think we want Facebook to decide which laws are unjust.
I am asking that Facebook takes a principled stand.
Judging from the reaction of Meta they realise that it was a mistake not to enable the "host proof" encryption protocols - like Signal, and what Whats APp was supposed to be (is it still?) - across the communication tools
They have exposed themselves to this - being complicate in what is starting to look like an organised campaign against women - they deserve our condemnation
Judging from the reaction of Meta they realise that it was a mistake not to enable the "host proof" encryption protocols - like Signal, and what Whats APp was supposed to be (is it still?) - across the communication tools
They have exposed themselves to this - being complicate in what is starting to look like an organised campaign against women - they deserve our condemnation
> I am asking that Facebook takes a principled stand.
It would be interesting to see it play out, but a company refusing to comply with a search warrant will likely result in really bad stuff for the company. Like officers in prison and conviction of crimes like Arthur Anderson during the Enron scandal.
I don’t see an opportunity here for Facebook to “take a stand” unless Zuck wanted to burn the company down.
That’s not realistic. And I think calling for companies to act illegally is a slippery slope I don’t want to get onto.
It would be interesting to see it play out, but a company refusing to comply with a search warrant will likely result in really bad stuff for the company. Like officers in prison and conviction of crimes like Arthur Anderson during the Enron scandal.
I don’t see an opportunity here for Facebook to “take a stand” unless Zuck wanted to burn the company down.
That’s not realistic. And I think calling for companies to act illegally is a slippery slope I don’t want to get onto.
Real people without expensive teams of lawyers and wealth to fall back on risked jail, beating, and lynching to sit at a lunch counter. I'm sorry that the officers of Meta are men of little courage and worth.
This kind of moral posturing may feel satisfying but that kind of reasoning is literally why in Germany we're 80 years later still cleaning up the mess of companies benefitting from forced labor under entirely legal-at-the-time public-private partnerships.
Facebook doesn't get to decide which laws are unjust. But Facebook gets to decide which laws it considers unjust and how it wants to deal with them. If big corporations can decide they consider tax laws unjust and want to avoid them as much as possible, they can also consider laws unjust that impact other people.
Facebook doesn't get to decide which laws are unjust. But Facebook gets to decide which laws it considers unjust and how it wants to deal with them. If big corporations can decide they consider tax laws unjust and want to avoid them as much as possible, they can also consider laws unjust that impact other people.
Nobody is asking Facebook to decide; Facebook is being told which laws are unjust.
Facebook are being told which laws are unjust by multiple different groups (not just on the topic of abortion) who disagree about everything other than that Facebook is pure evil for allowing the other lot to say anything.
This is not a normative statement: I'm not saying which group Facebook should listen to. Only that everybody (except for Facebook themselves) agrees that Facebook should not be making the decision.
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If so, how is that any different from Uber breaking various laws?
The pursuit of private profit vs the defense of someone else's private liberty.
You might think rule of law subsumes both considerations, or something else, but if so you should say that. Asking a rhetorical question whose answer is blindingly obvious is more of a conversational gambit for Socratic authority than a sincere inquiry.
The pursuit of private profit vs the defense of someone else's private liberty.
You might think rule of law subsumes both considerations, or something else, but if so you should say that. Asking a rhetorical question whose answer is blindingly obvious is more of a conversational gambit for Socratic authority than a sincere inquiry.
> Asking a rhetorical question whose answer is blindingly obvious
You are either disingenuous or naive if you think this is true.
It is an extremely complex question both ethically and practically.
You are either disingenuous or naive if you think this is true.
It is an extremely complex question both ethically and practically.
I was able to summarize the difference in 12 words. The ramifications can be complex but the question as asked was simple.
Regardless, asking capital for justice is foolish and damning Facebook to hell is impossible.
Yeah, the only real civil rights question I see here that relates to Facebook and social media is how are courts looking at warrants for social media accounts. If the police suspect you of a crime they can't just ask for warrants to acquire the letters you may have written to anyone you've ever corresponded with. They have to be more specific. But if they can request a broad swath of your messages simply because you have a social media account then that's a bit like requesting papers from someone simply because they own a filing cabinet.
It's not even an access to abortion issue. Abortion is legal in that state. 23 weeks is really late, an abortion that late would be illegal in most of europe.
Not exactly. European laws have restrictions on when it's available "upon request", but if there are any medical concerns around the fetus or the mother they can and are performed much later.
This is likely more of a side-effect of having government sponsored healthcare wanting to limit the number of elective procedures rather than any sort of moral issue like its viewed in countries like the United States.
This is likely more of a side-effect of having government sponsored healthcare wanting to limit the number of elective procedures rather than any sort of moral issue like its viewed in countries like the United States.
In most of Europe what happened in this particular case would still have been illegal (although it's fair to ask whether the individual in question would have had a legal abortion at an earlier point in time in Europe). The linked article leaves out a lot of relevant contextual details; there's more here: https://journalstar.com/news/state-and-regional/nebraska/nor...
Would it? There's always been an open question in the US around whether or not you charge mothers who seek illegal abortions vs the doctors. How have European courts typically sentenced women who sought to terminate pregnancies passed the gestational term limits?
The teenager ("mother") isn't being prosecuted for getting the abortion. She's being charged for concealing or abandoning a dead human body, concealing the death of another person, and false reporting. It's the teenager's own mother who's being charged with the abortion-related offences (performing or attempting an abortion on a pregnancy at more than 20 weeks, and performing an abortion as a non-licensed doctor).
> She's being charged for concealing or abandoning a dead human body, concealing the death of another person, and false reporting.
Those crimes don't make sense if they're following an abortion. That looks to me like a flimsy cover for prosecuting getting an abortion.
