Boing Boing » authoritarianism

Former Tory mayor admits to beating up woman who videod him parking illegally

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 06 May 2013 00:55:15 +0000

Brian Coleman, a former Conservative mayor and concillor has admitted to assaulting a constituent who was video-recording him while he parked illegally to use an ATM. Coleman had been unpopular for passing strict parking rules, and the woman whom he assaulted was a local parking campaigner.

Coleman, of Essex Road in Finchley, was ordered to pay £1,385, including a £270 fine, prosecution costs of £850 and £250 to the victim as compensation.
Ms Michael, 50, a mother-of-two, who suffered injuries including scratches to her wrist and soreness to her shoulder and chest, called on Coleman to resign.
She said: "[I was] looking at my phone and all of a sudden he's upon me, it was pure shock.
"I think he's bullied and intimidated people for a long long time and I think he has now got what has been long overdue."

Barnet Councillor Brian Coleman admits parking row attack [BBC]

12-year-old calls out cop for illegal parking, cop refuses to provide badge number

Cory Doctorow — Sun, 05 May 2013 16:15:27 +0000

In this short video, a young man who identifies himself as a 12-year-old named Jeremy approaches a Las Vegas Metro motorcycle cop who has illegally parked his motorcycle on a sidewalk, apparently in order to get a soft drink. The young man politely asks the cop if he had any emergency reason to park, and then requests his badge number. The cop refuses to answer either question, and asks Jeremy if he is a lawyer. Jeremy avows again that he is a 12-year-old, and reiterates his request for a badge number. The cop continues to refuse, and eventually drives off. Perhaps the officer can be identified through this footage and reported to a superior who can work with him to correct his misunderstandings about his relationship to the law and his obligations to the public.

Cop called out by a 12 year old for illegally parking his motorcycle. Refuses to give his badge number. (youtube.com)

UK ISPs betray customers, collaborate on government surveillance

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 14:00:26 +0000

Britain's Communications Data Bill -- AKA the Snooper's Charter -- would effectively eliminate private communications in the UK, giving government and the police the power to spy on virtually everything you do online (which is rapidly merging with everything you do, full stop). The major ISPs in the UK have apparently been turned to the government's cause, and have been quietly supporting the bill, which strips their customers of any semblance of privacy.

The government defends this proposal by saying that they're not intercepting "messages," only "envelopes." That is, they'll get the subject lines, social graph data, who is talking, where, how often, and who replies, how long the messages are, and so on. I like to imagine Alan Turing taking this approach to informational significance: "Mr Churchill, I'm sorry, there's no point in what you're asking us to do: all we can decode from the Nazis is who is sending messages, who receives them, what they're about, where they're sent from, how often they're sent, and how long they are. Nothing compromising." (Then I imagine the ghost of Turing haunting Home Secretary Teresa May, who claims that none of that kind of data compromises Britons' privacy).

In an open letter to the major ISPs, the Open Rights Group, Big Brother Watch, and Privacy International accuse the ISPs of entering into a conspiracy of silence on the surveillance system:

It has become clear that a critical component of the Communications Data Bill is that UK communication service providers will be required by law to create data they currently do not have any business purpose for, and store it for a period of 12 months.
Plainly, this crosses a line no democratic country has yet crossed – paying private companies to record what their customers are doing solely for the purposes of the state.
These proposals are not fit for purpose, which possibly explains why the Home Office is so keen to ensure they are not aired publicly.
There has been no public consultation, while on none of your websites is there any reference to these discussions. Meetings have been held behind closed doors as policy has been developed in secret, seemingly the same policy formulated several years ago despite widespread warnings from technical experts.
That your businesses appear willing to be co-opted as an arm of the state to monitor every single one of your customers is a dangerous step, exacerbated by your silence
Consumers are increasingly concerned about their privacy, both in terms of how much data is collected about them and how securely that data is kept. Many businesses have made a virtue of respecting consumer privacy and ensuring safe and secure internet access.
Sadly, your customers have not had the opportunity to comment on these proposals. Indeed, were it not for civil society groups and the media, they would have no idea such a policy was being considered.
We believe this is a critical failure not only of Government, but a betrayal of your customers' interests. You appear to be engaged in a conspiracy of silence with the Home Office, the only concern being whether or not you will be able to recover your costs.

ISPs In ‘Conspiracy Of Silence’ With Government On Snooper’s Charter (via ./)

San Diego cop smashes phone & beats up suspect: "Phones can be converted to a weapon. Look it up online."

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 01:07:20 +0000

A San Diego cop beat up a man whom he was ticketing for illegal smoking, after the man refused to stop video-recording the experience. The cop told the man that he feared the phone might actually be a gun disguised as a phone, before smashing the phone and tackling the man and smashing his face into the boardwalk. He was taken away in an ambulance.

