Indiana Legislator Wants To Force NFL Team To Hand Out Refunds To Fans 'Offended' By Kneeling Players

from the First-Amendment-protects-speech-I-like,-all-others-pay-cash dept

Free speech isn't free, people trying to stifle your free speech will often remind you. It's dumb enough when it's just your fellow man. It's way worse when it's your elected representative. (via PrawfsBlog)

An Indiana lawmaker is filing legislation that would require the Indianapolis Colts to offer fans refunds if Colts players kneel during the national anthem at home games.

The lawmaker is Milo P. Smith, a lawmaker who has pushed forward legislation opposed by his own offspring to satisfy his base. This appears to be more of the same. Smith's anti-kneeling bill not only poses Constitutional problems, but it completely misconstrues the reasons NFL players kneel.

Rep. Milo Smith, R-Columbus, said his bill would allow fans who feel disrespected by the kneeling to ask for a refund during the first quarter.

"To me when they take a knee during the national anthem, it’s not respecting the national anthem or our country," Smith said. "Our government isn’t perfect, but it's still the best country in the world and I think we need to be respectful of it."

Kneeling doesn't "disrespect" paying customers. If they want to feel offended by it, that's their prerogative, but it's not directed towards them. And it has nothing to do with not respecting the national anthem, the United States, the troops fighting for these players' freedom to express themselves, or anything else related to patriotic jingoism. It's a protest of ongoing oppression of African Americans in the United States. That's what has been diluted by attacks on this particular form of protest. Not only have people like Smith managed to turn the protest into an anti-American statement, they've shifted the players' goalposts away from the law enforcement target to an assault the flag, the troops, and every other symbol of unquestioning patriotism.

Smith is dumb and his proposed law is dumber. Even if it manages to survive a vote on its highly-dubious merits, it certainly won't survive a Constitutional challenge. As Howard Wasserman of Prawfsblog points out, there are numerous ways the law could be construed as government infringement on free speech rights.

[T]he law infringes the Colts' First Amendment rights by sanctioning them (or setting them up for sanction) if they do not prohibit their players from kneeling. If we understand the team as exercising its First Amendment rights when it decides what its players can do, the law abridges that right and for reasons of disagreement with the team's speech in allowing its players to kneel.

A law also can violate a person's rights even if it does not prohibit some actions, by empowering or obligating private persons to take certain steps that harm that person... The same logic is at work with this statute--the Colts are essentially being fined for not stopping the players from kneeling and so will prohibit kneeling to avoid the fine.

In this case the fine comes in the form of a ticket price refund, provided the offended person leaves the game before the end of the first quarter. So, it will basically appeal to those with the same mentality as our Vice President, who apparently attended an Indianapolis Colts game solely for the purpose of being offended. His walkout and attendant statement of offense was apparently directly ordered by President Trump. The demands for refunds by "offended" attendees will serve the same virtue-signalling purpose VP Pence's leaving-in-a-huff did: to briefly ascend a shitty bully pulpit to preach to the converted. (Facebook videos of jersey-burnings optional.)

This bill has zero chance of going anywhere because it's so obviously targeted at silencing protected speech. Considering Smith has done nothing more than talk about this bill so far (it has not been submitted to the legislature at this point), it would appear Smith has plenty of opportunities to run his mouth about speech he doesn't agree with (a.k.a.: more speech). This alone renders his First Amendment-harming legislation superfluous. The Constitution will render the law illegal, should Smith ever put his taxpayers' money where his offended motormouth is.

Filed Under: first amendment, football, free speech, indiana, kneeling, milo smith, offended

Revealed: Vietnam's 10,000-Strong Internet Monitoring Force, Tasked With Stamping Out 'Wrongful Views'

from the whatever-happened-to-occupying-the-moral-high-ground? dept

Over the years, Techdirt has published quite a few stories about Vietnam's moves to stifle dissent online. On Christmas Day, Colonel General Nguyen Trong Nghia, deputy chairman of the General Political Department of the People's Army of Vietnam, revealed that the country had secretly created a massive Internet monitoring unit called "Force 47":

Nghia said the special force tasked with combating wrongful information and anti-state propaganda is called the Force 47, named after Directive No. 47 that governs its foundation.

The team currently has more than 10,000 members, who are "the core fighters" in cyberspace.

The three-star general underlined that members of this team are "red and competent," implying that they have both technology expertise and good political ideals in addition to personality.

