[00:00.000 --> 00:03.500]  We're going to the last morning of hope, of The Eleventh HOPE.
[00:13.100 --> 00:17.200]  Now, the Courage Foundation is a great organization.
[00:17.400 --> 00:20.320]  They are... it helps to have some light.
[00:26.920 --> 00:29.660]  The Courage Foundation is doing good work.
[00:29.820 --> 00:31.000]  It's supporting whistleblowers.
[00:31.000 --> 00:41.000]  It's trying to help highlight that... the work that hackers are doing to help shine on...
[00:41.700 --> 00:44.220]  that helps the... I can't speak this morning.
[00:44.420 --> 00:44.800]  That's all right.
[00:45.700 --> 00:48.740]  To help shine lights on what's going on in the world.
[00:49.460 --> 01:06.200]  And I do want to welcome on stage Nathan Fuller, Grace North, Naomi Colvin, Carey Shenkman, Yan Zhu, and on the big screen, Lauri Love.
[01:07.180 --> 01:07.700]  Yay!
[01:12.510 --> 01:14.590]  So, thank you all for coming.
[01:14.810 --> 01:17.950]  I realize it's the first session in the morning, so we really appreciate it.
[01:18.350 --> 01:19.770]  I'm Naomi Colvin, and this is Nathan...
[01:20.670 --> 01:21.190]  Closer.
[01:21.530 --> 01:22.950]  And this is Nathan Fuller.
[01:23.130 --> 01:27.090]  We both work for the Courage Foundation, and we're kind of a new organization.
[01:27.090 --> 01:35.850]  But if you haven't heard of us before, you'll certainly have heard of some of the people we support, who are all people who have gone to enormous risk to make the world a better place.
[01:36.410 --> 01:39.150]  I'm really thrilled that we have such a great panel for you today.
[01:39.330 --> 01:42.630]  And I'd like to quickly introduce everyone who's going to be speaking to you.
[01:43.150 --> 01:49.210]  So, Carey Shenkman, who's a First Amendment lawyer from the Centre for Constitutional Rights, and also a member of our advisory board.
[01:49.830 --> 01:53.850]  Then followed by Grace North, who's a very important person in this community.
[01:54.090 --> 01:55.810]  She's done prisoner support for many years.
[01:56.010 --> 02:01.510]  She heads up Jeremy Hammond's defence committee and is also a friend of Mr. Lauri Love.
[02:01.510 --> 02:11.950]  And then Yann Zhu, and I know a lot of us have been quite concerned about Chelsea Manning and how she's doing.
[02:11.950 --> 02:17.490]  So I'm really very appreciative that Yan is here to let us know about that.
[02:17.790 --> 02:25.610]  And then finally, we will hear from Lauri Love, who is a Courage beneficiary and currently fighting extradition to the United States.
[02:25.610 --> 02:31.690]  So I'm thrilled that he is here, but this is basically as close to the United States as I ever want to see him.
[02:34.270 --> 02:47.470]  She was saying the Courage Foundation is an international organisation based here and in London and in Berlin, devoted to defending those who take great risks to make important contributions to the public record.
[02:47.850 --> 03:02.750]  We started in July 2014 around the Legal Defence Fund for Edward Snowden, and we've since grown to take on six more beneficiaries, not only other whistleblowers such as Chelsea Manning, but hacktivists as well, anyone who makes information public.
[03:04.690 --> 03:18.030]  So yeah, we've called this talk practical solidarity and hackers are whistleblowers too, because we believe that this distinction which is often made between whistleblowers and hackers or hacktivists is artificial and unhelpful.
[03:18.190 --> 03:23.170]  It's usually sort of used instrumentally to sort of say like good group and bad group, but which is rubbish.
[03:23.330 --> 03:30.450]  There's no functional difference between people who are bringing important information light to light from outside an organisation as opposed to within it.
[03:30.530 --> 03:36.990]  And anyone who follows these issues know that those two categories collapse into each other really rapidly anyway.
[03:36.990 --> 03:39.050]  In fact, we go further than that.
[03:39.270 --> 03:51.570]  There's a whole chain of people who are involved in bringing important information to public light from sources and couriers to journalists and publishers.
[03:51.930 --> 03:57.690]  All of them deserve our support, because if there's one weak link in the information chain, that will be exploited.
[03:57.930 --> 04:04.030]  So everyone in that chain deserves our support and solidarity, and that's the operating principle that Courage works on.
[04:04.030 --> 04:06.490]  But we don't think this is just a niche concern.
[04:06.670 --> 04:10.690]  It shouldn't just be hackers and their close allies who care about this.
[04:11.390 --> 04:17.990]  Information exposure is, as we've seen over the last several years, one of the most effective triggers for social action towards social justice.
[04:18.270 --> 04:32.170]  We've seen this on the grand scale with Chelsea Manning's Iraq and Afghanistan war leaks, and the diplomatic leaks helped fuel respectively the end to the Iraq war, and then helped fuel uprisings across the Middle East and North Africa.
[04:32.170 --> 04:40.370]  We've seen certainly with Edward Snowden's leaks bringing a sea change to the global debate about privacy and surveillance and how we view our government.
[04:41.190 --> 04:43.310]  But I think we've seen it on a local level, too.
[04:43.510 --> 04:52.390]  Here in the United States, the Black Lives Matter movement is often fueled by videos of police brutality, police killing innocent citizens.
[04:52.730 --> 04:54.730]  And these people are truth-tellers, too.
[04:54.730 --> 05:00.350]  The only person who went to jail for the police killing of Eric Garner was the person who filmed it.
[05:01.130 --> 05:02.690]  So that person's a whistleblower.
[05:02.790 --> 05:04.790]  That person's a truth-teller who should be supported.
[05:05.070 --> 05:09.890]  And so that's why we don't want to make these distinctions, only care about the national security cases.
[05:10.110 --> 05:16.010]  This is about people who make information public and more easily available, and that is what brings social action.
[05:17.990 --> 05:26.230]  2016 has been a really busy year so far, so we want to give you sort of a whistle-stop tour of some of the things we're doing just in the past few months.
[05:27.730 --> 05:34.990]  Last month, we staged the premiere of a film called The Good American, a documentary about Bill Binney in Berlin.
[05:34.990 --> 05:38.990]  It's a shame that our Berlin colleagues aren't here to tell you about that themselves.
[05:39.210 --> 05:46.030]  But that's one of a series of things that we've done in Berlin, which is a critical intervention into the surveillance debate over there.
[05:47.330 --> 05:59.110]  Edward Snowden's revelations had an impact everywhere, but maybe especially so in Germany, where there's been a long-running now parliamentary investigation into NSA surveillance and German complicity with it.
[05:59.110 --> 06:06.870]  So we've been really happy to further that debate and keep provoking discussion about that.
[06:07.190 --> 06:10.910]  I will try to do that.
[06:11.130 --> 06:24.190]  We're also really honoured to have, in recent months, announced our support for Chelsea Manning, for whom we'll complement U.S. fundraising efforts with our own European fundraising efforts to try to connect a lot of Manning support networks around Europe.
[06:24.190 --> 06:37.390]  This is a super important time for Chelsea because she has just launched her legal appeal, which will not only challenge her unjust conviction, but also the Espionage Act and how these cases are tried in court and solitary confinement.
[06:37.550 --> 06:40.710]  Her case has so many issues that are really important to uncover.
[06:41.730 --> 06:50.010]  We also have a whole series of projects around improving access to all of the published Snowden documents.
[06:51.530 --> 06:57.350]  We built and maintained the Snowden document search, which is a full text search of all the documents released to date.
[06:57.570 --> 07:00.230]  And we've just partnered with the University of the Arts London.
[07:00.870 --> 07:09.210]  If you're in London in the next few weeks and you're around Elephant Castle, go to the London College of Communication and I've got an exhibition based around the Snowden documents ongoing there at the moment.
