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Police bail sysadmin in animal rights extremism probe

Now is the time to defend our media! | 10.02.2009 22:01 | Animal Liberation | Indymedia | Repression | Technology | Birmingham | Cambridge | Liverpool | Oxford | Sheffield | South Coast | World

Here is the latest from the register about the arrest related to the latest imc server seizure. The arrested man is a sys admin who hosted several servers including the indymedia server. Apparently this is enough to get you held for 8 hours and bail conditions. But the comments get it -  http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/10/indymedia/comments/

Police bail sysadmin in animal rights extremism probe

Colo contract prompts Serious Crime Act arrest

By Chris Williams

Posted in Law, 10th February 2009 15:01 GMT

A Sheffield man has been released on police bail after being questioned in connection with comments posted to the activist news website Indymedia, which included the personal details of a prominent High Court judge.

The man, in his 40s and thought to work as a systems administrator, was arrested on Monday and questioned for about eight hours. He has been bailed without charge to appear at a police station in May. His home was searched and computer equipment and paperwork seized.

The comments at the centre of the investigation were critical of Mr Justice Neil Butterfield for the landmark blackmail sentences he handed down to seven animal rights extremists last month. One posting encouraged other Indymedia users to use the personal information to contact Butterfield and "to let this friend of [animal testing firm Huntingdon Life Sciences] know exactly what you think about him".

Indymedia administrators deleted the personal information soon after it was posted, but they were contacted by Kent Police the following day requesting the IP addresses of the posters. The Kent force carried out the original investigation that resulted in the blackmail sentences handed down by Butterfield.

Indymedia told Kent Police it does not record IP addresses. The same day the force seized a server belonging to Indymedia and hosted at Manchester-based colocation provider UK Grid.

The Register understands that the man arrested was not responsible for either of the comments and is not an Indymedia activist or administrator. Rather the server was hosted by UK Grid under a contract in his name, along with several others on behalf of unrelated clients.

He was arrested under sections 44-46 of the Serious Crime Act 2007, which came into force on October 1 last year. The relevant sections criminalise "intentionally encouraging or assisting an offence", "encouraging or assisting an offence believing it will be committed" and "encouraging or assisting offences believing one or more will be committed".

A spokeswoman for Kent Police confirmed the man was arrested on "suspicion of incitement" under the Serious Crime Act.

Indymedia has a long-standing policy of not retaining IP address logs to preserve anonymity, and the hard drive of the server taken from UK Grid was encrypted, as were the drives taken from the man's home. It's understood police did not use Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) powers to demand he turn over any encryption keys.

Refusing to provide encryption keys is an offence under section 49 of RIPA and carries a prison sentence of up to five years.

Now is the time to defend our media!

Comments

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this is intended to change Indymedia's policy

10.02.2009 23:18

This is clear harassment, and intended to change Indymedia's policy on not logging and not encrypting, etc.

I'm sure no charges will be filed against this person, but that is irrelevant, the damage is already done.

Expect more like this from Big Brother in the future.

Practical solutions anyone?

anon

Hidden Comment

This posting has been hidden because it breaches the Indymedia UK (IMC UK) Editorial Guidelines.

IMC UK is an interactive site offering inclusive participation. All postings to the open publishing newswire are the responsibility of the individual authors and not of IMC UK. Although IMC UK volunteers attempt to ensure accuracy of the newswire, they take no responsibility legal or otherwise for the contents of the open publishing site. Mention of external web sites or services is for information purposes only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a recommendation.

whats going on

11.02.2009 00:15

One minute its a sysadmin, then it isn't, now it is again.
Then one minute, IPs aren't store, then they are store 'temporary' in the cms.
This is horrendous misinformation from indymedia. The stories just keep changing

steve

re: whats going on

11.02.2009 01:43

It's fairly simple, there is no big conspiracy:

I have no inside knowledge, this is just what I get from reading the reports:

a) The guy who was arrested was just someone who has several servers on his account at UK Grid, one of which happens to be Indymedia's. He's just like a middle-level ISP who sorts out servers on behalf of customers.

b) Most websites store IP logs for every single page hit. Indymedia doesn't, it just temporarily stores the IP address that posts stories as they come in. This is essential otherwise it makes it easy for spammers or political opponents to post thousands of junk stories.

