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US says it can hack into foreign-based servers without warrants


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The US government may hack into servers outside the country without a warrant, the Justice Department said in a new legal filling in the ongoing prosecution of Ross Ulbricht. The government believes that Ulbricht is the operator of the Silk Road illicit drug website.

Monday's filing in New York federal court centers on the legal brouhaha of how the government found the Silk Road servers in Iceland. Ulbricht said last week that the government's position—that a leaky CAPTCHA on the site's login led them to the IP address—was "implausible" and that the government (perhaps the National Security Agency) may have unlawfully hacked into the site to discover its whereabouts.

Assistant US Attorney Serrin Turner countered (PDF).
"In any event, even if the FBI had somehow 'hacked' into the SR Server in order to identify its IP address, such an investigative measure would not have run afoul of the Fourth Amendment," Turner wrote. "Because the SR Server was located outside the United States, the Fourth Amendment would not have required a warrant to search the server, whether for its IP address or otherwise."

Turner added, "Given that the SR Server was hosting a blatantly criminal website, it would have been reasonable for the FBI to 'hack' into it in order to search it, as any such 'hack' would simply have constituted a search of foreign property known to contain criminal evidence, for which a warrant was not necessary."

The prosecution's papers were in response to Ulbricht's defense team crying foul on the government's explanation of how they discovered the servers. Experts suggested that the FBI didn't see leakage from the site's login page but contacted the site's IP directly and got the PHPMyAdmin configuration page. That raises the question of how the authorities obtained the IP address and located the servers.

"Thus, the leaky CAPTCHA story is full of holes," said Nicholas Weaver, a University of California, Berkeley computer scientist who analyzed traffic logs the government submitted as part of the case.

The authorities also disputed assertions that they found the servers through illegal wiretapping.

"However, no wiretap of any kind was used in the FBI’s investigation—let alone any wiretap intercepting Ulbricht’s communications," Turner wrote. "Indeed, Ulbricht did not even become a suspect in the FBI’s investigation until well after the SR Server was searched. Hence, no information collected from or about Ulbricht, through a wiretap or otherwise, was ever used to locate the SR Server."

The underground drug website Silk Road was shuttered last year as part of a federal raid, and it was only accessible through the anonymizing tool Tor. The government alleges that Ulbricht, as Dread Pirate Roberts, "reaped commissions worth tens of millions of dollars” through his role as the site's leader. Trial is set for next month. Ulbricht has pleaded not guilty.

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of course they "can" but doesn't mean they "should". they fail to mention that hacking a foreign server without that country's permission constitutes an act of WAR

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if US doesn't bully other countries then how the entire world will come to know US's supermacy? always keep in mind the straight formula.......more the powerfull country=more bullying over other countries. and remember international laws are only for other countries ....not for powerfull ones

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if US doesn't bully other countries then how the entire world will come to know US's supermacy? always keep in mind the straight formula.......more the powerfull country=more bullying over other countries. and remember international laws are only for other countries ....not for powerfull ones

you mean like nazi germany? like the roman empire? like the mongol empire? i disagree. real power is humble and kind, not oppressing. these kind of actions only serve to spark more international conflicts (like we don't have enough already?)

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if US doesn't bully other countries then how the entire world will come to know US's supermacy? always keep in mind the straight formula.......more the powerfull country=more bullying over other countries. and remember international laws are only for other countries ....not for powerfull ones

you mean like nazi germany? like the roman empire? like the mongol empire? i disagree. real power is humble and kind, not oppressing. these kind of actions only serve to spark more international conflicts (like we don't have enough already?)

You don't know the hostory. the real definition of 'powerful' has changed over time. i can prove it. answer me ....why other four veto countries didn't vetoed against USA when USA invaded Iraq and killed hussain (Iraq President). and what happened in Vietnam? what did USA army with Vietnamese women and girls? they prepared them for sexual needs of USA military men. then which powerfull country condemned it???

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if US doesn't bully other countries then how the entire world will come to know US's supermacy? always keep in mind the straight formula.......more the powerfull country=more bullying over other countries. and remember international laws are only for other countries ....not for powerfull ones

you mean like nazi germany? like the roman empire? like the mongol empire? i disagree. real power is humble and kind, not oppressing. these kind of actions only serve to spark more international conflicts (like we don't have enough already?)
You don't know the hostory. the real definition of 'powerful' has changed over time. i can prove it. answer me ....why other four veto countries didn't vetoed against USA when USA invaded Iraq and killed hussain (Iraq President). and what happened in Vietnam? what did USA army with Vietnamese women and girls? they prepared them for sexual needs of USA military men. then which powerfull country condemned it???

wrong. the definition of powerful has not changed. nor the definition of decency. only some douchebags white collar criminals very bad people want to justify their schemes by pissing on other people's heads and calling it rain.. and the UNSC is just a device to facilitate this. irak was (is) just an example of how far are they willing to go to persue their oil interests...not that they really care about the conflict in the middle east...just like india didn't really care about the conflict in vietnam during the 70's but they had to save face by issuing a formal "condemnation". unfortunately india was neck deep in bed* with the US for food and financial aid, so otherwise they discretely held their tongue. prostitution* in vietnam was already rampant. the traffick of girls was not planned by us military either (i'm surprised at the misinformation!) but by the very viet-cong supporters. it was just another type of warfare that would bring resources for weapons and food, whittling the enemy forces with STDs and sometimes more direct means. either way it's nothing new or unique

i hope that answers all your questions. now...care to prove your point?

edit: btw, i do know history, but i also know that "history" is written by the victor. spoon feeding is the easiest way to change a definition. (because hey, that's what people do nowadays! right? ....WRONG!)

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china and russia do this all the time too... as mentioned above it is called spying...and all countries partake of this...despite what you all think to the contrary...do you really thing india does not hack into pakistans servers or vis versa ...or that china and russia are doing the same to the usa...no inocent bystanders here

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