A New Year, A New Tortuga House Update, January 27, 2010

It has been several months since our last communication regarding the “situation” here at Tortuga House, but with nothing more than the seemingly interminable filing of legal motions by our defense to unseal the secret affidavits authorizing the raids in Pittsburgh and New York, counter-motions by prosecutors to keep these affidavits sealed, and judicial providence obviously favoring the side which signs their checks, we may as well be submitting a blank sheet of paper for all the real news we have. With the affidavits in our case remaining sealed—the motives and strategy of the state remain in the realm of speculation and will obviously not do for any public statement. However, a recent court date in Pittsburgh has since brought us several scraps of useful information that we felt it was important to share with others.

On January 15th, a court date/rubber-stamping procedure regarding a request by the state of Pennsylvania to keep the affidavit, which authorized the September 24th raid on a motel just outside of Pittsburgh and the arrest of two of our housemates during the G-20 protests, sealed for yet another 30 days yielded a bit more than the inevitable ruling in favor of the prosecution. The judge in the case, perhaps bored or suffering indigestion from eating a rich lunch, asked the state to explain why this affidavit—in a case where all charges against the accused had been dropped—required the extension of the seal.

Amid the standard spiel of the on-going investigation and grand jury in New York, the prosecution also claimed in oral arguments that this investigation now included Minnesota. In the application to the court, the prosecution wrote: “…certain alleged acts that occurred during the G-20 Summit were not isolated incidents confined to Allegheny County but instead may have been related to more expansive activities that went beyond the Pittsburgh G-20 both in time and in substance.” Also in the application to the court, is the first official mention of informants in the investigation. “The affiants are requesting the original search warrants be sealed for an additional 30 days to protect the informants involved in the investigation as well as an ongoing, more expansive investigation.”

It is worth noting that the prosecution manipulated facts in oral arguments about the investigation in New York—claiming that investigators could not move forward with the case until a decision was reached by the US Supreme Court (which is not true in any respect), as well as claiming the reason that the state has still not gone through our computers is because our hard drives are “booby-trapped” and would “self-destruct” if removed! Of course our lawyer objected to such outright fabrications and of course the judge, after the enormous strain of asking a legitimate question, extended the seal on the affidavit once more. The seal is currently set to expire on February 21st.

We wish we had more than these meager scraps from the dungheap of justice to provide—but this points to the necessity of unsealing the affidavits in both Pennsylvania and New York, as well as why the state is fighting to keep these documents sealed. What we now know is that prosecutors in Pennsylvania claim there are multiple informants in this investigation—which has repeatedly been described as “multi-state” and “ongoing” in court documents—and if we can believe them, that the investigation now includes Minnesota. According to the January 15th application to the court, they also state that included in the investigation are “activities that [go] beyond the Pittsburgh G-20 both in time and in substance.” However, it is unclear what activities they are referring to or where they think they might have taken place. Unfortunately, this is all the precious information we have—everything else remains conjecture.

While this new information is certainly not comforting, our goal in sharing this information is definitely not to frighten others into inactivity. State repression attempts to douse the inevitable flames of rebellion by targeting individuals with the hope that in striking one (or two or three) they will frighten many. By sharing our experiences in being openly targeted by the state, we hope we can collectively overcome their attempts to control those who refuse their authority and find ways to fight back while navigating the treacherous waters of life under capitalism. No matter what they do they will never succeed in putting out our fire—can’t stop won’t stop.

Tortuga House
http://friendsoftortuga.wordpress.com/

Related Links/Background:

• Charges withdrawn against 2 who Twittered police location, Gabrielle Banks, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, November 2nd, 2009
• How Could It Be Against the Law to Spread Public Information? An activist shared on Twitter what he heard on his police scanner, and now faces serious federal investigation, Charles Mostoller, AlterNet, October 29th, 2009
• Twitter anarchist raided under ‘riot’ laws, Ryan Singel, CNN, October 24th, 2009
• During G-20, police linked with texting, Margaret Harding, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, October 12th, 2009
• The Twitterest Pill: Policing Dissent in the Information Age, Jack Z. Bratich, CounterPunch, October 9th, 2009
• Rights activists see double standard in Twitter arrest, Michelle Nichols, Reuters, October 7th, 2009
• Men arrested for G-20 Twittering say it’s free speech: Police claim tweets aided protesters’ criminal activity, Paula Reed Ward, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, October 5th, 2009
• Arrest Puts Focus on Protesters’ Texting, Colin Moynihan, The New York Times, October 5th, 2009
• New York pair accused of directing protesters during G-20 in Pittsburgh, Jeremy Boren, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, October 4th, 2009
• When They Kick Out Your Front Door, How You Gonna Come?, Infoshop Anonymous Posting, Independent Source, October 4th, 2009
• Queens ‘terror’ raid hits G-20 anarchist, Kati Cornell, The New York Post, October 3rd, 2009
• From St. Paul to Pittsburgh: Citizen Media is Not a Crime, Nigel Parry, RNC 08 Report, September 21st, 2009

Search Engine’s Jesse Brown: “Canadian/Iranian blogger Hossein Derakhshan has been held and tortured in a Tehran prison for over a year, without being charged. Both the Canadian and Iranian governments seem content to let him stay there. The media has also largely forgotten his case. Hoder’s imprisonment begs the question: do we only fight for the freedom of dissidents whose beliefs we agree with?” (via Boing Boing)

Canadian/Iranian blogger Hossein Derakhshan has been stuck in  prison in Iran for over a year and has still not been officially charged with a crime.  What we know to be true is that Hodor has an independent voice that has at times been critical of Iran as well as other governments and individuals.  That the Canadian government should have no complaint about one of its citizens being jailed largely on the basis of content posted online while living in Canada should be an embarassment. We urge the Canadian government to press Iran on the issues and work to free one of its citizens.