[07:09.670 --> 07:14.570]  We also scored a major privacy victory in the U.K. in Lauri Love's case.
[07:14.570 --> 07:24.230]  The British police, the National Crime Agency, tried to pull an AFL versus FBI situation, tried to force him to hand over his encryption keys, and he rightly refused.
[07:24.390 --> 07:32.310]  And with a little bit of our help, we defeated that measure, preventing a precedent that would have put U.K. citizens nationwide in danger.
[07:39.040 --> 07:50.180]  So, Lauri's victory against the National Crime Agency is, in our opinion, a really good example of how, by doing work to support individuals, you can score victories which benefit populations as a whole.
[07:50.340 --> 07:58.560]  And in that same vein, by working lots of individual cases, you can't help but become aware of the systemic issues which would help all truth-tellers.
[07:58.560 --> 08:08.860]  And on that note, I'm going to hand over to Carey Schenkman from the Center for Constitutional Rights, who's going to explain why public interest defenses for truth-tellers are so important.
[08:09.820 --> 08:10.700]  Thank you, Naomi.
[08:10.980 --> 08:13.360]  And thank you, everyone, for being here and making it out this morning.
[08:13.400 --> 08:17.240]  I know there's many things competing for attention, including sleep.
[08:19.160 --> 08:20.560]  But my name is Carey Schenkman.
[08:20.580 --> 08:31.020]  I don't want to take too much time from our other amazing panelists, but I just want to touch upon a very important topic, which is the idea of public interest defenses, and especially freedom of expression, especially in digital spaces.
[08:31.420 --> 08:36.300]  And this is something that's gotten a lot of attention, especially with the cases of Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning.
[08:37.240 --> 08:53.440]  But there are many prominent...one of the primary challenges to Ed is this idea that high-level officials and commentators often say is that he should, even if he disclosed information in the public interest, as Attorney General Eric Holder has even admitted,
[08:53.700 --> 08:59.700]  he should come back and face the music, that he should come and face trial, because that's part of an act of civil disobedience.
[08:59.980 --> 09:05.340]  But the reality of that is actually there is no opportunity for a fair trial under U.S.
[09:05.420 --> 09:06.080]  secrecy laws.
[09:06.180 --> 09:10.180]  And those include laws like the Espionage Act and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
[09:10.320 --> 09:17.700]  So there's actually no opportunity for truth-tellers to mount any evidence or present evidence in court that their disclosures were in the public interest.
[09:17.700 --> 09:21.540]  And actually, just in May, Chelsea Manning launched her appeal.
[09:21.760 --> 09:31.900]  And one of the core issues of that, and raised in an excellent brief by the ACLU, is that the Espionage Act doesn't include any form of public interest defense.
[09:32.320 --> 09:35.600]  And this raises some serious issues for freedom of expression.
[09:35.900 --> 09:52.960]  It's not consistent with customary international law in this field, especially comparing to jurisdictions like in Europe with the European Court of Human Rights, has held that disclosures in the public interest need to be weighed according to a proportionality test.
[09:53.620 --> 10:10.980]  And especially in recent years, it's especially important to consider the idea of a public interest defense, not just with traditional whistleblowers, so to speak, but with any issue of access to information or freedom of information.
[10:11.300 --> 10:16.680]  Because fundamentally, an act of protest isn't tied to one space.
[10:16.680 --> 10:30.580]  And it's almost absurd to say that we're going to respect First Amendment rights and rights under international law and confine those rights to brick-and-mortar spaces, but not extend them to digital spaces.
[10:30.580 --> 10:37.440]  In fact, if there's one article I might recommend to everyone in this room, it's a Guardian piece written by Thomas Hughes.
[10:37.640 --> 10:43.900]  And he's the executive director of Article 19, which is one of the world's leading free speech organizations.
[10:44.240 --> 10:49.380]  And it's titled Hacktivism to Balaklava Punk, Protest Must Be Protected in All Its Forms.
[10:49.640 --> 11:01.060]  And actually, in that article, he cites an Iranian protest campaign run by Iranian women called My Stealthy Freedom, where they posted photos of uncovered hair, which is a criminal act in Iran.
[11:01.260 --> 11:05.380]  But it basically was an act of protest against compulsory hijab laws.
[11:05.600 --> 11:23.380]  And this was a brilliant example of how in a place where essentially physical protest was impossible, barring risk of arrest or bodily harm, yet alone that protest could be taken to a digital space.
[11:24.740 --> 11:37.960]  And unfortunately, though, in the United States, the CFA, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which is a law used against unauthorized entry into computer systems, doesn't allow for such a defense.
[11:38.300 --> 11:47.980]  Even though such a public interest defense would have helped and possibly saved the life of Aaron Schwartz, who tragically committed suicide.
[11:48.260 --> 11:50.120]  I'm sure Grace can speak, too.
[11:50.400 --> 12:05.460]  It certainly would have helped Jeremy Hammond, who numerous supporters, including famed Pentagon Papers, whistleblower Dan Ellsberg, have called heroes for being motivated to expose government and corporate surveillance.
[12:05.460 --> 12:08.380]  So I want to leave it on that.
[12:08.580 --> 12:09.380]  We can return to the point.
[12:09.540 --> 12:12.120]  But again, I don't want to take too much time from the other speakers.
[12:12.700 --> 12:17.320]  And just highlight, I think, a significant case in Germany, actually.
[12:17.500 --> 12:27.640]  In 2001, a German court actually acknowledged that certain denial of service attacks can actually constitute forms of protest.
[12:27.640 --> 12:40.500]  And this goes back to this theme that peaceful acts of civil disobedience, you know, have historically been protected and recognized as a legitimate form of political expression.
[12:40.540 --> 12:51.280]  And it's very important that we protect those, especially as our speech becomes privatized as we move to these public spaces, but in a digital sphere.
[12:58.060 --> 13:02.460]  We move now to Grace North, the head of the Jeremy Hammond Support Network.
[13:03.700 --> 13:07.260]  I, as they have said, my name is Grace North.
[13:07.440 --> 13:10.160]  I am not a public speaker, so you're going to have to excuse me.
[13:11.620 --> 13:16.580]  I head up Jeremy Hammond's defense committee, if you are unaware of who he is.
[13:16.580 --> 13:26.060]  He hacked the private intelligence firm, Stratfor, back in 2011 as part of an offshoot of Anonymous called AntiSec.
[13:26.760 --> 13:39.080]  He, unbeknownst to him, was being monitored by the FBI due to the fact that another member of AntiSec, Sabu Hector Monsigir, had been flipped by the FBI a few months prior.
[13:39.760 --> 13:45.900]  So, he hacked Stratfor and then submitted those, what he hacked, to WikiLeaks.
[13:46.020 --> 13:46.660]  You can read them online.
[13:46.820 --> 13:47.920]  They are the GI files.
[13:49.600 --> 13:50.900]  Global intelligence, right?
[13:52.720 --> 13:54.340]  You said global intelligence files.
[13:54.400 --> 13:55.240]  Global intelligence files.
[13:55.460 --> 13:56.500]  Don't interrupt me.
[14:00.620 --> 14:04.800]  So, I also am, as mentioned, friends with Lauri Love.
[14:04.800 --> 14:06.140]  I guess he's over there.
[14:09.060 --> 14:11.420]  And what I...
[14:13.080 --> 14:26.800]  In all this talk about whistleblowers and protecting hacktivists and protecting sources, I sort of... one of the reasons that I got involved with the Courage campaign was not only to protect Jeremy and not only to protect other whistleblowers like him,
[14:26.940 --> 14:33.720]  but also to bring into the public sphere a more comprehensive view of what a whistleblower is.
[14:35.740 --> 14:38.800]  As said, whistleblowers are not just sources.
