Governments are using charges of cybercrime to silence journalists | Hacker News Reader

Governments are using charges of cybercrime to silence journalists

sociable.co

73 pointsjtjones9214 comments

I think a fundamental issue is that journalists want to be a protected class with special rights that are unavailable to the average citizen. A journalist should have exactly the same rights as the average citizen. Thus, if the laws are not amenable to an average citizen looking into the affairs of their government, fix the laws, don't try to carve out exceptions for journalists.

> I think a fundamental issue is that journalists want to be a protected class

No. Goverment and polictians want to be a protected class.

>A journalist should have exactly the same rights as the average citizen.

It should be the other way around: The average citizen should have exactly the same rights as a journalist. If it were so, then public animosity towards the media would dwindle.

I think we are in violent agreement.

I believe that was implied.

It’s a very tricky issue. Investigative journalism plays an important role keeping governments accountable but technically they often do illegal stuff or get information from people who did illegal stuff. Making a law around that will be pretty difficult if you want governments to keep the right to classify things.

> if you want governments to keep the right to classify things

I want governments to keep things classified.

Leaks should be automatically declassified: the contents are going to be in the public domain one way or another, whether governments like it or not.

The illegal stuff leakers do is the morally ambiguous part. Everything else is already fine and I think the law should reflect that.

And the next question is... who determines who is or is not a journalist. I don't believe there is a definitive requirement that is used to differentiates between a blogger and someone that writes for the NYT.

Everyone has the right to a free press, anybody trying to collect and transmit news to the public should be considered a journalist.

This, exactly.

The only reason we are having these discussions is massive consolidation in media, which has diluted journalism to mere access models.

> Who determines who is or is not a journalist?

Whom pay for the message. Politics are strongly infiltrated in journalism. Often to the point of being undistinguishable.

There has to be a balance, and that balance has to be continually tested in the courts.

So on the face of it, I do think it's appropriate that journalists get charged when they commit a crime. Let a high court decide if indeed the public interest did outweigh the law, or somebody's privacy, or whatever. You can't codify it.

Some will call that a chilling effect, or harassment, but how else do you reliably test things like this?

Future crimes: Aggravated tweeting. Seditious live stream.

TL;DR: Journalists saying things you don't like? Just tweak the laws (or misapply current laws) to make them criminals. EZ

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