Update.
This must be very frustrating for the FBI but the stakes seem to be
rising also. What happens if the court tosses out their evidence?
(Read the article!)
Dennis Wagner reports:
In
spring 2008, FBI agents were struggling to identify a criminal who
electronically filed hundreds of fraudulent tax returns, ripping off
the federal government for more than $3 million.
Investigators
and informants started referring to their phantom bad guy as “the
Hacker.” Prosecutors persuaded a federal grand jury in Arizona to
secretly indict him, even without a name, and agents traced his
computer to Northern California.
The
Hacker continued to cash in tax refunds using the pseudonym “Travis
Rupert,” with help from accomplices who did not know his real
identity.
That
April, FBI agents arrested one of the associates and persuaded him to
help arrange a sting.
Read more on The
Republic.
[From
the article:
More than five years
later, Rigmaiden is still behind bars — battling the Justice
Department in a legal odyssey that has questioned the
constitutionality of federal surveillance methods and added to a
growing national controversy over the government’s willingness to
compromise Americans’ privacy in the pursuit of evidence.
… The Justice
Department alleges that Daniel Rigmaiden is a crooked computer geek
who figured out how to loot the federal Treasury while using multiple
aliases. He is accused of filing more than 1,900 phony tax returns
and is under indictment on 74 felony counts of wire fraud, identity
theft, mail fraud, hacking and conspiracy.
In court, Rigmaiden
pleaded not guilty and alleged that FBI agents deceived a federal
magistrate, unlawfully infiltrated his computer, smeared him in
news releases, destroyed evidence and violated his constitutional
rights.
The case is based in
Arizona because federal agents initially focused on fraudulent tax
refunds sent to a bank account in Phoenix established by co-defendant
Ransom Marion Carter III, who already has pleaded guilty.
Rigmaiden’s court
docket lists more than 1,100 motions, responses and other entries
containing profound legal arguments and mind-numbing discourse about
invasive technology. Some search-and-seizure issues are so important
that the American Civil Liberties Union supported Rigmaiden’s
motion to suppress evidence.
Rigmaiden, who is not a
lawyer, has remained incarcerated since his arrest. Early on, he
dismissed five successive defense attorneys because he was not
satisfied with their work. He now represents himself with support
from private investigators and a lawyer-adviser, or “shadow
counsel.”
At the Central Arizona
Detention Center in Florence, Rigmaiden works on a laptop computer
with no e-mail or direct Internet access. When he goes to court, the
angular, bearded inmate with thick glasses delivers cogent legal
arguments with machine-gun articulation.
Attorneys with no
stake in the case show up as spectators.
… The FBI case
against Rigmaiden hinges in part on the StingRay — a surveillance
tool generically known as an “IMSI catcher” because of its
ability to track the International Mobile Subscriber Identity of
cellular devices. In simple terms, the StingRay allows police to
pinpoint the location of a wireless phone or computer.
The FBI traced the
Hacker to Rigmaiden’s apartment complex, but it could not identify
the unit or perpetrator. Investigators subpoenaed Verizon to
remotely change the program of an air card in the suspect’s
computer so that when agents dialed the wireless number, it would
disconnect from a regular cell site and ping against their device.
StingRay not only determined the computer location, it captured a
unique wireless ID number and data.
But the FBI’s
technology and tactics have come under challenge for several reasons.
First, StingRay and a
similar tool known as KingFish did not just gather information from
Rigmaiden’s computer, but from numerous other wireless Verizon
customers in the vicinity — even though they were not under
suspicion of criminal activity.
Second, agents obtained
a court order for surveillance rather than a search warrant, which
requires probable cause. According to court filings, their
application did not inform the judge that StingRay would be used,
explain how it works, or divulge that the privacy of innocent parties
would be compromised.
Third, although police
use of cellphone locators has been common knowledge in criminal
probes for two decades, federal agencies had not previously divulged
the breadth of intrusions or the degree of complicity by service
providers such as Verizon. Even in Rigmaiden’s case, the FBI
affidavit remains sealed, though segments have been quoted in legal
filings.
Speculation,
anyone?
Flappy
Bird Flies The Coop
Flappy Bird is no
longer available to download, with the game’s creator Dong
Nguyen deciding to pull the game from the iOS and Android app stores.
Flappy Bird was released back in May 2013, but gained notoriety
after being featured on a popular YouTube channel and consequently
shared on social networking sites.
By the end of January
Flappy Bird was a
mainstream hit sitting atop the free game charts on iTunes and
Google Play. By the time Nguyen removed the game on Sunday (Feb 9),
it had been downloaded by more than 50 million people. Those who
hadn’t yet succumbed to the lure of this maddeningly difficult game
have now missed the opportunity to ever experience it.
The reason behind the
removal of Flappy Bird remains mystifyingly unclear. In a series of
tweets, Nguyen
explained that he “cannot take this anymore,” but denied
it was due to “legal issues.” He also refused to sell
the game to interested parties, but promised to “still make
games.” Flappy Bird is thought to have been
bringing in $50k a day in advertising revenues, making this decision
absolutely bewildering.
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