[14:39.020 --> 14:39.880]  They're not just from the inside.
[14:40.200 --> 14:43.940]  They are also from the outside, as with Jeremy Hammond.
[14:45.280 --> 14:47.380]  But also, I think it's also very important.
[14:48.060 --> 15:03.320]  One of the things that I also would like to accomplish is also bringing the idea that tech has such a huge power to influence things and to sort of bring movements together.
[15:03.680 --> 15:18.120]  And it's incredibly important for tech to sort of bring together all the solidarity movements, hackers, whistleblowers, activists of different kinds.
[15:18.120 --> 15:25.120]  As mentioned, the Black Lives Matter movement has been largely fueled by online...
[15:26.100 --> 15:35.420]  I mean, not to discount the real-life physical protests that are happening to people that are putting their sometimes lives on the line.
[15:36.440 --> 15:42.500]  But I don't think it would have spread as far as it would have without tech to bring it together.
[15:42.500 --> 15:52.460]  So sort of the idea that tech people need to sort of move outside of their sphere of what they consider activism and whistleblowing.
[15:52.560 --> 15:53.940]  It does not just have to do with computers.
[15:53.940 --> 16:02.820]  It also has to do with other movements such as the Black Lives Matter movement, such as other political prisoners that may not have anything to do with tech.
[16:02.820 --> 16:11.440]  These people have been on the inside for years talking about things like the prison industrial complex, what it does to prisoners, what it does to people.
[16:12.140 --> 16:23.010]  And it is extremely important for people to recognize that these people are also whistleblowers.
[16:23.740 --> 16:29.180]  Because how the government treats people is not just confined to surveillance.
[16:29.180 --> 16:36.760]  It has to do with how we treat our most vulnerable, including prisoners, including other marginalized groups.
[16:39.740 --> 16:47.300]  So that's sort of one of my goals in the Courage Foundation is to sort of tie in all of these different movements.
[16:49.820 --> 17:01.560]  And sort of bring them together and also have tech use their powers for good to sort of bring attention to all these other things that are also happening as well.
[17:02.060 --> 17:06.200]  Building bridges of, as I said, building bridges of solidarity.
[17:06.840 --> 17:09.680]  Building bridges of understanding and of respect.
[17:09.680 --> 17:12.860]  So I will stop babbling now.
[17:14.220 --> 17:14.700]  And...
[17:14.700 --> 17:15.540]  That was awesome.
[17:15.640 --> 17:16.220]  Thank you, Grace.
[17:17.040 --> 17:17.800]  Pass it on.
[17:17.940 --> 17:21.140]  Turn now to Yan Zhu, who's a friend of Chelsea Manning's.
[17:21.760 --> 17:22.460]  Hi, everyone.
[17:22.820 --> 17:25.880]  So some of you might remember me from last time I was here.
[17:26.000 --> 17:32.220]  I think I was in this room giving a talk about TLS deployment best practices two years ago.
[17:32.220 --> 17:37.280]  But today I want to speak mostly as a friend of whistleblower Chelsea Manning.
[17:37.500 --> 17:39.760]  So how many people here have heard of Chelsea?
[17:40.600 --> 17:41.040]  Right?
[17:41.380 --> 17:42.480]  So when she...
[17:42.480 --> 17:48.680]  When she did her act of whistleblowing and was arrested, that was actually, I hope, six years ago.
[17:48.900 --> 17:54.020]  I remember there was a lot of paranoia and fear around WikiLeaks around that time.
[17:55.400 --> 18:00.260]  So first off, I want to say that Chelsea really loves getting letters.
[18:01.640 --> 18:03.720]  She reads each and every one of them.
[18:04.600 --> 18:19.320]  And to make this process easier, we at the Freedom of the Press Foundation, who I'm helping out with, this hope, we have these postcards for her, which are conveniently pre-addressed and pre-stamped, because we know no one really knows how to physically mail letters anymore.
[18:19.320 --> 18:26.560]  So if you'd like one, just find me afterwards or come to our booth on the mezzanine floor.
[18:26.900 --> 18:30.330]  I'll just leave them here in case anyone wants to, like, grab one while...
[18:33.640 --> 18:35.880]  Oh, yeah, that'd be awesome if you wanted to hand them out.
[18:36.060 --> 18:36.920]  Some of them don't have stamps.
[18:37.060 --> 18:37.300]  I'm sorry.
[18:37.500 --> 18:38.760]  We kind of ran low on stamps.
[18:38.900 --> 18:39.640]  I have stamps.
[18:40.500 --> 18:41.920]  Someone has stamps in this room.
[18:42.060 --> 18:42.700]  Thank you so much.
[18:43.380 --> 18:51.740]  So first off, I'd like to say a bit about my relationship to Chelsea and what it's been like being a friend to her through this whole process.
[18:52.020 --> 18:54.820]  So we met seven years ago.
[18:55.700 --> 19:05.920]  Before she was famous, before she did anything, before I did anything, I was a physics student at MIT, and she was a friend of a friend in the free software community.
[19:06.660 --> 19:14.380]  She came to my house, and we kind of became friends because she seemed really interesting, and I didn't know anyone in the military at the time.
[19:15.240 --> 19:18.740]  And then she friended me on Facebook after that.
[19:21.020 --> 19:26.240]  I think that was a really seminal moment because it's kind of how I became interested in privacy.
[19:26.500 --> 19:31.960]  Like, when she was arrested, I realized this is not...
[19:31.960 --> 19:34.320]  Like, whistleblowing is not an abstract thing.
[19:34.460 --> 19:39.300]  It's like a thing any of us could fall into if we were in the right context.
[19:39.300 --> 19:43.460]  And it affects the people around us.
[19:43.600 --> 19:48.740]  Like, people have to be paranoid about their emails, about what they do, because of the climate around what's blowing.
[19:49.460 --> 19:54.320]  So I did not reconnect with her after that for about seven years.
[19:54.520 --> 20:04.060]  And then earlier this year, I wrote a blog post about my experience, and that was the first time I'd, like, publicly talked about meeting Chelsea Manning a long time ago.
[20:04.060 --> 20:08.580]  And she reached out and was like, you can actually be on my phone list if you wanted.
[20:09.140 --> 20:11.460]  So we started talking on the phone.
[20:12.000 --> 20:14.160]  Her from prison in Fort Leavenworth.
[20:16.120 --> 20:18.860]  And eventually, I actually got to visit earlier this year.
[20:20.420 --> 20:26.220]  So it's a really... I would really like to point out that she is pretty isolated from the world.
[20:26.220 --> 20:28.680]  She only gets 20 people on her call list.
[20:28.860 --> 20:30.520]  So her list is full right now.
[20:30.720 --> 20:32.980]  And to add anyone else on that list, she has to take someone off.
[20:33.080 --> 20:35.760]  And that's kind of an arduous, bureaucratic process.
[20:37.880 --> 20:41.620]  Only people who have known her before arrest are allowed to visit.
[20:41.680 --> 20:46.360]  And she has to present proof of that acquaintance before someone's added to that list.
[20:46.360 --> 20:51.000]  So not many people at all are allowed to visit.
[20:51.420 --> 20:55.180]  I think she has about four people on her visit list currently.
[20:55.840 --> 20:57.620]  And one of them has never visited.
[20:57.860 --> 20:59.980]  So she literally only has three visitors.
[21:01.840 --> 21:03.840]  And we all feel kind of bad about that.
[21:04.160 --> 21:08.540]  So if you happen to be someone who knew Chelsea before arrest, please reach out to me.
[21:08.640 --> 21:10.920]  I can help you get on that visit list if you're interested.
[21:14.840 --> 21:17.260]  People often ask, like, can I send her music?
[21:17.340 --> 21:18.980]  Or can I send her, like, gifts?