Anyway, if you want your privacy, you shouldn't rely on Indymedia, whatever they say or are doing. Someone else said it only takes one infiltrator in the right place and your privacy is toast.

Work on the assumption that your IP address will be logged, and will be visible to the police (even though that is probably not true). Use Tor ( http://torproject.org) to read or post if your privacy is important - that will hide your IP address by sending your connection through a chain of randomly-chosen proxies, encrypted at each step.

anon

solutions

11.02.2009 01:51

blame the messenger

?

Hidden Comment

This posting has been hidden because it breaches the Indymedia UK (IMC UK) Editorial Guidelines.

IMC UK is an interactive site offering inclusive participation. All postings to the open publishing newswire are the responsibility of the individual authors and not of IMC UK. Although IMC UK volunteers attempt to ensure accuracy of the newswire, they take no responsibility legal or otherwise for the contents of the open publishing site. Mention of external web sites or services is for information purposes only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a recommendation.

re: whats going on

11.02.2009 02:05

"One minute its a sysadmin, then it isn't, now it is again."

He is a sysadmin as a proffession. He is not a sysadmin of indymedia.

"Then one minute, IPs aren't store, then they are store 'temporary' in the cms."

They are stored in the same way as a webpage is stored temporarily in the ram memory of your computer. If you do not save it in your hard drive, you close your browser, and next time you open it you need to find it again from the serve - it is not on your computer.

"This is horrendous misinformation from indymedia. The stories just keep changing"

Simply more information and more understanding after each comment?

one of imc

Hidden Comment

This posting has been hidden because it breaches the Indymedia UK (IMC UK) Editorial Guidelines.

IMC UK is an interactive site offering inclusive participation. All postings to the open publishing newswire are the responsibility of the individual authors and not of IMC UK. Although IMC UK volunteers attempt to ensure accuracy of the newswire, they take no responsibility legal or otherwise for the contents of the open publishing site. Mention of external web sites or services is for information purposes only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a recommendation.

Here's My IP then Big Brother!

11.02.2009 02:17

Hi Cops!

So it's a crime to think for yourself now, is it?

It's a crime now to dare to suggest that you have a political thought other than what the Parliamentary System would like us to have?

I've got news for you Cops - there's a lot of us about, so watch your backs, because we outnumber you, whatever you do to try and harass and bully us into submission.

You can't censor our minds or our souls, however hard you try.

Oh Yes, and best of luck with forthcoming Server seizures, because whatever you have in mind it won't work - we'll all still be out here afterwards, speaking our minds freely and there's nothing you can do about it.

And that goes for the government as well, whatever legislation they produce, we'll all still speak our minds regardless.

I geuss you never read anything by George Orwell, because if you did, you'd know that 1984 was a warning from the past to all future generations that we should NEVER become a Police State.

Ah no, that's right, it's 'subversive literature', so you probably haven't read it, have you?

But then the truth will always be subversive, won't it?

Stuff You Police State

all credit...

11.02.2009 11:14

...to Indymedia for the strength they have shown to date. We, the so called activists, have been woefully inactive at challenging the increase to police powers year on year. It has surely got to the stage when we have to devote a lot more energy into defending ourselves, collectively, not just leaving it to a few individuals to carry the can.

Fighting Fit

Hidden Comment

This posting has been hidden because it breaches the Indymedia UK (IMC UK) Editorial Guidelines.

IMC UK is an interactive site offering inclusive participation. All postings to the open publishing newswire are the responsibility of the individual authors and not of IMC UK. Although IMC UK volunteers attempt to ensure accuracy of the newswire, they take no responsibility legal or otherwise for the contents of the open publishing site. Mention of external web sites or services is for information purposes only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a recommendation.