It all seemed pretty civil until the cop writing the citation told him to stop recording, which Pringle refused to do.
“Phones can be converted into weapons …. look it up online,” the cop told him.
Last month, a South Florida cop confiscated a man’s phone citing the same reason, so maybe this is a new trend.
When Pringle tried to talk sense into the cop, the cop slapped the phone out of his hand where it fell onto the boardwalk and broke apart.
The other cop then pounced on him, slamming him down on the boardwalk where he ended up with a laceration on his chin.
“Blood was everywhere,” Pringle said. “I was laying on my stomach and he had one knee on my back and the other knee on the side of my face.
“They kept telling me ‘to calm down,’ that ‘you’re making this worse for yourself,’ that ‘you have no right to record us.’”

He didn't get the cop's name, and the SDPD won't give it to him.

San Diego Police Attack and Arrest Man Video Recording Them, Claiming Phone Could be a Weapon (Updated) 294 (via Techdirt)

Montreal police arrest young woman for instagramming photo of anti-police mural

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 21:57:57 +0000

Jennifer Pawluck, a 20 year old woman from Montreal, was taken into police custody yesterday and questioned after she posted a photo of a graffiti mural on her Instagram. The mural showed a caricature of a Montreal police spokesman called Cmdr. Ian Lafrenière, with a bullet hole in his head.

After she posted the image to Instagram, police came to her house and took her in for questioning, releasing her several hours later. The police say that there are secret reasons they detained her, beyond taking a picture of graffiti and posting it, but they won't say what they are.

Pawluck participated in the mass student demonstrations in Montreal and was part of the ensuing mass arrests. She will have to appear in court on April 17, and is barred from going with a kilometer of police HQ and from communicating with Cmdr Lafrenière. She has not been charged.

Lafrenière is the head of the service's communications division and frequently appeared in the media during the student protests.
Pawluck said that when the picture was taken, she didn’t know who Lafrenière was, but she found the image interesting.
Montreal police confirmed that a young woman was arrested at her home Wednesday and brought to the police station to be questioned by investigators. They did not name Pawluck.

Instagram anti-police pic sharing tied to Montrealer's arrest [CBC]

Parents in danger of having six-year-old daughter taken away for letting her walk to their local post office on her own

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 21:43:53 +0000

A reader of Free Range Kids is in danger of having his six-year-old daughter taken into protective services custody because he let her walk a few blocks to the post office in their Ohio town. The kid, Emily, asked for a little independence, and was given permission to take some unsupervised, short walks. Neighbors and cops freaked out, detained her, detained her parents, sent CPS after them, and has made their life into a nightmare -- one that's just getting worse and worse.

Day 41: We are served with a complaint alleging neglect and dependency. The County wants to take Emily into “protective supervision” or “temporary custody.” The complaint contains many factual errors and inaccuracies.
There is also a motion for “pre-dispositional interim orders.” As I understand it, this is a mechanism by which CPS can intervene even before the merits of the case against us for neglect are even heard, but less decided. It is scheduled to take place more than a month before the hearing on the neglect charge. It asks the court to force my wife and I to “allow ______ County Children Services to complete an assessment with the family. This is including allowing the agency access in the home, allowing the agency to interview the children, and participate openly in the assessment process.” In other words, they want to search our house, interrogate the children, and force us to testify.
We are trying our best to raise Emily to be responsible, curious, and capable. We have chosen to include teaching her about using the library, navigating the neighborhood, and mailing letters as elements of her homeschooling. Needless to say, this entire ordeal has been quite distressing for the entire family, and we view it as a threat to our homeschooling her, our parental rights, and both my and Emily’s civil liberties. Since our family is being threatened by legal action, I have tried to confine my comments to a dispassionate statement of known facts.

As Lenore Skenazy notes, this shouldn't deter you from letting your own kids move independently about their towns: "I am posting this story NOT because it is common and we should all worry about being hounded by CPS if we let our kids go outside. I am posting it in utter outrage at the idea that a child on her own could be considered neglected or in danger when she is so obviously, clearly, and indisputably neither."

They're looking for pro bono legal assistance.

6-y.o. Who Walked Alone to Post Office May be Removed from Her Home

EFF explains yesterday's National Security Letter ruling

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 16 Mar 2013 18:42:48 +0000

Further to Xeni's post from yesterday about the landmark ruling by a San Francisco district court judge that the FBI may not issue "national security letters" (NSLs), the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who fought the case, has posted a good explanation about what NSLs are and why they were so creepy:

The controversial NSL provisions EFF challenged on behalf of the unnamed client allow the FBI to issue administrative letters -- on its own authority and without court approval -- to telecommunications companies demanding information about their customers. The controversial provisions also permit the FBI to permanently gag service providers from revealing anything about the NSLs, including the fact that a demand was made, which prevents providers from notifying either their customers or the public. The limited judicial review provisions essentially write the courts out of the process.
In today's ruling, the court held that the gag order provisions of the statute violate the First Amendment and that the review procedures violate separation of powers. Because those provisions were not separable from the rest of the statute, the court declared the entire statute unconstitutional. In addressing the concerns of the service provider, the court noted: "Petitioner was adamant about its desire to speak publicly about the fact that it received the NSL at issue to further inform the ongoing public debate."
"The First Amendment prevents the government from silencing people and stopping them from criticizing its use of executive surveillance power," said EFF Legal Director Cindy Cohn. "The NSL statute has long been a concern of many Americans, and this small step should help restore balance between liberty and security."