Those crimes don't make sense if they're following an abortion. That looks to me like a flimsy cover for prosecuting getting an abortion.
I see that perspective, but the rules around reporting and disposing of bodies have purposes independent of the abortion debate, e.g., to protect the rights of live-born disabled babies from intentional euthanasia.
Here, the police laid the first set of three charges before there was any allegation of anything other than miscarriage/stillbirth, so it's hard to argue that the police were trying to punish the teenager for abortion in this particular case.
Here, the police laid the first set of three charges before there was any allegation of anything other than miscarriage/stillbirth, so it's hard to argue that the police were trying to punish the teenager for abortion in this particular case.
In the US that question is actually less a legal or moral question and more of a political one. Politicians are generally afraid of the public opinion reaction to punishing mothers (especially if they happen to be 10 year old victims of rape[1]) - that is of course what all of these restriction laws do, they punish mothers, but silently executing an action and announcing that action out loud are two different things.
1. https://www.politifact.com/article/2022/jul/21/could-10-year...
1. https://www.politifact.com/article/2022/jul/21/could-10-year...
AFAIK 23 weeks would be illegal in the majority of the US as well. Though there is some ambiguity as a number of states just say 'fetal viability' which can be as late as 24 weeks depending on who you ask.
This would have been illegal in states like New York. The people who are blindly defending this should consider that situations have nuance, and that the child that was born probably also looked like a small newborn instead of a meat bean.
What an absolute failure of the health care in her world.
How did this get to 20 weeks?
Who in any position of power was watching out for this child?
Now those in power will use it to crush her.
How sad. How bad. How mad.
How did this get to 20 weeks?
Who in any position of power was watching out for this child?
Now those in power will use it to crush her.
How sad. How bad. How mad.
Social media search warrants for abortion law enforcement is the issue.
The legality of 23rd-week abortions in parts of Europe is not an issue.
The legality of 23rd-week abortions in parts of Europe is not an issue.
Why do you or Europe get to define late? This was legal until a month ago.
> after authorities obtained her Facebook messages using a search warrant.
The fact that it was obtained using a search warrant is an very important part of the story. Right now, the headline is designed to create an outrage against Facebook. Forbes is being very misleading here.
The fact that it was obtained using a search warrant is an very important part of the story. Right now, the headline is designed to create an outrage against Facebook. Forbes is being very misleading here.
23 weeks might be illegal even in California. In California, there is no strict cut-off date as to when a pregnancy may be terminated. But absent special circumstances, abortion cannot be performed once the fetus becomes viable. Hospitals will resuscitate and actively treat babies born in the 22nd week of pregnancy.
> abortion cannot be performed once the fetus becomes viable
I don't think that's universally true. That would depend upon the state. The Roe decision protected women from government intervention before the fetus was vaible but now that Roe is gone that does not mean the inverse is true.
I don't think that's universally true. That would depend upon the state. The Roe decision protected women from government intervention before the fetus was vaible but now that Roe is gone that does not mean the inverse is true.
Yes - but let’s not use this instance as “abortion” story. This story can also be used by anti-abortion people to show how abortion is about killing babies.
In short, if you ask any nurse or doctor they will tell you that rules are to try to save any baby which is more than 22 weeks.
In short, if you ask any nurse or doctor they will tell you that rules are to try to save any baby which is more than 22 weeks.
Or Hatebook could decide that this law is unjust and block all users from Nebraska from accessing their platform as a protest. This would do more to get the law changed than a letter writing campaign, etc. Twitter and the other social platforms could follow suit. And sure the company has a responsibility to share holders but that shouldn't override all else. A stance of "we don't want to get involved in politics" is a political statement in and of itself and these companies donate millions to campaigns. Look at all the CA stuff that got abused in a previous election.
Or they can say that "they are just following the law" while they collect all the ad $$$. They have the power to morally affect this issue. They can very trivially put out a statement that they will no longer continue operate in states and countries that violate the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But we see the big players chasing money over humanity and democracy and even decency. And it isn't just Hatebook, look at the concessions Apple and Google and others have made to get access to markets in China and other totalitarian regimes.
Or they can say that "they are just following the law" while they collect all the ad $$$. They have the power to morally affect this issue. They can very trivially put out a statement that they will no longer continue operate in states and countries that violate the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But we see the big players chasing money over humanity and democracy and even decency. And it isn't just Hatebook, look at the concessions Apple and Google and others have made to get access to markets in China and other totalitarian regimes.
Everybody seems to be reading and answering this from the assumption that the writer of this article wants you to believe Facebook is bad for complying with this warrant, but I can't see where that is the case. I read the article and she's just reporting what happened. There is no statement saying this is bad, anyone should be outraged, or that they should ignore and/or break laws. Presumably, part of the reason for writing articles like this is just to inform people who might think of breaking the law not to engage in their conspiracies to break laws using Facebook private messages as the communications medium. Drug dealers and terrorists are well aware by now, but people who weren't breaking the law a few weeks ago need to know.
>this article wants you to believe Facebook is bad for complying with this warrant, but I can't see where that is the case.
That's probably due the headline missing vital context that turns this from arguments on backdoors(a topic FB has often got into trouble with) to one of "can you issue search warrants on digital media?"
But I understand writers don't often write the headline in larger publications. Maybe the writer wanted to be impartial but some higher power wanted to maximize engagement
That's probably due the headline missing vital context that turns this from arguments on backdoors(a topic FB has often got into trouble with) to one of "can you issue search warrants on digital media?"
But I understand writers don't often write the headline in larger publications. Maybe the writer wanted to be impartial but some higher power wanted to maximize engagement
> Should companies disobey the law by refusing to comply with a valid search warrant from a state government in the United States?
a) Yes, they should
b) At minimum they should fight the warrant and advocate for their users
c) They should protect that data such that they can't turn it over
a) Yes, they should
b) At minimum they should fight the warrant and advocate for their users
c) They should protect that data such that they can't turn it over
It's ok to break some laws and not others. Breaking the law, and following the litigation to have the law struck down through courts is part of the rule of law.
