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Comment by canistr | Hacker News Reader

I think he should make an open apology to the FBI.

People really have to understand that "the government" isn't after you and that Western society has generally had a really good track record of not abusing their power as compared to most places around the world. The FBI simply doesn't walk into data centers or your homes and try to disrupt things. There are real American people who work in the government and police agencies who do good work. You have to realize that when they do something they shouldn't be doing, they have to answer to the court of law just like you and I with presented evidence.

I'm sorry if you disagree with me. But I don't think it's fair to assume corruption on part of the police.

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The FBI still took Instapaper's blade servers, and that was wrong. I don't think it was intentional at all, but it was certainly careless, and therefore I don't think there's any need for Marco Arment to apologize to the FBI. If anything, the FBI should apologize for their careless seizure of hardware not covered by the warrant.

You are making an assumption that his blade server wasn't covered by the warrant. It's much more likely that the warrant was quite broad and allowed for the FBI to take exactly what they did. This has proven to be the case throughout the years under similar circumstances. I'm more surprised they only took one enclosure.

It's still careless to take something that wasn't relevant to the investigation and thereby cause harm to citizens who aren't involved.

It's not about an assumption of corruption. It's about the fact that the FBI took something which they had absolutely no right to take.

Whether or not they looked at or did anything with the data on his servers is irrelevant to the fact that they violated constitutional provisions against unreasonable search and seizure.

He did make it a point in his initial post to claim the passwords were salted. Meaning he wanted to assure his users they were protected from even the FBI. Furthermore, assuming the FBI wanted to seize and investigate his servers for their own nefarious purpose.

But remember, let's not confuse direct violation of constitutional rights with mistakes.

Not... abusing... Huh?

Off the top of my head: Communist registration, mail censorship, Japanese internment, McCarthy, Nixon, J. Edgar Hoover and/or COINTELPRO, warrantless wiretapping, PATRIOT Act, Guantanamo Bay, the current crusade against whistleblowers. These are just some of the biggies I'm familiar with.

I've never seen any evidence that the US government as a whole cares about rights until the courts and people MAKE them, and I've seen plenty of politicians and law enforcement officers sounding off in the press about how some big new threat necessitates the completely unconstitutional and usually unethical and immoral conduct they are about to engage in.

I think he was comparing life generally in the US and other Western Countries to life in Russia, China, Iran, etc. Western Countries are no angels, but by and large their is far less repression and corruption.

BTW -- the Government is made up of people. Citizens. People become politicians because they are voted in by other people. I find it unusual that people talk about "government" as if it is something that is detached from the citizens. People are the Government. People determine the direction of Government.

If you forget that people are the Government then you've pretty much given up on democracy.

People placed in a group constitute a herd. Herd (mob) mentality applies to government as much as to any other group of people, and government is just as prone to authoritative and/or charismatic figures turning its mentality toward a negative end as any other group.

Government is a mob -- it is up to those outside the mob to keep it aimed in the correct direction, because it won't do so on its own.

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