I am so proud of my friends at EFF this morning. Go team!

National Security Letters Are Unconstitutional, Federal Judge Rules

How Chinese secret police talk about their jobs when they think the camera isn't rolling

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 16 Mar 2013 15:38:56 +0000

When a Sky News reporter broadcasting live from Tiananmen Square mentioned the 1989 protests, Chinese ~~secret~~ police swooped down on his and hustled him and his cameraman into the back of a van, and kidnapped them to a distant park where they were polite but Orwellian in their explanation for their deeds (they didn't realize he was still broadcasting, and thought it was all going to disc or tape whence it could be scrubbed):

At this point, the police do something Orwellian in its brilliance. An officer who speaks English informs Stone that they have to stop filming because they don’t have official permission. Stone disagrees, saying that they sought and received permission to film in Tiananmen Square. But the officer counters that they’re not in Tiananmen anymore. They’re in a park where the police have brought Stone against his will, and he doesn’t have permission to record in that park, so regrettably the police have no choice but to insist the camera be switched off. Who could have possibly foreseen that little complication?
The officer then takes the Orwellianism to the next level by explaining that Stone and his team are neither being detained nor are they free to go. They can do whatever they like, except that they must go sit in an empty classroom and wait for some unnamed officials to show up.

This reminds me of nothing so much as the DHS checkpoint officials who won't tell you if you're being detained, won't tell you if you're legally required to answer their questions about your citizenship, but also won't let you go.

Video: Chinese police detain British reporter, unaware he’s broadcasting live throughout [Max Fisher/Washington Post]

(via Reddit)

Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 21:10:54 +0000

Chloe from Portland's Reading Frenzy sez,

Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse is the a documentary about a teenage boy who finds himself through punk rock, zines, and comics and loses himself to schizophrenia. Although he was able to manage his illness with medication, live independently, and make a life for himself -- a success story within the mental health community -- his story ends in tragedy. Six years ago he was confronted and apprehended by Portland Police, tackled, beaten and tased, refused medical treatment, and ultimately died in police custody. He had committed no crime other than to run when ordered to stop.
This is an important story to our local community (Portland, Oregon) because of James' early involvement in the punk scene, the fact that he was connected to so many people who have gone on to be successful musicians (Greg Sage), artists (Mike King), writers (Monica Drake), and filmmakers (Steve Doughton), and that he was a downtown Portland fixture for decades (also a Reading Frenzy customer). But his story has broader implications around the issues of police brutality and corruption, civil rights, and mental health issues. Of course it is especially near and dear to my heart because James found a vital outlet for his ideas and creativity through zines and comics.
Brian Lindstrom is a Portland filmmaker who has a number of compelling works under his belt. Lindstrom has created a very human portrait of James Chasse, someone the police and the media thought they could sum up in a few words and dismiss. He allows everyone -- family, friends, witnesses, and experts -- to speak for themselves, while he explores every angle of James' life and death. Any attempt to reason this tragedy away or blame the victim is almost effortlessly vaporized by the truth.

Chloe adds, "Also wanted to make sure you got the link for the free download of the zine we put out a few years ago. It's a nice supplement to the film.

Alien Boy: The Life and Death of James Chasse (Thanks, Chloe!)

Texas student suspended for refusing RFID tracker

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 16:55:16 +0000

A student in San Antonio, TX, has been suspended from school for refusing wear a RFID tracking device on privacy and religious grounds (she believes the tracker is somehow related to the "Mark of the Beast"). The school's funding is based on student attendance, so they use prisoner-style trackers to follow students' movements. A judge has temporarily reversed the suspension.

The suspended student, sophomore Andrea Hernandez, was notified by the Northside Independent School District in San Antonio that she won’t be able to continue attending John Jay High School unless she wears the badge around her neck, which she has been refusing to do. The district said the girl, who objects on privacy and religious grounds, beginning Monday would have to attend another high school in the district that does not yet employ the RFID tags.
The Rutherford Institute said it would go to court and try to nullify the district’s decision. The institute said that the district’s stated purpose for the program — to enhance their coffers — is “fundamentally disturbing.”
“There is something fundamentally disturbing about this school district’s insistence on steamrolling students into complying with programs that have nothing whatsoever to do with academic priorities and everything to do with fattening school coffers,” said John Whitehead, the institute’s president.

Student Suspended for Refusing to Wear a School-Issued RFID Tracker [David Kravets/Wired]

UK surveillance bill: 19,000 letters opposing, 0 in favour

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 12 Oct 2012 19:00:50 +0000

The Snooper's Charter is Britain's pending Internet surveillance law, which requires ISPs, online services and telcoms companies to retain enormous amounts of private online transactions, and to hand them over to government and law enforcement employees without a warrant. A public campaign on the bill had 19,000 responses, every one of which opposed the legislation. 19,000 against, 0 for. The question is, will the government (which ran in part by opposing similar legislation proposed by the previous Labour government) actually pay attention? Here's Glyn Moody in Computerworld:

Got that? Out of 19,000 emails received by the Committee on the subject of the proposed Draft Communications Bill, not a single one was in favour of it, or even agreed with its premise. Has there ever been a bill so universally rejected by the public in a consultation? Clearly, it must be thrown out completely.

