[tor-relays] knock knock, police is here

Mailing Lists tor-relays
1

Hi folks.

On Tuesday morning police knocked on my door, performing a full house
search.
Some Nazis used TOR to send nazi-emails to several schools in Germany.

Unfortunately their mails left one of my Exit Servers from dark- to
clearweb, so an ip address, registered on my name, was the last stamp.
Now im accused of Volksverhetzung (german, try to find a good translation).
It means spreading bad nazi bullshit to the internet.

I can take this down by showing them German Telemediengesetz §8, which
protects TOR operators in Germany.
Unfortunately they found some dope (yea, 420guy here) during the house
search, which makes thing even more complicated.

Now I am considering shutting down all my exits.
I promise you guys, there is nothing more bad than a police house search in
the early morning hourse. Even a burglary would be less worse. Burglars
come, steal, go and you never hear again from them.
Police comes, searches through all your belongings, destroys your privacy,
is allowed to take ALL what they want - and they will send you bad bad
letters afterwards.

What are your thoughts about this?

Best regards,
volker

···

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tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
https://lists.torproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tor-relays

2

On Tuesday morning police knocked on my door, performing a full house
search.

For me the bastards were 2 weeks ago at 6:05 am :frowning:
Until now I was not told which IP's and when it was.

Unfortunately they found some dope (yea, 420guy here) during the house
search, which makes thing even more complicated.

Oh, that sucks. I hope you don't live in Bavaria and it's your first BTM case.
Since my whole place is full of IT stuff, including server cabinets, they
overlooked the BTM stuff. They were only interested in child pornography.

Now I am considering shutting down all my exits.

For me they have achieved the opposite, I would like to do even more exit
traffic. The server IP's continue to run under my name. Lawyer Udo Vetter¹ will
inspect the files and we will most likely file a complaint.
I'm saving for my next server and would like to offer Freifunk exit traffic in
addition to Tor exit traffic.
If the cops come again, everything will be re-registered as an LLC or LTD like
relayon.org & yggdrasil.ws do.

¹https://www.vetter-mertens.de/law-blog/
Solmeke is also familiar with exits.
Christian Solmecke, LL.M., Rechtsanwalt für Internet- und Medienrecht

I promise you guys, there is nothing more bad than a police house search in
the early morning hourse. Even a burglary would be less worse. Burglars
come, steal, go and you never hear again from them.

Oh, I've had worse raids before. They only searched 2 laptops and a mobile
phone for child porn pictures. They didn't find anything and didn't search the
rest of the IT any further. They confiscated nothing and ransacked no
cupboards. We then talked about why I do Tor and Freifunk. What does that
cost. And were interested in FreeBSD on the Macbook.

Police comes, searches through all your belongings, destroys your privacy,
is allowed to take ALL what they want - and they will send you bad bad
letters afterwards.

I am in contact with Digitalcourage and Artikel10 and have sent them all the
documents.

What are your thoughts about this?

Heartfelt condolences.

You are welcome to write to me privately and in German.

···

On Samstag, 10. September 2022 14:37:18 CEST volker.mink@gmx.de wrote:

--
╰_╯ Ciao Marco!

Debian GNU/Linux

It's free software and it gives you freedom!

3

Get a signed proof from torproject that this was relay by time of abuse:

http://hctxrvjzfpvmzh2jllqhgvvkoepxb4kfzdjm6h7egcwlumggtktiftid.onion/exonerator.html?ip=87.118.96.154&timestamp=2022-09-09

This Relay is in Question?
http://hctxrvjzfpvmzh2jllqhgvvkoepxb4kfzdjm6h7egcwlumggtktiftid.onion/rs.html#details/C9DF64AF926E2E584E345D13BCE4A97C231A36BE

···

Am 10.09.2022 um 14:37 schrieb volker.mink@gmx.de:

Hi folks.

On Tuesday morning police knocked on my door, performing a full house
search.
Some Nazis used TOR to send nazi-emails to several schools in Germany.

Unfortunately their mails left one of my Exit Servers from dark- to
clearweb, so an ip address, registered on my name, was the last stamp.
Now im accused of Volksverhetzung (german, try to find a good translation).
It means spreading bad nazi bullshit to the internet.

I can take this down by showing them German Telemediengesetz §8, which
protects TOR operators in Germany.
Unfortunately they found some dope (yea, 420guy here) during the house
search, which makes thing even more complicated.

Now I am considering shutting down all my exits.
I promise you guys, there is nothing more bad than a police house search in
the early morning hourse. Even a burglary would be less worse. Burglars
come, steal, go and you never hear again from them.
Police comes, searches through all your belongings, destroys your privacy,
is allowed to take ALL what they want - and they will send you bad bad
letters afterwards.

What are your thoughts about this?

Best regards,
volker

_______________________________________________
tor-relays mailing list
tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
tor-relays Info Page

4

The thing is you can try to explain that it was not you that was sending the information, but unfortunately it went through your computer which makes you partially responsible. Yes, it would have probably gotten there one way or another but it got there because your computer provides the next hop for the traffic. There is always an inherent risk when running a relay. That is why not many people do it. Considering that TOR is regarded as either illegal or unaccepted at the very least. If you didn't prepare for this eventually, then it seems that you did not thourly read or understand what it means to run a relay. I am very sorry that this has happened to you and good luck.

···

September 11, 2022 3:33 AM, volker.mink@gmx.de wrote:

Hi folks.

On Tuesday morning police knocked on my door, performing a full house
search.
Some Nazis used TOR to send nazi-emails to several schools in Germany.