[21:19.140 --> 21:19.940]  And the answer is no.
[21:20.060 --> 21:23.520]  You can only send her letters and books sent directly from Amazon.
[21:24.260 --> 21:29.660]  And she has a Twitter account, but that's coordinated over a phone.
[21:29.920 --> 21:32.940]  She doesn't have Internet access either.
[21:33.260 --> 21:36.120]  So it's really a very isolating environment.
[21:36.120 --> 21:38.740]  And she feels, like, it's difficult.
[21:38.740 --> 21:40.960]  Like, she doesn't have that much connection to the outside world.
[21:42.960 --> 21:44.840]  And, you know, she can't speak to us.
[21:44.980 --> 21:46.260]  She can't speak to you all here today.
[21:46.440 --> 21:50.620]  But she was able to send me a statement to read to all of you.
[21:52.060 --> 21:53.680]  She's really excited that you're here today.
[21:54.300 --> 21:57.260]  And I would like to read that.
[21:57.380 --> 22:06.080]  So one thing to note is please don't, you know, tweet or publish this statement because she's planning to publish it as a blog post tomorrow morning.
[22:06.080 --> 22:08.840]  So, yeah, don't share it.
[22:09.060 --> 22:09.400]  Okay.
[22:09.940 --> 22:19.780]  So the title is Endless Lemons, My Statement for the HOPE conference 2016 by Chelsea Manning.
[22:21.320 --> 22:25.960]  First, I'd like to thank you all for your warm love and strong support over the years.
[22:25.960 --> 22:31.540]  You never cease to amaze me with how truly extensive and long-lasting your support has been.
[22:31.740 --> 22:35.700]  And I am always hearing about your messages being posted on social media.
[22:36.840 --> 22:40.880]  In just the last few weeks, I have needed you all more than ever.
[22:40.880 --> 22:43.380]  It has been a roller coaster for me.
[22:44.240 --> 23:03.160]  I just filed my appeal a few months ago where I have asked the judges to dismiss all charges or give me a shorter sentence based on the harsh solitary confinement conditions before my trial, the admission of vague evidence for sentencing, the lack of evidence on charges of theft for information,
[23:03.860 --> 23:17.440]  the vagueness of the definition of exceeding authorized access under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, and the lack of proof by the government that the disclosures actually harm the United States national security or diplomatic interests.
[23:18.540 --> 23:22.780]  This last May, I saw my friend Jan for the first time in nearly seven years.
[23:23.060 --> 23:25.460]  If you have any questions about it, feel free to ask her.
[23:25.680 --> 23:29.540]  It was great to see her again and be reminded of all my friends in the tech community.
[23:31.800 --> 23:49.040]  Today, as is obvious in some of the headlines that we see online, we are in a constant technological arms race, and I think that it's important to realize that we are always only a single breakthrough away from making the methods of network obfuscation and encryption pointless or unusable.
[23:50.500 --> 24:08.280]  While I agree that it's unlikely, it certainly is well within the realm of possibility that we might wake up tomorrow morning and find that some truly brilliant or devious mathematician or mathematicians have solved the Riemann hypothesis, throwing entire regions of our encryption arsenal into turmoil.
[24:08.640 --> 24:16.080]  Or we might wake up and find that a powerful quantum computer with near-perfect error correction has been built, effectively accomplishing the same thing.
[24:17.380 --> 24:20.940]  It's important to keep our encryption safe in the post-quantum world.
[24:20.940 --> 24:30.280]  Luckily, you don't need to be a quantum math or quantum computer expert in order to be able to design stronger algorithms to protect our current encryption methods against quantum attacks.
[24:30.600 --> 24:35.000]  These algorithms are classical and don't require any kind of complex understanding of anything quantum.
[24:35.280 --> 24:36.780]  We can let the PhDs deal with that.
[24:37.960 --> 24:46.700]  I am putting together a collection of materials on this topic, and I thought perhaps we could all explore this together during this year's Aaron Schwartz Day hackathons.
[24:47.500 --> 24:56.260]  Using Sage, an open-source Python-like mathematics software system, I am hoping to start things off with a generic construct that anyone can start easily working from.
[24:57.020 --> 25:02.240]  But I'd like to leave you with a little bit of Sage wisdom from my own life experience so far.
[25:02.700 --> 25:13.840]  Quote, If life gives you endless lemons, then raise capital, industrialize your process, market aggressively, expand everywhere, and totally dominate the lemonade industry.
[25:15.600 --> 25:17.480]  Much love from Chelsea.
[25:20.160 --> 25:21.000]  Thank you.
[25:21.740 --> 25:25.780]  So, she's been really interested in post-quantum cryptography lately.
[25:25.980 --> 25:27.820]  We've sent her papers and books about that.
[25:29.720 --> 25:46.380]  And the Dianne Schwartz hackathon is in November every year, and she's hoping to do some sort of, like, introductory course on quantum computing, or quantum cryptography from her, from prison, and have people kind of get started, like, learning about it,
[25:46.460 --> 25:48.520]  because she thinks it's really important right now.
[25:50.980 --> 25:56.300]  And a question I'm sure people will ask a lot is, how can we help Chelsea from the outside?
[25:57.180 --> 26:02.580]  And she told me the ways that she appreciates the most are, one, donating to her legal appeal.
[26:03.180 --> 26:07.920]  So, as mentioned earlier, that's ongoing right now, to reduce her sentence to ten years.
[26:08.060 --> 26:11.400]  That would mean a lot to her, like, so much to her.
[26:11.540 --> 26:15.340]  And you can donate via the Freedom of the Press Foundation website.
[26:15.660 --> 26:18.700]  Just Google Freedom of Press Chelsea donation.
[26:19.060 --> 26:19.980]  That should get you there.
[26:21.000 --> 26:22.000]  You can spread the word.
[26:22.320 --> 26:30.240]  Chelsea's often afraid people have forgotten about her, because she, you know, she was kind of before Snowden, and she had, like, less publicity at the time.
[26:30.580 --> 26:33.460]  So, just make sure, you know, tell people who Chelsea Manning is.
[26:34.100 --> 26:35.020]  Spread the word out.
[26:35.380 --> 26:36.940]  And write letters and cards.
[26:37.200 --> 26:38.860]  And she really likes getting them.
[26:39.020 --> 26:42.480]  And as I said, she reads every one and replies to quite a lot of them.
[26:42.880 --> 26:43.460]  That's all.
[26:44.780 --> 26:45.220]  Thanks.
[26:46.880 --> 26:47.480]  Thank you.
[26:48.680 --> 26:53.660]  So, now we have a live feed from Lauri Love, who will speak to you now.
[26:53.660 --> 26:53.800]  Hi.
[26:54.540 --> 26:55.400]  Sorry, can you hear me?
[26:55.400 --> 26:56.240]  Mm-hmm.
[26:56.940 --> 26:57.000]  Yeah.
[26:57.100 --> 26:57.280]  Okay.
[26:57.600 --> 26:59.340]  So, I'll keep this very brief.
[27:00.260 --> 27:01.280]  I'm Lauri Love.
[27:01.480 --> 27:09.320]  I was arrested in October 2013 by the National Crime Agency, and not charged with any crimes, I remember.
[27:09.660 --> 27:15.800]  And then, I think because the name Lauri Love's quite cool, the Department of Justice started writing fan fiction about me.
[27:17.100 --> 27:23.940]  Because I heard on the radio from the BBC that I had been charged with crimes, and I was going to call them up and say, no, no, I haven't been charged with any crimes.
[27:24.120 --> 27:28.480]  And it turned out that I'd been charged with crimes in America, which is not the normal thing.
[27:28.580 --> 27:32.740]  Normally, you're charged with crimes in the country where you allegedly committed the crimes.
[27:33.420 --> 27:36.260]  And so, this was the first sign that things were going a bit awry.