As Tuoi Tre News reports, Force 47 is tasked with fighting "wrongful views". Bloomberg points out some recent moves by the Vietnamese authorities to police the online world:

Facebook this year removed 159 accounts at Vietnam's behest, while YouTube took down 4,500 videos, or 90 percent of what the government requested, according to VietnamNet news, which cited Minister of Information and Communications Truong Minh Tuan last week. The National Assembly is debating a cybersecurity bill that would require technology companies to store certain data on servers in the country.

The Wall Street Journal notes that heavy sentences have been imposed on people for using the Internet to spread some of those "wrongful views":

In recent months, the country has increased the penalties for anyone using Facebook as a platform to attack the government. In November, a young blogger was given a seven-year prison sentence for "spreading propaganda against the state," while a well-known environmentalist, Nguyen Ngoc Nhu Quynh, was handed a 10-year sentence on the same charges in June.

Vietnam is hardly alone in wanting to censor online content on a massive scale. As well as the obvious example of China, Germany, too, now requires Internet companies to delete "hate speech". In addition, the UK is threatening to impose tax penalties on companies that don't take down "extremist" material. In order to meet these global demands for rapid and even pre-emptive removal of material, the leading online companies are taking on thousands of people as in-house censors. Both Google and Facebook have promised to increase their "safety" teams to 20,000 people. Against that background, it's hard for the West to condemn Vietnam's latest moves without appearing hypocritical.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and +glynmoody on Google+

Filed Under: censorship, free speech, internet monitoring, vietnam

Hawaiian Supreme Court Says The First Amendment Protects Filming Law Enforcement

from the another-feather-in-the-First-A's-cap dept

There's no unified national view on First Amendment protections for filming police, but a few recent cases have established this right in some judicial circuits. Until a case makes its way to the US Supreme Court, cops who don't like being recorded in public can still roll the dice on immunity when arresting people for operating cameras.

Via the Volokh Conspiracy (at its new, paywall-free home at Reason) comes another decision in favor of a First Amendment right to record. This one was delivered by the Hawaiian state supreme court, which at least ensures residents can't be hassled for recording officers… or at least ensures success in the pursuant lawsuit.

In this case, journalist Thomas Russo happened upon a police checkpoint and decided to film it. During his filming of a traffic stop, he was instructed to do several things -- like back up and turn his vehicle's hazard lights on. Every instruction given by officers appeared to be followed in Russo's recording but officers still arrested him and took his phone. The charges -- failing to comply with a lawful order and disorderly conduct -- were ultimately dismissed. The court examined the footage of the stop and found it did not show Russo disobeying orders. Anything that appeared as noncompliance on Russo's part was due to the vagueness of the officer's orders, rather than direct disobedience.

More importantly, the court takes a stand on the First Amendment issue.

We agree with the reasoning of the First Circuit and of other federal courts of appeal that have considered this issue. The rights to free speech and press serve not only to protect the individual's right to self-expression, but also to promote the vital goal of “affording the public access to discussion, debate, and the dissemination of information and ideas.” Bellotti, 435 U.S. at 783... This aspect of the First Amendment is all the more critical when the ideas and information sought to be disseminated pertain to government officials and law enforcement personnel, “who are granted substantial discretion that may be misused to deprive individuals of their liberties.” Glik, 655 F.3d at 82; see also Gentile, 501 U.S. at 1034-35. Public access to such information serves to guarantee “public oversight of law enforcement” and “minimizes the possibility of abuse by ensuring that police departments and officers are held accountable for their actions.” Peer News LLC v. City & Cty. of Honolulu, 138 Hawai‘i 53, 73-74, 376 P.3d 1, 22-23 (2016) (considering accessibility of police officer disciplinary records under state public records law). In light of these principles, this court likewise concludes that the “filming of government officials engaged in their duties in a public place, including police officers performing their responsibilities,” Glik, 655 F.2d at 82, is protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and by the independent protections afforded by article I, section 4 of the Hawai‘i Constitution.

[...]

In this case, Russo was engaged in video recording Officers Lawson and Fairchild as they conducted a traffic stop pursuant to a scheduled law enforcement action. Whether he was acting in an individual capacity or as a representative of the media, Russo's conduct in videotaping the police officers in public was protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I, section 4 of the Hawai‘i Constitution.