Snooper's Charter: 19,000 Emails Against, 0 In Favour (via /.)

Australian Attorney General says that public scrutiny of spying bill would not be in the public interest

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 15:43:12 +0000

The Australian government is following the UK, US and Canadian governments' examples and establishing a secretive, no-holds-barred snooping regime. The "data retention" bill that's been prepared by the Federal Attorney-General’s Department requires ISPs to store all communications for two years, and grants wide access to those stored records, as well as allowing snooping on residents' social networking activities. What's more, the Attorney General has denied a Freedom of Information request for a look at the draft legislation from the Pirate Party, saying that public scrutiny of spying laws is "not in the public interest" and would be prejudicial to the decision-making process.

The Pirate Party, which is an activist and political organisation which lobbies to maintain and extend Australians’ digital rights and freedoms, issued a media release this morning noting that it had filed a Freedom of Information request with the department, seeking draft national security legislation which had been prepared in 2010 with respect to the current proposal. The draft legislation had been mentioned by the Sydney Morning Herald in an article in August.
However, the Attorney-General’s Department wrote back to the organisation this week, noting that the request had been denied. Logan Tudor, a legal officer with the department, wrote that he had decided that the draft legislation was exempted from being released because it contained material which was being deliberated on inside the department. “… the release of this material would, in my view, be contrary to the public interest,” Tudor wrote.
In the Pirate Party’s statement, its treasurer Rodney Serkowski described the response by the Attorney-General’s Department as “disgraceful and troubling”.
“They have completed draft legislation, prior to any transparent or consultative process, and are now denying access to that legislation, for reasons that are highly dubious and obviously politically motivated,” wrote Serkowski. “The Department is completely trashing any semblance or notion of transparency or participative democratic process of policy development.”

Govt censors pre-prepared data retention bills (via /.)

Tim Berners-Lee blasts UK government's Internet spying plan

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 17:54:12 +0000

Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web, has blasted the UK government's Draft Communications Bill, which will allow bulk, warrantless, unaccountable surveillance of all Internet traffic by government agencies in the UK. TBL rightly points out that this will overturn the whole UK tradition of freedom and privacy. The Open Rights Group has a campaign to kill the bill, and you can help.

“If the UK introduces draconian legislation that allows the Government to block websites or to snoop on people, which decreases privacy, in future indexes they may find themselves farther down the list,” he said.

Sir Tim Berners-Lee accuses government of 'draconian' internet snooping (via /.)

Black teenager who was stopped-and-searched 50 times between 14 and 17 will sue London cops for harassment

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 25 Aug 2012 01:05:30 +0000

A 17 year old black teenager in London is tired of being busted for walking while black. He says he's been stopped-and-searched without cause fifty times since he was 14, and that on a number of occasions this has included bullshit charges (later dropped), wild accusations, strip searches, and detention in police cells. None of these stops has led to a conviction -- his most recent one almost did. PC John Lovegrove arrested the teenager during a stop-and-search, alleging that he assaulted the cop during a stop-and-search. The case went to court, but then collapsed when the footage showed that the teenager "[lay] there like a dead fish" during the search, and did not roll over or spit, as was alleged by the constable.

The Met won't comment on the case. The teenager will sue the London Metropolitan Police for harassment.

The youth had been stopped by police in Sidcup, south London, on 11 February this year, after reports on the police radio that a named white suspect had threatened his father with a knife and had then run off. The police description was later amended to black or mixed race male.
Although no weapon or drugs were found on the youth, he remained handcuffed while the police forced him to the ground. He was then strip-searched at the police station. He had cigarette papers in his pocket and torn up cardboard that PC Lovegrove said could be used as a filter when smoking cannabis. No drugs were found during the strip search.
The youth said: "I can't think of any other reason why the police keep doing this to me apart from racism. I've been stopped and searched so many times I've lost count, I think it's about 50 times."
The Met police is 11 times more likely to stop and search black people than white ones, according to Equalities and Human Rights Commission research published earlier this year. It has accused the Met of racial profiling.

Black teenager 'stopped 50 times' plans to sue Met police for harassment

Free Pussy Riot [Jasmina Tesanovic]

Jasmina Tesanovic — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 20:04:52 +0000

I used to say, "This will not be my war anyway" to my daughter, to my young colleagues, and friends feminists or not: to girls.

We fought in the seventies eighties nineties for freedom of choice, for divorce, for contraception, for women's human rights, against domestic violence, for peace in the world. We fought incessantly, ruthlessly, risking our careers, our private lives, our security and normality. And we accomplished a lot, all over the world; in Italy, in Serbia, in USA, name it.

The second wave of feminism was standing on the shoulders on the suffragettes from the beginning of the 19th century, who often gave their lives for women's rights. Then I got tired, and not me only. The world took a bad turn, not only in Serbia during the nineties, but everywhere after September 11!