[27:36.640 --> 27:38.180]  I was kept on bail for nine months.
[27:38.780 --> 27:46.860]  I was given my passport back and released from bail, and I asked for my computers back very politely, and they refused.
[27:47.240 --> 27:48.760]  And so, I asked a few more times.
[27:49.720 --> 27:54.720]  And I ended up taking them to court, which is how we got the victory on the cryptography matter.
[27:55.140 --> 28:00.800]  That case is still ongoing because I very gracefully withdrew it after they cheated a bit.
[28:01.420 --> 28:06.500]  And then I was arrested again by the extradition unit, and things got a bit more serious at that point.
[28:07.580 --> 28:13.960]  So, tomorrow, I've got to go back to London, to Westminster Magistrates Court, for the conclusion of my extradition hearing.
[28:15.020 --> 28:16.440]  It's just the final argument.
[28:18.060 --> 28:28.320]  We're hoping the extradition will be refused in very self-interested terms because I don't want to spend 99 years in prison in America for very silly reasons.
[28:29.020 --> 28:48.220]  In more important terms, because we have been able to identify a lot of problems with the U.S. justice system, and problems that we've already been discussing, such as the CFAA being broken, being out of date, being misused constantly, and the sentences for it being disproportionate.
[28:48.380 --> 28:55.400]  But also the plea bargaining, coercive plea bargaining system, that sees 19 out of 20 federal defendants never get their chance for a trial.
[28:55.800 --> 29:07.000]  And the mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines that mean that we had to get free constitutional experts to sit in a room, well, a virtual room for about a day to figure out how many years I'd be in prison for.
[29:07.140 --> 29:08.720]  And that's absurd in itself.
[29:09.820 --> 29:18.060]  The reason we're in this position, to begin with, is because of Aaron Swartz's tragic death.
[29:20.020 --> 29:29.140]  Aaron, I'm sure you all know, was very central to people in the Internet community, the Internet governance and architecture, the hacker community, the activist community.
[29:29.980 --> 29:38.140]  He was at the intersection of a lot of these movements, and his death has left us reeling, and we still really haven't recovered from that.
[29:39.160 --> 29:44.580]  But the factors that caused his death, that contributed to it, can be addressed.
[29:44.960 --> 29:57.980]  And there must be a reform of CFAA, there must be a reform of coercive plea bargaining, there must be a reform of mandatory sentencing, and there must be a change in attitude from the U.S. government and Department of Justice to take risks away from deterrence,
[29:58.280 --> 30:11.020]  and making examples of people that they consider subversives in terms of information, and towards an attitude of cooperation with the hacker community, because we can't really afford to be at loggerheads when we're facing such massive global insecurity.
[30:11.540 --> 30:26.580]  So I'm hoping that my extradition will be refused, that some light will be shed upon these issues that will be helpful for the people that drive reform in the United States, and that other people will not be put in a similar situation as Gary McKinnon was before me,
[30:26.820 --> 30:31.720]  who spent 10 years of his life waiting to know if he'd be sent to America for stupid reasons.
[30:32.360 --> 30:34.720]  And eventually it was refused, and the law was changed.
[30:35.020 --> 30:55.440]  So my case is a chance to test that law, but it's also a chance to draw a bit of a line in the sand where it comes to this pattern of prosecution, and this pattern of prosecutorial overreach, of punitive, indictive sentences, and hopefully maybe the tie can start to go back in the other direction,
[30:55.440 --> 31:03.340]  and that can then potentially, if not directly help people like Chelsea and Jeremy, then help other people not be in their position in the future.
[31:05.900 --> 31:06.940]  It's difficult.
[31:06.940 --> 31:08.240]  It's very stressful.
[31:10.240 --> 31:28.680]  The thing that gives me hope is the support that I get from people at the Courage Foundation, from my friends and family, and the hope that there is opportunity for something positive in any difficult life experience, and that it's possible to earn through suffering,
[31:29.960 --> 31:32.180]  and through determination and courage.
[31:32.180 --> 31:38.900]  It's possible to, if not always win, to make it easier to win in the long run.
[31:39.260 --> 31:50.120]  And you sometimes have to take a big picture view of these things because there's always going to be hurdles, there's always going to be sadder points, there's always going to be darker days, but things get better.
[31:50.460 --> 31:53.160]  And they get better because people believe in them.
[31:53.880 --> 31:55.920]  So that's enough of me rambling again.
[31:57.800 --> 31:58.540]  Thanks, Leva.
[32:03.870 --> 32:04.510]  Thank you.
[32:04.510 --> 32:09.290]  We're happy to take questions for any of us on the panel, or for Lauri himself.
[32:10.450 --> 32:15.190]  We also want to let you know that we have a Courage Foundation table down in the mezzanine.
[32:15.810 --> 32:22.190]  And while we're a lean and mean organization, we do need to eat and are in the midst of an emergency funding drive.
[32:22.490 --> 32:28.390]  So any donation or purchase of merchandise helps us out and helps us help people like Lauri.
[32:30.210 --> 32:32.050]  You can get a T-shirt with my name on it.
[32:32.130 --> 32:34.250]  I find that incredibly awkward as a British person.
[32:37.270 --> 32:42.870]  So yeah, we have a wide selection of stickers with Lauri's name on it, which you can get and send him pictures.
[32:43.110 --> 32:44.050]  By the way, Naomi, I'm sorry.
[32:44.190 --> 32:44.930]  I left them on a pub.
[32:45.110 --> 32:47.530]  I hope somebody picked them up and put them everywhere, but I don't know.
[32:47.710 --> 32:48.630]  I've got some more at home.
[32:48.630 --> 32:49.230]  I'll get them to you.
[32:50.130 --> 32:54.810]  I put one on my computer, so now you're right underneath Jeremy.
[32:56.130 --> 32:58.390]  Only in sticker form and not in cell form.
[32:59.890 --> 33:02.890]  So does anyone have any questions for anyone on the panel?
[33:07.590 --> 33:12.030]  While people are thinking, I actually wanted to ask a question for our friend from the CCR.
[33:12.310 --> 33:12.690]  Was it Carey?
[33:13.010 --> 33:13.690]  Yeah, Carey.
[33:13.690 --> 33:33.470]  In terms of the CFAA, here in the U.K., this actually came up in my extradition hearing because I said that the person who may have been responsible for this campaign in response to the death of Aaron Swartz might want to mount a defence of necessity.
[33:33.470 --> 33:38.390]  I argue that this would not be possible in the U.S. simply because there would be no chance of a trial.
[33:38.890 --> 33:40.850]  They would be strong armed into taking a plea.
[33:41.550 --> 33:45.650]  But I think you make a further claim that you can't actually make that case.
[33:45.650 --> 33:49.890]  In the U.K., you can argue that you had to do it.
[33:49.930 --> 33:54.010]  It was in prevention of a bigger harm or it was an act of conscience.
[33:54.210 --> 33:56.970]  And it's hard to argue, but it has been successfully argued.
[33:57.250 --> 34:01.950]  Is there something about the law or the CFAA as it's written that makes that harder in America?
[34:05.060 --> 34:09.920]  I think it's a hard question to answer without thinking in more depth.
[34:10.120 --> 34:16.800]  I can't think of any cases offhand where that's been successfully presented.
[34:17.440 --> 34:27.960]  And as you know and have likely been advised, I mean, the CFAA cases on the books have been quite onerous and it's been extremely controversial law.
[34:28.240 --> 34:43.360]  Many organizations like the EFF have been mounting strong campaigns, actually, to amend with one amendment actually named after Aaron Schwartz to revise the CFAA.
[34:43.540 --> 34:45.260]  It was actually passed in 1986.
[34:45.320 --> 34:58.800]  A lot of people don't know this, but literally in response to the Matthew Broderick movie War Game, where you had a very hyper-reactive Congress that had seen too many speculative movies.