That mechanism is built into the system, just as much as democratic change is
That mechanism is built into the system, just as much as democratic change is
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Facebook shouldn't have had access to this access this data in the first place. Sure, they have to (within some framework) cooperate with law enforcement, but their entire platform is optimized to be a data vacuum for advertising from the jump. The fact that mass surveillance for the state is a side effect is just piling unacceptable effect onto unacceptable cause. Fuck facebook all day long.
We would expect individuals to disobey fugitive slave laws and refuse to return slaves to bondage. We also would expect people not to turn in jews in nazi occupied states.
It is curious if we were to expect civil disobedience by individuals risking everything but also expect companies who risk little to turn in little Anne Frank at the first opportunity without even diminishing our respect.
It is curious if we were to expect civil disobedience by individuals risking everything but also expect companies who risk little to turn in little Anne Frank at the first opportunity without even diminishing our respect.
Yes companies and people should disobey the law more often, we should all strive to minimize the effects of government control and coercion enabling us to lead our lives as we see fit for the short time we're on earth.
For me, I'm happy Uber is around today, most likely because the flouted the law. Win/Win for me and them IMO.
For me, I'm happy Uber is around today, most likely because the flouted the law. Win/Win for me and them IMO.
You do realize your cheap transportation is partially built on the backs of hundreds of rape cases,[1] right?
1. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-62158976
1. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-62158976
We live in a culture saturated with rape.
In which "justifying rape" is only recently (I am getting old. Last decades) gone out of fashion.
Some call it a "rape culture", with some justification.
Uber is a part of that culture, and it is an open question just where on the spectrum of "angelic operator" to "dangerous predation" they lie. But the claim: "cheap transportation is partially built on the backs of hundreds of rape cases" is only true because of "partially". I think it is a weak claim.
In which "justifying rape" is only recently (I am getting old. Last decades) gone out of fashion.
Some call it a "rape culture", with some justification.
Uber is a part of that culture, and it is an open question just where on the spectrum of "angelic operator" to "dangerous predation" they lie. But the claim: "cheap transportation is partially built on the backs of hundreds of rape cases" is only true because of "partially". I think it is a weak claim.
I'm not really sure I agree Uber was "built" by cab drivers, but for the sake of argument, sure, but what's the alternative? The subway has way more crime.
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Facebook selectively complies in what could charitably be viewed as a profit-focused strategy and less charitably as nakedly partisan. Case in point, ongoing violation of Washington State campaign finance laws.
> Should companies disobey the law by refusing to comply with a valid search warrant from a state government in the United States?
Yes
Yes
Hopefully we can see blue states pass abortion bounty bounty laws, where anyone aiding and abetting this sort of behavior is at least civilly, but maybe even criminally liable.
Texas let the genie out of the bottle, and you can't put it back in.
Texas let the genie out of the bottle, and you can't put it back in.
Texas has a bounty on people helping residents across the boarder to seek care AFAICT - that's an action that happens within the state. Passing a law restricting actions in another state is either 1) super illegal or 2) creates a really awful situation legally in the states.
If Texas can say "Hey, Massachusetts, it's illegal for teachers in your state to teach evolution" then we've essentially destroyed any ability to have laws in the US.
If Texas can say "Hey, Massachusetts, it's illegal for teachers in your state to teach evolution" then we've essentially destroyed any ability to have laws in the US.
Facebook's data centers and personnel might well be located within the jurisdiction of a blue state. Perhaps this will incentivize it to not retain this information, so that it can't be requested by hostile law enforcement or authoritarian regimes.
> creates a really awful situation legally in the states.
You are correct, it's a pretty awful situation, but it's one that we currently live in.
Also, it's rather common for sovereign states to sanction people for committing crimes in other jurisdictions. Meng Wanzhou was arrested for breaking US laws regarding trade with Iran in China.
> creates a really awful situation legally in the states.
You are correct, it's a pretty awful situation, but it's one that we currently live in.
Also, it's rather common for sovereign states to sanction people for committing crimes in other jurisdictions. Meng Wanzhou was arrested for breaking US laws regarding trade with Iran in China.
Well, also this:
"Still, Meta has remained largely silent on how it will moderate abortion content in general. However, users recently noticed that Instagram and Facebook posts about acquiring abortion pills such as mifepristone were being systematically removed. At the same time, Meta continued to earn revenue from anti-abortion advertisements containing dangerous misinformation, Media Matters found. An investigation by the Markup discovered that Facebook was collecting data from users interacting with abortion services websites, and subequently made that information available to anti-abortion groups."
"Still, Meta has remained largely silent on how it will moderate abortion content in general. However, users recently noticed that Instagram and Facebook posts about acquiring abortion pills such as mifepristone were being systematically removed. At the same time, Meta continued to earn revenue from anti-abortion advertisements containing dangerous misinformation, Media Matters found. An investigation by the Markup discovered that Facebook was collecting data from users interacting with abortion services websites, and subequently made that information available to anti-abortion groups."
They have to comply with the law, and there's nothing wrong with anti-abortion ads. Facebook doesn't have an obligation to only sell ads to Democrats.
> subequently made that information available to anti-abortion groups
That part is probably misleading, I'm assuming they didn't give them any kind of information, they just allowed demographic targeting like they do for most kinds of ads.
> subequently made that information available to anti-abortion groups
That part is probably misleading, I'm assuming they didn't give them any kind of information, they just allowed demographic targeting like they do for most kinds of ads.
