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Comment on There’s a Secret Patriot Act, Senator Says (2011)

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IANAL, so help!

So, as in the OP, suppose I'm in business, and the FBI knocks at my door and says that they want all the data in my server farm.

I say, "Just a minute while I contact my lawyer". Then I turn to the FBI and say, "My lawyer says we'll see you in court. I've got to get back to work. Be seeing you.".

So, in court, the FBI lawyers tell the judge that they are due the data in my server farm because of a double secret, triple top secret, national security, national command authority, black law that can't be talked about because the first rule of black law is never talk about the rules of black law.

Then the judge says what? This is a joke, right? Or, get out'a here. Or. you can take your double-triple nonsense back to your FBI HQ funny farm and use it for intellectual self abuse, but you've got nothing more to do here or with the defendant.

That's the way it would work, right?

Or, maybe as in the OP there are some double-triple secret laws, but as soon as the FBI wants to use one to get all the data in my server farm, we go to court, and the judge starts laughing, right?

"I say, 'Just a minute while I contact my lawyer'."

Wouldn't it be amusing if, by revealing the request to an outside, third-party, your lawyer, you were in violation of the requirements of the request and had therefore committed a criminal act?

"...because of a double secret, triple top secret, national security, national command authority, black law..."

Of course, the judge is privy to the law and the government's evidence, even if you and your defense counsel are, regrettably, not. But he, naturally, can be trusted to understand the gravity of the situation and act in a fair, impartial manner with regards to the laws of this nation, right?

You poor bastard.

Sounds like I will need to program a big red button for my server farm: I see a knock at the door with an FBI badge and then push the big red button. Boom -- my Web site starts putting up circulating arrows indicating an over busy condition; the last of my data for an incremental backup gets encrypted and shipped, in pieces, but with considerable redundancy, to 10 undisclosed, secure, foreign locations; and all the data on my server farm is erased by being written over. Then I open the door with the FBI guys!

Or, I have a really nice looking server farm, totally neat and squeaky clean, behind nice, spotless glass walls, with doors controlled with finger print scanners. So, I let the FBI in to that glass house and let them have all the data. When they come back the next week and demand the private key for the RSA encryption, I object and delay but finally give in and let them have the key.

Meanwhile, there are some optical fibers running to a hidden basement of a run down, ugly, old building where the real server farm is!

When the FBI/NSA/CIA/DHS decrypts the data they got, all they see is "Mary had a little lamb.".

Meanwhile, back at the farm, everything's been moved to Iceland with backup sites in Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, etc. And I'm out'a here on my private plane/yacht/submarine, whatever, to my own undisclosed, secure, foreign location. Then my Web site goes live again!

Unfortunately such things may not be entirely a joke.

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