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DOTCOM saga - updates
IainB:
This is not so much an update about the Dotcom case per se, but about some of the repercussions of the fiasco: GCSB review ordered
SpoilerBy Kate Shuttleworth
Updated 3:25 PM Monday Oct 1, 2012
The Government Communications Security Bureau is being reviewed after it was found to be spying on Kim Dotcom illegally.
The Secretary of Cabinet has been appointed to carry out a capability, governance and performance review of the Government Communications Security Bureau after it was found to be spying on Kim Dotcom illegally.
Chief executive of the department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet Andrew Kibblewhite Director of the GCSB Ian Fletcher announced today that Secretary of Cabinet Rebecca Kitteridge will be seconded immediately to the GCSB for an initial period of up to three months in the new role of Associate director of the Bureau.
Ms Kitteridge will be responsible to the director of the GCSB for the immediate review.
Ms Kitteridge's responsibilities will include:
* # Review the systems, processes and capabilities underpinning the GCSB's collection and reporting,
* # Build capability and provide assurance to the GCSB director that the compliance framework has been reviewed, improved and is fit for purpose.
* # She will establish new, specific approval processes for activity in support of police and other law enforcement agencies.
Ms Kitteridge was appointed as secretary of the Cabinet and clerk of the executive council in April 2008.
She is a senior public servant who is responsible for the security and integrity of the Cabinet decision-making system and the New Zealand Royal Honours systems.
She provides advice on ethics and conduct in relation to Ministers of the Crown, and is a key constitutional advisor to the Governor-General and the Prime Minister of the day.
Ms Kitteridge is a lawyer and a focus in private practice was on legal compliance for corporate entities.
Since joining the public service she has specialised in constitutional matters at both the Cabinet Office and in the legal division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. While in Cabinet Office she has advised four Prime Ministers and four Governors-General.
--- End quote ---
I presume from this that since the Dotcom case is already under scrutiny in the High Court, then there will be no interference in the current and proper rigorous judicial review of the circumstance around what was - according to the judge - an apparently unwarranted and thus illegal/wrongful break-in, arrest, with subsequent sequestration of Dotcom's private and business assets, all by NZ police authorities.
There is a defined crime called Home Invasion - Refer: Crimes (Home Invasion) Amendment Act 1999 - in New Zealand, applied in cases where people illegally break into your home and variously imprison/beat up/kidnap/rape/kill the occupants and damage/steal property.
I am unsure how the legislation is to be enforced in cases where it seems that it is the police that have carried out the Home Invasion - the police presumably existing to protect people and their property, rather than the opposite of that.
I am none too sanguine about this so-called "review". GCSB's operation needs to have the hard light of scrutiny shone on it, by an independent review panel. The review needs to be carried out in an auditable, open and transparent review process. It should ideally result in a published report of what the findings are, and what has been done to stop the rot that is clearly there (QED).
The report should be open to public scrutiny and not in the form of a whitewash. However, whitewash is what you can typically expect to see when government departments review each other. Effectively seconding a public servant into a subordinate role to the Director of GCSB - rather than having an independent review panel - would therefore seem most unlikely to be able to cut the mustard.
People will be unlikely to believe that it isn't going to be a whitewash. How could they believe otherwise, when the government is deliberately not putting in an independent review panel?
Regardless of the outcome, the voters will at least be able to make a decision, come the next election.
"The rule of thumb is that, if a business process can not stand the hard light of scrutiny, then there is probably something unethical about it". - Sir Adrian Cadbury (Chairman of the then Quaker family-owned Cadbury's) in his prize-winning article on Business Ethics for Harvard Business Review circa 1984.
--- End quote ---
IainB:
But wait - there's more!
(NZ Herald news item copied below, sans embedded hyperlinks/pix.)
Suspicion over Dotcom net glitch
By David Fisher
5:30 AM Friday Oct 5, 2012
Telecom engineers investigating internet irregularities weeks before GCSB has said it started spying on him.
Kim Dotcom's internet connection was being diverted inside New Zealand weeks before the Government Communications Security Bureau says it started spying on him.
The Herald has obtained details showing Telecom engineers and staff at its technology services company Gen-I were investigating irregularities with his internet connection in November.
The revelation has raised suspicion that Mr Dotcom was victim to earlier spying than the GCSB has admitted. It has brought fresh calls for an inquiry amid claims of the spy agency's role in the international "Five Eyes" Echelon Network.
The focus of the early investigation is the dedicated internet connection from Mr Dotcom's mansion in Coatesville to the Sky Tower in Auckland. It was intended to give him the fastest possible internet connection - a factor which would have been critical in his quest to be the best in the online Modern Warfare 3 game.