But there's also no law against posts providing information on "acquiring abortion pills such as mifepristone"; Facebook is choosing to remove such posts.
There's also no law restricting guides on how to turn any rifle into an automatic machine gun... but Facebook chooses to remove those too.
There is no equating healthcare to gun rights - one of these is used to make lives better and the other is used to destroy them.
I'm 100% pro-abortion-rights but I can still accept that abortion is an act of destroying a life. Even in the case of taking abortion pills. But obviously most of us consider there to be a huge difference in ethical significance between destroying the life of an embryo and that of a fully grown independent human.
I think this is the tragedy of America - in Canada abortion is enshrined as a human right that helps to protect the lives of young people who have made a mistake instead of dooming them to a life of misery (and their future children with them).
Only in America has the continuous rhetoric actually forced the idea that abortions are murder out of the fringe crowd and into the common understanding. That is truly sad.
Only in America has the continuous rhetoric actually forced the idea that abortions are murder out of the fringe crowd and into the common understanding. That is truly sad.
Canada sends people to the US for abortions:
https://globalnews.ca/news/7868372/coronavirus-covid-pandemi...
Canada's abortion laws are more restrictive than what was under Casey.
https://globalnews.ca/news/7868372/coronavirus-covid-pandemi...
Canada's abortion laws are more restrictive than what was under Casey.
No more than excising a cancer is, before the age of viability. Early on, it's just cells.
I don't think cancer qualifies as "a life" at all sorry.
Taking anti-biotics to kill a bacterial infection might be a better comparison.
Cancers don't become cooing babies if left alone to grow.
Even if you are pro-choice, comparing an unborn child to a disease that kills millions is a poor move.
Even if you are pro-choice, comparing an unborn child to a disease that kills millions is a poor move.
It's part of the rhetoric--the rationalization.
Later on, it's also just cells. That kind of naive reductionism leads us to reducing a human being to cancer.
I don't think he's equating them as identical situations. He's using analogy to explain that Facebook's acceptable ad policies are not exactly the same as US law - and that Facebook doesn't get selective solely in the area of abortion.
I don't think a comparison between an abortion pill that terminates fetuses and a firearm are that different. Both can be used for good or bad.
Not explicitly, but there are laws against providing illicit access to abortion, and this can be reasonably interpreted as such.
That's called "misinformation" now. If you disagree, join the club.
Facebook could have legally gone to court to block this.
That wouldn’t be breaking the law. It would actually be following the law.
That wouldn’t be breaking the law. It would actually be following the law.
They could have tried -- and how do you know they did not?
Even if they tried, they could have still been required to turn over the data.
Even if they tried, they could have still been required to turn over the data.
No they could have won, at the very least this would go to the SC over if they have the right to subpoena over a crime outside the state, that isn't illegal in that state.
> if they have the right to subpoena over a crime outside the state, that isn't illegal in that state
Yes. This goes back to the fugitive slave act days.
That said, they should have fought. They should always fight. There might be novel case law. And it sets the right precedent.
Shameful.
Yes. This goes back to the fugitive slave act days.
That said, they should have fought. They should always fight. There might be novel case law. And it sets the right precedent.
Shameful.
As we have learned, laws don't mean what they used to, just takes a judge changing it when you appeal.
What you're describing is a common law system, which is basically what the US has[1].
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_law
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_law
Ya that is my point :)
I would like to see FB challenge it and get a ruling.
I would like to see FB challenge it and get a ruling.
> at the very least this would go to the SC
Supreme Court chooses what cases to look at.
And since it has swung to being much more conservative are more interested in cases which reinforce the originalism doctrine for interpreting the constitution.
Supreme Court chooses what cases to look at.
And since it has swung to being much more conservative are more interested in cases which reinforce the originalism doctrine for interpreting the constitution.
Yes, companies definitely should disobey the law by refusing to comply with a valid search warrant in cases where someone is being prosecuted for having an abortion. Obeying the law in this case is clearly immoral!
There is nothing unreasonable or illogical about believing that it is okay for companies to break some laws but not others. You can come to that conclusion in at least two perfectly reasonable ways: you can believe that breaking laws is not in itself a bad thing (but that actions that break some law may be bad for some other reason, such as harming people), or that it is a bad thing but in some cases the lesser of two evils.
However, in practice it may be difficult for a company to organize such disobedience, particularly since, for example, Facebook cannot avoid hiring employees from religious groups who are in favor of these laws. So, a more practical approach is to avoid being in the position of surveilling people's private communications in the first place, so that no employees at the company have access to the information the police seek. End-to-end encryption is a crucial structural protection against this kind of pervasive surveillance, because it prevents intermediaries from having the private information in the first place. Pseudonymity is another one: the teenager should never have given Facebook her legal name, but unfortunately Facebook has extensive policies in place to extort legal names from its users, making them vulnerable to such abuses.
Of course talking about encryption always brings out the knuckledraggers who link to XKCD 538 and talk about hitting people with $5 wrenches. Hopefully this example clarifies why encryption sometimes defeats a $5 wrench: neither the Nebraska teenager nor the Facebook employees were ever at risk of being beaten with a wrench in this case.
There is nothing unreasonable or illogical about believing that it is okay for companies to break some laws but not others. You can come to that conclusion in at least two perfectly reasonable ways: you can believe that breaking laws is not in itself a bad thing (but that actions that break some law may be bad for some other reason, such as harming people), or that it is a bad thing but in some cases the lesser of two evils.
However, in practice it may be difficult for a company to organize such disobedience, particularly since, for example, Facebook cannot avoid hiring employees from religious groups who are in favor of these laws. So, a more practical approach is to avoid being in the position of surveilling people's private communications in the first place, so that no employees at the company have access to the information the police seek. End-to-end encryption is a crucial structural protection against this kind of pervasive surveillance, because it prevents intermediaries from having the private information in the first place. Pseudonymity is another one: the teenager should never have given Facebook her legal name, but unfortunately Facebook has extensive policies in place to extort legal names from its users, making them vulnerable to such abuses.
