Posted on 11/10/2005 2:29:24 PM PST by Republican Red
Did the Washington Post Violate the Electronic Communications Privacy Act? 11/10 05:24 PM For those of you who have been following the MD4Bush story (if not, click on the links at the bottom of this post to catch up), here's a little breaking news: Free Republic is looking into whether the Washington Post violated the Electronic Communications Privacy Act when Post reporter Matthew Mosk accessed the Free Republic account of MD4Bush.
According to the Post's statement on the matter, Mosk was given MD4Bush's sign-on information by "someone acting on MD4Bush’s behalf." He then used that screen name and password to log into MD4Bush's account and view private e-mails sent between MD4Bush and former Maryland state official Joseph Steffen.
According to the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, anyone who "intentionally accesses without authorization a facility through which an electronic communication service is provided; or... intentionally exceeds an authorization to access that facility" is committing a crime. In this case, the Post claims it had authorization to view the private e-mails because it was given the password by "someone acting on MD4Bush's behalf."
There are two problems with this defense. First, how could the Post have known that this "someone" was really "acting on MD4Bush's behalf"? Free Republic spokesman Kristinn Taylor gave me the following example:
Imagine if I gave you the keys to someone's house and I said, 'If you go in this house, you'll find something newsworthy. Oh and trust me, I know the guy whose house this is, and he wants you to go in there.' Regardless of the legal questions, that certainly wouldn't be ethical. Yet that's exactly what Mosk did when accessed a total stranger's Free Republic account and viewed that account holder's private correspondence. To compound that ethical lapse, Mosk did not report these actions in his stories about Joseph Steffen. He merely alluded to "private e-mails, which were given to The Washington Post."
Second, even if the Post could prove that Mosk had MD4Bush's consent to log into his private account, that wouldn't be enough to exempt the Post from the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. That's because each Free Republic user agrees to terms of use, one of which is that the user will not give out his password. In other words, MD4Bush was not authorized to give Mosk permission to use his password — as the other party to the user agreement, Free Republic's consent was required also.
Taylor told me that Free Republic is looking at its options and considering legal action against the Post. Up until now, Free Republic has not released much information about the identity of MD4Bush, other than to say that his account was associated with the mddems.org web domain (not an mddems.org e-mail address, as this otherwise informative Washington Times piece reported today). But since it's now clear that MD4Bush violated his user agreement, Free Republic is considering whether he forfeited his confidentiality.
That Free Republic might go public with the name has the state Democratic Party on the defensive. This week, WBAL in Baltimore reported that the co-chairman of the Maryland Democrats, Keiffer Mitchell, has called for an investigation into whether the state party was involved in the MD4Bush affair, calling MD4Bush's tricks, "despicable" and saying an investigation was needed to "clear the air."
Unfortunately, the Washington Post has not shown a similar desire to shed light on its own role in assisting MD4Bush in his political hit on the governor of Maryland. The Post maintains that it does not know the identity of MD4Bush, but it has refused to name the "someone" who gave Mosk MD4Bush's sign-on information. In the interest of avoiding a criminal investigation, it might behoove the Post to come clean.
I love suspense, keeps you intrigued. I'll have some of that popcorn with butter. Please!
Rathergate or Watergate?
Something is rotten.
Bump for later read.
Bump for later read.
WaPo violated the law it appears, and certainly violated the confidential user agreement between MD4Bush and FreeRepublic.... and certainly severely violated Steffen's privacy, since he had reason to rely upon the terms of the FreeRepublic user agreement - he was not posting the controversial comment on any open forum with public access, it was made in a 1-on-1 private email communication. Anyway, as everyone has pointed out, it is MD4Bush who was playing the active role of spreading rumors and Steffern who was merely giving a passive and PRIVATE "yeah I heard that too".....
This was an obvious set-up, and the gross journalistic misconduct in this case needs to be compared with the parallel behaviors of the various MSM journalists who were (while not accessing private emails, so far as we know) dragging Libby and Rove into their own cesspool of rumor-mongering about Valerie Pflame and then Libby gets burned because of MSM whores.......
"Talk radio, Free Republic and the Pajammadeen have inflicted a mighty blow for "truth, justice and the American way".
Which is why we will be outlawed by regulations next.
Very interesting post.
"..The Washington Post clearly didn't have a very good weekend. First, circulation numbers continue to drop. Then, the Washington Post Company's third-quarter earnings dropped. And Jack Shafer takes them to task for royally excessive coverage of Charles and Camille (as in "10 pieces totaling 11,500 words" excessive"). Then there's this interesting--and fairly underreported--news item. Post reporter Matthew Mosk "may have violated a federal privacy law and the newspaper's ethical code when he used an unidentified person's account to view private conversations that linked a former aide to Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich's administration to a whisper campaign about a political rival."
Will the Post, like the White House, have to urge its staffers to "Let's Get Ethical! Ethical! I want to get Ethical! (Let me hear your body talk...)"?.."
I'm hoping that it does, and that it is a very big hammer.
I'm hoping it is in the form of a US Attorney and a Grand Jury. That would bypass the democratic controlled legislative
committee in Maryland that has no intention whatever of investigating who MD4Bush was.
Are you just stupid? Laws don't apply to liberals! </disgusted sarcasm>
Delicious
"Delicious!"
What is the really good news? Their poor stock performance may just be the appetizers with the main coursea and deserts to come. Many newspapers will not be around when GW watches his replacement sworn in in Feb 2009.
That's not your sculpture, I hope!
A Congressional hearing would be interesting.
I don't comment much on these MD4Bush threads, but I sure have a grin while I read them. It seems my grins get wider with each new development. heh heh ☺
Nam Vet
The Post was involved in a domestic spying operation.
From a "lets get rid of old MSM" that is good news indeed. But I still like to get my news in the morning via hardcopy, rather than staring at a screen. I have pretty much learned over the past few years how to believe what I think is plausible and what is obvious MSM bias. For example I don't believe in any of these polls and it became so apparent in the Clintoon admin when he had a 70% approval rating during impeachment -comon!!
"Did the Washington Post Violate the Electronic Communications Privacy Act?"
"Possibly" is the Post most favorite response. The Post, like Mapes, wants eveyone else to prove them wrong. I'm thinking the grand jury investigation, if it's legitimate, will find lots of things to blast the Post with.
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