Just a note about redaction -- my personal experience with FBI redaction is that it is completely subjective based upon the person who happens to be doing the redaction. There isn't some giant conspiracy to omit facts -- sometimes the person redacts too much, other times they screw up, etc. I've had names redacted on one page, only to appear non-redacted a few pages later. Even in cases where I've sent in death certificates for certain names (I know for a fact who the redacted person is), the name is still redacted in the output. I'm sure it is a very laborious, human process and all such processes involve a lot of errors.
Amazon handed over his account details with very little prodding. No mention of a warrant. Making connections from AWS is probably more incriminating than making them from your home internet connection (your home connection has certain protection)
While we're talking about it... I sent in a FOIA request recently, and it came back a few days ago as 404 File Not Found. I previously sent in requests in 2009 and 2010 and never received replies. From talking with others, they claim that these requests should be on a record and that my 2013 request should have returned evidence of my 2009 and 2010 requests. Does anyone have a scoop on this?
It seems odd that his whole file would be an entire 23 pages in its entirety, and amount to 21 releasable pages without a single page relating in any way to anything other than publicizing the PACER records.<p>Surely they have more...
FYI, Aaron himself posted his FBI file back in 2009:<p><a href="http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/fbifile" rel="nofollow">http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/fbifile</a><p>Has anything else been added since?
Anyone else find it weird they included his social security number (page 5)? With the amount of detail they included it seems as though it would be fairly easy for someone to use any FBI file on a deceased person for fraudulent purposes, ID theft, or accessing accounts at companies who may not realize he is deceased yet.
It makes me sad the NYT story brought on extra heat. As a journalist, it stinks when collateral damage like such happens in the name of "truth" or some other subjective good. Good reminder to be careful what you say to the press.
Many of the pages were the same with different redactions, but the FBI withheld 2 claiming privacy, sources and methods, and the danger that physical harm would come to someone if they released them.<p>- Dan Wright, FireDogLake.com
How much do you want to bet that someone manually goes through to scrub the personal information on every page...any other reasons the white out boxes would be so inconsistent?