Of course talking about encryption always brings out the knuckledraggers who link to XKCD 538 and talk about hitting people with $5 wrenches. Hopefully this example clarifies why encryption sometimes defeats a $5 wrench: neither the Nebraska teenager nor the Facebook employees were ever at risk of being beaten with a wrench in this case.
> Obeying the law in this case is clearly immoral
Everyone has different morals. That's why laws exist.
Everyone has different morals. That's why laws exist.
People have different beliefs about many different things, not just morals. For example, some people believe that the Earth was created 6000 years ago. I'm not claiming my beliefs are infallible, just explaining what they are and, in some cases, why I hold them.
It's difficult to tell from your one-line comment, but it sounds like one of your beliefs is moral relativism: that there is no objective reality of what is good and bad, only "different morals" held by different people. That belief is false.*
Laws exist only in the same sense that Zeus or Santa Claus exists, which I think is the sense you believe that morals exist: they are collections of ideas that are passed from mind to mind, but there is no sense in which it can be objectively true or false to say, "The law forbids [such and such]." There is only, at best, a social consensus.
______
* Of course, my belief that goodness and badness exist objectively is fallible, but even if it is as incorrect as the belief that the Earth was created 6000 years ago, its veracity is still an objective question; it could be true, false, or partly true, but not meaningless.
It's difficult to tell from your one-line comment, but it sounds like one of your beliefs is moral relativism: that there is no objective reality of what is good and bad, only "different morals" held by different people. That belief is false.*
Laws exist only in the same sense that Zeus or Santa Claus exists, which I think is the sense you believe that morals exist: they are collections of ideas that are passed from mind to mind, but there is no sense in which it can be objectively true or false to say, "The law forbids [such and such]." There is only, at best, a social consensus.
______
* Of course, my belief that goodness and badness exist objectively is fallible, but even if it is as incorrect as the belief that the Earth was created 6000 years ago, its veracity is still an objective question; it could be true, false, or partly true, but not meaningless.
The law has more existence than Santa Clause
Mere assertion does not constitute an argument.
It is unfortunate that you think you are contributing to the conversation by posting a one-line statement that simply repeats conventional beliefs.
What evidences can you give for the existence of the law that cannot also be given for Santa Claus? Or could not be given for Zeus, if we were in Classical Greece?
It is unfortunate that you think you are contributing to the conversation by posting a one-line statement that simply repeats conventional beliefs.
What evidences can you give for the existence of the law that cannot also be given for Santa Claus? Or could not be given for Zeus, if we were in Classical Greece?
Doe it matter? It is obvious.
But for the fun of it:
The law is written down, codified in a formal way that is consistent across writing.
The law is backed up by police thugs.
The law has formal processes of creation and destruction.
Santa Claus has none of these things.
But for the fun of it:
The law is written down, codified in a formal way that is consistent across writing.
The law is backed up by police thugs.
The law has formal processes of creation and destruction.
Santa Claus has none of these things.
The law is immoral according to many of us and people will be breaking it.
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Facebook could have refused on the grounds that they aren't based out Nebraska and not subject to their jurisdiction. They could have used some of their extensive legal budget to challenge the warrant on those grounds.
> grounds that they aren't based out Nebraska and not subject to their jurisdiction
This isn’t how jurisdiction works. Facebook had a customer in Nebraska who allegedly did a crime in Nebraska under Nebraska law. That creates a legal nexus for them there.
This isn’t how jurisdiction works. Facebook had a customer in Nebraska who allegedly did a crime in Nebraska under Nebraska law. That creates a legal nexus for them there.
Facebook almost surely does have a jurisdictional nexus in Nebraska, but not merely because they have a customer there.
One can argue that Facebook users aren't customers either.
That's the only interesting point in this thread. "We don't have any advertisers from Nebraska so no customers" would be an interesting case.
Not only is it not sufficient to have customers in a jurisdiction to have a jurisdictional nexus there, it also is not necessary.
Operating a telecommunications service doesn't automatically make you subject to every state's jurisdiction. Interstate communication is subject to federal control. States can't willy-nilly act like they can reach outside their boundaries.
For "telecommunications services" in the US I think having customers in a state is sufficient to establish nexus: https://www.avalara.com/blog/en/north-america/2016/01/commun...
But it's debatable whether Facebook Messenger is a "telecommunications service" under US law.
But it's debatable whether Facebook Messenger is a "telecommunications service" under US law.
This is a good point.
They don't want to establish a history of noncompliance with the big dogs.
This thread is disgusting. All these men making excuses for why the state should investigate a 17 year old for a miscarriage.
It's not your fucking business. It's a private health matter. Period. You don't get to go on a fishing expedition "to get to the bottom" of anything after the fact with zero evidence of any wrong doing.
It's not your fucking business. It's a private health matter. Period. You don't get to go on a fishing expedition "to get to the bottom" of anything after the fact with zero evidence of any wrong doing.
The state should not.
Facebook should have fought the search warrant if it, say, wanted to hold on to its most valuable demographic.
But the amount that you can be outraged at Facebook for complying with a court order is limited, rule of law (and not just rule of your opinion on what the law should be) is important. You definitely don't want people who have opposite opinions to be making up what they think the law should be.
Facebook should have fought the search warrant if it, say, wanted to hold on to its most valuable demographic.
But the amount that you can be outraged at Facebook for complying with a court order is limited, rule of law (and not just rule of your opinion on what the law should be) is important. You definitely don't want people who have opposite opinions to be making up what they think the law should be.