[...]

[W]e observe that “[i]n our society, police officers are expected to endure significant burdens caused by citizens' exercise of their First Amendment rights,” and, to ensure the protections that the First Amendment affords, officers may often be expected to show restraint when “they are merely the subject of videotaping that memorializes, without impairing, their work in public spaces.” Glik, 655 F.3d at 84.

As for the government's claims the officers had every right to arrest Russo for disobeying orders, the court has this to say:

The video footage stipulated into evidence by the parties shows that Russo did, in fact, comply with the officers' order. When Officer Fairchild instructed Russo to return to his vehicle and turn on his hazard lights, Russo complied. When Officer Fairchild waved his hand and directed Russo to “step off to the side” to avoid getting “run over,” Russo likewise complied--responding, “Okay,” and walking away from the general area to which Officer Fairchild had gestured. When Russo was subsequently approached and ordered by Officer Lawson to “stand back there,” Russo complied by taking a few steps away from the area and asking whether he could stand on private property. When Officer Lawson responded that he could not and ordered him to “stand back there,” Russo took several steps back towards the highway and asked, “Can I stand on public property?” When Officer Lawson then threatened Russo with arrest, Russo immediately began walking backwards, away from the area and towards the general direction to which Officers Lawson and Fairchild pointed. For the remainder of the video, as the police officers persisted in walking towards Russo and commanding that he “stand back there,” Russo continued to walk backwards and away from the traffic stop area. It appears from the video recording that Russo only stopped walking backwards when he was physically prevented from doing so and arrested by the officers.

Although Russo may have continued to engage Officers Lawson and Fairchild in conversation and questions during the encounter, the video itself plainly demonstrates that Russo obeyed their command. Russo appeared to make a concerted effort to comply with the officers' instructions, and the video shows that he walked away or backwards when ordered by the officers to step or stand back. The parties agreed that the video footage was the best evidence of the encounter, and the footage impels the conclusion that Russo did, in fact, comply with the officers' order. Thus, given the evidence in this case, there was no probable cause to support the charge of failure to comply with a lawful order of a police officer in violation of HRS § 291C-23.

Not only was it a baseless charge, it was stacked on top of a First Amendment violation and a catch-all "disorderly conduct" rap. No credit of good faith is given and the court finds in favor of Russo and filming police officers. It's a solid win for Hawaiian citizens and another favorable court opinion to be cited in upcoming courtroom battles.

Filed Under: filming police, first amendment, free speech, hawaii

Knicks Center Enes Kantor To Be Tried In Absentia For Upsetting Turkish President Recep Erdogan's Fickle Ego

from the scoring-in-the-twitter-post dept

In all of our coverage of the actions of the Turkish government under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, quite a picture of the man, who now has a stranglehold on his country, has emerged. We can be sure of many things with all of this coverage. For instance, Erdogan has an ego the size of an oil rig, yet the intellectual armor of a flea. We also know that His Honor is perfectly happy to brutally wield the power of a sovereign nation for the petty benefit of his reputation. And, when all else fails, detractors and the journalists that cover him can be simply labled "terrorists" before being jailed, tortured, or otherwise harmed.

Still, for those of us in America, the dealings of a dictator can be beyond the horizon, both literally and figuratively. There are many places in the world ruled by goons, after all, and we have a proud tradition in America of simply not giving a shit if it doesn't effect the homeland in some conceivable way. Well, in the case of Erdogan, there is at least a touch-point for his brutality in New York Knicks big-man Enes Kantor who, after having members of his family arrested for the crime of being related to him, is now facing a trial in his absence on charges of insulting Erdogan and, you guessed it, being a terrorist.

The Turkish government is seeking at least a four-year prison term for New York Knicks center Enes Kanter because of insulting remarks he made about President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Twitter in May and June 2016, according to the Associated Press. And, yes, this is the world we live in in 2017.

A Turkish judge issued an arrest warrant for Kanter in mid-May of this year, when an Istanbul-based prosecutor pointed to the 25-year-old's social media account as evidence of his alleged "membership of an armed terrorist organization." To which Kanter responded on Twitter: "You can't catch me. Don't waste your breath. I will come on my own will anyway, to spit on your ugly, hateful faces."

