I wasn't a computer geek when I was a kid, but I was a debate geek.
And this case of Best Buy's Geek Squad reporting child porn to the FBI is the kind of "values" debate we'd have about various topics in our high school tournaments.
The question is age old: the right to privacy vs. the right to know
When you take your computer in for repair, which one of these rights is most important?
- Is it the right to privacy? (If a technician discovers child porn while fixing a computer, the computer owner's rights matter most, so the discovery stays private.)
- Or is it the right to know? (Kids should live without being used in childhood pornography. Child porn is illegal. Law enforcement should absolutely know if this is found on a device.)
NPR did such a fantastic job with this story, I'll let them take it from here. But if you had to debate this case with someone, which side would you be on?
"The FBI paid Best Buy Geek Squad employees as informants, rewarding them for flagging indecent material when people brought their computers in for repair.
That's according to documents released to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital civil liberties organization, which filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit seeking records that might show warrantless searches of people's devices.
EFF filed its complaint last year after revelations about the FBI's interactions with Geek Squad technicians emerged in the case of Mark Rettenmaier, an Orange County, Calif., physician and surgeon who took his computer in for repair when it wouldn't boot up. Rettenmaier faced child pornography charges after a Geek Squad employee flagged his computer to the FBI."