I don't think I'm anywhere near my limit with regards to outrage towards Facebook. Facebook should have protected that data better, Facebook should have fought the warrant, and yeah I'm fine with Facebook refusing to hand over the data and going to court over it.
I believe that companies should be zealous advocates for their users, just as lawyers are for their clients. Facebook was not any kind of advocate here.
I believe that companies should be zealous advocates for their users, just as lawyers are for their clients. Facebook was not any kind of advocate here.
Making excuses for the state or making excuses for Facebook? Because I will apologize for Facebook in this case all day long. Not because I think their motives are pure. But because they are behaving exactly as the system incentivizes them. And to me, this is the most clear example of why Roe was a good precedent. Because a big part of laws is how they are enforced and there was a for some time a pro-democracy court which believed this was relevant. And now there is a legal absolutist court which believes that the letter of law is imporant and how a law is enforced can be regarded free of context at another time. But the tools of the state are blunt and this can be reason as much as justice for choosing what is and is not a crime. And to blame Facebook in this case rather than to accept that the consequence of laws is state violence is a way of deceiving oneself.
Facebook lied about privacy.
Corporations are amoral constructs. The expectation that they will behave morally and that they therefore deserve moral reciprocity is the greatest mass deception of our time.
You have one legal mechanism for enforcing good behavior upon capital, democracy.
You have one legal mechanism for enforcing good behavior upon capital, democracy.
Those who populate, benefit from, and speak for corporations are human. I do expect humans to behave with morals—it’s what separates us from animals.
And yet we find that they so seldom do. Again and again the people must use the law to
-stop them from poisoning people
-stop them from lying to people
-stop them from endangering workers
-stop them from endangering their customers
-stop them from exploiting ecosystems unto failure
-stop them from manipulating workers
-stop them from extorting workers
-stop them from enslaving people
-stop them from poisoning people
-stop them from lying to people
-stop them from endangering workers
-stop them from endangering their customers
-stop them from exploiting ecosystems unto failure
-stop them from manipulating workers
-stop them from extorting workers
-stop them from enslaving people
> Corporations are amoral constructs.
Such nonsense. Corporations are a legal entity, they exist on paper. Facebook is people. People make decisions. People are not amoral.
Such nonsense. Corporations are a legal entity, they exist on paper. Facebook is people. People make decisions. People are not amoral.
There are countless examples of individuals placing the welfare of the corporation above their own personal morality. The same happens within the armed forces, the police, governments, religious institutions, etc.
If you think there is sufficient historical precedent to believe that shaming corporations into good behavior is an effective long term way to protect individuals then we simply disagree. I think you're wrong and believe that law is the only mechanism to ensure their behavior is pro-social.
To me, complaining about the bad behavior of capital is like being angry at the sun for burning you. IMO, you're only real option is to protect yourself.
If you think there is sufficient historical precedent to believe that shaming corporations into good behavior is an effective long term way to protect individuals then we simply disagree. I think you're wrong and believe that law is the only mechanism to ensure their behavior is pro-social.
To me, complaining about the bad behavior of capital is like being angry at the sun for burning you. IMO, you're only real option is to protect yourself.
> It's a private health matter. Period.
Up to what point? Are you saying that someone should be allowed to abort their baby one day before it would be born on its own? That would actually be a pretty extreme opinion, and would put you in a fairly small minority. Most people recognize that somewhere along the line a fetus becomes a child with a set of basic human rights just like the rest of us. The definition of that point is the entire reason we argue incessantly about it.
Up to what point? Are you saying that someone should be allowed to abort their baby one day before it would be born on its own? That would actually be a pretty extreme opinion, and would put you in a fairly small minority. Most people recognize that somewhere along the line a fetus becomes a child with a set of basic human rights just like the rest of us. The definition of that point is the entire reason we argue incessantly about it.
And yet this happens naturally all the time and we don't investigate every single case because it's..... A private health matter.
No matter how many times I say this someone always jumps in with "what about". Let me stop you right there. It's not your business. It's a private health matter. Period.
There's a reason we don't count unborn fetuses until they are actually born as people. Mainly the fact that so much can go wrong between those two points in time.
No matter how many times I say this someone always jumps in with "what about". Let me stop you right there. It's not your business. It's a private health matter. Period.
There's a reason we don't count unborn fetuses until they are actually born as people. Mainly the fact that so much can go wrong between those two points in time.
What does whether it is investigated or not have to do with whether it is morally or legally right? A lot of rapes don't get investigated, I guess that is just a private matter too.
> Let me stop you right there. It's not your business. It's a private health matter. Period
That's literally the heart of the discussion. A lot of people don't view it to be a private health manner if you kill a fetus that would be perfectly fine on the outside world, but just hasn't made that transition yet. You're just saying "Stop talking. I'm right". Good for you in having confidence in your convictions I guess, but don't expect to convince anyone.
> There's a reason we don't count unborn fetuses until they are actually born as people. Mainly the fact that so much can go wrong between those two points in time.
Yes, and already born humans can die from natural or unnatural causes. The system is fairly good at detecting if someone died from natural or unnatural causes though, and then looking into the unnatural causes a bit deeper if it seems appropriate. How would you be able to tell if this woman (1) had an abortion(natural or unnatural), and then burned the body and buried her, or (2) gave birth at 6 months to a viable baby, and then killed her shortly after it was born?
> Let me stop you right there. It's not your business. It's a private health matter. Period
That's literally the heart of the discussion. A lot of people don't view it to be a private health manner if you kill a fetus that would be perfectly fine on the outside world, but just hasn't made that transition yet. You're just saying "Stop talking. I'm right". Good for you in having confidence in your convictions I guess, but don't expect to convince anyone.
