this post was submitted on 24 Jul 2026
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I don't believe you can be compelled to provide a password. That does after all (at the very least) constitute speech. And freedom of speech is also freedom of non-speech, they can't make you say something.
They will however try to make you do that... In many situations authorities are allowed to lie to you. So that's sucks. They can tell you that you're required to unlock your phone, you just have to know that your not actually.
Also they can't make you say anything, but they can make you do things, like for instance "put your finger here" or "look into this camera", which is why biometric unlock is unsafe around cops.
There's that one guy who is being held in contempt of the court (to be clear this is not the police asking for his password, but a judge in a court of law) because he won't give a password to decrypt a hard drive.
They believe it is highly likely that the drive contains sexually explicit material of children, which is why he's being held in prison until he gives up the password.
I would want to catch pedophiles too, but I seriously don't believe a damn thing any branch of this government says about anyone.
For all I know he has a video of trumps night out at Epstein island and that's why they want the password to destroy it.
Obviously probably not but still, I'm supposed to just take the scouts honor of our unhonorable government that this guy totally has this on his hard drive even if they can't prove it?
They could say this about any of us at any time for any devices password we won't give them.
I don't agree with this precedent.
Oh yeah I think it's terrible this guy is imprisoned for not giving up a password, for something they can't prove. Like they shouldn't be able to detain someone indefinitely for an unproven crime. At some point they have to release them or it's guilty until proven innocent.
So basically he is in prison without proven guilty? That is exactly how "Communist" countries did: "you are probably guilty and just in case you will spend next 10-20 years in prison untill you admit your guilt". Now is "OK" for pedophiles, next will be OK too for political oposition.