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Comment by scotty79 | Hacker News Reader

So basically police raided and closed off post office and now they feel entitled to hold and read throuh all letters and all the security deposits of random people because they have a valid suspicion that some of them contain cd's with copied music?

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I agree with the sentiment, but in this case, the police raided a private business with probable cause, and will hold all assets of that business as possible evidence in a criminal investigation. If your car is found full of drugs, they will also impound it and inconvenience the other possibly innocent passengers. If they find a body in a storage facility, they will probably deny everyone else access to the facility until they have gathered all the evidence they need.

That's a reasonable argument to make, but there's a difference between a temporary inconvenience and permanently losing data. It's not yet clear which of those this will be.

Unless the MegaUpload business continues to operate somehow, I can't imagine how they would allow people to access their data once again. Would the police run the business so that people can get their data back? Hard to imagine them absorbing the cost of doing that.

If your car is found full of drugs, they will also impound it and inconvenience the other possibly innocent passengers.

While we're coming up with analogies, this seems more like impounding all the other cars in a public parking lot because a percentage of them had drugs.

If they find a body in a storage facility, they will probably deny everyone else access to the facility until they have gathered all the evidence they need.

Shutting down MegaUpload isn't to "gather evidence", it's a punitive, open-ended action.

But if you knew 60% of the cars had drugs, and knew the parking attendants were mixing in drug and non-drug bearing cars to hide the cars with drugs, then I suspect you could get a warrant from a judge.

Yea. Stretching the metaphor.

Except that probable cause requires a judge to authorize the action and allows supervision of the terms.

They could allow people to download their personal files by keeping the site up for a few days after seizing it.

Try to avoid metaphors when dealing with the Internet. It doesn't help understand the situation and just spawns the inevitable thread in which people argue about which inapplicable metaphor is the least inapplicable.

The Feds confiscated a cloud storage service used for both lots of copyright infringement and lots of valid files. The situation isn't so complicated to understand that we need metaphors anyhow.

The problem we're dealing with is not understanding the mechanics of what's going on, but of the legality of it. That's why we reach for the metaphors: to relate it to something that has legal precedence.

Metaphors are even less useful for guessing how a judge will rule in advance than for trying to understand the situation.

Police raided a warehouse used for storing alcohol by Al Capone and various other bootleggers. It just so happens that numerous other people used the same warehouse for storing their entirely legitimate possessions. The raid occurred as it did because the warehouse owners had full knowledge that their warehouse was storing illegal merchandise and looked the other way as they were paid handsomely by Al Capone and the other bootleggers for their services.

While police investigate the warehouse's dealings with Al Capone, others are unfortunately inconvenienced as their belongings are inaccessible. Those who had legitimate possessions in storage should question why the warehouse owners put their belongings in jeopardy by knowingly storing illegal material rather than taking responsible measures to curb illegal use.

That makes sense, if MegaUpload ever goes back up again - doubtful. That makes sense, if the feds return people's private intellectual property - doubtful.

This is more like the FBI burning the warehouse to the ground, with everyone's stuff still inside.

In a physical warehouse, keeping people's property would be considered theft as it deprives them of the property. In this case, it's only a copy of the data so there is no theft.

Where did I hear this logic before? Oh the hypocrisy...

The feds didn't create a copy, they seized possession of an existing copy and took it offline. That actually deprived users of the contents (at least those who didn't have another copy elsewhere).

"...burning the warehouse to the ground..."

If you've a militaristic mindset, and there's a bad guy in the warehouse, this is exactly what happens. A siege mentality, and the simplicity and effectiveness of execution reinforce the approach.

"You know the score, pal? You're little people."

Not only that, but the owners were making money (gasp) by charging users to send letters! And if you want your letter sent really fast, you had to pay extra.

Moreover, it's a foreign post office and much of the mail is foreign - since when does the FBI have jurisdiction over the entire world?

Surely if the servers are located in the US you cannot argue that it is really a foreign post office.

If some airmail stages through a US airport, does the US have the right to rifle through the mailbags on the plane?

Not that I think this analogy holds, but I believe they would have the right, unless there is an international treaty that forbids them from doing so. That's what sovereignty is about. It is a privilege to use a US airport for this purpose, not a right.

Let's use the example of of a private logistics company who is suspected of say drug smuggling (as in that's their primary business and the logistics part is just a cover to hide drugs among large numbers of packages), should the police only open packages which they're sure of being drugs or would they be remiss in not investigating the other packages which statistically speaking are likely to contain drugs ?

It depends where you live. In a world where privacy is valued they should not open the other packages if they don't have a valid reason (backed up by a court order). If you start thinkging that "statistically speaking" is a valid reason to violate someone privacy then you are opening a scary pandora's box.

That's my main concern. That all the communication that was going through there now is in hands of police and that they feel entitled to read it all. Isn't there some laws in the US that ensure confidentiality of communication unless theres criminal investigation against you?

You forgot the part where the people all still have their letters, and the post office was keeping a copy of that letter.

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