> There's a reason we don't count unborn fetuses until they are actually born as people. Mainly the fact that so much can go wrong between those two points in time.
Yes, and already born humans can die from natural or unnatural causes. The system is fairly good at detecting if someone died from natural or unnatural causes though, and then looking into the unnatural causes a bit deeper if it seems appropriate. How would you be able to tell if this woman (1) had an abortion(natural or unnatural), and then burned the body and buried her, or (2) gave birth at 6 months to a viable baby, and then killed her shortly after it was born?
To me this is no more disgusting than whatever happens in China or the Islamist world. Very few here lives in a place where abortion is banned (abortion is legal in most of USA as well) so not sure why it is such a huge deal compared to all other shit that happens in the world. If you want this to change then vote for it to change, don't pressure Facebook to change it, encouraging companies to break laws isn't a good thing.
There are legal means for resisting a search warrant which a company responsible for so much personal information would hopefully pursue based on the merits and contents of a search warrant.
Plenty of silicon valley companies resist laws with much larger consequences freely and mostly with impunity.
Some of the same people will be saying uber was a hero for breaking taxi laws around the world (more before it became fashionable to hate uber)
Plenty of silicon valley companies resist laws with much larger consequences freely and mostly with impunity.
Some of the same people will be saying uber was a hero for breaking taxi laws around the world (more before it became fashionable to hate uber)
How do you know a company resisted a search warrant? Or, how do you know Facebook didn't already do what they could here?
I mean, they could just refuse and get held in contempt.
It's not like a Nebraska sheriff can hop over to California or wherever Facebook data centers are and start seizing computers until they found this girl's messages (so much of that process would be absurd).
Just look to Trump to observe what obstructing a court order looks like.
I am not, of course, a corporate lawyer. One would know appropriate procedures to delaying, opposing, or otherwise objecting and appealing an order like this.
But it's Facebook. A half a trillion dollar company can resist an overzealous prosecutor going after a single teenager by just ignoring it and ignoring the consequences of ignoring it. It is approximately equivalent to a billionare not paying a parking meter. Sure, they "have to", but nothing of consequence actually happens if they don't.
It's not like a Nebraska sheriff can hop over to California or wherever Facebook data centers are and start seizing computers until they found this girl's messages (so much of that process would be absurd).
Just look to Trump to observe what obstructing a court order looks like.
I am not, of course, a corporate lawyer. One would know appropriate procedures to delaying, opposing, or otherwise objecting and appealing an order like this.
But it's Facebook. A half a trillion dollar company can resist an overzealous prosecutor going after a single teenager by just ignoring it and ignoring the consequences of ignoring it. It is approximately equivalent to a billionare not paying a parking meter. Sure, they "have to", but nothing of consequence actually happens if they don't.
That's a really low bar.
No, it is a reasonable bar. People say that different states in the US are like different countries, if that was the case why are people so outraged that this happened to a girl in a different country? It isn't like I am outraged that abortion is illegal in Poland, but I would be outraged if they banned abortion in my country.
Different states are not different countries, and, if I may be so bold, the U.S. should be held to a higher standard than theocratic states or dictatorships.
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If it involves the legal or political system, it's all of our business, at least within whatever jurisdiction we're talking about. There aren't subjects only women get to talk about and vote on and only men get to talk about and vote on. If we vote on it (or the people who will) - we ALL get an opinion and a voice and a vote. It would also probably be good to not assume everyone's comment who you disagree with are "men."
No. Women have the right to bodily autonomy. I don't care what the "law" says. The world is full of unjust laws of men.
It's pretty clearly mostly men making these comments cause there's a distinct lack of awareness about how female anatomy actually works.
It's pretty clearly mostly men making these comments cause there's a distinct lack of awareness about how female anatomy actually works.
I understand "bodily autonomy" is a pretty popular buzz phrase, but does it actually exist? There are plenty of procedures you can't just go in and ask that they perform, and plenty of medical procedures you would be denied unless you met their criteria. If we truly had bodily autonomy, we'd be able to get whatever procedure we wanted done.
I asked this elsewhere, but I'll ask the same question to you: Do you think it is a private health matter to abort a fetus after 40 weeks of gestation, that is 100% normal, 100% viable, and poses no abnormal risk to the mother?
Do you think parents should be forced by law to donate their organs for transplant when necessary to save their kids? Because it's the exact same situation.
No, it clearly isn't.
There is no taking of organs. It would be merely removing the parasite from the body of the host.
And from a practical perspective, how exactly are you getting rid of a 40 week old fetus? You need to effectively give birth to get rid of it, regardless of whether you kill it or let it live.
There is no taking of organs. It would be merely removing the parasite from the body of the host.
And from a practical perspective, how exactly are you getting rid of a 40 week old fetus? You need to effectively give birth to get rid of it, regardless of whether you kill it or let it live.
From an ethical perspective there's no difference between forcing someone to donate their body to a fetus and a transplant - both are violations of bodily autonomy.
Bodily autonomy doesn't exist, I'm not sure where this idea has come from. If it did exist, prisons wouldn't exist because they are fairly clearly a violation of bodily autonomy.
“Life from birth” doesn’t exist, but we know well where that fringe theory originated.
Bodily autonomy is one of the fundamental human rights: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodily_integrity
Bodily autonomy is one of the fundamental human rights: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodily_integrity
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> All these men making excuses for why the state should investigate a 17 year old for a miscarriage.
I'm very curious to know what the percentage of those people self-identify as libertarians and have "don't tread on me" decals on their vehicles.
I'm very curious to know what the percentage of those people self-identify as libertarians and have "don't tread on me" decals on their vehicles.
Exactly. Demanding that Facebook upend the law for personal benefit has never been a real political position. It's just animals making a mess all over the democratic system.
