Barrett Brown is an Internet Activist and Journalist.
For the last twelve months he has been sitting in prison, facing trial on a multitude of charges including, but not limited to "trafficking in stolen information" and "threatening a Federal Agent".
So what makes a journalist do either of those things? Did he do them, and should we be allowed to see the evidence against him? There are no National Security matters at issue here ... or so we are told.
Until September 2012, Barrett Brown was a regular contributor to this site. He was banned following a series of increasingly "odd" Diaries, and comments to match. I have no information as to why he was banned, but the apparent descent into "conspiracy theory" may account for it.
Recent developments suggest there may be more to this story than meets the eye, and again the government are going hell for leather to prevent us finding out, and discussing the matter. They may have cogent reasons for doing so, but the information so far does not appear to support this.
I feel bad about Barrett Brown. He was "one of us", and he was banned. As one of the people who HR'd a comment from the guy with the Mitt Romney "47%" Video Diary, I am maybe a bit over-sensitive to these matters, but I'll do my best to explain and you can make up your own minds.
Nothing in this Diary will compromise the Site, its proprietor or myself. There are no links to stolen material, no links to Anonymous, and no opinions from me. I am here to tell the outlines of a story; I am not about to land myself in the adjacent cell to Mr Brown.
Brown is, whatever else he might be, a recognised journalist. He has had pieces published in Vanity Fair (well worth a read) and The Guardian, as well as Huffpo and Daily Kos.
He is/was also a supporter, and one of the public faces of the hacking group known as Anonymous. Brown denies any actual involvement with Anonymous, but he was keen to use the information they gathered as part of his investigative journalism.
According to The Guardian, Brown's problems started when he began an investigation into the hacking of HB Gary Federal, and effort to expose a plot by that firm and it;s attorneys to have Bank of America (lol) and it's law firm employ the supporters of Wikileaks, then attempt to destroy their careers.
Anonymous hacked into the computer system of the private security firm HB Gary Federal and then posted thousands of emails containing incriminating and nefarious acts. Among them was a joint proposal by that firm - along with the very well-connected firms of Palantir and Berico - to try to persuade Bank of America and its law firm, Hunton & Williams, to hire them to destroy the reputations and careers of WikiLeaks supporters and, separately, critics of the Chamber of Commerce
Brown himself discussed that operation in
articles on this Blog.
However, Anonymous didn't only harvest emails, they also got hold of a file containing the credit card details of five million people. This file was among a tranche of information posted into the public domain.
Central to the indictment is the uncontested fact that Brown shared a link to that file, in an internet chatroom while he was researching a piece he had called Project PM. This raises a very difficult question and one central to how our Federal Prosecutors are working. Does the simple sharing of a link, to a site or file in the public domain, constitute a federal offense? If the government deems the linked material to be classified, commercially sensitive, stolen or merely copyright infringement, there does seem to be very little to stop anyone being charged with a crime.
Here is what Adrian Chen, Gawker, had to say on this point:
As a journalist who covers hackers and has "transferred and posted" many links to data stolen by hackers—in order to put them in stories about the hacks—this indictment is frightening because it seems to criminalize linking. Does this mean if a hacker posts a list of stolen passwords and usernames to Pastebin, the popular document-sharing site, and I link to them in a story or tweet I could be charged with "trafficking in stolen authentication features," as Brown has been? (I wouldn't typically do this, but I've seen plenty of other bloggers and journalists who have.) Links to the credit card number list were widely shared on Twitter in the wake of the Stratfor hack—are all the people who tweeted links going to be rounded up and arrested, too?
Barrett Brown is not the most stable person you would ever meet. He has fought with substance abuse and, for a journalist, some of his writing contrasts with the Vanity Fair piece, by being considerably less lucid. Into this mercurial life came the FBI, seeking, then demanding information that any journalist would expect to be privileged. What upset Brown the most were the veiled threat to indict his mother. He had taken refuge at her house when the FBI searched his own home; now here they were accusing her of complicity.
Barrett Brown hit back with a very ill-advised video that he posted to YouTube in a three part series. All are viewable here.
Now it is not unreasonable for folk to suggest that there may, on the face of it, be some kind of case to answer. Brown did share that link, although as detailed above, so did thousands of other people so it would be natural to wonder why Brown alone has bee indicted. Brown was not accused of the hacking, he did not steal anything.
The problem here is twofold.
Firstly, he is facing charges so numerous and grave that the potential sentence is somewhere in the region of 100 years. The only actual crime I can find is the allegation that he shared a link, and that he published a rather intemperate response to what he viewed as the FBI intimidating his Mom. That may deserve some kind of penalty, but that is not what is reflected in the vehemence with which he is being prosecuted; neither does it seem to justify twelve months remanded in prison.
Secondly, and here is the kicker ... The government has filed a motion for a Gag Order (pdf)
I haven't been particularly aware of a mass media campaign to sway any potential jury in this case, and for the life of me I can't understand why pre-trial publicity would harm the prosecution, although it may cast some light on the apparent "over reach" that is becoming increasingly common in matters such as this.
This from Natasha Leonard over at Salon:
Brown’s defense has pointed out to the presiding judge that despite writing from jail and speaking to a handful of journalists, Brown has made no justice-obstructing statements. The government’s argument is that they want to ensure Brown’s case is tried in court rather than put on public trial in the media, with Brown’s and his defense team controlling the narrative.
However, at a time when Bradley Manning faces decades in military prison, Jeremy Hammond faces a ten-year sentence for his role in the Statfor hack and Edward Snowden is hiding in Russia for fear of persecution for revealing uncomfortable truths about government surveillance, Brown’s case also reflects a general epoch of troubling crackdowns; his voice as both journalist and activist in the midst of one such crackdown is an important one to publicize. If default messaging comes from the government, the media must be allowed access to dissenting (and incarcerated) voices like Brown’s.
It is distressing that the personal information of credit card holders was exposed in the way it was. That should not happen, and there is no possible justification for it. Anonymous should, however, be the ones answering for their crimes,
and indeed they have.
Some of this story was sourced from writing by Glenn Greenwald. I am aware that there is a tendency to dismiss the message due to the reputation of the messenger. However, in this case the story is widespread. Links are available from the New York Times, Dallas Morning News, Salon, Huffington Post, the LA Times, among others. The Nation even stole my Title, even if they got there first. But whatever this case is, it is very strange, so the Title stays!
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5:08 PM PT: Let me be clear, in case the Diary gives a false impression. I do not think that the ban imposed on Barrett Brown was inappropriate. I am aware that he made some very unpleasant comments, that included threats to other Users.
I do wonder, without making excuses for him, just what pressures he was under at the time. Whatever, the comments were quite sufficient to justify a ban.