U can B prosecuted 4 deleting your browser's search history!

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(clicky)you can now be prosecuted for deleting your browser's search history, under the 2002 "Sarbanes-Oxley Act". just ask David Kernell.*
*In 2010 David Kernell, a University of Tennessee student, was convicted under Sarbanes-Oxley after he deleted digital records that showed he had obtained access to Sarah Palin’s Yahoo e-mail account. Using publicly available information, Kernell answered security questions that allowed him to reset Palin’s Yahoo password to “popcorn.” He downloaded information from Palin’s account, including photographs, and posted the new password online. He then deleted digital information that may have made it easier for federal investigators to find him. Like Matanov, he cleared the cache on his Internet browser. He also uninstalled Firefox, ran a disk defragmentation program to reorganize and clean up his hard drive, and deleted a series of images that he had downloaded from the account. For entering Palin’s e-mail, he was eventually convicted of misdemeanor unlawfully obtaining information from a protected computer and felony destruction of records under Sarbanes-Oxley. In January 2012, the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit found that Kernell’s awareness of a potential investigation into his conduct was enough to uphold the felony charge. At the time Kernell took steps to clean his computer, he does not appear to have known that there was any investigation into his conduct. Regardless, the government felt that they were entitled to that data, and the court agreed that Kernell was legally required to have preserved it.

ok, do any of you think this passes the constitutional "smell test"? is it really an ok thing for our gov't to make people leave their computers always open for inspection by the authorities? do you think uncle sam is or should be legally ENTITLED to all our private information, whenever it wants? what if somebody's computer hard drive gets fried somehow, not by intent, should one still be considered legally culpable if the feds can't get the information that was on said hard drive that said feds demanded?

Doesn't seem constitutional, clear violation of the 5th

What kind of person chooses security questions which aren't secure?

auntblabby,

you must realize that the govt has already seized all our rights and powers.
Questioning these things in the courts is just for show, to "convince" the citizens that they still have a choice,
when it comes to their rights, protecting themselves, and freedom. You know, the very thing this nation was supposed to be founded on. It's a dream, not a guaranteed right anymore.

We're all sitting in a prison, pretending we have rights, and we don't even realize it.

If you are aware of an investigation and destroy evidence, then yes, you can and will be charged. Once you are made aware of an investigation, you are required to preserve evidence to the best of you ability.

Now, if the investigation is secret and you were not aware, then no, they cannot charge you. You have no responsibility to preserve anything at that point and if one is deletes their browser history every day, that is their choice absent of any responsibility to preserve that history.

"NO! PERIOD! " is as close as I could get to "...without a warrant from a judicial court."

U.S. judicial courts are now considering whether the on-board computers of motor vehicles may legally be altered for whatever reason the owner chooses under the First-Sale Doctrine ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine ) as they have considered with several various products including books, and recorded music or movies where the purchaser is under no obligation to avoid altering the product while it remains in the purchaser's possession and isn't sold secondarily with the alteration(s).

So, while it appears that the Court considers alterations to be protected in a variety of ways, at least two subordinate courts have determined that altering one's computer-history files by deletion is evidence of actus reus, or "guilty act." I have a feeling that this is the kind of case that gets granted review by the U.S. Supreme Court. At that point, I would hope that a few justices would consider how many computer users routinely delete their computer history without ever doing so to concealed evidence of greater crimes. They should also consider remanding the case with an exclusion of such solitary flimsy "evidence." By itself, the evidence does nothing. The fact that the Electronic Frontier Foundation is noticing this case is a welcome sign. The courts' implication that Kernell was legally required to have preserved his computer history instead of having chosen to delete it would turn the First-Sale Doctrine on its head.

Wow, the government misuses powers we give it? Who could ever have predicted?

It's a crime to hack a public official's online account, even if they make it stupidly simple for you to do.
It is also a crime to post private information of a public official without their and the government's permission.
It is a crime to post personal information and files of anyone without their permission.
It is also a crime to hack somebody period.

Oh it finally a crime to destroy evidence, even if that evidence is browsing history.


He committed numerous crimes under state and federal laws was rightfully prosecuted!

Many of you are overreaching to make an un defendable point, even though it is clear this guy willingly broke the law.
I don't care for Palin, but she has rights too.

I don't think uncle Sam wants to know why I'm deleting my history.

I think that Xenocity is right on many points, the thing is that regardless of how much you love or hate Sarah Palin the man did break computer law and then he took steps to cover his tracks by destorying evidence on the computer.

Consider the following hypothetical case

Woodpecker goes bad and he builds a gaint drilling machine, he goes to the woods and pecks to death 100 rare trees (Vandalism). If he then smashs the machine in small bits and then melts them in furnace to cover up his crime.

Should he be treated as a more serious criminal than one who did not make an effort to destroy the evidence after the guilty act. I would say yes, I think we need to get past the point of judging the crime based on how we feel about the politics of Ms Palin.

_________________
Health is a state of physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity I am not a jigsaw, I am a free man !

Diagnosed under the DSM5 rules with autism spectrum disorder, under DSM4 psychologist said would have been AS (299.80) but I suspect that I am somewhere between 299.80 and 299.00 (Autism) under DSM4.