It's simple, without grounds for a suspicion people's rights should be respected. What this is is the erosion of our rights and if we object we become a convicted terrorist. Shocking.
Read the article, it states there was intelligence although it doesn't state what it was or whether the security services directed them to do it.
"The prosecution told Westminster Magistrates' Court that Rabbani was not stopped "randomly", but did not say whether the security and intelligence services had directed police."
How do you feel about random bag searches for drugs in luggage? Or having to put your items through an X-Ray machine at an airport? Of walking through those machines that detect drugs and explosives on skin?
and then what would you propose?
sit and wait for a terrorist to continue with his chats to organize an attack?
or let him share information about airport security or sensitive spotsI analyzed phones of unexpected people who then turned out to be pedophiles, with even 40 victims?
how do you think of discovering these things if you deny the chance of investigating random samples?
alternatives?
It seems to me - with all due respect - that you are missing the point.
The data (whether terrorism related or not) was AND remains encrypted, almost one year later, and possibly will never be accessed, so, clearly, this measure/Law/whatever is far from being "effective".
I made this comment elsewhere
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To me it makes little sense.
For Police work, time is "relative", as an example the cop that is held in the US for contempt of the Court for not revealing the password to his drives is suspected of possessing child pornography, whether he is kept in jail because he won't reveal them or because as the sheer moment he reveals them he will be proved guilty doesn't change things much (there is anyway other evidence against him).
Here it is not a "Police" case, but rather a "counter-intelligence" one, in these cases time is everything, a delay of hours, or at the most days in gathering the information is vital.
AFAIK Mr.Rabani NEVER revealed the password(s), he refused revealing it/them on 20/Nov/2016, now, almost one year later, he is found guilty of obstructing the search, still there is no evidence that he is or was - even tangentially - connected with terrorism.
So, £620+12 months' conditional discharge seem to me a lot of time/a very severe punishment if he was in good faith attempting to protect some sensitive data for his non-governement organization, and nothing if he was in bad faith or however protecting terrorism related info.
In any case, whatever the Police expected to find on the device(s) they didn't access it/them, and much worse than that they didn't access it/them in a timely fashion (and no charges of terrorism or connections to it were made against Mr.Rabani in almost one year) so - besides seeming more a petty vengeance than anything else - it is not like it helped in ANY way the counter-terrorism.
jaclaz
It's simple, without grounds for a suspicion people's rights should be respected. What this is is the erosion of our rights and if we object we become a convicted terrorist. Shocking.
Read the article, it states there was intelligence although it doesn't state what it was or whether the security services directed them to do it.
"The prosecution told Westminster Magistrates' Court that Rabbani was not stopped "randomly", but did not say whether the security and intelligence services had directed police."
How do you feel about random bag searches for drugs in luggage? Or having to put your items through an X-Ray machine at an airport? Of walking through those machines that detect drugs and explosives on skin?
If you have practical experience in the field, you should know 'intelligence' is usually nothing more than 'someone said'. It's far, far below what would form grounds for a reasonable suspicion.
Airport security and customs clearance is an entirely different matter - you consent to open your bags and such so people can do their job and make sure people are not carrying drugs or dangerous weapons for example. It is not a matter of privacy, it is a reasonable security precaution and it is applied consistently to everyone passing through an airport. And most people would be carrying clothes and such items in their luggage, it is a reasonable check to make sure some people are not also carrying say a bomb. But on people's phones and personal devices people carry their entire personal and professional lives, they have an expectation and right to privacy and the data on there cannot reasonably be presumed to pose a security threat in the same way it's necessary to rule out the presence of contraband in people's luggage.
If you have practical experience in the field, you should know 'intelligence' is usually nothing more than 'someone said'. It's far, far below what would form grounds for a reasonable suspicion.
