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Crime

Should the FBI Have Shut Down a Whole Email Server Over Bomb Threats?

Apr. 24, 2012 9:25am Liz Klimas

FBI Seizes European Server That Sends Anonymized Emails in University Bomb Threat Investigation | Groups Using Server Peeved

(Photo: Flickr/Kalavinka)

Last week, the Federal Bureau of Investigation seized an email server in an effort to find the sender of bomb threats to the University of Pittsburgh, but the seizure itself has raised some red flags.

Wired’s Threat Level, a blog on the tech website that focuses on privacy, crime and online security, reported the server was called Mixmaster and was used by groups who wanted to anonymize their messages. More specifically, Wired reported human rights groups, such as Riseup Networks and May First/People Link, used this server to prevent emails from being traced back to them. The server itself was operated by an ISP based in Europe.

What has some groups like Riseup peeved about the server’s takedown is the approach the feds used. The FBI did have a warrant to do so, but Riseup described in a statement that the FBI used a “sledgehammer approach” that shutdown not only whoever sent the bomb threats but also anyone else who relied on that server for communication. The statement called it “an attack on anonymous speech.”

“The server seizure is not only an attack against us, but an attack against all users of the Internet who depend on anonymous communication,” May First/People Link director Jamie McClelland said in the statement.

Devin Theriot-Orr, a spokesperson for Riseup, called it a “particularly misguided” move as “there is unlikely to be any information on the server regarding the source of the threatening emails” due to the fact the server itself is set up to prevent tracing emails back to senders.

While Theroit-Orr said said the organization sympathized with the situation the university was faced, the seizure of the server itself has only resulted in disruption of the email and websites of “thousands of unrelated people.”

In the statement, the groups described that remailers such as this server are important for protecting “corporate whistle blowers, democracy activists working under repressive regimes, and others to communicate vital information that would otherwise go unreported.”

The groups wrote they believe the FBI was “grasping at straws” with this seizure, stating the agency may have felt they had to show they were taking some action in the case, even at the risk of others.

Wired contacted the FBI for comment but the agency had not responded.

The Associated Press reported the university had received dozens of threats during the last two months. It stated some were received through the media while others were as physical writing on building walls. The most recent threat reported by AP was on Thursday.

[H/T Daily Caller]

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Comments (28)

Mary Just
Posted on April 25, 2012 at 9:46pm
Only 27 responses. Are people afraid to criticize the FBI?

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Cheetosareus
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 9:37pm
Looks like Obama’s FBI burned a whole bunch of leftwing activist sites. All of a sudden they are squeeling like a stuck pig when they get a taste of their government’s overreaching tactics.roflmao

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blackyb
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 3:17pm
The biggest threats to America are Obama and Eric Holder.

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blackyb
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 3:15pm
Was anyone arrested? I have not heard, myself, but someone must have if it is not something initiated by the leftists for some kind of control test or a scare tactic.

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blackyb
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 3:13pm
Time to break out the drums and smoke signals? Maybe.
Time for coded languages to pick up and start? Maybe.

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blackyb
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 3:12pm
It is time to break out the CB radios? Maybe.

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Melvin Spittle
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 1:10pm
If you think this is shocking, the FBI is now a debt collector in a related story.

The FBI is now a collection agency for AT&T and Verizon: FBI seizes equipment from Texas University data centers in response to non-payment for services complaint from AT&T and Verizon.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/04/data-centers-ra/?utm_source=Contextly&utm_medium=RelatedLinks&utm_campaign=Previous

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- Melvin Spittle
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 1:35pm
  ammend: Not Texas University data centers, just specific Texas data centers.
  
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billy1970
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 12:06pm
Maybe they should down some twitter accounts, for death threats on American Citizens, Van Jones, Black Panthers, they need to all go to jail. Where is The DOJ? What are they doing? oh yea, thats right, there all racists too..Hypocrites…

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sallyredneck
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 11:39am
Craziest part is the threat that if Pitt’t drops its $50,000 dollar reward they would stop the bomb threats, which came after the servers were shout down.

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LimitstoGovernment
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 10:53am
Sorry folks this is one reason the government it in place – to protect us from threats. This terrorist has had my daughter out of her dorm in the middle of the night dozens of times in the last two months. She will no longer go to Pitt after this.

Organizations that aid and abet crimes are criminal – this has nothing to do with freedom of speech.

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- RamonPreston
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 11:17am
  Our biggest threat is our government. 9/11 was a drop-flag operation to bring these new laws into place. It’s all about control. America is going down, get ready to go into a FEMA camp.
  
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- EqualJustice
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 11:18am
  How can you TRACK those attackers if you shut down the site? STUPID move.
  
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- Abraham Young
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 6:50pm
  You’re crazy.
  
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SweetDoug
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 10:53am
And the ACLU is where on this one?

Oh, yeah…

What happens if somebody mails in a threat? Do we shut down the whole postal system?

•∆•
V-V

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- blackyb
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 3:10pm
  A control test. A government excuse and a government cause to act, would be a possibility.
  
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Dougral Supports Israel
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 10:52am
I don’t have a problem with this action. The FBI had a warrant. I also suspect that many of these people who use open mail servers are anarchists in nature who want to be able to send threatening E-mail without consequences.

You can be effectively anonymous by using screen names and E-mail addresses that don’t tie to you personally. No one will find out who you are unless you tell them. I don’t have a problem with law enforcement having the ability to track threatening messages back to their sender as long as they have a proper court issued warrant. There is a place for the Law on the Internet as long as they follow the Constitution.

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- Abraham Young
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 6:50pm
  You’re poorly informed.
  
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- Mary Just
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 9:26pm
  a sheer genius
  
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lainpa
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 10:33am
I’m on the campus, University staff. Total number of threats has been 46 since mid-March, with a total number of buildings threatened to 155! I’m perfectly fine with them taking this groups server. Why do you need to send anoymous emails? There are other means for whistleblowers to report and protect themselves.

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- lainpa
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 10:35am
  This is a form of domestic terrorism! These building have to be evacuated and search. The students have been kicked out of their dorms in the middle of the night!
  
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- taxpro4u03
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 11:22am
  While the ‘threats’ SHOULD be taken seriously… me thinks its more a ploy to co-op and exaust limited resources as someone’s personal ‘vendetta’ — disgruntled employee/student etc. many things ‘could be,’ but thru REASONABLE process of elimination and ‘profiling’ of activity – this appears to me to be the most logical. Anytime there are groups of people anywhere, the ‘potential’ is there – when a populace and her resources are OVERWHELMED all at once is when ‘they win.’ — > Asked, “What instrument would you use to detect (expletives – insert devices) hidden somewhere in a city?” Robert Oppenheimer sarcastically replied, that it would take a screwdriver to open each and every suitcase coming into the country – a clear impossibility. “It is clear to me that wars have changed,” he said, meaning that the advantage now rested with the stealthy agressor, not the well-fortified powerful defender. Harry Truman kicked him out of his office and said, “Don’t let that S.O.B. back in this office ever again…” –
  
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piper60
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 10:11am
Big Sis is capable of anything.

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- blackyb
  Posted on April 24, 2012 at 3:20pm
  Big Sis’ azz.
  
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Sniper48
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 10:08am
‘Good thing the FBI is here to protect us from those nasty exploding emails!

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term limits for congress
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 9:52am
If it is electronic, consider it public. Buy some stamps!

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justangry
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 9:36am
How easy would it be for someone in the Government to send a bomb threat through this server?

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possom
Posted on April 24, 2012 at 9:28am
And there’s more to come folk’s! Buy a CB just in case

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