I usually do not post about news events. But this one here made it irresistible for me to keep from blogging on it.
I got this news from the EFF Blog. A Boston University student’s computer, cell phone and other properties were seized by the police as a part of an investigation to find who send an email to the college mailing list saying that another student is a gay.
Though there is no indication of any crime he has committed, the police has issued a very stupid and funny warrant. Some of the supposedly suspicious activities listed include: the student being seen with “unknown laptop computers,” which he says he was given by Boston College for field testing or he was “fixing” them for other students; the student uses multiple names to log on to his computer; and the student uses two different operating systems, including one that is not the “regular BC operating system”(I think BC stands for Boston College. And BC operating system is some customized version of Windows) but instead has “a blackscreen with white font (I cannot stop laughing… they should have sepcified the font size too..) which he uses prompt commands on.”
During their search, the police seized (among other things) the student’s computers, storage drives, cell phone, iPod Touch, flash drives, digital camera, and Ubuntu Linux CD ( Oh, I never knew u can send email from iPod Touch or Ubundu CD). None of these items have been returned to him.
To strengthen their arguments, the police also says the (computer science major) student is considered a computer genius by other students (Oh my god, they are hunting down geniuses,.. I must be careful 😀 😀 😀 ).
The student who was employed by college IT department was suspended from job. EFF has filed an emergency motion to quash and for the return of seized property on behalf of a Boston College computer science student Riccardo Calixte.
[poll id=”2″]
cya. bye.
Reference: Computer science student challenges tech seizure – CNET News