[FYI] Porno-Newsgroups und Equipment-Beschlagnahme in den USA

[Horns@t-online.de (Axel H. Horns)]

Auch in den USA stellt sich fuer ISPs die Frage, ob sie ihr Equipment 
riskieren, wenn sie bestimmte Newsgroups fuehren. Hier ging es 
offenbar um

  alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.pre-teen (ABPEPT)
  alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.early-teen (ABPEET)

Der Fall steht unter US-Recht und betrifft Provider in DE nicht 
unmittelbar, koennte aber dennoch als Hintergrundwissen interessant 
sein.

  "AG" = "Attorney General" = Staatsanwalt

Axel H Horns


------- Forwarded Message Follows -------
Date:          Sun, 01 Nov 1998 23:40:13 -0500
To:            politech@vorlon.mit.edu
From:          Declan McCullagh <declan@well.com>
Subject:       FC: New York official explains why police seized ISPs
Reply-to:      declan@well.com



Date: Fri, 30 Oct 1998 21:50:03 -0600 
From: Sean Donelan <SEAN@SDG.DRA.COM> 
Subject: It must be election time again 

The New York State Attorney General seized the computers at a 
couple of ISPs in New York State.
http://www.oag.state.ny.us/press/oct98/oct28_98.html
The ISPes responses to the AG's press release are at
http://www.dreamscape.com/dream98/statement.htm 
http://www.buffnet.net/ag/
It is unclear what the purpose of physically seizing the news servers
since according to Buffnet.net, none of the accused traffickers used
Buffnet.net as their ISP. Nor was either ISP actually charged with any
criminal activity (as opposed to the AG's implication to the media) If
the AG's office wanted to receive those newsgroups they could have
received their own feed. Maybe the A.G. just needed some new computer
hardware for his offices. Anyone care to guess just how many different
law enforcement agencies are conducting various undercover activities?
More seem to pop out of the wood-work every week. In case anyone
missed it, notice that all the arrested people are identified by AOL
screen names. I assume it was AOL, since the term "screen name" is
rarely used by any other provider. Any prediction when New York's AG
is going to sieze AOL's servers, or does the AG only target small ISPs
likely to have limited legal resources. 




Date: Sat, 31 Oct 1998 20:03:52 -0600 
From: Sean Donelan <SEAN@SDG.DRA.COM> 

=================================================
From: mikemc@cops.ORG (Mike McCartney) 
Subject: Re: Breaking the law (Re: RE: ISP's Raided by POLICE) 
Date: 31 Oct 1998 13:21:06 -0600
I would like to breifly state a few points regarding this thread of
discussion. I would like to start by stating that I have very much
enjoyed most of the very intellecual comments and concerns raised by
this group. All of your comments will be reveiwed and considered in
the comming months. Yes, I am the guy you have all been talking about.
My name is Michael McCartney and I am the Lead NYAG Investigator
responsible for Operation RipCord and most recently, Operation
Sabbatical initated by the New York State Attorney General's Office. I
will keep my comments brief due to the fact that the investigation is
still on - going. But I felt it important to mention a few concepts
here in an attempt to keep all of your comments focused. With respect
to Task Force Agencies investigating child porn: Operation Innocent
Images headed by the FBI in Baltimore MD has been investigating and
prosecuting end users and producers for over 5 years. Additionally,
U.S. Customs has been very active in investigating and prosecuting end
users and producers for much longer, both domestically and
internationally. Lastly, my office has been investigating and
prosecuting end users and producers for the past 32 months. Our
collective mission is to identify the people or persons responsible
for the production and disemination of this most horrific material.
Let just be clear that we are talking about children as your as 18
months being brutely raped by adults and having this crime documented
by the attacker in the form of photos or videos (*.jpg, 
*.avi and many other formats) and then distrubted to other interested 
partiies. You will all be happy to know that the first amendmant of
the U.S. constitution is alive and well here in America. We will not
and can not enforce the text discussion of these people (Canadian
citizens may want to be more careful in this regard however) Operation
Sabbatical: OS is an investigation into an organized group of child
pornographers which were identified living all over the world. They
called themselfs Pedo University (PU). They operated predominately on
the news group side of the internet, although they also operated in
other places as well. The two (2) places they called home were
Alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.pre-teen (ABPEPT) and
Alt.binaries.pictures.erotica.early-teen (ABPEET). When I first began
this investigation, It was difficult to find an ISP that carried these
2 NG's, for obvious reasons. In fact, AOL, ix.netcom and many other
local ISP's in NY did not allow access to these groups. I was able to
find a couple ISp's in NY that did and the investigation in to PU and
the end user / producers of this material began. On any given day over
the six month investigation, we would connect to those NG's and
download literally hundreds of binary attachments depicting this
recordation of the sexual abuse of our children. the NG's contained
hundreds if not thousands of these pics. There is no mistaking that
the name of the NG alone is not and was not illeagl but coupled with
the material contained therein, it became an legal issue. Timing: the
operation was the culimation of over 30 law enforcement jurisdictions
at the local, state and federal level working together to fight this
crime. as many of you know in your own line of work, it is difficult
to coordinate a meeting with just a few participants to attend let
alone 30 LE jurisdictions. The date to take this down was the date it
came down where we felt we could get the best benefit of sucess
regarding as many jurisdictions and targets involved. In addition, and
most importantly, this investigation revealed that a number of the
targets were actually producing this material and victimizing actual
children in the process. would you have rather I waited until after
the election to stop this victimization? In fact, my boss, Dennis C.
Vacco did not have a press confrence on this case. A press confrence
where agency heads from many LEA's would have atended, including both
democrates and republicans (if that matters). He only got on the TV
after the major network affiliates where standing outside his office
wanting to know what happened. The other jurisdicitions that had held
press confrences and the network affilates had pick up the fact that
something big had happened. Monitoring: Let me just say that no one is
asking you or anyone else to monitor NG's for there content. LE will
continue to actively do that role. For the most part, most of the NG's
are text based and are not at issue here. Of the ones that are binary,
most of those are the free exchange of adult pornography which "most"
LEA's are not interested in investigating or prosecuting. Most of that
material is also protected by our first amendmant. What we are all
talking about is child pornography. The mere possession of which is a
felony in all states and most countries. When someone, anyone, informs
you that there is a NG that appears to be "dedicated" to the exchange
of "child pornography" It may be in your best interest to investigate
that information and take some approriate action. As far as taking ISP
equipment for a few pics posted in an out of the way NG, it just wont
happen. Just like we (LEA's) cant seize a vehicle because it has a MJ
roach in the ash tray. there are things called the "excessiveness" and
"proportionality" clauses. In the case where a few CP pics are
discoverd posted to a NG, you can count on LEO tracing down the poster
and working with the everyone to determine the IP log addys and NNTP
posting host to determine the resposible party. In the case where an
ISP is informed of the content and character of the material occuring
in a NG and the name alone is a very good indicator of the content and
the ISP chooses to do nothing about it, additional action may be taken
under the possession theory. Analogies: the post office and telephone
analogies are legally flawed. In fact, the post office workes very
closly with LEA's when they are informed or "discover on their own"
that narcotics and/or child porn is being transmitted through the
services they provide. It just the right thing to do. Please keep up
the comments and suggestions on this very important issue. Michael
McCartney Investigator New York State Attorney General's Office
mikemc@cops.org - 



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