Court Allows Arkansas To Hide Wikipedia Edits

rheotaxis writes "A circuit judge in Arkansas will not order the state to reveal where its computers were used to edit Wikipedia articles about former governor Mike Huckabee while he was running for President. Two Associated Press journalists used WikiScanner to track the edits to IP addresses used by the state. Writer Jon Gambrell and News Editor Kelly P. Kissel filed a suit in October 2007 asking the state to reveal which state offices used the IP addresses, because state rules don't allow using computer resources for political purposes. The director of the Arkansas Department of Information Systems, Claire Bailey, claimed in court that releasing this information would allow hackers to target these state offices."

Re:Next question

[evanbd]

Corruption in government should be investigated and cleaned up, even on small scales. If you leave it alone, it will fester. And yes, using government resources for political gain is corruption.

Re:Secrecy or Transparency?

[Anonymous Coward]

if it relies on obscurity, then it's not secure, period.

Way to pick out a keyword and use it to make an irrelevant "talking point" type response in your desperation to give the impression that the person you're replying to is an idiot.

His whole point is that all security ultimately depends on secrets. If you do not protect your passwords and your private keys by preventing attackers from finding them out, then you have no security. In other words, your security depends on the obscurity of your passwords and private keys.

Re:Huh?

[AmberBlackCat]

What's interesting here is they were able to shutdown an investigation into government corruption in the name of security. I guess it's not just for federal government anymore.

Re:Government corruption

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm from Arkansas, and have been through the legal system. It is very corrupt and the government agencies collude with the courts all the time.

I can name names but I do not see the point as you can google it yourself with "Arkansas Aids Blood Prison Scandal", just to name one.

I know for a fact that charges for crimes as serious as DUI with injury can be made to disappear completely for as little as $20,000.

One day all the corruption is going to overflow and pour out, and people are going to be absolutely disgusted.

AC for obvious reasons

Re:Huh?

[Smallpond]

That's for private investigators - note the "private". If you aren't investigating private persons, then you don't need a PI license.

Re:Huh?

[sumdumass]

Private is a term describing the service sectors. Private and public. [wikipedia.org] The Public service is little more then an denotation that jobs are being done for the government instead of the private sector. [wikipedia.org] Public servants aren't servants of the public, they are people who perform jobs in the public service. Private investigator [thefreedictionary.com] are investigators who are not public employees, they are working in the private sector.

It has nothing to do with the target of the investigation and everything with the service sector.

According to Arkansas state law 17-40-102 (20)"Private investigator" means any person who performs one (1) or more services as described in subdivision (13) of this section

(13)"Investigations company" means any person who engages in the business or accepts employment to obtain or furnish information with reference to:
    (A)Crime or wrongs done or threatened against the United States or any state or territory of the United States;
    (B)The identity, habits, conduct, business, occupation, honesty, integrity, credibility, knowledge, trustworthiness, efficiency, loyalty, activity, movement, whereabouts, affiliations, associations, transactions, acts, reputation, or character of any person;
    (C)The location, disposition, or recovery of lost or stolen property;
    (D)The cause or responsibility for fires, libels, losses, accidents, damages, or injuries to persons or to property; or
    (E)The securing of evidence to be used before any court, board, officer, or investigating committee;

If the reporters were conducting an investigation, they would fall under 13- (A),(b) and likely (E). If they were reporting a story and inquiring to the facts of the story, they would be nothing but reporters doing their jobs (which might require a private investigators license). But declaring their actions a criminal investigation would most certainly require the license and registration.

Violations are class A misdemeanors unless it happens twice within one year then it becomes a class D felony.