FBI, Federal Judge Agree Fighting Botnets Means Allowing The FBI To Remotely Install Software On People’s Computers::The ends aren’t always supposed to justify the means. And a federal agency that already raised the hackles of defense lawyers around the nation during a CSAM investigation probably shouldn’t be in this much of hurry to start sending out unsolicited software to unknowing recipients. But that’s the way things work now. As a result…
Meh, this is overblown.
They seized the control servers of the malware operation, used that to send an update destroying the bots, after getting a warrant to do so. In the article it makes it seem like they searched everyone’s computer, even though the warrant explicitly forbade them from doing so, saw the bot software and then targeted them. This is not the case.
The warrant explicitly forbade the FBI from searching the computers they for the warrant for. The article implies that they could violate the warrant if they want to. And they could. But by that logic any warrant can be abused, let’s just get rid of warrants. And the issue at hand, that the court issued the warrant, is being glossed over on this point. The FBI had this capability, they’ll abuse it warrant or no if they’re trying to abuse it. The warrant makes no difference. So why even bring up the warrant?
It’s not overblown, they are modifying people’s systems without their knowledge or consent, a warrant to do so should never have been granted. Whether their intent was good or not is irrelevant.
This smells of a case where they are looking to broaden their reach through precedence. They now can modify peoples systems if a judge feels it’s “good” to do so.
They uninstalled a malicious bot-net from people’s machines that they never consented to either. The bot-net posed a serious and persistent threat to essentially everyone on the internet.
While having law enforcement writing code to run on people’s machines unwittingly is definitely extreme and absolutely should be heavily scrutinized, leaving the bot-net active is not a better option. And in this case law enforcement has been public about their actions so there’s plenty of opportunity for what happened to be reviewed.
This smells of a case where they are looking to broaden their reach through precedence.
What are you even talking about? I’ve never heard of such thing as “warrant precedence.” There’s case law precedence, and a ruling on a case can create precedence that impacts the legality of warrants. If anything, they’re actively trying to prevent such legal precedent by not informing their targets, who would have been the best suited to file suit against them.
It’s not overblown, they are modifying people’s systems without their knowledge or consent
I’m about as upset about this as I was about the guy who hacked into people’s routers to close known, commonly exploited vulnerabilities. Which is to say, not at all.
Why are you upset about this? Do you think those people were harmed in some way by the FBI’s actions?
Having botnet malware on your computer harms you. It also harms other people - everyone who is impacted by the person controlling the botnet. It means your private files are likely visible to criminals who have no qualms about exploiting them for personal gain.
Removing the malware, therefore, helps you.
This is like walking into a stranger’s house uninvited through their unlocked front door, removing the extension power cord + ethernet cable that their neighbor had plugged into their outlet and peripheral, and then leaving. (Side note - in many jurisdictions, walking into a house uninvited through an unlocked or open door isn’t a crime.)
Whether their intent was good or not is irrelevant.
Nonsense.
Their intent was good. The end result was good. Their means were not excessive, given their goal.
Could they have used this exercise as an excuse to hurt someone? Sure. Did they? Did the tool they were using malfunction and brick a nice old lady’s home desktop PC? Did someone get charged with a crime because of evidence collected outside the scope of the warrant of this case? Not as far as we know or have any reason to believe.
That doesn’t mean they didn’t, but you fix that with oversight, not by refusing to allow the government to combat botnets.
And if you’re concerned about the FBI breaking into your computer through the use of one of these vulnerabilities, then secure your computer. It’s irresponsible not to.
This wasn’t an urgent crisis, the victims should have been notified before their privacy was infringed upon.
Breaking into someone’s computer without their consent is wrong no matter the reason.
Relying on a judge’s discression as to what is safe and what is good before you break into someone’s computer is a terrible idea. There’s a current federal judge that thought Firefox was a search engine, he’s one in a pool of federal judges that would be approving FBI requests to fix you computer for your own good.
Like trying to reduce the number of different industry standards by creating your own standard.
Soon…There is now an additional botnet.
I am all for freedom and generally against empowering the government keeping in mind the potential for abuse and other consequences. But in this case I don’t think we should prevent them. It should be scrutinized to make it harder to abuse but it’s a necessity for national security.
Edit: i will assume that tankies didn’t like the national security aspect of my comment since they want us to fail