[34:59.320 --> 35:06.120]  And in research journals, so to speak, you've seen these kind of fears of a cyber Pearl Harbor.
[35:06.460 --> 35:19.970]  Going back, I mean, the last time I've done research into this, I mean, I saw in a law library articles from the early 90s, talking about the cyber Pearl Harbor is imminent, imminent, and we have to worry about this.
[35:20.230 --> 35:22.350]  But such a thing hasn't come to fruition.
[35:22.870 --> 35:33.670]  I mean, directly to that question, I mean, I think it's something that would require more serious thought, but I can't think of any cases offhand where there's been that successful defense.
[35:33.670 --> 35:39.570]  I don't think it's been argued in the U.K. that the precedents would come from more traditional trespass offenses.
[35:39.830 --> 35:50.990]  So people have, for example, trespassed onto U.S. air bases based in the U.K. and disabled B-52 bombers, and have successfully argued that they felt that they had to.
[35:51.170 --> 35:59.490]  The court doesn't have to agree, but the jury can say, I believe that these people, sincerely believe that it was necessary for them to go in and turn off these bombers.
[35:59.490 --> 36:09.510]  And whether that would work in a context of a digital defense is harder to argue, but I think it's more conceivable in the U.K. than America just because of the court system.
[36:10.690 --> 36:11.770]  Grace wants to say something.
[36:12.030 --> 36:25.930]  Yeah, I was just going to say that there is no exception for acts of conscience, especially, I know personally, in Jeremy's case, I mean, a lot of his hacks were very political.
[36:25.930 --> 36:28.290]  Everybody knows about the Stratfor hack.
[36:28.530 --> 36:39.210]  One of the other things that he was charged with was hacking the Arizona Department of Public Safety and releasing information on that sort of thing.
[36:39.430 --> 36:46.950]  And that release was titled Chinga La Migra, which is Spanish for F*ck the Border Patrol.
[36:46.950 --> 37:04.650]  And it was in response to the racist law being passed in Arizona that said basically if you are a brown person, you must carry documents on you at all times that prove that you are an American citizen or you have the right to live in America.
[37:04.650 --> 37:09.130]  So, I mean, many, a lot of Jeremy's hacks were very political.
[37:09.450 --> 37:20.710]  And, I mean, he even said over and over again in his sentencing statement, he said, I saw the acts of Chelsea Manning and I said, you know, if she can put her life on the line to do that, how can I do any less?
[37:21.890 --> 37:28.150]  And the only thing that was focused on in his case was the fact that he said he wanted to cause maximum mayhem.
[37:30.750 --> 37:38.110]  It's, there's, I mean, and what Lauri said, you know, people trespassing onto air bases to disable B-52 bombers.
[37:38.330 --> 37:50.190]  Every year there's a protest in a very infamous, in a very infamous base in Georgia, where there's the School of the Americas, which basically train mercenaries to go into other parts of the world and...
[37:50.190 --> 37:52.230]  Funny story about them, I'll tell you in six years.
[37:52.230 --> 38:03.010]  And kill many people, and every year there is a symbolic act of protest where people will cross onto the property of the School of the Americas, and they are immediately arrested.
[38:03.210 --> 38:07.790]  I mean, nuns have spent time in jail for simply walking across an imaginary line.
[38:09.210 --> 38:18.330]  There's absolutely no provision for acts of conscience, and that is one thing that has to change right now.
[38:18.330 --> 38:20.450]  Must, absolutely.
[38:22.930 --> 38:24.230]  There's just no question.
[38:25.850 --> 38:38.890]  Hack activists, even anybody who has any sort of political leaning is treated so horribly in the, I will not call it the justice system, I absolutely refuse to do so.
[38:39.490 --> 38:56.990]  In the American court system, in the American prison system, I had a personal friend who was put in solitary confinement by himself for several months, because he had anarchist tattoos, and a copious amount of anarchist literature.
[38:57.490 --> 39:03.690]  He was basically put in solitary confinement, tortured for months, because of his political views.
[39:03.910 --> 39:12.930]  It had nothing to do with his crime, it had nothing to do with him doing anything wrong, he just had political views, and was put in solitary confinement for it.
[39:15.830 --> 39:24.090]  So, could we not, can we bypass the justice system, and put together a voluntary national institute of conscience?
[39:24.510 --> 39:28.250]  I'm for that, I'm an anarchist, I'm absolutely for that.
[39:28.750 --> 39:38.210]  Yeah, okay, do that, so we can just decide what is an act of conscience and what isn't, and if enough people agree, then that puts leverage on the justice system to stop being a dick about it.
[39:39.630 --> 39:41.770]  I'd like to take a question from Lynn.
[39:42.410 --> 39:46.910]  Yeah, I'm Lynn Olbrecht, Ross Olbrecht's my son, he's a defendant in the Silk Road case.
[39:47.090 --> 39:50.670]  He's got a double life sentence for all non-violent charges.
[39:52.070 --> 39:56.550]  And I'd like to just back up what you're saying about the political.
[39:57.450 --> 40:15.330]  One of the things that bolstered this sentence was the judge cited DPR's political beliefs and writings, the libertarian philosophy of the site, and things like saying the government is the enemy or the oppressor.
[40:15.330 --> 40:22.650]  And this is a judge who took an oath to uphold the First Amendment and freedom of speech and political speech.
[40:23.550 --> 40:29.930]  So it's true, it's being used, and that completely goes against the basic values of our country.
[40:30.330 --> 40:38.030]  And another thing I think is kind of interesting is that there's a question in Ross's case of the warrants being illegal.
[40:38.030 --> 40:43.590]  But the government basically says, well, even if they were, we did it in good faith, so it's really okay.
[40:44.170 --> 40:48.830]  And they're using that argument in several cases, and the courts are upholding it.
[40:49.050 --> 40:55.330]  So how is that different from basically you're saying people are expressing their political views in good faith?
[40:55.690 --> 40:58.090]  Or, you know, it's an act of conscience, so it's good faith.
[40:58.470 --> 41:00.570]  So it's, you know, obvious double standard.
[41:01.670 --> 41:03.870]  And so anyway, thank you for your work.
[41:04.010 --> 41:05.410]  It's really important.
[41:05.430 --> 41:07.110]  I feel like we're really at a pivotal time.
[41:08.370 --> 41:08.870]  Thanks.
[41:15.090 --> 41:17.730]  I really wish you guys all the best in your appeal.
[41:18.030 --> 41:21.030]  I think you have the strongest conceivable case for an appeal.
[41:21.230 --> 41:26.390]  And I hope that the Court of Appeals is a little bit more fair than the first court that heard Ross's case.
[41:26.830 --> 41:41.990]  And for anyone that doesn't know the gory details, it's worth looking into it because the U.S. government, the investigations were corrupt, their tactics in court were corrupt, the sentencing report that to influence the sentencing was corrupt.
[41:42.190 --> 41:49.370]  And it's hard not to look at the judge's determination as anything other than bias and twisted.
[41:49.610 --> 41:52.170]  So it's important that people pay attention to this appeal.
[41:53.170 --> 42:05.770]  Because if they can get away with what they did to what then, no person who does non-violent opposition to the system, the status quo, or the state is safe from being locked up for the rest of their life.
[42:05.890 --> 42:12.470]  If they're willing to do that to Russell Brick, then anyone who gets on the radar for the wrong reasons doesn't have any security.
[42:12.470 --> 42:15.710]  So I think we have to pay very close attention to that and support it as much as we can.
[42:16.510 --> 42:17.330]  Thank you for that.
[42:17.430 --> 42:18.390]  I really appreciate that.
[42:18.530 --> 42:27.430]  And I think what you said about taking the big picture, because it's not...it is about individuals and individuals are important, but it really affects everyone.