Airport security and customs clearance is an entirely different matter - you consent to open your bags and such so people can do their job and make sure people are not carrying drugs or dangerous weapons for example. It is not a matter of privacy, it is a reasonable security precaution and it is applied consistently to everyone passing through an airport. And most people would be carrying clothes and such items in their luggage, it is a reasonable check to make sure some people are not also carrying say a bomb. But on people's phones and personal devices people carry their entire personal and professional lives, they have an expectation and right to privacy and the data on there cannot reasonably be presumed to pose a security threat in the same way it's necessary to rule out the presence of contraband in people's luggage.
And from practical experience, more often than not, those little bits where someone says "Its probably nothing but…." or the gut feeling from people on the ground turns into some of the best results.
So this took place at an airport and I'm therefore assuming he was either leaving the country or coming back into it on a flight. So it comes under the same section as Airport Security.
Secondly, your options at airports are open your bag or don't fly. Agree to be searched or don't fly. Basically do as we say or don't fly. Here the option was effectively the same, though rather than provide password or don't fly it was provide password or face criminal charges.
Some people store their entire lives on a computer and we can seize that quite easily with a warrant. Here its been done under the legal power provided to airports where, especially with people of different countries, its not practical to use warrants as they may be temporary in the country etc.
If you have practical experience in the field, you should know 'intelligence' is usually nothing more than 'someone said'. It's far, far below what would form grounds for a reasonable suspicion.
Well, that is highly debatable.
While it is clear that all intelligence, counter-intelligence and counter-terrorism is vastly based on "hearsay" it undoubtedly has its merits.
In a perfect world there would be available 24/7 a Judge at each entry point, capable, to rule - on the base of the information provided by the police or customs to authorize via a warrant *any* search.
Just as an example, when arriving in Australia, if - for whatever reasons - the customs decide that you are suspect they can ask you (respectfully) your consent to both a body search and an internal (x-ray or similar) body search.
You are free to deny this consent in which case a magistrate (which is BTW - I believe - actually a high ranking civil servant of some kind, not a judge as we commonly think of) comes in, hears what the customs say about the reasons they believe you are a suspect and on the spot authorizes (or denies) the body search(es) overriding your denial of consent.
Airport security and customs clearance is an entirely different matter - you consent to open your bags and such so people can do their job and make sure people are not carrying drugs or dangerous weapons for example. It is not a matter of privacy, it is a reasonable security precaution and it is applied consistently to everyone passing through an airport. And most people would be carrying clothes and such items in their luggage, it is a reasonable check to make sure some people are not also carrying say a bomb. But on people's phones and personal devices people carry their entire personal and professional lives, they have an expectation and right to privacy and the data on there cannot reasonably be presumed to pose a security threat in the same way it's necessary to rule out the presence of contraband in people's luggage.
Well, that is highly debatable.
Let's make a different, hypothetical scenario.
Let's imagine that there is a "secret map" useful for a terrorist attack that (for whatever reasons) cannot be transmitted (for fear of interception) and *needs* to be carried on some storage media.
An effective Law (or however provision) would be *anyone* that - upon a warrant emitted by a suitable democratic and transparent authority (such as a magistrate or judge) the data is actually accessed (AND accessed in a timely fashion).
This particular UK Law is instead at the same time non-democratic (allowing searches without a suitable Authority warrant) and ineffective (since the culprit, one year later or so is punished while the data remains unaccessed).
And as said the punishment given in this case is (as I see it) at the same time way too harsh for someone protecting in good faith sensitive data and amounting to nothing if the undisclosed data was actually of meaning for counter-terrorism activities.
This said, I would find not entirely impossible that the refusal to disclose the password(s) in this specific case was nothing but an intentional attempt to create a case.
Come on ) , if you are publicly into an organization very likely to be subject of this or that three or more letter government agencies' curiosity, do you really-really carry sensible data with you - encrypted as much as you want - through a border (and on a leisure trip)? 😯
The risk of said agencies being actually capable of decrypting the data is way too high to create the opportunity for them to seize them during a border crossing check.
So - specifically - I can see two possibilities
1) Mr. Rabani is a complete moron, totally unaware of basic security principles
2) He is intentionally doing this to create a case/provoke a reaction/see what happen
I would personally believe the second, and then most probably his iPhone and Laptop are filled with lolcat pictures and video.
jaclaz