Posts by Andrew Geddis
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All that is required is that the access was done ‘knowing that he or she is not authorised’. This would include taking advantage of a poorly configured server to reveal documents that are clearly not meant to be publicly available.
Exactly. If someone pushes on a door, finds it’s unlocked, and walks through it to take whatever they can find inside, it seems a bit odd to say “well, of course if they leave it open you haven’t really done anything wrong!”
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Hard News: Dirty Politics, in reply to cindy baxter,
@cindy,
In law, probably no difference at all - whosoever hacked Slater breached s. 252 of the Crimes Act, and maybe s. 249 as well. But this isn't really about whether hacking Slater was legal or not. It's about what ought to be done with the material gained from that (illegal) hack and passed on to Hager without him asking for it/knowing who had given it to him. And, as you note, "Nicky’s not twisting the emails, I’d imagine, and has meticulously checked everything", which makes the use of the material quite different from the ClimateGate example.
Point being - the ethics of how (stolen) material is used is not governed entirely by the fact that the material was stolen.
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Wondering if anyone has changed their views at all.
I think it's fair to say that the darker fears - she was being parachuted in to destroy the office from the inside - have been proven wrong.
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The “calls” came from former North Shore comedy mayor and current New Zealand First MP Andrew Williams talking to Leighton Smith.
Given the "Taxpayer Union's" linkages with one David Farrar, it's interesting to revisit how he treats the utterances of Andrew Williams on subjects he disagrees with him on: http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2012/11/fail-2.html
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Hard News: The Digital Natives, in reply to BenWilson,
I’m sure she can. I just don’t see what she brings to whatever it is that is actually different between the Internet Party and Mana. If there is nothing, then my comment that it’s a sham stands.
I don't think anyone would claim that Harre was chosen to drive IP policy development in the IT/tech freedom area. I think the idea more is that she'll front that policy as developed by others, will manage the relationship with MANA and bring a general measure of competence and professionalism to the enterprise. Those political skills are why she's there, not her internet learnings.
Does this make the exercise a "sham"? Well, political reality is that without a tie-in with the MANA Movement, the IP isn't going to get into Parliament. And without getting into Parliament, the exercise is a futile one. So stepping back and looking at this in terms of pure power dynamics, MANA actually held more cards in this liaison than did the IP. So if the price of a deal was choosing a leader that the MANA Movement could recognise as "one of us", then the IP pretty much had to pay it.
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Hard News: The Digital Natives, in reply to BenWilson,
But what on earth does she have to do with the Internet?
I'm not sure the Internet Party has anything to do with the Internet. What makes you think that it does?
More seriously, this rather upends the idea that Dotcom had pwned the MANA Movement. It looks more like the MANA Movement (and its sympathisers helping organise the Internet Party) have pwned Dotcom.
(See how I used interweb speak to put my point of view?)
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Hard News: The Digital Natives, in reply to Andre Alessi,
The "Does this person have any interest in Māori issues?" questions would never get asked otherwise (although I'd like to see that question become commonplace.)
Not so sure about that interpretation, Andre. I took it to be more of in the vein of "what on earth do the IP and MANA have in common?" - the assumption being that the IP leader will be some Pakeha tech-head who has no track record of interest in te tino rangatiratanga or the like.
Of course, Espiner may be wrong in his assumption, but I wouldn't assume his line of questioning revealed any inside info. If he had a name, he'd have asked outright.
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Hard News: Circumstance and coincidence, in reply to Pete George,
Because Dotcom is the person disputing Key’s story. He has an open interest in damaging Key and ousting him as Prime Minister.
So basing our assessment of what has happened entirely on Dotcom's claims about what he says Banks says he told Key would be very silly. Accepted. But that's an incredibly minor point in the narrative thread, and has nothing at all to do with Campbell's story. So derailing things by asking "is Dotcom a good guy or not?" really does nothing to further discussion.
FWIIW, I wouldn't believe a thing that comes out of Dotcom's mouth, unless there were some form of corroboration available. But equally, I think Key's track record for telling the truth in this area means he isn't entitled to much credibility, either. Meaning that we're left with circumstantial evidence as to who was meeting whom when and where, and what can we reasonable assume from such meetings.
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Hard News: Circumstance and coincidence, in reply to Pete George,
I just don’t think it’s as simple as Key bad and guilty, Dotcom good and innocent.
How is Dotcom's "goodness" or "badness" relevant to the present discussion? Let's say, purely for the purposes of argument, that Dotcom is a crooked copyright thief who made his fortune out of illegal activities. So what?
The questions here are (i) what was John Key's knowledge of/involvement in the (as we now know, illegal) surveillance of Dotcom; and (ii) has he lied to Parliament and the public about this? There's no need to have any view of Dotcom whatsoever in order to examine these matters and draw conclusions based on the evidence that is available at the time. So you seem to be trying to create extra shades of greyness for no apparent purpose.
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Hard News: Standing together, in reply to Bart Janssen,
You should check, but I’m pretty sure their power comes directly from the law.
That's just simply not true. Otherwise they would be called "legal panels". And why exactly do I need to check - I thought you were the scientist who should have some general idea about the systems within which he works?
But anyway - an example. No-one in any NZ academic institution or other research facility will ever be allowed to replicate the Milgram experiment. It would never get ethical approval, full stop. However, there is absolutely no legal issue involved with it … if some Joe Public wanted to run it as a joke on his friends, no legal liability would result from convincing them they were actually electocuting some subject to the point of death. Which proves that "lawful" and "ethical" are not the same thing in the field of science.
As for your claims that the ethical codes imposed on you by your employer and the scientific community generally don't "really" constrain you personally … good luck being an "independent scientist" without any access to research funding or institutional support or publishing. That would be the functional equivalent of a "legal advisor" who is not a "lawyer" - which is a thing, you know.