For six years, Syrian users have been affected by U.S. government trade sanctions that exclude certain goods from the Syrian market. Specifically, the Syria Accountability Act (SAA) of 2004 prohibits the export of most goods containing more than 10% U.S.-manufactured component parts to Syria, with the exceptions of food and medicine. Sudan, Cuba, North Korea, and Iran are all also affected by similar sanctions.

In the past year, the fact that the sanctions against Syria include software has garnered significant attention. Last year, in an attempt to comply with the sanctions, LinkedIn unintentionally cut off Syrian users entirely (the sanctions require that sites block software downloads, not general access), a decision that was quickly reversed. Web-hosting companies have also kicked off Syrian, Iranian, and other users, some of which were not actually prohibited from use.

The discussion recently reached a fever pitch when, a day after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called for a free and open Internet, Syrian users noticed they could no longer access open-source software community SourceForge. Syrian Abdulrahman Idilbi, writing for ArabCrunch, broke the news:

As of January 2008, people from those countries can browse SourceForge projects and download from them, but access to the secure server was not allowed, so they would not be able to log in to SourceForge or contribute to projects. As of January 2010, blocking went further with not allowing people coming from “banned locations” to download anything from SourceForge.net, having a response similar to this one: http://sourceforge.net/t7.php.

SourceForge's blockpage for Syrian users

Hiconomics, who tweets here, started up a discussion on the subject on the Yalla! Startup community. He writes:

As some of you may already know… SourceForge.net has suddenly blocked Syrian & Sudanese users on the basis of being compliant to US law.

This has obviously opened up the debate (again) about how ‘Open’, ‘Open Source’ really is… and how susceptible it is to the shackles of Politics and National laws. I’m not looking to open any political debate… but there must be a way to help.

In an excellent analysis on Syria Comment, guest blogger Idaf questions whether or not the sanctions against Syria are helpful, and questions who they serve:

Does this serve American interests? It is hard to see how. The stated objective of the policy is to “stop US technologies from reaching terrorists.” The only problem with this lofty goal is that all the “terrorist” organizations that America accuses Syria of supporting are based outside Syria: Hamas is in Palestine; Hizbullah is in Lebanon; and Iraqi insurgents live in Iraq. The US sanctions none off these countries. On the contrary, US IT corporations pour money into these three countries under CSR, development and market expansion plans. And besides, the technology of these companies reaches Syrians through third parties. Of course, the restriction make the technology more expensive and it annoys us, but we get it. Cisco routers can be purchased in Damascus; they are brought from Lebanon. Cheap Chinese knock offs are also easily obtained in the Syrian market. One can also argue that Washington’s policy is also counter-productive because it will cause long term damage to US businesses in these region.

On the Middle East Journal’s Editor’s Blog, Michael Collins Dunn shares the sentiment, remarking:

US restrictions have been used to limit open-source software access in countries under US sanctions, sometimes harming dissidents more than governments. Nations are still trying to understand how to regulate (or not regulate) new media, and in general it would seem greater access is normally a good thing. Sanctions that in effect help regimes control their populations unintentionally should be reconsidered.

Finally, SourceForge staff have commented on the block, explaining the law with which they’re required to comply. They did state, however:

We regret deeply that these sanctions may impact individuals who have no malicious intent along with those whom the rules are designed to punish. However, until either the designated governments alter the practices that got them on the sanctions list, or the US government’s policies change, the situation must remain as it is.

The freedom to connect,” Clinton said this morning, “is like the freedom of assembly in cyber space.” The comparison is apt. That freedom was codified and placed in the Bill of Rights after the British limited gatherings in a bid to suppress the fledging patriot movement. Today, citizens meet in a very different kind of forum, but with the same fundamental purpose: to connect with people like themselves, and with them, become more effective than they can be alone. Through cooperating, they can take control of their own fate and live the democratic ideal. It is heartening that the secretary sees that the Internet is what fills this niche today, and that she realizes that a change of technological venue is not a change in social purpose or need.

The secretary also called upon companies in the United States to follow Google’s example in recognizing the long-term benefits to not appeasing censors. However, she stopped short of laying out a program that would provide incentives for companies to follow these principles, and until these statements have a more concrete basis, they will merely remain fine words.

As Elisa Massimino puts it:

The voices of human rights defenders are among the first to be silenced by repressive Internet policies. I hope that today’s announcement leads to greater protection for these brave men and women, and takes the United States’ human rights agenda into the 21st century.

I couldn’t agree more and am continually amazed that we all, because of the Internet, have a chance to break down barriers and do what could never have been done before. I’m proud of you, Internets. All of you.

(The full transcript of Sec Clinton’s speech on Internet Freedom has also been posted.)