The Globalization of Balkanization put at stake all the conquests of women and not only of women: terrorism, and raging war on terrorism, brought us police right-wing technocrat dystopian states where human rights became just another word for nothing left to lose. I told my young girls then: you must fight it now, this is your world, the one we inadvertedly left you. Learn how much you have inherited from your grandmothers, don't take it for granted because you are may well lose it, step by step, bit by bit. To the church, to the state, to the financiers.

Proof of this new world we are living in is the conviction of the punk Russian band Pussy Riot, convicted of blasphemy against Russian church and state, sentenced to two years of prison because of an art performance in a church. Of course, if women dared to protest in a Moslem mosque, a harsh repression would be “normal,” but since this event happened in a Russian Orthodox church, there are still voices all over the world who link this new repression to past violations of civil rights. Easy to link Putin to Stalin, but what about many long centuries of Christian culture-war and land-war, burning heretics and witches, torturing their dissidents and scientists, and Catholic-Protestant land-wars convulsing Europe for a century? And for that matter, what would happen to American punk artists invading a Mormon Tabernacle to insult Mitt Romney? Would they escape unscathed?

Two of the Pussy Riot activists sentenced to prison are mothers of small babies. World stars like Madonna, Yoko Ono and Paul McCartney have written open letters and petitions for their liberation. Even Putin, the old new Russian leader the main target of their protest performances, expressed his hope that they wouldn't get the maximum sentence of three years. So, they got two years.

They have already even in the slammer for six months; but they have achieved the world fame for their act and their bravery. One wonders if they will be forced into exile, in the style of Taslima Nasreen in the 1990s, or the Russian dissident political artists and scientists of the 1970s. Does this evergreen usual method of uprooting the rioters, so as make them inoffensive in another country, in another language, still work in today's globalized world? Nowadays being forced into exile can make a domestic discontent even more incendiary.

Thanks to the Internet, to the globalization of the activism, music, culture and politics, there is hope for the Pussy Riot girls, if not for their country, Russia, and their fussy sultan, Putin. Putin is one of the best friends of Berlusconi, and the third member of the gang was Ghadaffi, now dead and gone with all his harem. Only a couple of years ago, these three notably macho world leaders would meet in their fancy villas to congenially plot another world order, along with their accompanying harems of Italian showgirls, Libyan female bodyguards, Russian siloviki astronaut spygirls, and so on. Their women were chattel, though often in uniform instead of burqas. The Pussy Riots girls wear red balaclavas when they perform as punks, as rioters -- as those who just won't have any of those new-old fashioned ways of “women and children” first: meaning women as the first sent to the slammers.

Their name is not vulgar, it is provocative; the red of their masks is not Communist, it's the color of blood; their personal story is not private, it is political; and by now they do not stand only for Russia but for a a generation of young women, visible or invisible, wrapped in chains of this new age which wants to destroy “bad girls”.

Whatever they do, they are doing it in my name too!

(Image: @tom_watson)

Student disciplined for improving campus course-selection system

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 04 Aug 2012 21:56:22 +0000

Timothy Arnold, a student at the University of Central Florida, produced a app called U Could Finish that automated the process of hunting for vacancies in popular courses. After the app was the subject of a popular Reddit post, the administration at UCF punished Arnold for doing this, on the grounds that it had overloaded their servers. As a persuasive presentation from Arnold and friends documents, this claim is not very plausible. Nevertheless, the project has been terminated and Arnold faces three semesters of academic probation, a paper in which Arnold must explain why what he did was naughty and why the system's administrators are good people, and a coaching session on making good life sessions.

The Reddit post on the shutdown is full of good examples of universities that rewarded students who improved their systems rather than reacting with immediate and thorough reactionary discipline.

UCF student penalized for writing program to simplify searching for open university classes (ucouldfinish.com)

Private security at London Olympic site illegally harasses photographers shooting from public land

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 14:04:12 +0000

A few of the 10,000 G4S private security guards hired to police the London Olympics have been videoed while illegally harassing photographers who were taking pictures of the Olympic site from public land. In the video, the guards make lunges for the press-cameras, put their hands over lenses, and make inaccurate statements about whether and where images may be taken of the site. Scotland Yard had previously assured the National Union of Journalists that the private security at the Olympics had been trained on the legality of taking images from public land.

They were totally wrong.

Peter Walker writes in The Guardian:

As they walked along one pavement, near the adjoining Westfield shopping mall, a G4S guard approached the group and told them they were not allowed to film, before trying to hold his hand over Hurd's camera.
A supervisor who arrived told the group that guards had been specifically instructed to stop people filming a nearby "security screening area".
She said: "We are told that we should refrain from letting anybody film the security screening area. Obviously, we don't want that filmed."
The supervisor appeared not to know the difference between filming on public and private land, likening the rules to those against taking pictures of security checks at London's Heathrow airport.
She added: "We're all here for the protection of the Olympic park. Obviously, if you don't care about that, that's your business. We care."

