(FBI) Request to (Hack)Erase (Re)Classified (Public) Files Nixed

[DUreader]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uslatest/story/0,1282,-3294126,00.html


WASHINGTON (AP) - The Justice Department
sought extraordinary permission to let the FBI
conduct a search-and-destroy mission on any
computers harboring classified information about
a 1980s case that temporarily became public in a
lawsuit. A federal judge, however, rejected the
idea.

The request from federal prosecutors in
Sacramento, Calif., was considered highly unusual
by legal experts because it did not specify which
computers the government believed might contain
the classified information or how agents would
retrieve and destroy information that already had
been made public.

``This stuns me,'' said Kate Martin, director for
the Washington-based Center for National
Security Studies. ``I have never heard of them
asking for such authority before. It's very
disturbing that the FBI is contemplating going out
and secretly examining hard-drives to see whether
they contain this information.''

Justice officials said they were reviewing whether
to refile their request.

snip

[DUreader]

1. COURT REJECTS FBI REQUEST TO SEARCH COMPUTER HARD DRIVES

http://www.bigleftoutside.com/archives/000197.php

[DUreader]

2. Follow up to: COMING SOON: THE FBI'S "TEN MOST WANTED HARD DRIVES"

http://www.bigleftoutside.com/archives/000196.php

Authentic Journalist Bill Conroy at the San Antonio Business Journal keeps pulling that one little thread... and all kinds of hell is
breaking loose...

The FBI is in court now chasing permission to hack websites and remove inconvenient information from the datasphere:

Attorneys for the U.S. government recently asked a federal judge for a court order to allow an FBI "computer
specialist" to remove from "any computer hard drives" certain public court records that the government was seeking
to have sealed due to alleged national security concerns.

If you missed my October 14 blog entry on this matter, it's worth a look.

Can anybody say "off-shore server"?

[donotpassgo]

3. Do these Hard Drives have wife beaters and mullets?

n/t

[izzie]

4. This is a very odd story; and is it true?

I mean how many places could it have gone. 1000, 10,000 once out how do you get it back?

[DUreader]

5. Not necessarily over yet, refiles and appeals etc.

bears watching

[KellyW]

6. I got my copy

You should too !!!

[Dover]

7. Sounds to me like the Bushies could be looking for a convenient

patsy to take the fall for the Wilson leak...or at least is somehow connected with that case. This agent seems vulnerable as does the one he says revealed his cover (a "highly placed asset"). And he fully expects to be "gotten" one way or another by his agency. Are they concerned about having the "highly placed asset" revealed in this agents court case?

Remember O'Neill's "stolen briefcase" incident? This article has the same fishy feel to it that the report on O'Neill "losing" his briefcase had....before we knew what we now know about him.

..The government didn't tell the judge how it might determine who copied the classified material onto the computers, nor did it suggest whether it already has searched anyone's hard drives for the documents.

The unorthodox legal skirmish in Sacramento occurs amid heightened sensitivity within the Bush administration over intelligence leaks, as the Justice Department tries to find out who revealed the name of the undercover CIA officer married to former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson.


..snip..

The classified sections of the court papers describe a covert mission by Lau in November 1987 to a country he doesn't identify. Lau said he was warned the night before his trip that one of the FBI's ``highly placed assets'' betrayed his identity as an undercover FBI agent, but, to avoid confirming the disclosure, he did not cancel the trip.