Now, I will note that Kanter has not been shy about sharing his feelings about Erdogan. The NBA player has taken a shine to calling the Turkish President Recep "Hitler" and claiming that the recent coup attempt was a fiasco staged by the Turkish government purely to allow Erdogan to grab more power and to commit genocide on his rivals in the country. Whether either of those assertions are true, it's easy to see why Kanter might hold these opinions, given how drastically Erdogan has personally impacted Kanter's life for the worse.

Turkish officials arrested Kanter's father in what the NBA player believes was a warning this past June, even though his family had publicly disowned him for his political views and Kanter said he "would sacrifice my mother, my father and whole family for Gulen's sake." This is how strongly he opposes a president who the United Nations accused of creating an "environment conducive to torture" and whose rise has resulted in what the New York Times called "an almost untrammeled grip on power."

"Right now, even if I try to communicate with my parents, my mom or dad or brother or sister, [the government] will probably listen to their phones and as soon as they are in contact with me, they will put them in a jail — and the jails are not fun," Kanter said at the time of his father's arrest, via ESPN. "Right now, my family can't even go out to eat. My brother told me that my dad went to the supermarket and they spit on his face."

It's somehow worth repeating that all of this was done for opinions Kanter had expressed on Twitter, while half a world away playing in the NBA. The end result of all of this is that Kanter can be said to be without a family, without a country, but yet is fully in possession of his freedom and political faculties. Most of the legal experts that have been asked to comment for these stories indicate that while it's likely that Turkey has or will petition for the extradition of Kanter, it's worth noting that President Trump has been relatively friendly with Erdogan, lavishing the dictator with praise as recently as this past Fall.

One would hope that the spotlight of the NBA and America's tradition for free political speech and asylum for political refugees would equate to a full-throated rebuke of any extradition requests.

Filed Under: enes kantor, free speech, recep tayyip erdogan, turkey

Europe's Ongoing Attack On Free Speech, And Why It Should Concern Us All

from the this-is-not-helping dept

David Kaye, a law professor who has also been the UN's Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression (quite the title!) has penned a very interesting article for Foreign Affairs (possibly behind a paywall or registration wall) about how Europe's recent attempts to regulate the internet are now a major threat to free speech. It talks about many issues we've written about, from the awful Right to be Forgotten cases to efforts to fine internet platforms if they don't magically disappear hate speech. While telling internet platforms to "fix it' may feel good, the reality is that it doesn't work, creates more problems, and gives those platforms even more power as the de facto speech police (something we should all be worried about). As Kaye writes:

In September of this year, the commission doubled down on these principles, adopting a formal communication that urges “online platforms to step up the fight against illegal content.” As with the right to be forgotten, the communication puts the companies themselves in the position of identifying, especially through the use of algorithmic automation, illegal content posted to their platforms. But, as Daphne Keller of Stanford’s Center for Internet and Society has argued, the idea that automation can solve illegal content problems without sweeping in vast amounts of legal content is fantasy. Machines typically fail to account for satire, critique, and other kinds of context that turn superficial claims of illegality into fully legitimate content. Automation thus involves a disproportionate takedown of legal content all to target a smaller amount of illegal material online. As a matter of law, as attorney and legal analyst Graham Smith noted, the commission process reverses the normal presumptions of legality in favor of illegality, with safeguards so weak that companies will likely err on the side of taking down content.

The communication expressly avoids the problem of disinformation and propaganda. But regulation of such content may also be on the horizon, as the commission has announced creation of a High-Level Group to address it. Even the staunchest promoters of freedom of expression in European politics recognize that disinformation is a major problem. Marietje Schaake, a Dutch member of the European Parliament and a leading proponent of respect for human rights in Europe, captured a widespread view on the continent when she said in parliamentary debate that she is “not reassured when Silicon Valley or Mark Zuckerberg are the de facto designers of our realities or of our truths.”  

He goes on to point out a number of other problematic attacks on free speech in the name of "regulating the internet" -- including the EU's attempt at copyright reform. He concludes by noting we should be very, very concerned about how this will play out for free speech:

These rules should concern anyone who cares about freedom of expression, as they involve limitations on European uses of online platforms. European policymakers have good faith reasons to advocate them, such as countering rampant abuse at a time of human dislocation, political instability, and rise of far-right parties. Yet the tools used often risk overregulation, incentivizing private censorship that could undermine public debate and creative pursuits. Companies may be forced into the position of facilitating practices that undermine their customers’ access to information. Europeans should be concerned, as many are.

