Posted on 05/24/2005 9:56:37 PM PDT by atomic_dog
A Minnesota appeals court has ruled that the presence of encryption software on a computer may be viewed as evidence of criminal intent.
Ari David Levie, who was convicted of photographing a nude 9-year-old girl, argued on appeal that the PGP encryption utility on his computer was irrelevant and should not have been admitted as evidence during his trial. PGP stands for Pretty Good Privacy and is sold by PGP Inc. of Palo Alto, Calif.
But the Minnesota appeals court ruled 3-0 that the trial judge was correct to let that information be used when handing down a guilty verdict.
"We find that evidence of appellant's Internet use and the existence of an encryption program on his computer was at least somewhat relevant to the state's case against him," Judge R.A. Randall wrote in an opinion dated May 3.
Randall favorably cited testimony given by retired police officer Brooke Schaub, who prepared a computer forensics report--called an EnCase Report--for the prosecution. Schaub testified that PGP "can basically encrypt any file" and "other than the National Security Agency," nobody could break it.
The court didn't say that police had unearthed any encrypted files or how it would view the use of standard software like OS X's FileVault. Rather, Levie's conviction was based on the in-person testimony of the girl who said she was paid to pose nude, coupled with the history of searches for "Lolitas" in Levie's Web browser.
Judge Thomas Bibus had convicted Levie of two counts of attempted use of a minor in a sexual performance and two counts of solicitation of a child to engage in sexual conduct. The appeals court reversed the two convictions for attempted use of a minor, upheld the two solicitation convictions, and sent the case back to Bibus for a new sentence.
Does anyone else see something wrong here or am I just being paranoid?
It's just part of the Patriot Act, Son of the Patriot Act, Return of the Patriot Act, Cheech and Chong Meet the Patriot Act, etc. mentality. "If you do nothing wrong, you've nothing to hide." Thus if you are hiding something, you must be doing Something Wrong.
Geez, how many people have PGP on their computers?
DING! No, I love to have my CONSTITUTIONAL rights just trapled by the Courts and the Legislature.
This is America, whoever the hell wants to.
Doesn't everyone?
I'm too lazy.
Therefore, I take a dim view of Minnesota courts. And maybe Minnesota.
Yeah, what the hell - I do. Frozen wasteland anyway. Decrypt this!
There's not very much common ground between me and a pervert who likes to photgraph nude children, but hey, I'm actually on the same page with this guy about the encryption.
I have passwords to bank accounts, commercial accounts, my resume, application letters, my own and relatives' social security numbers, love letters, hate letters, proprietary business data, and other critical information on my computer.
It is criminally negligent NOT to encrypt your important files.
Is that really what the court is saying in this case though? I mean, they had the testimony of the girl herself plus the guy's web browser history.
Ok, from what I gather from this poorly written article is that the convicted guy appealed because the state claimed that the existance of PGP indicated criminal intent.
The appeals court overruled this, allowing the state to claim the existance of PGP indicates criminal intent, but then they tossed what appear to be the most onerous charges anyhow.
Why?
During a messy child custody dispute, my exwife managed to intercept some communications from my then current wife to her friends. Some of these communications were not complementary. Of course after that we encrypted a lot of email to our friends.
Entering PGP software as evidence of criminal intent is like a presumption of guilt for Constitutionally protected refusal to testify.
This will likely be overturned on appeal. New Trial.
The Constitutional rights of the innocent are often defended in court by the guilty.
(many here on FR fail to realize this.)
Compression software like WinZip can be considered encryption tools. Once compressed, a file is unreadable just as if it were encrypted. This is an example of judicial ignorance, and how that can be dangerous.
Quite a few actually - mostly linux users now, since WinXP is trashed when PGP is installed.
Warning to WinXP users - do NOT install PGP, unless you really enjoy wiping the hard drive and reinstalling everything from scratch.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.