Olympic park security guards forcibly stop journalists from taking photos

Byron Sonne quizzed over saved tweets, goat avatar

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 00:08:14 +0000

Denise sez, "Update on the trial of Byron Sonne, arrested in Toronto on explosives charges in advance of the G20 in June, 2010. This week, the Crown pulled up information off of Sonne's harddrives, including tweets from Clay Shirky and Oxblood Ruffin, 50-year-old U.S. military manuals and photos of goats. Much time was spent discussing why Sonne used a goat as his username/avatar."

On Monday, Nadeau also pressed Ouelette for his personal understanding of why there were photos of goats (one labeled “drunk goat”) on Sonne’s hard drive, and why the accused had used “Goatmaster” and “Toronto Goat” as his online usernames. Peter Copeland, one of Sonne’s lawyers, objected, saying that Ouelette wasn’t an expert on acronyms. Spies decided to hear the argument as “voir dire,” meaning she will decide later if it’s admissible as evidence. So, Ouelette opined that “Goat,” stood for “Greatest of All Time,” based on his knowledge of hockey, nicknames, and Wayne Gretzky.

Miles to go: Byron Sonne trial Continues (Thanks, Denise!)

Trompe l'oeil graffiti vanishes Egyptian military barrier

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 14:22:44 +0000

Noordijk sez, "Egyptian graffiti artists make this military street barrier 'disappear.'"

Sheikh Rihan mural

Midnight Climax: CIA's MK-ULTRA LSD experiments in San Francisco

Cory Doctorow — Sat, 17 Mar 2012 19:20:03 +0000

Newly released documents shed light on the San Francisco edition of the CIA's notorious MK-ULTRA program (through which people were unwittingly given massive doses of LSD to see if the drug would be useful for brainwashing), which ran from 1953-1964. There's lots of detail about MK-ULTRA's work in NYC and Montreal, but the San Francisco operation has been shrouded in mystery. The newly declassified documents form the springboard for a good investigative piece in SF Weekly, in which Troy Hooper speaks to Wayne Ritchie, one of the survivors of MK-ULTRA's San Francisco operation.

There were at least three CIA safe houses in the Bay Area where experiments went on. Chief among them was 225 Chestnut on Telegraph Hill, which operated from 1955 to 1965. The L-shaped apartment boasted sweeping waterfront views, and was just a short trip up the hill from North Beach's rowdy saloons. Inside, prostitutes paid by the government to lure clients to the apartment served up acid-laced cocktails to unsuspecting johns, while martini-swilling secret agents observed their every move from behind a two-way mirror. Recording devices were installed, some disguised as electrical outlets.
To get the guys in the mood, the walls were adorned with photographs of tortured women in bondage and provocative posters from French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. The agents grew fascinated with the kinky sex games that played out between the johns and the hookers. The two-way mirror in the bedroom gave the agents a close-up view of all the action.
The main man behind the mirror was burly, balding crime-buster George H. White, a Bureau of Narcotics maverick who made headlines breaking up opium and heroin rings in Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, and the U.S. Few knew he doubled as a CIA spook for Uncle Sam. He oversaw the San Francisco program, gleefully dubbing it Operation Midnight Climax.
"[White] was a real hard head," said Ritchie, who regularly ran into him in courtrooms and law enforcement offices in downtown San Francisco. "All of his agents were pretty much afraid to do anything without his full approval. White would turn on them, physically. He was a big tough guy."
American chemist Sidney Gottlieb was the brains behind White's brawn. It was the height of McCarthyism in the early '50s, and government intelligence leaders, claiming fear of communist regimes, were using hallucinogens to induce confessions from prisoners of war held in Korea, and brainwash spies into changing allegiances. What better way to examine the effects of LSD than to dose unsuspecting citizens in New York City and San Francisco?

Operation Midnight Climax: How the CIA Dosed S.F. Citizens with LSD (Thanks, tyrsalvia!)

China Mieville's London: the (authentic) city and the (banks and surveillance) city

Cory Doctorow — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 10:05:21 +0000

Writing in the New York Times Sunday Magazine, China Mieville blazingly describes two Londons: an exuberant, organic place that has been lived and built over and remade, bursting with energy and vitality; and a fearful, banker-driven collection of megaprojects and guard labour, where billions of pounds can be found to surround the Olympics with snipers and legions of police, but nothing can be found for the library on the corner, where the center of town is being purged of anyone but the super-rich, and where rioting has nothing to do with stop-and-search powers and poverty, and is the result of mere "pure criminality."

The Olympics are slated to cost taxpayers $14.7 billion. In this time of “austerity,” youth clubs and libraries are being shut down as expendable fripperies; this expenditure, though, is not negotiable. The uprisen young of London, participants in extraordinary riots that shook the country last summer, do the math. “Because you want to host the Olympics, yeah,” one participant told researchers, “so your country can look better and be there, we should suffer.”
This is a city where buoyed-up audiences yell advice to young boxers in Bethnal Green’s York Hall, where tidal crowds of football fans commune in raucous rude chants, where fans adopt local heroes to receive Olympic cheers. It’s not sport that troubles those troubled by the city’s priorities.
Mike Marqusee, writer and activist, has been an East London local and a sports fan for decades. American by birth, he nonetheless not only understands and loves cricket, of all things, but even wrote a book about it. He’s excited to see the track and field when it arrives up the road from him in July. Still, he was, and remains, opposed to the coming of the Olympics. “For the reasons that’ve all been confirmed,” he says. “These mega-events in general are bad for the communities where they take place, they do not provide long-term employment, they are very exploitative of the area.”
Stratford sightseers are funneled into prescribed walkways; going off-piste is vigorously discouraged. The “access routes,” the enormous structures are neurotically planned and policed. For the area to be other than a charnel ground of Ozymandian skeletons in 30 years, it will have to develop like a living thing. That means beyond the planners’, beyond any, preparations.