Why should anyone else care? In the analog era, after all, a fair response in the United States to speech regulation across the pond (or anywhere else) might have been: that’s the way they do it in Europe. They have different experiences, giving some support (if very limited) to rules that U.S. courts would never permit—such as those against Holocaust denial or the glorification of terrorism.

But online space is different. All of the major companies operate at scale, and there is significant risk that troubling content regulations in Europe will seep into global corporate practices with an impact on the uses of social media and search worldwide. The possibility of global delinking of search results may be the most obvious form of content threat, but all of the rules and proposals noted above may slowly move to undermine freedom of expression. For instance, once a company invests the considerable funding required to develop sophisticated content filters for European markets, the barriers to applying them in American contexts are likely to come down.

There's much more in Kaye's piece and I highly recommend reading the whole thing.

One important point in all of this, which is noted in the quoted section above, but is worth repeating: most of the people pushing for these laws are not doing so with the intention of suppressing speech. Some may be doing so, but most of them really do have good intentions. The problem is that if you don't live in the world of free speech (or spend time watching how speech is stifled in various ways) it's often hard to realize how your "perfectly reasonable" attempt to stop some form of "bad" speech can be turned around and twisted, stretched and abused to silence all sorts of important speech. Even worse, it's very difficult for many people proposing these rules to comprehend that their attempts to, say, silence Nazis online, will almost certainly be used to silence the most vulnerable. Tools to suppress speech are frequently used against the powerless, especially when they try to speak out against the powerful.

The fact that so many new regulations in Europe (not to mention elsewhere) are being pushed with little concern for or regard to the wider impact on free expression should concern us all.

Filed Under: david kaye, eu, europe, free speech, gdpr, regulations, right to be forgotten, social media

Good News: Trump Protestors Accused Of 'Hiding Behind The First Amendment' Acquitted

from the first-amendment-still-works dept

Last week we wrote about the insanity of the DOJ's argument in trying to convict a group of protestors at Trump's inauguration. As we noted, the DOJ didn't even try to connect the defendants with any violence or property damage, but merely said that by being near the property damage they were accomplices, because they made the actual perpetrators harder to catch. When talking about the First Amendment and the right to assemble, Assistant US Attorney Rizwan Quereshi, incredibly, claimed that the defendants were "hiding behind the First Amendment." Even more incredibly, on Monday of this week another Assistant US Attorney, Jennifer Kerkhoff, tried to tell the jury that the judge's instruction about reasonable doubt "doesn't mean a whole lot", leading the judge to jump in and say that Kerkhoff clearly didn't mean to say that:

Kerkhoff: The defense has talked to you a little bit about reasonable doubt. You're going to get an instruction from the Judge. And you can tell it's clearly written by a bunch of lawyers. It doesn't mean a whole lot. But look at the last line.

The Court: So wait...

Kerkhoff: I apologize.

The Court: I know she didn't mean to say what she just said. But --

Kerkhoff:: It means a lot.

The Court: I just need to say, ladies and gentlemen, you will be instructed on reasonable doubt. You must follow each and every word of my instructions on reasonable doubt.

Kerkhoff: Yes.

The Court: Ms. Kerkhoff did not mean to trivialize any portion of it, and it's just as important that you understand --

Kerkhoff: I apologize.

The Court: -- that every word of the reasonable doubt instructions, like all the rest of my instructions, are very important.

Kerkhoff: It's an important instruction.

Well, it appears that the jury did, in fact, pay attention to the reasonable doubt instructions, and has acquitted all six defendants on all charges. That includes Alexei Wood, the journalist who was covering the protests, as well as two other defendants who were there as medics to treat anyone injured (the DOJ tried to paint them as accomplices who helped fix people up to do more damage).

This case was important for trying to criminalize reporting, but to an even larger extent for trying to criminalize protesting as a group, where all members of a protest would somehow be considered liable for any damage done by any member. Thankfully, the jury saw through it and found all defendants not guilty on all charges. One hopes that the Justice Department (which rarely loses cases) will maybe think more carefully in the future about bringing such bullshit charges against people for exercising their First Amendment rights. And that matters quite a bit, as there are 188 other defendants from the same protest who are still awaiting trial.