Mr Dotcom became the "number one" ranked player of the game before his arrest.
During the record-setting effort, Gen-I staff began an investigation into the amount of time it took for an internet signal from Mr Dotcom's home to reach an offshore Xbox computer server.
Information held by the Herald shows Gen-I studied data showing the amount of time it took information on the internet connection to reach the Xbox server. It went from 30 milliseconds to 180 milliseconds - a huge increase for online gamers.
The reason for the extra time emerged in a deeper inquiry, which saw a "Trace Route" search which tracks internet signals from their origin to their destinations. When the results were compared it showed the internet signal was being diverted inside New Zealand.
The data showed the internet signal had previously taken two steps before going offshore - but was now taking five.
The GCSB is under police investigation after admitting it illegally spied on Mr Dotcom between December 16 and January 20, the day of the raid. It is also studying three other cases of possible illegal action carried out after requests from the police.
The other cases emerged after Prime Minister John Key - who is responsible for the agency - ordered an inquiry. Asked about the possibility of earlier spying, a spokeswoman said the Prime Minister had sought and received "a fresh assurance" the GCSB and Security Intelligence Service had not carried out any surveillance before December 16.
Green co-leader Russel Norman said it could not be ruled out.
He said a commission of inquiry was needed to examine the behaviour of the GCSB.
He said it could be conducted in secrecy with sensitive material excised from a final public report.
Mr Norman highlighted the Echelon of Five Eyes agreement where the GCSB worked with intelligence agencies from the US, Australia, Canada and the UK.
Labour leader David Shearer said he also wanted an independent inquiry which could be run by a senior and trusted New Zealander. "The critical issue is who knew what and how all the checks and balances work."
A Telecom spokeswoman said the company would not give information to the police of "any other government agency" unless legally forced to do so.
--- End quote ---
This stinks.
Renegade:
This stinks.
-IainB (October 07, 2012, 11:58 PM)
--- End quote ---
That it does.
The concept of "principles" is lost. Governments act unilaterally with no respect for law or rule of law.
If these people were actually charged for their crimes, the economy would instantly recover as countless new prisons would need to be built to house them all. Think of all the employment opportunities!
Then again, if all the people convicted of offenses like gathering in public or smoking flowers were released, there'd be lots of room for real criminals, like Prime Ministers and the like. That wouldn't be so great for the economy, but pretty much replacing them with almost anyone would be. :)
IainB:
Confuzzling. The US judiciary apparently want Dotcom extradited because they cannot put him on trial until he is in the US.
However, it seemed to me that they had already established his guilt in something, having effectively somehow already charged and tried him in his absence - otherwise why sequester all his personal and business assets as they would do for a confirmed criminal?
The illegality (QED) of the arrest/seizure behaviours so far would seem to support this.
Per ArsTechnica post:
Megaupload to remain under indictment pending Dotcom extradition
(Copied below sans embedded hyperlinks/images.)
Megaupload to remain under indictment pending Dotcom extradition
by Timothy B. Lee
A United States judge has rejected Megaupload's effort to escape the reach of US criminal law. Lawyers for Megaupload have argued that its lack of a US mailing address makes it impossible for the government to properly indict the file-sharing company. But in a Friday ruling, Judge Liam O'Grady ruled that the government may be able to satisfy the law by serving notice on Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom once he has been extradited to the United States.
American law requires that when the government criminally indicts a corporation, it must send notice of the indictment to the corporation's last known address in the United States. But Megaupload is a Hong Kong-based corporation, and its founder Kim Dotcom lives in New Zealand. Megaupload's lawyers argued that since Megaupload has no US address to send notice to, the government cannot satisfy the requirements of the law and therefore cannot indict Megaupload at all.
While that might seem like a perverse result, Megaupload attorneys made the case in July oral arguments that this was exactly what Congress intended. They contended that the misdeeds of Hong Kong corporations should be dealt with under Hong Kong law, and that it was unreasonable to expect a corporation with no US presence to defend itself in a courtroom halfway around the world.
--- End quote ---
wraith808:
Confuzzling. The US judiciary apparently want Dotcom extradited because they cannot put him on trial until he is in the US.
However, it seemed to me that they had already established his guilt in something, having effectively somehow already charged and tried him in his absence - otherwise why sequester all his personal and business assets as they would do for a confirmed criminal?
-IainB (October 11, 2012, 09:51 AM)
--- End quote ---
There are two types of seizure - criminal and civil. Criminal is what you refer to, but this was most likely a civil seizure (most likely because most these days are, and the requirements place the onus on the claimant, not the authorities).
A good explanation of asset forfeiture lawsw
HR 1658
Overview of Current US Forfeiture Processes (.pdf courtesy of UNAFEI)
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