Curious - Is this Forum Evidence?

[joe817]

Excuse me while I go and delete every post I've ever made.

Boy I'm sure glad I've NEVER posted anything that could be remotely conceived as personal.

I save and print all PM's

Oh good grief! Careful there buddy, I know what you look like. It's scary!

[LarryH]

Excuse me while I go and delete every post I've ever made.

That probably wouldn't help. Just because you've "deleted" it doesn't mean it's really gone (although someone with experience in forum software would have to confirm that), especially if another member quoted your post, because YOU can't edit his/her post.

For those who are old enough to remember the Iran-Contra hearings, one of the factors that gave Ollie North so much trouble was the fact that "deleted" emails were only deleted from his system, but were archived on the email server. I'd imagine the situation with the forum would be similar.

[USA1]

Excuse me while I go and delete every post I've ever made.

That probably wouldn't help. Just because you've "deleted" it doesn't mean it's really gone

You're probably right. All the more reason to be extra cautious about what we say here and what actions we take
in any future altercations that may arise.

BTW , have I mentioned that I love our government ?

[PeteCamp]

Forget the Internet. Having worked at a sensitive defense job for a number of years while going to school, I can tell you that the technology existed (in the mid 1980's and was/is presumably used) to read key presses on a keyboard from low earth orbit.

We enclosed sensitive computer systems in a room built inside a Farady cage and protected in all kinds of ways. But never worry. The people who do such things are from the government, and they are here to help us.

[DONT TREAD ON ME]

Forget the Internet. Having worked at a sensitive defense job for a number of years while going to school, I can tell you that the technology existed (in the mid 1980's and was/is presumably used) to read key presses on a keyboard from low earth orbit.

We enclosed sensitive computer systems in a room built inside a Farady cage and protected in all kinds of ways. But never worry. The people who do such things are from the government, and they are here to help us.

security violation?

[bdickens]

There's a reason I stay out of certain threads.

[57Coastie]

Excuse me while I go and delete every post I've ever made.

For those who are old enough to remember the Iran-Contra hearings, one of the factors that gave Ollie North so much trouble was the fact that "deleted" emails were only deleted from his system, but were archived on the email server. I'd imagine the situation with the forum would be similar.

As I am sure you know, Larry, your occupation being what is shown on your profile, if the government really wants to get at what you "deleted," it can get it off your personal computer even when you do not have a backup server, since when one deletes something it does not really delete anything, the computer just applies a code to the item "deleted" whch in essence says "as far as you know this is deleted, but I am really still there." You may rest assured that the feds and many state and local LEOs have the technical capability of resurrecting this material. In a pinch many people have been known to do a complete reformat of the disk drive if the deleted info was critical. For this reason I have destroyed many a hard drive when replacing computers at home and at the office, as they were both loaded with proprietary and privileged information, not, I hasten to add, evidence of my having committed a crime.

I'm sure there is an IT type out there somewhere who can explain this technically. It is beyond me, but those who do not know this need to learn about it.

Jim

[koolaid]

Assuming you haven't posted identifying information, think through how a prosecutor would tie entries here to you ?

If you didn't use your legal name as your handle a Google search wouldn't help. Even if you did - depending on your name and what they serached for they will likely get thousands to millions of results. How much time and expertise do they have to wade through that ?

It would probably be fairly easy just based on the dates in your message signature.

[92f-fan]

Assuming you haven't posted identifying information, think through how a prosecutor would tie entries here to you ?

If you didn't use your legal name as your handle a Google search wouldn't help. Even if you did - depending on your name and what they serached for they will likely get thousands to millions of results. How much time and expertise do they have to wade through that ?

Assuming the prosecution was very technical and sure you were doing bad things on the Internet, they could attempt to subpoena every IP address you have been assigned and then subpoena every forum in a fishing expedition but I doubt that kind of fishing expedition would be approved.
IMO
Some how you would likely need to be tied to content here via offline means. In other words it would likely have to come up in interrogations.

Once all those hurdles were managed they would need to prove that the content was yours, was unaltered and was true.

"True??"

Keith is right, but you of course are entitled to your opinion. BTW, I just Googled "92f-fan" and got 8 hits, most of them being your contributions to this forum. If someone deludes himself by suggesting that his or her real name cannot be identified, he or she does so to their possible serious risk.

