Declan McCullagh and prosecutions

[Greg Newby]

On Mon, Apr 02, 2001 at 02:52:15AM -0400, Seth Finkelstein wrote:
> 	I'm probably going to be deeply sorry for this, but the
> following question has been bothering me for a while:
> 
> 	Why in the world does anyone on this list trust Declan McCullagh?

Your argument doesn't do much for me, Seth.  The problem is,
what you say of Declan could be true of ANYONE you talk to,
journalist or not, and ANYONE on mailing lists or other forums
where you send your thoughts.

The advantage of talking to Declan is that maybe, possibly,
some "freedom of the press" issues will let him avoid spilling
everything.  In that case, you'd need to trust him to keep
your best interests.

For non-press, you'd still need to wonder whose interests they
have at heart, but without the (minimal) protection offered
by a member of the press.

More importantly, a member of the press isn't going to get a lot
of inside scoops if he develops a reputation as a turncoat.
This, to me, is the crux: It's in any journalist's interest
to be trustworthy.  In the context of cypherpunks activity,
being trustworthy means not playing into the hands of
over-zealous law enforcement techniques.  After all, the
DATA are there (that is, the Web pages, mailing list
postings, news articles, etc.).  All the Feds are looking for, 
in this case, is someone with credentials a judge will
listen to.

That's my logic, anyway.

Personally, on what I've read from Declan, I'd trust
him more than 99% of other journalists who write about
technological issues.  This is based on technical understanding,
as well as what I consider to be a decent track record
of standing up against authority.

  -- Greg