[42:27.710 --> 42:30.490]  And so that's what I think a lot of people need to understand.
[42:31.870 --> 42:44.810]  We're all vulnerable in this situation, and so it's not just impacting you or Ross or Jeremy or Chelsea or whoever, and people who are less well-known.
[42:45.110 --> 42:53.370]  It's causing precedent and creating precedent and abilities to put us all in peril, actually.
[42:54.070 --> 42:55.470]  So this is the thing.
[42:57.470 --> 43:19.730]  The forces that try and reduce liberty and justice can often win victories that seem hard to undo, but it's possible to exact the cost in terms of public relations, in terms of the conversation and the dialectic that follows from it, in terms of creating solidarity and making it clear that even though this result was secured through the courts,
[43:19.850 --> 43:22.110]  it is not the result that the public believes is just.
[43:22.110 --> 43:25.570]  And that makes it harder for the next injustice to ratchet in.
[43:25.750 --> 43:30.730]  So we have to be vocal and we have to continue to organize.
[43:31.170 --> 43:32.170]  Never get despondent.
[43:32.350 --> 43:40.110]  Organize, have conversations, make people understand the issues, and then the next time it comes around it will be harder and we'll have a better chance of victory.
[43:41.050 --> 43:43.210]  We have another question from the floor, I think.
[43:44.390 --> 43:49.850]  So I think everyone in this room has been fighting this fight for a long time, and this is a cultural fight, right?
[43:49.910 --> 43:50.950]  These are political prisoners.
[43:50.950 --> 43:52.790]  No one's going to jail because of what they did with the computer.
[43:52.890 --> 43:57.350]  They're going to jail because they threw mud in the eye of these top-level people.
[43:57.830 --> 44:11.370]  And I was wondering, since you guys are really big in the activism community, and I'm glad that you're connecting this to Black Lives Matter and, of course, the larger race problem that's going on since before the birth of our country.
[44:11.870 --> 44:19.790]  But I'm wondering, do you have a viewpoint on how some social issues have been able to sort of swing very quickly?
[44:20.250 --> 44:24.130]  So specifically, like, in the U.S., like, gay and lesbians can get married now.
[44:24.250 --> 44:28.250]  And, like, when I was growing up, like, gay was the term that you would use to make fun of people, right?
[44:28.330 --> 44:29.970]  That was a pretty big switch, right?
[44:29.970 --> 44:51.610]  So I was wondering, from your viewpoint, do you have any ideas of... or any perspective or insight on how some things like this community, who's a lot of times in the media, sometimes very positively, right, on a lot of TV shows, have a very hard time sort of making that cultural change when sometimes other organizations or other ideas don't.
[44:51.970 --> 44:53.290]  And also, thank you for your work.
[44:53.330 --> 44:54.390]  You guys do excellent stuff.
[44:56.170 --> 44:59.390]  I have some perspective on that.
[44:59.610 --> 45:03.930]  I think it's very much because we couch certain issues in certain terms.
[45:05.310 --> 45:13.310]  People having the right to get married, while it is very threatening to some people, to a much larger portion of the population, it's not threatening.
[45:14.550 --> 45:17.630]  But you sort of couch these, I get it all the time.
[45:17.810 --> 45:19.110]  Well, Jeremy broke the law.
[45:20.870 --> 45:22.110]  Okay, what is the law?
[45:22.110 --> 45:24.450]  Is the law just?
[45:24.610 --> 45:25.290]  Should it be broken?
[45:25.830 --> 45:32.510]  But there's sort of this issue of people find certain things acceptable and certain things not.
[45:32.890 --> 45:47.910]  And most often, why they find that acceptable is based on these arbitrary standards of what is legal, what is right, what is sort of mostly due on what is legal.
[45:47.910 --> 45:57.130]  And I think we really have to change that sort of whole perspective on just because something is legal does not always mean it's right.
[45:57.290 --> 46:00.970]  And just because it's right doesn't always mean it's going to be legal.
[46:01.950 --> 46:07.070]  And we need to change that entire perspective that we have on that.
[46:09.130 --> 46:12.510]  Protest is protest is protest is protest.
[46:12.730 --> 46:23.350]  It doesn't matter if, in my personal opinion, I support direct action, whether that direct action is nonviolent or chooses to be more direct and violent.
[46:23.690 --> 46:26.610]  I support that because you are going up against oppressive forces.
[46:27.670 --> 46:35.010]  And I believe it was who said it that nonviolence only works if your opponent has a conscience.
[46:36.030 --> 46:39.210]  And he continued and said the United States has none.
[46:39.670 --> 46:42.850]  I believe it was Stokely Carmichael Black Panther that said that.
[46:46.150 --> 46:56.790]  I think one of the reasons that certain movements have gained traction and certain movements haven't is this arbitrary sort of distinction between legal and not legal.
[46:57.530 --> 47:05.470]  And we need to sort of just f*ck that and make it go away personally.
[47:06.550 --> 47:12.970]  One thing, actually, a point I wanted to add actually from somebody, unfortunately, who's not with us.
[47:13.130 --> 47:20.370]  But for the last three years, I worked for Michael Ratner, who's President Emeritus of CCR and one of the greatest constitutional lawyers.
[47:22.090 --> 47:29.470]  And this is something that we talked about, actually, because he was a huge supporter of the hacker community.
[47:32.890 --> 47:37.770]  And, I mean, we speculated, I mean, what's the future of this space?
[47:37.790 --> 47:41.550]  And what's the future of, like, the First Amendment in the digital space?
[47:42.070 --> 47:46.730]  And he actually was hopeful, and that's one of the reasons that he continued that work.
[47:47.010 --> 47:53.290]  Even if you have kind of a stampede against you, it's one thing to have the goal of stopping that.
[47:53.290 --> 48:00.670]  But if you look historically, I mean, even efforts to slow mass repressions of rights are incredibly crucial.
[48:00.910 --> 48:12.150]  And looking back to World War I, which the Espionage Act was born out of, the first 2,000 people who were imprisoned under the Espionage Act weren't spies by any means.
[48:12.290 --> 48:14.150]  They were members of the Socialist Party.
[48:14.970 --> 48:18.430]  Like, the mass leadership of the Socialist Party was put in prison.
[48:18.430 --> 48:21.550]  Eugene Debs, who received a million votes when he was in prison.
[48:22.250 --> 48:24.130]  And also labor unions.
[48:24.390 --> 48:33.330]  But many of, actually, over time, after World War I, what happened is we have many of the greatest First Amendment cases of our time.
[48:34.250 --> 48:37.650]  And I have some personal criticisms of some of those opinions.
[48:37.850 --> 48:41.970]  But basically, out of those cases was the birth of modern First Amendment doctrine.
[48:42.110 --> 48:46.050]  The First Amendment wasn't something that was really litigated in this country until after World War I.
[48:46.050 --> 48:49.990]  So I think this is, I mean, it's a very difficult time.
[48:49.990 --> 48:56.410]  I think many individuals are paying dearly in exile or in prison with their liberty.
[48:57.450 --> 49:05.570]  But one thing is to keep looking forward and at the, you know, the fact that, to not lose hope about that.
[49:05.670 --> 49:07.190]  And I think that's the legacy of Michael.
[49:09.650 --> 49:16.270]  And there's a saying, in legal circles, from bad statutes you get good law, or something like that.
[49:16.390 --> 49:25.650]  But in things being unjust, in injustices mounting up and setting precedent, it allows you, it gives you the tools to write the next law better.
[49:26.110 --> 49:32.530]  So in a way, it's more brisk to the mill, and you can use even the worst injustices to make better justice.
[49:33.870 --> 49:36.330]  And we have a question from Viala, I think.
[49:36.630 --> 49:41.550]  It's more of a comment to the last question, because I think that's a really good one.
