January 6, 2012

Wikileaks Supporters Must Disclose Twitter Records

First published on Technorati by Craig Blaha.

A U.S. District Judge in Alexandria Virginia will require Twitter to disclose account information of three Wikileaks supporters in support of a U.S. investigation into the disclosure of secret government documents.

Wired News reports Birgitta Jonsdottir, Jacob Appelbaum, and Rop Gonggrijp are each part of the order to disclose account information now, despite the availability of an appeal. The judge reasoned (pdf) that the defendants request for a stay, or the ability to deny access to the Twitter records while the defendants pursue an appeal, should be denied because they are unlikely to win the appeal.

Judge Liam O’Grady based his assessment on the fact that courts have consistently found that the revelation of IP addresses is not a violation of privacy, and that the information being requested has already been disclosed to a third party – Twitter.

The original subpoena (pdf) requested all non-content information related to these accounts as well as Asange’s. A request for non-content information, or envelope information as it is more commonly referred to, is covered by the Stored Communications Act section of the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act and is a tool commonly used by law enforcement to get account and routing information without requiring a search warrant.

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