Law - SlashGear

‘law’ Stories

Twitter can lead Indonesians to a decade in prison

Mark Raby, Feb 9th 2012 Discuss [0]

Indonesia's Communications and Information Minister has made it officially known that anyone breaking the country's restrictive, non-free-speech laws will be strictly adhered to even for users who are on Twitter. The micro-blogging site does not prohibit users from posting defamatory or threats, but if an Indonesian native is found to be the one posting such content, they will be persecuted to the fullest extent of the law, however backward it may be. Read The Full Story

Steve Jobs FBI file pulled with Freedom of Information Act

Chris Burns, Feb 9th 2012 Discuss [0]

There's quite a bit of hubub about the Steve Jobs FBI file that's been put up for download by any man, woman, or child who would dare read it today, but not a whole lot of people speaking about how it came to us all now, of all times. What's going on here is that the FBI was vetting Jobs for a tech job with the President - a Bush at the time. The result of this interview process was a set of papers with interviews of colleagues of Jobs speaking highly and in some cases not so highly of his character - this packet of papers is now available for download thanks to the Freedom of Information Act and a fellow by the name of Michael Morisy. Read The Full Story

Anonymous hits Police websites in Boston and SLC

Chris Burns, Feb 3rd 2012 Discuss [0]

Attacks this week by hacker collective Anonymous appear to have taken the Boston and Salt Lake City police by surprise once more as they retaliate for police brutality at Occupy Wall Street weeks ago. Though it's not been immediately apparent why this second attack has come when it has, Anonymous does appear to have left a message on Boston Police news website BPDNews.com currently being redirected to their Facebook blast page instead. On that page they currently have a statement which speaks on how irritated they are that the site would be brought down when all it aims to do is bring safety information to fair citizens. Read The Full Story

Netflix’s Facebook sharing calls up antiquated law

Mark Raby, Feb 1st 2012 Discuss [0]

Did you that it's actually illegal for Netflix to share your movie "rental" history with the public? There's a law called the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA), passed in 1988, to that effect. And now Netflix is facing a Congressional subcommittee because of its Facebook app that allows users to willingly share their streaming information online. And unfortunately, some Senators are refusing to accept changes that should be made to the 24-year-old measure. Read The Full Story

Flying Drones employed by Miami Police for standoff situations

Chris Burns, Jan 25th 2012 Discuss [0]

Though they've had approval to utilize such technology since July of 2011, the police force in Miami Florida have never actually utilized their drone technology, but it's certainly there and ready for action. There aren't any weapons attached to these T-Hawk Micro-Air Vehicles, and the drones aren't really capable of destroying or saving any target - instead they're used to capture events from the sky with their basic video and photo cameras installed aboard. These drones are made specifically for standoff situations in which an overhead view would be beneficial, and their relative small size and ease in use makes them perfect for use by the police forces in the area. Read The Full Story

Judge rules Fifth Amendment to no longer cover hard drives

Chris Burns, Jan 24th 2012 Discuss [0]

In a court case currently going on here in the United States including a Colorado woman who's hard drive may well include incriminating evidence against her, it's been ruled that her encrypted password on said hard drive must be bypassed by her, and is not protected under the Fifth Amendment. Before this case, a distinction had been drawn in cases which included such situations, the difference being clear between forcing a person to reveal their password and forcing a defendant to decrypt encrypted data without revealing their password. Revealing the password has up until now been ruled as forcing the defendant to reveal the contents of their mind, this bringing up some Fifth Amendment issues - that's no longer the case according to Judge Robert Blackburn. Read The Full Story

Supreme Court rules GPS tracking now needs warrant

Chris Burns, Jan 23rd 2012 Discuss [13]

In a move on a ruling that very well may put Batman’s tights in a bundle, the Supreme Court voted unanimously this week that police, private investigators, and anyone else with a sweet tooth for tracking will have to get a warrant before attaching a GPS device to a vehicle they do not own. Of course monitoring a vehicle’s movements had previously been called legal in a case against a drug dealer that’d been tracked for a month without a warrant, but now according to the Supreme Court, this tracking has been deemed “unreasonable.” Tracking a person with a GPS device without a warrant is now deemed illegal under the 4th Amendment.

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SOPA and PIPA delayed indefinitely, Internet Wins

Chris Burns, Jan 20th 2012 Discuss [2]

In what can only be described as seeming to be a Flawless Victory, not a few hours after Senator Harry Reid announced he’d be delaying the vote on PIPA, representative Lamar Smith, better known now as the sponsor of SOPA, has announced he would delay consideration on that bill as well. Both teams have been pressured by waves of not only internet-based groups during the blackout of major websites earlier this week, but by voters calling in from around the nation this week as a result of it. Both groups have noted their intent to “revisit” how to defeat “foreign thieves” in regards to piracy, but would be stopping votes on their legislature for now.

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Megaupload is down, Piracy indictment to blame

Chris Burns, Jan 19th 2012 Discuss [8]

One of the most notoriously popular media uploading and downloading sites in the world has been shut down today amid allegations of piracy and charges amounting to $500 million in lost revenue for pirated content. These charges come from federal prosecutors in Virginia and are being leveled against the founder and others involved with the site. If found guilty, needless to say, Megaupload's owners will stand no chance of revival any time soon. Read The Full Story

TED talk video on SOPA and PIPA makes it all crystal clear

Chris Burns, Jan 18th 2012 Discuss [17]

The result of groups across the web making an effort to bring the damaging effects of SOPA and PIPA to light has been a nice cross-section of explanatory posts made to educate the masses, and what we've got here is a TED talk video of Clay Shirky taking all of that and making it so clear your grandmother could understand it. The video in this post has Shirky, a man who goes by many names, American writer, teacher, consultant, and specialists on the social and economic effects of Internet technologies. He knows his stuff, he's very well spoken, and this is the video that'll make it clear for you why SOPA and PIPA are beyond dangerous, they're absolutely unacceptable. Read The Full Story

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SlashGear 101: SOPA and PIPA explained in plain English

Chris Burns, Jan 17th 2012 Discuss [29]

If you’ve not heard of either SOPA or PIPA in the last few weeks and months in your journeys through the internet, now’s the time to get educated, and quick. While the most recent news has been that the White House reaction to the SOPA bill specifically has effectively curbed it, there’s no reason why it can’t pop up again with a different name or a couple of simple changes that allow it to pass silently. These two bills, SOPA and PIPA, are amongst the most dangerous pieces of legislature ever to be written up for passage by the United States government in regards to innovation and the free market on a global scale today: this post will tell you why.