[49:41.730 --> 49:50.630]  And I actually think we are in this really weird moment where actually the representations of hackers are more positive than negative.
[49:50.630 --> 49:56.790]  just because of what's happening in pop culture, with Mr. Robot, who am I, all sorts of references.
[49:56.990 --> 49:58.010]  I mean, I collect them all.
[49:58.530 --> 50:04.410]  And it's interesting, actually, like, every once in a while, some of my friends' parents send me an email.
[50:06.070 --> 50:13.270]  And there's a picture attached of a drawing that their kid made of the anonymous mask.
[50:13.430 --> 50:15.050]  And they're, like, really excited about it.
[50:15.050 --> 50:21.630]  And so I actually think we're in this really interesting moment where the representations are very positive.
[50:21.830 --> 50:26.610]  You have statues of Chelsea and Assange in Berlin.
[50:27.350 --> 50:30.050]  They're being lionized in certain ways.
[50:30.190 --> 50:38.190]  And so this is the moment to forge forward precisely with the legal and policy initiatives, because people are open to hackers.
[50:38.190 --> 50:55.190]  I think the thing that worries me is that the moment that there is an attack against critical infrastructure that leads to loss of life, that then is in any way remotely connected to the hacktivists, then, you know, what do we do?
[50:55.190 --> 51:16.010]  And so I think it would be interesting as a community to start thinking about what response we would wage at that point to make sure we continue to sort of be able to, yeah, to be able to continue forward with the sort of positive representations that are occurring right now.
[51:16.170 --> 51:22.170]  And then, in all seriousness, I ended my talk, which was about this topic yesterday, children's books.
[51:22.170 --> 51:35.690]  You know, I think that people may not know this, but Sesame Street was created as kind of propaganda, because people felt like advertising was really corrupting children's minds.
[51:35.950 --> 51:39.870]  And then people were like, well, what can we create to sort of make good kids?
[51:39.990 --> 51:42.290]  You know, and Sesame Street was that response.
[51:43.430 --> 51:46.850]  And there's a lot of really, really good material being made about hackers.
[51:47.110 --> 51:50.150]  And the one place I don't see it is children's books.
[51:50.150 --> 51:53.370]  So maybe there's someone here who writes children's books.
[51:53.610 --> 51:55.290]  And that would be a great story.
[51:55.650 --> 51:55.690]  Yeah.
[51:56.670 --> 51:57.590]  Can I add to that?
[51:57.730 --> 52:00.210]  I've had this, and I've spoken with you about this before, Biela.
[52:00.310 --> 52:17.150]  But if anybody knows an artist who can make graphic novels, comics, and I've been thinking for a while about a series on the famous hackers and little blowers and activists in the digital age and turning that into a comic series and just dramatizing it a little bit,
[52:17.150 --> 52:19.630]  but using that to introduce the ideas and stuff like that.
[52:19.770 --> 52:22.790]  So if anyone knows anyone that could do the art for that, I'd love to help with the ideas.
[52:23.250 --> 52:25.550]  But the other bit was winning the culture war.
[52:25.950 --> 52:28.190]  I watched an amazing documentary.
[52:28.430 --> 52:30.250]  There's a website called Films for Action.
[52:30.470 --> 52:32.550]  The documentary is called Let Fury Have the Hour.
[52:32.890 --> 52:38.270]  And it's about how people became politicized in our generation, which is from the 80s and 90s.
[52:38.390 --> 52:39.790]  Born in the 80s and 90s, roughly.
[52:40.690 --> 52:46.510]  And pretty much everyone said it was not through going to a politics class or going to a meeting.
[52:46.510 --> 52:59.470]  It was through punk rock or hip-hop or skateboarding or some kind of cultural thing that enabled them to turn their feelings of rage and alienation and disenfranchisement into a meaningful analysis.
[52:59.710 --> 53:09.590]  Even if it was just a NoFX song or a propaganda song or some hip-hop, some KRS-1, it put that energy that people had and it made it political in a way.
[53:09.650 --> 53:10.370]  It gave them a voice.
[53:10.650 --> 53:12.510]  And that's happening with Anonymous.
[53:12.750 --> 53:19.410]  I think the greatest legacy of Anonymous will not be the systems that were hacked or the trolls that were done or the operations.
[53:19.630 --> 53:32.190]  It will be the seeds that it sows in people's imaginations that you, you from, you know, whoever you are, can put on a mask and raise up a banner and do something, make a difference in some way.
[53:32.330 --> 53:33.590]  And that's a powerful idea.
[53:33.590 --> 53:37.770]  And I think that's worth pursuing and it's worth building upon.
[53:39.030 --> 53:45.410]  And on that note, it's now 11am, so even though no one has given me a time check, which is confusing me, I think we're probably out of time.
[53:46.290 --> 53:51.630]  I'd like to, like, say some massive thanks to everyone on the panel.
[53:51.790 --> 53:54.010]  Thank you to Lauri for his time, thank you Jan.
[53:55.050 --> 53:57.950]  Sorry, one last really quick request from Chelsea, actually.
[53:58.130 --> 54:02.290]  So she really wants a photo of this panel and I didn't take one, so if anyone did, please send it to me.
[54:02.430 --> 54:03.230]  Thank you, Viola.
[54:03.490 --> 54:04.230]  Great, thank you.
[54:04.570 --> 54:05.830]  Oh, also, can I just...
[54:05.830 --> 54:06.170]  Of course.
[54:06.410 --> 54:10.690]  If you also, as Jan said, cards and letters are super important.
[54:11.190 --> 54:13.990]  Jeremy actually might have been placed in solitary.
[54:14.430 --> 54:16.450]  Yes, recently, we're not exactly sure.
[54:16.650 --> 54:18.590]  There's some conflicting information coming through.
[54:18.730 --> 54:19.810]  We're trying to find out.
[54:20.910 --> 54:26.530]  So, cards and letters, especially when an inmate is so very isolated, super important.
[54:26.650 --> 54:37.530]  You can go to freejeremy.net, find his address, and please write to him, because especially if he's in SHU, we don't know how long he's going to be there, and that would be super, super great for people.
[54:37.650 --> 54:39.630]  In fact, aren't you guys having some sort of nut selection?
[54:39.870 --> 54:45.450]  Like, feel free to write to your prospective Congress about this whole prison and solitary thing.
[54:45.450 --> 54:51.450]  Yeah, solitary confinement has been universally recognized as a form of torture.
[54:52.150 --> 54:54.410]  It needs to be abolished post-haste.
[54:54.750 --> 54:56.650]  It needs to be abolished like yesterday.
[54:57.710 --> 55:03.050]  So, please write Chelsea, please write Jeremy, or actually write a lot of prisoners.
[55:03.410 --> 55:09.490]  The New York Anarchist Black Cross on their website has a guide for prisoners from lots of movements.
[55:09.650 --> 55:18.210]  So, if you Google New York Anarchist Black Cross prisoner guide, give you a whole host of lots of great people to write to.
[55:18.470 --> 55:19.070]  So, please do that.
[55:19.370 --> 55:24.850]  We have a table downstairs in the mezzanine, so we can totally continue this conversation there.
[55:25.310 --> 55:29.510]  I can't leave before saying good luck, Lauri, tomorrow.
[55:29.510 --> 55:31.310]  I'm really sorry I can't be there.
[55:35.410 --> 55:36.690]  I've been watching on the Internet.
[55:37.630 --> 55:40.870]  Yeah, and thank you everyone for coming and listening to us.
[55:41.050 --> 55:42.330]  Let's continue this conversation downstairs.
[55:42.670 --> 55:43.090]  See you later.
[55:43.270 --> 55:43.550]  Thank you.
[55:43.610 --> 55:43.850]  Thank you.
[55:43.850 --> 55:44.050]  Thank you.