FC: Feds abandon pursuit of Seattle IMC's web logs

From: Declan McCullagh (declanat_private)
Date: Fri Jun 15 2001 - 06:11:20 PDT

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    [Thanks to many folks for sending this along. Background is here: 
    http://www.politechbot.com/cgi-bin/politech.cgi?name=imc --Declan]
    
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    http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,44532,00.html
    
        Reporters Win Web Logs Fight
        By Declan McCullagh (declanat_private)
        2:00 a.m. June 15, 2001 PDT
    
        WASHINGTON -- A Seattle journalists collective that was the target of
        an FBI probe declared victory this week after the U.S. government
        abandoned plans to obtain logs from the group's Web server. [...]
    
    ---
    
    Seattle Independent Media Center
    1415 Third Avenue
    Seattle, WA  98101
    206.262.0721
    http://seattle.indymedia.org
    
    GOVERNMENT DROPS COURT ORDER AS IMC PREPARES LEGAL CHALLENGE
    
    JUNE 14, 2001
    
    CONTACT: Jonathan Lawson, 206.709.0558
    
    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
    
    Yesterday, in a case involving internet press freedom, the US Government
    withdrew a previously-issued court order directing the Independent Media
    Center in Seattle to hand over computer server logs. The April 21 order
    instructed the IMC, a not-for-profit internet-based news organization, to
    hand over logs and other records pertaining to the IMC's coverage of
    anti-globalization protests in Quebec City. The government's retreat
    represents a victory for the IMC, where volunteers and a national legal team
    had been preparing to challenge the order in court.
    
    The IMC is undecided about further legal action. IMC counsel Nancy Chang of
    the Center for Constitutional Rights comments: "Although the court order has
    been withdrawn, the IMC's concerns over the government's ability to use
    internet technology for surveillance of political activists continue to
    linger."
    
    At the time of the order's issuance, FBI and Secret Service agents claimed
    that they needed the server logs to assist in an investigation related to
    sensitive documents which had been stolen from Canadian police, then posted
    to the IMC website by an anonymous journalist. The agents also falsely
    claimed that posted documents contained details of George Bush's travel
    itinerary. Bush was at the time attending the Summit of the Americas in
    Quebec City.
    
    IMC volunteers learned several weeks ago that police in Quebec identified
    and arrested three suspects in the stolen documents case, without any
    information provided by the IMC. Still, the U.S. government neither amended
    nor withdrew its order against the IMC until yesterday, instead allowing the
    order to continue absorbing the volunteer organization's personnel and legal
    resources. The timing of the original order, issued while mass protests were
    still underway in Quebec City, suggests that the government intended to
    produce a chilling effect among IMC journalists covering those protests - a
    suggestion then strengthened by the government's failure to withdraw its
    order, even weeks after the Canadian arrests.
    
    The IMC did not comply with the order, which would have involved handing
    over the individual internet protocol (IP) addresses of over 1.25 million
    journalists, readers and technical volunteers who accessed the IMC website
    on April 20 and 21, a much broader sweep than the stated focus of the
    government's investigation. According to IMC counsel Lee Tien of the
    Electronic Frontier Foundation, "This kind of fishing expedition is another
    in a long line of overbroad and onerous attempts to chill political speech
    and activism. Back in 1956, Alabama tried to force the NAACP to give up its
    membership lists -- but the Supreme Court stopped them. This order to IMC,
    even without the 'gag,' is a threat to free speech, free association, and
    privacy."
    
    The case drew immediate interest from some of the nation's top first
    amendment advocacy organizations. With help from the Electronic Frontier
    Foundation, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, the Center for
    Constitutional Rights and others, the IMC prepared to challenge the invasive
    order in court. However, on the eve of the IMC's planned court filing, the
    government suddenly withdrew the order. IMC volunteers speculate that
    government lawyers realized the likelihood that the order would be struck
    down on constitutional grounds, and decided to retreat rather than face a
    court defeat.
    
    Tien comments, "The government owes the IMC, its many users, and the general
    public an explanation. Maybe that will prevent this sort of thing from
    happening again." With the court order withdrawn, the IMC is denied the
    immediate opportunity to have the courts rule on several serious
    constitutional rights concerns, including:
    
    €  Under US law, freedom of speech guarantees the right to speak
    anonymously. This principle has been established repeatedly in the federal
    courts, and has been found recently to apply to internet speech as well. On
    April 19, District Judge Thomas Zilly ruled in Seattle that internet firm
    2TheMart.com could not compel an internet chat room host to identify
    anonymous users who had criticized the firm online.
    
    €  Freedom of association, particularly anonymous association, is afforded
    very strong protections under the law. Anonymity in public discourse has
    been a central theme in the history of American democracy; even the
    Federalist Papers were published under fictitious names. On the internet,
    anonymity is particularly important because it enables individuals to
    disguise their race, gender, class or other indicators which might lead to
    their marginalization in public space.
    
    €  Journalists hold a qualified privilege from compelled disclosure of
    sources and other work product. The Constitution requires this protection
    because court-compelled disclosure of newsgathering materials poses a
    serious threat to the vitality of the newsgathering process and a free
    press. The government's order falsely described the IMC as an internet
    service provider, rather than as a news organization. Independent
    journalists posting stories or photographs to IMC websites are entitled to
    the same protections as any other member of the news media.
    
    The IMC was launched in Fall 1999 to provide immediate, authentic,
    grassroots coverage of protests against the WTO. Just a year and a half
    later, the IMC network has reached around the world, with dozens of sites
    scattered across six continents. Each IMC's news coverage centers upon its
    open-publishing newswire, an innovative and democratizing system allowing
    anyone with access to an internet connection to become a journalist. Open
    publishing enables the IMC to present local and national issues from diverse
    perspectives, independent of many filters and biases affecting mainstream
    media coverage.
    
    The IMC's mission statement reads: "The Independent Media Center is a
    grassroots organization committed to using media production and distribution
    as tools promoting social and economic justice. It is our goal to further
    the self-determination of people under-represented in media production and
    content, and to illuminate and analyze local and global issues that impact
    ecosystems, communities and individuals. We seek to generate alternatives to
    the biases inherent in the corporate media controlled by profit, and to
    identify and create positive models for a sustainable and equitable
    society."
    
    REFERENCES:  www.indymedia.org and www.indymedia.org/fbi
    
    CONTACT:
    
    Jonathan Lawson, volunteer
    Seattle Independent Media Center
    jlat_private
    206.709.0558
    
    Jason Reep, volunteer
    Seattle Independent Media Center
    jasonrat_private
    206.545.2872
    
    David Burman, Attorney for the Seattle IMC
    Perkins Coie LLP
    1201 Third Ave. Ste. 4800
    Seattle, WA 98101-3099
    206.583.8888
    
    Lee Tien, Senior Staff Attorney
    Electronic Frontier Foundation
    454 Shotwell Street
    San Francisco, CA  94110
    415.436.9333
    
    Nancy Chang, Senior Litigation Attorney
    Center for Constitutional Rights
    666 Broadway, 7th Floor
    New York, NY 10012
    212.614.6420
    
    
    
    
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