Unfortunately their mails left one of my Exit Servers from dark- to
clearweb, so an ip address, registered on my name, was the last stamp.
Now im accused of Volksverhetzung (german, try to find a good translation).
It means spreading bad nazi bullshit to the internet.

I can take this down by showing them German Telemediengesetz §8, which
protects TOR operators in Germany.
Unfortunately they found some dope (yea, 420guy here) during the house
search, which makes thing even more complicated.

Now I am considering shutting down all my exits.
I promise you guys, there is nothing more bad than a police house search in
the early morning hourse. Even a burglary would be less worse. Burglars
come, steal, go and you never hear again from them.
Police comes, searches through all your belongings, destroys your privacy,
is allowed to take ALL what they want - and they will send you bad bad
letters afterwards.

What are your thoughts about this?

Best regards,
volker

_______________________________________________
tor-relays mailing list
tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
tor-relays Info Page

_______________________________________________
tor-relays mailing list
tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
https://lists.torproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tor-relays

5

Hi Marco.

Schreib mir doch mal privat ne Email.

Viele Grüße,
volker

···

-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: tor-relays <tor-relays-bounces@lists.torproject.org> Im Auftrag von lists@for-privacy.net
Gesendet: Sonntag, 11. September 2022 18:04
An: tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
Betreff: Re: [tor-relays] knock knock, police is here

On Samstag, 10. September 2022 14:37:18 CEST volker.mink@gmx.de wrote:

On Tuesday morning police knocked on my door, performing a full house
search.

For me the bastards were 2 weeks ago at 6:05 am :frowning: Until now I was not told which IP's and when it was.

Unfortunately they found some dope (yea, 420guy here) during the house
search, which makes thing even more complicated.

Oh, that sucks. I hope you don't live in Bavaria and it's your first BTM case.
Since my whole place is full of IT stuff, including server cabinets, they overlooked the BTM stuff. They were only interested in child pornography.

Now I am considering shutting down all my exits.

For me they have achieved the opposite, I would like to do even more exit traffic. The server IP's continue to run under my name. Lawyer Udo Vetter¹ will inspect the files and we will most likely file a complaint.
I'm saving for my next server and would like to offer Freifunk exit traffic in addition to Tor exit traffic.
If the cops come again, everything will be re-registered as an LLC or LTD like relayon.org & yggdrasil.ws do.

¹https://www.vetter-mertens.de/law-blog/
Solmeke is also familiar with exits.
Christian Solmecke, LL.M., Rechtsanwalt für Internet- und Medienrecht

I promise you guys, there is nothing more bad than a police house
search in the early morning hourse. Even a burglary would be less
worse. Burglars come, steal, go and you never hear again from them.

Oh, I've had worse raids before. They only searched 2 laptops and a mobile phone for child porn pictures. They didn't find anything and didn't search the rest of the IT any further. They confiscated nothing and ransacked no cupboards. We then talked about why I do Tor and Freifunk. What does that cost. And were interested in FreeBSD on the Macbook.

Police comes, searches through all your belongings, destroys your
privacy, is allowed to take ALL what they want - and they will send
you bad bad letters afterwards.

I am in contact with Digitalcourage and Artikel10 and have sent them all the documents.

What are your thoughts about this?

Heartfelt condolences.

You are welcome to write to me privately and in German.

--
╰_╯ Ciao Marco!

Debian GNU/Linux

It's free software and it gives you freedom!

_______________________________________________
tor-relays mailing list
tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
https://lists.torproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tor-relays

6

The thing is you can try to explain that it was not you that was

sending the information, but unfortunately it went through your computer which makes you partially responsible.

Not in Germany, at least it shouldn't. §§8-10 Telemediengesetz define something called "Providerprivileg" which exonerates any transport hops from prosecution, similar to how the postal service isn't responsible for any drugs they transport.

Additionally, thanks to the CCC [1] a lot of law enforcement actually knows what TOR is, that it's only a transport, and thus usually the investigation into the Exit operator is pretty limited... unless they find something else.

[1] Chaos Computer Club - Wikipedia

1 Like
7

Wow, that is really good, and totally the way it should be. In the US they love to wrap up a case fast and easy so if they get someone, not caring about that person's level of involvement, they will get them for anything they can. Even if it just ends up as an accessory. I wish it was like how you said everywhere and even more so. I completely agree that the person who runs the exit server is not the one who committed the crime or offense and should not be held responsible for the actions of others, but that is just simply not how it is for everyone. Thank you for your response, I learned something new about a place I have never been to but always wanted to go, and now even more so. Stay safe out there my friend.

···

September 13, 2022 5:48 AM, "Peter Ludikovsky" <peter@ludikovsky.name> wrote:

The thing is you can try to explain that it was not you that was

sending the information, but unfortunately it went through your computer
which makes you partially responsible.

Not in Germany, at least it shouldn't. §§8-10 Telemediengesetz define
something called "Providerprivileg" which exonerates any transport hops
from prosecution, similar to how the postal service isn't responsible
for any drugs they transport.

Additionally, thanks to the CCC [1] a lot of law enforcement actually
knows what TOR is, that it's only a transport, and thus usually the
investigation into the Exit operator is pretty limited... unless they
find something else.

[1] Chaos Computer Club - Wikipedia

_______________________________________________
tor-relays mailing list
tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
tor-relays Info Page

_______________________________________________
tor-relays mailing list
tor-relays@lists.torproject.org
https://lists.torproject.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/tor-relays