Like all of us, I respect Chas. and his tireless endeavors for us, but I will stick my neck out and guess that if asked he would confirm that with the law the way it has been demonstrated to be today it is quite likely that he might have to comply with a subpoena requiring him to identify you, given the right case. Let there by no misunderstanding. being the confirmed Liberal with a capital "L" that I am, I am distressed by the fact that most courts will do this today, but that doesn't change the fact that most will. I could probably prove this to your satisfaction by credibly saying here that I intend to kill a public figure, which, of course, is not the case. I would not be surprised if the NSA or DHS read the post before you did and I soon heard a knock on my door, if it were not shattered and broken open.

One's opinion is one's own, and all are at liberty to express them, but others are certainly not required by the 1st Amendment to agree with them.
I stand by mine.
Jim

No one said you had to agree. Its an opinion.
Im not saying it cant be done - of course with enough information you can be associated with lots of info. The point I was trying to make is that in most cases some NON Internet based info would need to point them here first. THEN they still have the same challenges of associating a username with a person. Which would involve 2 or more subpoenas.

In your Google example. You started with specific information that matters here. if you started with my legal name, which is all you would have to start an investigation. You would find nothing that points here.

I manage 2 webservers hosting over a dozen forums like this one. Been doing it for 10+ years. I have a little experience in this area. Been subpoenaed a couple times.

Assuming the technology is able as a previous poster suggested to read key strokes from earth orbit, that satellite still has to be TASKED to YOUR issue before it matters in this case, in the same way that IF the District Attorney has the technical ability to find and use this kind of info the resources that CAN do that are limited and wont likely be brought to bear on just ANY case.

Having said all that I used a different username on this forum than I have for others. And I keep track of my Google Presence. Ive posted 10's of thousands of times under another username on dozens of forums and none of them can be tracked to me just based on Google.

You question on deleted information is a good one. Most file systems simply mark information as deleted. The only time the information is really removed is when that space on the drive is used for new data. One way to understand it is to assume the drive uses a table of contents or Index to know where data is on the drive. When you delete a file you don't actually remove data - you simply remove the entry in the table of contents for that data, and you mark the space as eligible for a write operation. So to UNDELETE the data all you have to do is scan the unindexed space for information that might be a file. Assuming the data was not overwritten or was only over written once its pretty easy to recover. Of course this all assumes that the information isnt backed up. The same issues would exist for the backups if there were any.

Having said all that, this forum data is written in a database. Once an entry in a database is removed in many cases its unrecoverable since many databases almost instantly reuse that space for future entries. Again assuming no backups that contained the deleted data.

This doesn't mean you shouldn't be prudent with what you put in the Internet - Use common sense
It was simply a discussion of the technical background of the question

[Bart]

As I am sure you know, Larry, your occupation being what is shown on your profile, if the government really wants to get at what you "deleted," it can get it off your personal computer

If the real evidence they find isn't enough, they can manufacture any evidence they want once they have your computer.

[mctowalot]

RE: above posts - too many to quote. This is why I always type with my keyboard upside down. This explains all spelling, punctuation, and gramour errors (see what I mean?)

IMHO, this forum is evidence, evidence that some of us have a sense of humor classified as "wacky".

And some of us don't.

[tamc9395]

Thanks for all of the responses. Someone previously pointed out that likely the answer was "obvious", but I was curious since there are some posts that make wonder why someone would post that information in a public forum.

[surprise_i'm_armed]

IMHO, this forum can't be used as evidence.

To back that up I will state that I was the gunman on the grassy
knoll in Dealey Plaza on 11/22/1963;

I was the one who let the dogs out (Baha men anyone?);

and I am also the Tooth Fairy. :-)

SIA

[C-dub]

Isn't anything we post here just our opinion? Even if I were a lawyer or a LEO wouldn't anything I posted here still be just my opinion and not actual legal advice? Well, we know LEOs can't give legal advice, but does it make a difference for lawyers if one just tells me something in conversation vs. if I'm paying for one's legal advice? To me, I thought this whole forum was basically an informal conversation and no one here could be held liable for anything they write. Most of it may be the truth, but the statutes and court rulings are where it's at. Right?

[USA1]

I was the one who let the dogs out (Baha men anyone?);

I always wondered who did that.