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The whole New Zealand-based spying operation against Kim Dotcom and his Megaupload co-defendants was illegal, the High Court has ruled. The revelation appears in a newly released decision, which shows the GCSB spy agency refusing to respond to questions about its activities on the basis that could jeopardize national security.
In the months that preceded the January 2012 raid on file-storage site Megaupload, authorities in New Zealand used the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) spy agency to monitor Kim and Mona Dotcom, plus Megaupload co-defendant Bram van der Kolk. When this fact was revealed it developed into a crisis. The GCSB was forbidden by law from conducting surveillance on its own citizens or permanent residents in the country, which led to former Prime Minister John Key later apologizing for the error.
With Dotcom determined to uncover the truth, the entrepreneur launched legal action in pursuit of the information illegally obtained by GCSB and to obtain compensation. In July, the High Court determined that Dotcom wouldn't get access to the information but it also revealed that the scope of the spying went on much longer than previously admitted, a fact later confirmed by the police. This raised the specter that not only did the GCSB continue to spy on Dotcom after it knew it was acting illegally, but that an earlier affidavit from a GCSB staff member was suspect.
With the saga continuing to drag on, revelations published in New Zealand this morning indicate that not only was the spying on Dotcom illegal, the entire spying operation – which included his Megaupload co-defendants – was too.
Oopsie...
Source: https://torrentfreak.com/entire-kim-dotcom-spying-operation-was-illegal-high-court-rules-170825/ (archive)
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 27 2017, @05:16PM (1 child)
The little people couldn't care less about the British levying a few luxury imports. And the only people who thought taxation equals representation were people who actually had enough money to buy off a representative. 99% of the American colonists were drugged kicking and screaming into fighting the British. And when the war was won, the 1% fortified their political power right into the structure of government. Which is why, to this day, you can't get anything done in the US without a very rich person from a very powerful family agreeing with you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 28 2017, @11:22AM
And our banks are subservient to The City (in London), effectively making the USA's finances a slave to UK / global banking elite.
The USA doesn't exist anymore. The civil war did not end slavery. After the Act of 1871 everyone became indentured servants to repay the war debt. Lincoln had nothing left as collateral in repayment of past debts spanning back to the American Revolution. The land was already promised, the only thing left as collateral was people. Every time you get a child a birth certificate you are promising a new soul to the debt collectors. [Would you like to know more?] [youtube.com] (Not that the "science loving" simpletons here will take the time to educate themselves.)
Because The Union could not be dissolved legally the seats of America's congress were abandoned, left vacant. THE UNITED STATES (all caps name) became a federal municipal corporation (which also owns D.C., which is why it's not a part of any state). The idiots railing on about holding the government to their constitutions have no fucking idea what they're talking about. THE UNITED STATES corp set up its bylaws to mirror the constitution with some changes - AND with the ability to ignore or uphold those rules or change them at whim. Specifically they have given the right to govern by a secret set of rules which the public is not privy to. We don't have a President of the USA, we have an office of the president which is filled -- Trump is a CEO of the US corporation. We don't have a Congress, we have Congressional Offices that are filled just as one has Officers of a Corporation.
The way to put a stop to this is to simply become a republic again, not an incorporated democracy. Those seats of power were abandoned, not dissolved. The Old Republic is being rebuilt as we speak. [republicoftheunitedstates.org]