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Comment by icedchocolate | Hacker News Reader

This headline is misleading. Avast did the work. The police just gave the necessary legal approval.

Came here to see this comment. I was incredulous that police could have this sort of specialization.

Irrelevant. If it is authorised by the police, then they did it, and while Avast is the tech people behind it, attributing it to the police is more correct (it could've been some other tech company, but only the police can authorise such an attack).

> Irrelevant. If it is authorised by the police, then they did it, and while Avast is the tech people behind it, attributing it to the police is more correct (it could've been some other tech company, but only the police can authorise such an attack).

Doesn't the government have to authorize this kind of thing in order for it to proceed, as a prerequisite? Do we also say the government IPO-ed when a company IPOs? It can't happen without authorization. Just trying to understand this rationale.

Seems weird to give credit for allowing something versus the actual doing of the thing.

Well I don't know how France works but in the US, no the government doesn't need to authorize this. The police are required to follow the law just like everybody else. A judge could grant some sort of ex-parte legal judgement making an action legal. The police here just said "yeah we don't care." The article says the prosecutors gave the go ahead, my guess is that they said "Yeah we got all the evidence we need, shut her down" and that's what happened.

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