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Comment on Charges dropped against pentesters paid to break into Iowa courthouse

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This has been quite a wild ride.

Part of me says Wynn and De Mercurio could try to sue someone -- either their initial customer for not giving them sufficient safety, or people responsible for them being charged -- but then I consider that suing "The law" is such a famously bad idea that it's celebrated in song ("I fought the law and the law won.")

Ultimately, I think they'll get some good conference talks out of it.

then I consider that suing "The law" is such a famously bad idea that it's celebrated in song ("I fought the law and the law won.")

But that song is about armed robbery being punished by the law, not suing anyone. The lyrics aren't subtle:

Robbin' people with a six-gun
I fought the law and the, the law won

Fighting the law outside the system by disobeying it is a totally different concept from fighting the law within the system by suing over it.

Well, fighting the law outside the system is actually a bit more complicated. See civil disobedience, the civil Rights movement, etc as examples where laws were.deliberately broken to successfully fight against and change those laws.

Yeah, I agree that that's fighting the law outside the system. I don't think it's different from robbery in the same way that fighting the law from within the system is, I think they're similar in that regard. They're different in that robbery commands nearly zero popular support, making it a bad candidate for change through civil disobedience.

true, short of Robin Hood there's not much of a positive example of roberry as civil disobedience.

They look great from my perspective. Coalfire will be able to hire on this event in a field with a -15% unemployment rate. If they’re smart they’ll both work this into lucrative speaking arrangements.

Iowa can go tuck themselves in.

There are multiple laws. This issue was a dispute between two branches of government. That's a scenario where you can win. NYC /NYPD has a large budget for police brutality settlements.

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