view the rest of the comments
World News
A community for discussing events around the World
Rules:
-
Rule 1: posts have the following requirements:
- Post news articles only
- Video links are NOT articles and will be removed.
- Title must match the article headline
- Not United States Internal News
- Recent (Past 30 Days)
- Screenshots/links to other social media sites (Twitter/X/Facebook/Youtube/reddit, etc.) are explicitly forbidden, as are link shorteners.
-
Rule 2: Do not copy the entire article into your post. The key points in 1-2 paragraphs is allowed (even encouraged!), but large segments of articles posted in the body will result in the post being removed. If you have to stop and think "Is this fair use?", it probably isn't. Archive links, especially the ones created on link submission, are absolutely allowed but those that avoid paywalls are not.
-
Rule 3: Opinions articles, or Articles based on misinformation/propaganda may be removed. Sources that have a Low or Very Low factual reporting rating or MBFC Credibility Rating may be removed.
-
Rule 4: Posts or comments that are homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, anti-religious, or ableist will be removed. “Ironic” prejudice is just prejudiced.
-
Posts and comments must abide by the lemmy.world terms of service UPDATED AS OF 10/19
-
Rule 5: Keep it civil. It's OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It's NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
-
Rule 6: Memes, spam, other low effort posting, reposts, misinformation, advocating violence, off-topic, trolling, offensive, regarding the moderators or meta in content may be removed at any time.
-
Rule 7: We didn't USED to need a rule about how many posts one could make in a day, then someone posted NINETEEN articles in a single day. Not comments, FULL ARTICLES. If you're posting more than say, 10 or so, consider going outside and touching grass. We reserve the right to limit over-posting so a single user does not dominate the front page.
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
Lemmy World Partners
News !news@lemmy.world
Politics !politics@lemmy.world
World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world
Recommendations
For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/
- Consider including the article’s mediabiasfactcheck.com/ link
"private citizen sending a message abroad about publicly available information on someone?"
That is actually a pretty nefarious thing because it is targeted, as in spying. That's what is not legal.
Just a quick search gave me this:
18 U.S.C. 2261A says, “Whoever (1) travels in interstate or foreign commerce or is present within the jurisdiction of the United States, with the intent to kill, injure, harass, intimidate, or place under surveillance, or intimidate another person, and in the course of, or as a result of, such travel or presence engages in conduct that (A) places that person in reasonable fear of the death of, or serious bodily injury to (i) that person; (ii) an immediate family member (iii) a spouse or intimate partner of that person….”
In this case, there is an intent to have repercussions. I was wondering as well why Private Investigators are allowed to do this and in short, they are regulated so they have to work within the frame of law and should have a lawful purpose.
Thanks, that makes some things a lot clearer.
But just play along with me for a second...
We're in court and that law gets cited and the defence attorney says "surveillance was happening, yes, but that in itself wasn't illegal. In order to break that particular law one has to prove it was being done with the intention that it result in "a well founded fear of death or serious bodily injury"'. And where is the proof that was the intention or the result?
So if this guy's going around like a mobster on behalf of the Chinese government and threatening people on their doorstep I'd get it.
But, reading the law closely, just sending information to another country does not, in itself, seem to be illegal. That's why I was making the point about free speech. The first amendment is literally about communicating legal information freely without persecution from the government, even if that's with people the government doesn't like.
I'm not saying the guy didn't do anything wrong, I just mean I assume there's more to it than the article is describing..
But surveillance is illegal, especially in a targeted form. Let me put it like this, your address is public, as people can see when you get in and out of your house. But now someone goes and tells someone else, a criminal, your address with the intention to cause you damages. That person, the informant, becomes directly an accomplice, even if the person didn't do damage directly.
But it's the "with intention to cause you damages" bit that makes it illegal (I believe).
Saying you saw so-and-so down at the shops is obviously not illegal. Saying that to their ex-partner so they go and beat them up is. (Even then a prosecutor would have to prove you incited or intend harm to come, just the sharing of info itself isn't a crime per se)
That's what I wasn't understanding from the article. Are there very specific limits on first amendment so that what would ordinarily be communication of public information becomes illegal just because the recipient is a foreign government. Or was it illegal because the public information was shared with the known intent of causing physical harm.
The article sounded like the former, which surprised me. I think the latter is probably the actual circumstances though I could be wrong.
Well you are talking about 2 different things.
Stalking: just following a person for your own personal benefit.
And Spying/Surveillance: following someone to share the information with another entity or government.
The person in question had several logs and such logs were communicated to the chinese government, they have proof of this, so such actions are criminal offenses.