Filed Under: alexei wood, doj, donald trump, first amendment, free speech, inauguration, j20, jennifer kerkhoff, protests, rizwan quereshi

Keeper Security Files Bullshit SLAPP Suit Against Ars Technica, Letting Many More People Know Not To Use Its Software

from the fuck-that dept

If you're a security software company and you want to know the best way to make sure that no security professional ever recommends your software ever again, you should do what Keeper Security did and sue a respected security journalist for reporting on your security flaws. As first reported by Zack Whittaker (link above), Keeper Security has filed a totally bullshit SLAPP lawsuit against Ars Technica and its widely respected security reporter Dan Goodin. Last week Goodin published a story about a major flaw in the browser extension for Keeper's password manager, that was bundled with Windows.

The flaw was actually discovered by Google's Tavis Ormandy, who has a long history of discovering fairly high profile bugs -- especially in password managers (he famously found a big flaw in LastPass, earlier this year). Notice how LastPass responded, though. It worked with Tavis on fixing the problem and rushing out a solution. Compare that to how Keeper responded. It fixed the bug... but it's also filed a lawsuit -- but not against Ormandy. Instead, it's suing Ars and Goodin. And, let's be clear: the lawsuit is bullshit.

The crux of the complaint from Keeper is that it wasn't Keeper's main software that had the vulnerability, but rather its browser extension plugin. This is a meaningless and silly distinction. Almost anyone using a software password manager (as you should) will install the browser plugins to go with the software. The software without the browser plugins is almost useless. The fact that Goodin didn't initially note the very trivial detail that the browser plugin wasn't included in the initial bundle, but would only be installed later once someone started using Keeper is meaningless, and not even close to defamatory.

Here's how Keeper describes it in their own lawsuit:

Before any such “vulnerability” could have any chance to impact a user, the user would have to be subject to specific conditions and take the following steps: (1) the user would have to separately install the Keeper Browser Extension; then (2) sign into the Keeper Browser Extension (which requires the user to first have a registered Keeper account); then (3) create and store (or have existing and previously created) website login credentials inside their Keeper Vault; then (4) visit a malicious website set up to steal a user’s website login credentials; then (5) the malicious website would have to inject a specific type of malware into the Keeper Browser Extension. This omission from all versions of the Article was material because without this relevant information, readers were misled to believe that their computers were infected simply by having Keeper software installed on their devices.

Whether or not it is "material" or even whether or not it is good reporting, is not meaningful when it comes to the question of defamation.Basically all of the statements that Goodin made that Keeper claims are defamatory are statements of opinion, in which Goodin laid out the facts on which he based his statements. Providing the underlying facts and stating an opinion is not defamatory. For example, among the statements that Keeper claims are defamatory are the following:

1) “For 8 days Windows bundled a password manager with a critical plugin flaw.”

2) “plugin for Win 10 Version of Keeper had bug allowing sites to steal passwords.”

3) “For about eight days, some versions of Windows 10 quietly bundled a password manager that contained a critical vulnerability in its browser plug in, a researcher said Friday.”

4) “If an outsider can find a bug similar to the 16-month-old vulnerability so quickly and easily, it stands to reason people inside the software company should have found it first.”

5) “It’s also possible third-party apps don’t come with the same security assurances of other Microsoft software.”

None of those are even close to defamatory. They are a mix of statements based on disclosed facts and opinion. Even more ridiculously, Keeper claims that Goodin and Ars published this story "knowing and intending that the Article would cause injury to Keeper." That's bullshit. There is no way that Goodin would be publishing a story with knowing falsehoods or one "intending" to cause harm to a company like Keeper. He was just reporting on the facts of the story, which Keeper itself does not dispute.

The lawsuit was filed in Illinois, where Keeper is based, and Keeper and its lawyers probably should have noticed that Illinois has an Anti-SLAPP law, which says they'll have to pay Ars and Goodin's attorneys' fees if the case is determined to be a SLAPP suit, which it almost certainly should be. Either way, the lawsuit has made many more people (a) aware that Keeper's software had a bug in it and (b) that it is not software worth using. Lots of people in the security world are now making sure that lots of people know to stay away from Keeper. There are better products on the market, offered up by companies who don't try to abuse the judicial system to stop reporters from commenting on their flaws. Use those products instead.

Next time, maybe fix the flaw and apologize without suing reporters for writing about it.

Filed Under: ars technica, censorial thug, dan goodin, defamation, keeper, password manager, security, slapp
Companies: conde nast, keeper security