From the Bradley Manning Support Network:
Washington, DC, November 10, 2010 – Last week, David House, a developer working with the Bradley Manning Support Network, was detained and had his computer seized by the FBI when returning from a vacation in Mexico. He committed no crime, nor was he ever alleged to have committed a crime. He was questioned extensively about his support for alleged WikiLeaks whistleblower Bradley Manning, who has been imprisoned at Quantico for over 160 days.
This invasive search is of great concern to all Americans who value the Constitutionally-protected rights to free speech and free assembly. The campaign to free Bradley Manning – which has garnered the support of tens of thousands of individuals from across the United States and the world – is rooted in a belief that government transparency is key to a healthy democracy. Our network stands firm in support of alleged WikiLeaks whistleblower Bradley Manning and has raised over $80,000 for his defense. If he is a source for documents published by WikiLeaks illuminating the campaign of disinformation about US foreign wars, then Manning deserves the gratitude of the entire nation.
House sent an email to the Network describing his detainment, saying that, “My computer, video camera, and flash drive were confiscated, leaving me in a tough spot in terms of research obligations; the reason for the seizure, said the officials, was ‘border search.'”
The FBI denied House’s requests to have a copy of his research data. This seems to be part of a disturbing trend of intimidation and property seizure being carried out against activists critical of US policies, including the detainment and laptop seizure of activist Jacob Applebaum in July and the September 24th FBI raids against antiwar and social justice activists.
House has not been charged with a crime.
“I try to be as even-handed as possible, but based on the subject of the search I can’t help but feel that this constitutes a form of intimidation,” wrote House in an email to the Network, “I feel as though the DHS has turned to harassing the friends and supporters of Bradley Manning in a potential attempt to disrupt our abilities to run a legal defense network.”
The Bradley Manning Support Network denounces this recent attempt by the FBI to intimidate its supporters. Blowing the whistle on war crimes is not a crime, and neither is standing up for Bradley Manning.
MEDIA:
Mike Gogulski, Steering Committee, Bradley Manning Support Network
press@bradleymanning.org
(202) 640-4388
Raw, criminal intimidation of the most sickening kind. I do hope that Mr. House, and anyone else who values personal data, does the following things:
1. Implement strong passphrase-protected whole-disk encryption on their personal or work computers (TrueCrypt is one very useful application that comes to mind for this purpose, but CryptoHippy and other organizations produce similar products).
2. Perform a secure backup of their data at least once per day to a remote location. Ensure that any data backed up is encrypted both in transit and at rest.
3. Share work product with trusted individuals to the extent legally and ethically possible, preferably over as wide a geographic area as possible. This helps reduce the risk of "single points of failure" when someone finds themselves in a predicament like Mr. House did. Also, digital replication of work product artifacts further reduces the risk of data "loss" that can occur during IT asset seizures like that suffered by Mr. House. Needless to say, anyone with whom data is shared should be implementing the two procedures I previously listed, as minimum measures.
Last but not least, I hope Mr. House gets his computer back, with all data intact.
Obama is NOT a socialist. He is a fascist.
Heathcliff you are 1) off topic 2)wrong
I’m mad at Obama not overturning the patriot acts but remember it was that “great patriot” gw bush that pushed them into law
3) oh yeah your an idiot too
Soon we will have another president who will fit the norm – A "Barbie" or a "Ken" with changeable heads and a wardrobe suitable for all occasions and all these new "tools" at his or her disposal.
Have you already seen this movie?
Socialists that don't get their complete desire turn into Fascists .
House should have made himself aware of the 4th Amendment EXCEPTION to border searchers , especially involving electronic data . It was a legal nsearch and siezure , in addition povbable cause is suspended , as well as a warrant . Too bad for House .
This e-book goes into more depth than I presumably could, and I put you safely into his hands for steerage. Take a notebook and a pen to the library, and be prepared to take a seat for a few hours paging by way of a thick reference book titled Literary Marketplace, which lists every writer in the United States, the names of employees people, what number of books a yr that publisher places out, what kind of books it specializes in, and much more. vaddhana.org