‘Oh, London, You Drama Queen’ (via Making Light)

Why shrinks diagnose anti-authoritarians with mental illness

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 20:09:42 +0000

Bruce Levine, a clinical psychologist, has written on Mad in America about his colleagues' propensity for diagnosing anti-authoritarians with mental illness. Levine says diagnoses like oppositional defiant disorder, attention deficit hyperactive disorder and anxiety disorder are applied to people who question authority's legitimacy by mental health practitioners who are, themselves, unconsciously deferential to authority.

Gaining acceptance into graduate school or medical school and achieving a PhD or MD and becoming a psychologist or psychiatrist means jumping through many hoops, all of which require much behavioral and attentional compliance to authorities, even to those authorities that one lacks respect for. The selection and socialization of mental health professionals tends to breed out many anti-authoritarians. Having steered the higher-education terrain for a decade of my life, I know that degrees and credentials are primarily badges of compliance. Those with extended schooling have lived for many years in a world where one routinely conforms to the demands of authorities. Thus for many MDs and PhDs, people different from them who reject this attentional and behavioral compliance appear to be from another world—a diagnosable one.
I have found that most psychologists, psychiatrists, and other mental health professionals are not only extraordinarily compliant with authorities but also unaware of the magnitude of their obedience. And it also has become clear to me that the anti-authoritarianism of their patients creates enormous anxiety for these professionals, and their anxiety fuels diagnoses and treatments.
In graduate school, I discovered that all it took to be labeled as having “issues with authority” was to not kiss up to a director of clinical training whose personality was a combination of Donald Trump, Newt Gingrich, and Howard Cosell. When I was told by some faculty that I had “issues with authority,” I had mixed feelings about being so labeled. On the one hand, I found it quite amusing, because among the working-class kids whom I had grown up with, I was considered relatively compliant with authorities. After all, I had done my homework, studied, and received good grades. However, while my new “issues with authority” label made me grin because I was now being seen as a “bad boy,” it also very much concerned me about just what kind of a profession that I had entered. Specifically, if somebody such as myself was being labeled with “issues with authority,” what were they calling the kids I grew up with who paid attention to many things that they cared about but didn’t care enough about school to comply there? Well, the answer soon became clear.

Why Anti-Authoritarians are Diagnosed as Mentally Ill

Hidden camera footage of police officers hindering citizens who try to file complaints

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 05:00:17 +0000

This video is a montage of hidden camera footage of police officers across America -- in unspecified jurisdictions -- intimidating or otherwise hindering someone who has asked for a complaint form. They ask for ID, they demand details, they make veiled threats, they make explicit threats. This is exactly what happened to me the two times I tried to file a complaint for police misconduct (once in Toronto, once in San Francisco).

Wanna File a Police Complaint (Arrested for Trying) (via Reddit)

FBI says paying cash for coffee is a sign of terrorist intent

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 16:00:49 +0000

Icecube sez, "Earlier this month, a flier was released by the FBI saying that TOR users might be terrorists. It seems that there is another article that was recently published that says that if you see someone paying for a cup of coffee in cash, they too could be a terrorist. I wonder how much longer it'll be before drinking a cup of water at home could be considered suspicious as well."

Using cash for small purchases like a cup of coffee, gum and other items is a good indication that a person is trying to pass for normal without leaving the kind of paper trail created using a debit or credit card for small purchases.
The most recent update asks coffee shop owners, baristas and other customer-service specialists to be on the lookout for the enemy who walks among us (who evidently has been reanimated from the graves of the 1950s Red Scare era of blacklisting and Communist-baiting or the KGB's constant witch hunt for capitalist sympathizers or people who resent being witch-hunted for their political beliefs).

Update: From the comments, kPkPkP nails it: "If you see anything, say anything"

How to avoid being tagged as a terrorist: Don't pay cash for coffee (Thanks, Icecube!)

(Image: Coffee Shop, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from dailylifeofmojo's photostream)

Canada's sweeping new, evidence-free electronic spying bill

Cory Doctorow — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 22:06:47 +0000

Michael Geist sez, "The Canadian government will introduce new Internet surveillance legislation that will mandate a massive new surveillance infrastructure at all Canadian ISPs and remove the need for court oversight of the disclosure of customer information. I've posted a detailed FAQ on the history of the bill, the likely contents, the lack of government evidence supporting the need for the invasive legislation, and what Canadians can do about it."

