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Comment by jariel | Hacker News Reader

Was it 'asking for more' or 'helping' with said activities?

I think there is materially a difference.

That said, I don't know the specifics of the case, I'd be interested in hearing if there is material legitimacy to the case.

If they are jailing a reporter for essentially publishing data and merely 'communicating' with individuals ... this would be bad.

Also - there is the question of the legitimacy of publishing hacked data.

If someone hacked into your phone, and published it, it would be a crime. If they gave it to a journalist, not a crime?

If there is uncovering of actual, illegal activities, then it changes the dynamic, but what if it's not? What if the 'details' are just embarrassing, or problematic for those hacked? Do we want to legitimise theft for political objectives?

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I just read the part of accusation that was used to indicted Gleen Greenwald. There is no proof of collusion with the hacker. Actually in his communication with the hackers, he was very cautious . Also, the Supreme court had decided GG couldn't be investigated when he start publishing the conversations.

> If someone hacked into your phone, and published it, it would be a crime. If they gave it to a journalist, not a crime?

The hacking is a crime, the publishing isn't. But once you start giving direction to the hacker, you became the hacker accomplice.

> If there is uncovering of actual, illegal activities, then it changes the dynamic, but what if it's not? What if the 'details' are just embarrassing, or problematic for those hacked? Do we want to legitimise theft for political objectives?

That's whats happened in Brazil. There published communication didn't show any _unquestionably_ illegal activity. Even if did, the brazillian law don't allow to use illegally obtained proofs (unless if absolves someone).

> If someone hacked into your phone, and published it, it would be a crime. If they gave it to a journalist, not a crime?

It all depends on the contents of your phone. If you committed certain actions that are of public interest, and lied about and/or hide these actions (as is the case of the Brazilian group of judges and prosecutors), then it is imperative that journalists publish that content. Journalists are protected in their activity exactly because of this reason.

There is technically nothing that defines what a journalist is (in most cases), and "committed certain actions that are of public interest, and lied about and/or hide these actions" is an impossible grey area, technically difficult to define. Very, very vague.

By that logic, almost anything could be hacked and published on some arbitrary blog because of the very vague term 'public interest'.

If this is the threshold we're going to use than almost the majority of political communication, huge swaths of business communication, and large portions of personal information of anyone with a public profile can be subject to hacking and publication.

While it might be good that 'a liar was exposed somewhere in Brasil' - this might not be the path we want to go down.

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