[tor-talk] Tor Project Is Sued / Austrian Parliamentary inquiry

Joe Btfsplk joebtfsplk at gmx.com
Thu Jul 10 19:59:49 UTC 2014


On 7/10/2014 1:51 PM, MacLemon wrote:
> Hoi!
>
> On 10 Jul 2014, at 16:18, Joe Btfsplk <joebtfsplk at gmx.com> wrote:
>> * It's also not clear (to me) whether some of the references are actual, official *legal* opinions / rulings, or just commentaries.
> Clarification added to the cited links
>
>
Thank you.  These links may be the only type of new(er) info available 
at this time, but unfortunately, none are legal documents or opinion.
At least from the legal system's view, they are just personal opinion.
Perhaps useful, but not the official documentation on the court's 
justification for the sentence (if I understand).

Which is what many people wanted to see - the court's legal opinion 
(right or wrong).

Regardless of the court's opinion or whether or not it's legal to run 
Tor relays, it won't change the fact that in certain circumstances, 
running Tor relays (especially exits) could cause significant stress, 
expense.
In the US after 1865 through the 1930's or '40's, it wasn't illegal to 
be a black person, but many were hanged & thousands more incarcerated 
for "other" crimes, that no white person would ever have been tried on.
In most cases, those black people weren't jailed or executed for the 
stated offense of "being black."

Yet, records show that many would never have been charged with crimes or 
approached by angry mobs, if they had not been black.
They committed no other real crimes but the courts & mobs found other 
reasons besides being black.
This is the way many societies have operated.  If the legal system, 
zealous prosecutors or judges *really*don't like what you're doing, they 
may just find something else to charge you with.

So, it's not *technically* illegal to do a lot of things, that under the 
right circumstances can still bring your world crashing down.
Even if it involves trumped up charges.
Which may be exactly one of the things that Tor operators need to be 
educated on.  How to avoid trouble, even if running a relay is 
technically legal.

How to protect themselves - *proactively*; how to stay under the radar, 
even if not doing anything "illegal."
Perhaps educate them on how not to make mistakes similar to those 
William Weber apparently did.


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