The first prong mandates the disclosure of Internet provider customer information without court oversight. Under current privacy laws, providers may voluntarily disclose customer information but are not required to do so. The new system would require the disclosure of customer name, address, phone number, email address, Internet protocol address, and a series of device identification numbers.
While some of that information may seem relatively harmless, the ability to link it with other data will often open the door to a detailed profile about an identifiable person. Given its potential sensitivity, the decision to require disclosure without any oversight should raise concerns within the Canadian privacy community.
The second prong requires Internet providers to dramatically re-work their networks to allow for real-time surveillance. The bill sets out detailed capability requirements that will eventually apply to all Canadian Internet providers. These include the power to intercept communications, to isolate the communications to a particular individual, and to engage in multiple simultaneous interceptions.

Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Lawful Access, But Were (Understandably) Afraid To Ask

Nevada police beat the hell out of man immobilized with diabetic shock, screaming "Do not resist, motherfucker!"

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 16:19:18 +0000

Here's footage of the police in Henderson, NV beating the crap out of Adam Greene, a man immobilized diabetic shock whom the police have mistaken for a drunk driver. The police point guns at him, pull him from the car, throw him to the ground, pile on him, and one officer, Sgt. Brett Seekatz begins to kick him over and over again, while someone screams "do not resist, motherfucker!" Eventually, they realize that he's not drunk and not resisting and call an ambulance.

Greene has received a $158,500 settlement from Henderson city council; his wife got a further $99,000, and the state of Nevada paid $35,000 for civil rights violations.

Police spokesmen won't say whether any of the officers have been disciplined.

Officials wouldn’t specify how or if Seekatz was disciplined over the incident, saying the information is a personnel matter and will not be released. He remains a member of the Henderson Police Department.
However, the department issued a statement noting changes since the incident.
“Henderson Police Chief Jutta Chambers ordered a closer look at the training Henderson officers receive,” the statement read. “The training on use of force techniques was subsequently modified.”

Police Beat Man in Diabetic Shock – and Nevada City Pays for It (Thanks, Fipi Lele!)

Journalist arrested covering Occupy Miami eviction recovers arrest-video deleted by police

Cory Doctorow — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 15:51:12 +0000

Carlos Miller, an accredited photojournalist covering the Occupy Miami eviction, was arrested by Miami-Dade police, who deleted several videos from his camera before they returned it to him. Miller recovered some of the deleted files and has posted them to YouTube. They support his version of the events of that night, in which he was subject to arbitrary arrest. The deletion of a journalist's arrest-video seems a move calculated to obscure guilt on the part of the police.

So now the next step is taking my camera to a professional recovery service with a forensics specialists who will not only retrieve the entire deleted footage without interruptions, but would also determine the exact time the footage was deleted
That will determined that the footage was deleted while I was in custody and the camera was in their possession, leaving them no defense for blatantly violating my Constitutional rights.
I also plan on obtaining the footage recorded by the Miami police officer as well as the footage recorded by the television news cameraman.
And, of course, I plan on filing an internal affairs complaint against Perez as well as a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice for deleting my footage.

Here Is The Recovered Video Police Deleted Of My Arrest (via Ars Technica)

FBI tells net cafe owners that TOR users might be terrorists

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:28:17 +0000

Icecube sez, "Are you concerned about your online privacy? Do you shield your laptop from view of others? Do you use various means of hiding your IP address? Do you use any encryption at all like PGP? That means you are probably a terrorist according to the FBI. These are just some of the activities that are suggested indicators of terrorism according to a flyer being distributed entitled 'Communities Against Terrorism' You can find a PDF version here entitled 'Internet Cafes'"

Scunthorpe photographer faces down abusive security guards at Golden Wonder factory who want to enforce imaginary law against taking pictures from the public pavement

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 09:42:04 +0000

In this video, Hamst, a proud resident of Scunthorpe who enjoys taking photos of local landmarks for the Visit Scunthorpe site confronts two very nasty security guards for the Golden Wonder factory. The guards are furious that he is taking pictures of the factory from the public pavement and they shower him with threats and abuse (at one point, one of them encourages a colleague to run him down with a car). They cite imaginary laws that prohibit taking pictures of private buildings from a public place and repeatedly threaten to sic the police on him.

Hamst keeps an admirably cool head through the whole ordeal and is generally a model for how one should behave when corporations' representatives make illegal demands on photographers shooting in public places.

Golden Wonder Security (Thanks, Roach McKrackin!)

SOPA/PIPA aren't a failure to understand the Internet; they arise from self-interested fear of free speech

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 16:08:20 +0000

Writing in the Guardian, Dan Gillmor argues that SOPA and PIPA aren't foolishly extreme because their proponents don't understand the net; rather, they are extreme because their proponents understand that the net breaks the monopoly of the powerful over communications and organizing.

So, why do they make unsupportable statements?
Because they don't dare make an honest argument. If they were saying what they believe, it would go roughly this way: "The internet threatens our longstanding control of information and communications, and that is simply unacceptable. Therefore, it is essential to curb the utility of the internet for everyone else."

Stop Sopa or the web really will go dark