All our responsibilities

11.02.2009 14:20

Indymedia isn't just those handful of admins we get resentful about over for hiding posts but never thank for keeping the site clear from spam. Indymedia is all of us, those of us that go do the actions, take the pictures, upload our reports and update others through comments.

As such, when we critise indymedia we critise ourselves and when the admins abuse their power and discredit themselves they discredit us along with them.

This whole thing is an embarrassment which is probably while some of the admins are acting so badly to try to cover it up and by doing so they are embarrassing all of us.

Lets defend indymedia, defend ourselves - against not just the intimidation and threats of the state against our infrastructure but also against those among us who are bring shame down on all of us. We urgently need to hold these people to account as our enemies are having a field day and the long it festers the longer it will take to heal the rifts.

I suggest we attend the next meetings of our local IMC collectives, establish what the hell has been going on and ensure things are done openly and accountable in the future.

WE ARE ALL INDYMEDIA

Hidden Comment

This posting has been hidden because it breaches the Indymedia UK (IMC UK) Editorial Guidelines.

IMC UK is an interactive site offering inclusive participation. All postings to the open publishing newswire are the responsibility of the individual authors and not of IMC UK. Although IMC UK volunteers attempt to ensure accuracy of the newswire, they take no responsibility legal or otherwise for the contents of the open publishing site. Mention of external web sites or services is for information purposes only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a recommendation.

I'm not IM

11.02.2009 14:52

"This whole thing is an embarrassment which is probably while some of the admins are acting so badly to try to cover it up and by doing so they are embarrassing all of us."

Actually I can't see any embarrassment for Indymedia. They edited posts that broke both the guidelines and the law, there is no identifiable information on the server and the server was encrypted. They haven't anything to cover up and I think deserve praise in this case. If the next few activist computers the police seize are also locked maybe they will stop seizing them.
IMCs invite you to go along to their meetings anyway but you should probably reread the articles if you are going along thinking they have done anything wrong. You might not have known admins can see incoming IPs but that is the same with any webserver, and your safety is primarily your responsibility.

Danny

Hidden Comment

This posting has been hidden because it breaches the Indymedia UK (IMC UK) Editorial Guidelines.

IMC UK is an interactive site offering inclusive participation. All postings to the open publishing newswire are the responsibility of the individual authors and not of IMC UK. Although IMC UK volunteers attempt to ensure accuracy of the newswire, they take no responsibility legal or otherwise for the contents of the open publishing site. Mention of external web sites or services is for information purposes only and constitutes neither an endorsement nor a recommendation.

All indymedia?

11.02.2009 14:56

While the rhetoric might be that we are all indymedia it seems at least some of indymedia see things differently and are now closing ranks. Re-democratising indymedia might not be as easy as attending some meetings anymore, check out what was posted on the imc-london list~

> Due to recent events (see indymedia uk page please) our meetings will
> need to be a bit more private than usual for the time being.
- (source)  http://lists.indymedia.org/pipermail/imc-london/2009-February/0211-ym.html


@

Agree

11.02.2009 16:34

Very much agree with the last poster, we have to fight back for our rights to freedom of speech. If anyone is arrested unlawfully they must sue and put in a complaint to IPCC. Also get it in the press, the public should know what is happening to our rights. Intimidation tactics should not be allowed to prevent free speech and our democratic right to protest of course we have already lost the right to protest as Westminster). I did not see anyone from the CA arrested for 'incitement' when they stated they would carry on hunting regardless of the law, did anyone else?? Selective enforcement of so called laws seems to be rife at the moment but only for those who try to protect animals from abuse, not those who abuse!

anon

IM & El Reg challenge

11.02.2009 17:32

I am really interested in reading an interview with the person arrested, about his conclusions and experience. I am also interested in which one of you does this first.

Danny

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