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Agreed on your points but less sexism please.
The really important part is: when you decide to break an unjust law, don't talk about it on surveilled platforms, they're complicit and will hand your ass in. Don't bring your smartphone with you either.
Edit: yes I understand the laws themselves are sexist, but HN users didn't write the laws, and the "all you men" fingerpointing isn't really productive. Why the men here? You have much easier and more significant targets than male HN users.
I just want to say for the record that this comment briefly had a positive score before I got dogpiled.
The really important part is: when you decide to break an unjust law, don't talk about it on surveilled platforms, they're complicit and will hand your ass in. Don't bring your smartphone with you either.
Edit: yes I understand the laws themselves are sexist, but HN users didn't write the laws, and the "all you men" fingerpointing isn't really productive. Why the men here? You have much easier and more significant targets than male HN users.
I just want to say for the record that this comment briefly had a positive score before I got dogpiled.
Parent is calling it out, not doing it themselves. The topic itself is deeply rooted in sexism. These kinds of transgressions against women often get drowned in debates about technicalities, which end up dominating the conversation and shifting attention away from the real problem - in this case bodily autonomy.
So I for one actually applaud parent for calling it out.
So I for one actually applaud parent for calling it out.
Sure, keeping sensitive conversations off of un-surveilled systems is easy for an informed person to say but most people have no clue how much surveillance actually happens. The battle to get people to chose to use the correct tools has been lost. The only course of action here to to fight and push for privacy rights.
not sure it's realistic to expect children to have the opsec of a tech worker
Sexism is unfortunately a key component of this discussion. Anti-abortion laws are focused on controlling a woman's body.
I do agree that it's more productive when the conversation is civil and polite - but sexism is firmly in the middle of this particular topic.
I do agree that it's more productive when the conversation is civil and polite - but sexism is firmly in the middle of this particular topic.
How is this about controlling a woman's body? It is the question of what life is and when is it okay to end it. I think abortions should be legal, however, whether you are a male or a female does not make your opinion more valid. Unless you think there is a difference between a baby inside of a woman and a baby outside of her.
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Imagine if the case was against a rapist, child abuser, or insurrectionist.
Because there isn’t a huge difference when it comes to complying with subpoenas.
FB learned a long time ago that defending unpopular criminals’ communications isn’t worth the political cost.
Because there isn’t a huge difference when it comes to complying with subpoenas.
FB learned a long time ago that defending unpopular criminals’ communications isn’t worth the political cost.
The current Supreme has engaged in historical revisionism to reach its anti-abortion stance (eg abortion was perfectly legal 200 years ago, so much so that Ben franklin published at-home instructions for performing an abortion [1]). At the time of the ruling, it was pointed out that these draconian laws that half the states had passed or were passing wouldn't stop abortion, they would simply stop safe abortions. This case is evidence of that.
Some might choose to focus on why the defendant chose to get an abortion. I don't see any details of that here. Personally, I don't care. If she wants one, she should be able to get one.
Investigating this case at all is both unexpected and psychotic. Trying her as an adult is the next level of psychotic.
That all aside, as for Facebook, again this is light on detail regarding the cooperation given. Did they fight the subpoena? Did they have any grounds to? What steps were made to protect that user's privacy? We simply don't know.
As an aside, it seems like you have better privacy by using regular SMS than any form of IM. Law enforcement can get metadata but that's not so useful. Getting the actual messages from any IM service seems to be much easier. Perhaps WhatsApp would be better? I don't know how accessible WA messages currently are.
As for Facebook removing posts supplying at-home abortion medication, here I'm somewhat sympathetic just because Facebook does have to follow the law (even if that law is psychotic and unjustifiable). It's no different to supplying medical marijuana to people in places where it's illegal. Or supplying much cheaper medications from Canada or Mexico. These are all technically illegal so any company is going to have to try and enforce that.
Remember the political forces behind this under the guise of being "pro-life" go to every effort to restrict access to affordable medical care, recently voted against child tax credit (in the IRA) and fight efforts to allow people to fight a living wage.
[1]: https://www.npr.org/2022/05/18/1099542962/abortion-ben-frank...
Some might choose to focus on why the defendant chose to get an abortion. I don't see any details of that here. Personally, I don't care. If she wants one, she should be able to get one.
Investigating this case at all is both unexpected and psychotic. Trying her as an adult is the next level of psychotic.
That all aside, as for Facebook, again this is light on detail regarding the cooperation given. Did they fight the subpoena? Did they have any grounds to? What steps were made to protect that user's privacy? We simply don't know.
As an aside, it seems like you have better privacy by using regular SMS than any form of IM. Law enforcement can get metadata but that's not so useful. Getting the actual messages from any IM service seems to be much easier. Perhaps WhatsApp would be better? I don't know how accessible WA messages currently are.
As for Facebook removing posts supplying at-home abortion medication, here I'm somewhat sympathetic just because Facebook does have to follow the law (even if that law is psychotic and unjustifiable). It's no different to supplying medical marijuana to people in places where it's illegal. Or supplying much cheaper medications from Canada or Mexico. These are all technically illegal so any company is going to have to try and enforce that.
Remember the political forces behind this under the guise of being "pro-life" go to every effort to restrict access to affordable medical care, recently voted against child tax credit (in the IRA) and fight efforts to allow people to fight a living wage.
[1]: https://www.npr.org/2022/05/18/1099542962/abortion-ben-frank...
What Ben Franklin wrote is completely orthogonal to the legality of abortion. It was a States' rights issue until Roe v. Wade, and now it's a States' rights issue again. There was no single "law" or "right" that ever said abortion was legal, even in the case of Roe v. Wade, which is now considered a flawed ruling.
[1]: https://krebsonsecurity.com/2022/03/hackers-gaining-power-of...