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Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.....

jamesrage

jamesrage

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If you needed a reason to not like Cisco.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/...ing-china-detain-torture-religious-minorities
Chinese citizens who suffered forced detention, torture, and a panoply of brutal human rights abuses at the hands of the Chinese government have been engaged in a high profile court case against Silicon Valley mainstay Cisco Systems for many years. Those Chinese citizens suffered yet another indignity in a California court a couple of weeks ago: a district judge dismissed the case against Cisco without even giving them the chance to gather evidence on the key point where the court found them wanting. The court noted that even though Cisco may have designed and developed the Golden Shield system for the purpose of tracking, identifying and facilitating the capture of Chinese religious minorities, Cisco would not be held liable because it didn’t do enough in the U.S. to facilitate human rights abuses.

snip....

No tech company should be held accountable when governments misuse general use products to engage in human rights abuses. This isn’t about bare routers or server logs. The case alleged and presented some strong early evidence that Cisco did far more – including:

  • A library of carefully analyzed patterns of Falun Gong Internet activity (or “signatures”) that enable the Chinese government to uniquely identify Falun Gong Internet users;
  • Highly advanced video and image analyzers that Cisco marketed as the “only product capable of recognizing over 90% of Falun Gong pictorial information;”
  • Several log/alert systems that provide the Chinese government with real time monitoring and notification based on Falun Gong Internet traffic patterns;
  • Applications for storing data profiles on individual Falun Gong practitioners for use during interrogation and “forced conversion” (i.e., torture);
It also included a presentation by Cisco to the Chinese authorities highlighting the special tools Cisco offered for persecuting what it called “Falun Gong evil religion.” Using such terms about any ethnic or religious group in an internal presentation regarding a government project should be a red flag for anyone concerned about human rights.
The court acknowledged these allegations, noting that the complaint alleges “individual features customized and designed specifically to find, track and suppress Falun Gong,” and that the tools were actually used for those purposes: “Golden Shield provided the means by which all the Plaintiffs were tracked, detained and tortured.” The complaint also alleged that much of Cisco’s work building the specific tools to target this religious minority was conducted from its San Jose offices.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

jamesrage said:
If you needed a reason to not like Cisco.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/...ing-china-detain-torture-religious-minorities
Chinese citizens who suffered forced detention, torture, and a panoply of brutal human rights abuses at the hands of the Chinese government have been engaged in a high profile court case against Silicon Valley mainstay Cisco Systems for many years. Those Chinese citizens suffered yet another indignity in a California court a couple of weeks ago: a district judge dismissed the case against Cisco without even giving them the chance to gather evidence on the key point where the court found them wanting. The court noted that even though Cisco may have designed and developed the Golden Shield system for the purpose of tracking, identifying and facilitating the capture of Chinese religious minorities, Cisco would not be held liable because it didn’t do enough in the U.S. to facilitate human rights abuses.

snip....

No tech company should be held accountable when governments misuse general use products to engage in human rights abuses. This isn’t about bare routers or server logs. The case alleged and presented some strong early evidence that Cisco did far more – including:

  • A library of carefully analyzed patterns of Falun Gong Internet activity (or “signatures”) that enable the Chinese government to uniquely identify Falun Gong Internet users;
  • Highly advanced video and image analyzers that Cisco marketed as the “only product capable of recognizing over 90% of Falun Gong pictorial information;”
  • Several log/alert systems that provide the Chinese government with real time monitoring and notification based on Falun Gong Internet traffic patterns;
  • Applications for storing data profiles on individual Falun Gong practitioners for use during interrogation and “forced conversion” (i.e., torture);
It also included a presentation by Cisco to the Chinese authorities highlighting the special tools Cisco offered for persecuting what it called “Falun Gong evil religion.” Using such terms about any ethnic or religious group in an internal presentation regarding a government project should be a red flag for anyone concerned about human rights.
The court acknowledged these allegations, noting that the complaint alleges “individual features customized and designed specifically to find, track and suppress Falun Gong,” and that the tools were actually used for those purposes: “Golden Shield provided the means by which all the Plaintiffs were tracked, detained and tortured.” The complaint also alleged that much of Cisco’s work building the specific tools to target this religious minority was conducted from its San Jose offices.
Click to expand...

Is Cisco locking up Falun Gong members? No? Then stop blaming them. If it wasn't Cisco that created this system, then it would of been someone else, possible even a Chinese corporation. At least in this instance it supported American jobs and American taxes.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

I am surprised it worked that well. Cisco is a great hardware company and makes the most reliable network equipment in the industry. However, they have never been a very good software company.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

Eebul corporations. It's never the government, just the eebul corporations. If the courts didn't get them, with ALL the US laws that hold corporations and their officers liable for what they do overseas, they must not have done what they have been accused of doing.

Other than that comment above, I don't know enough about this to say whether the courts were right or wrong in their conclusion.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

Hamster Buddha said:
Is Cisco locking up Falun Gong members? No?
Click to expand...

Cisco created the system for the purpose of locking them up. This is not the same thing as a company who makes cars and someone used one of those cars to run down a bunch of innocent people.

Then stop blaming them.
Click to expand...
That is like saying don't blame the terrorist who made the bomb for the expressed purposes of killing innocent people.

If it wasn't Cisco that created this system, then it would of been someone else, possible even a Chinese corporation.
Click to expand...
If Chester a child rapist didn't rape that child then someone else would have. If a guy didn't beat the living **** out of his girlfriend then someone else would have. If some thug didn't steal your car then someone else would have. The if they didn't do it someone else would have is the most idiotic ride in the back of the short bus der dee der ****ed up reason to something.

At least in this instance it supported American jobs and American taxes.
Click to expand...

I do not want American companies committing evil overseas nor do I want then aiding in evil overseas.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

I believe the court made a very wrong decision. Cisco is clearly an accomplice in the holocaust of Falun Gong practitioners; the CCP officials will never see justice, but the least we could do is punish the Americans involved. There is no difference than if they aided Nazis track down Jews.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

Carjosse said:
There is no difference than if they aided Nazis track down Jews.
Click to expand...

I certainly hope you are aware of the precedent IBM set with Nazi Germany.

<Link>
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

WillyPete said:
I certainly hope you are aware of the precedent IBM set with Nazi Germany.

<Link>
Click to expand...

Or Ford, or Chase Manhattan Bank or Coca Cola or Standard oil, or Random House publishing.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

It begs the question, doesn't it?


If someone hires me to kill a guy, who's in more trouble? Me, for doing my job, or my employer?
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

Another question....



Is anything Cisco did illegal....in China?
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

The District Court Judge probably wasn't willing to make a sweeping claim of jurisdiction on a matter that hasn't been adequately resolved by the higher courts. Issues of contacts and touch are some of the most important in American jurisprudence and it seems like the law remains vague. Let's wait and see what the appellate courts say.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

KevinKohler said:
Another question....


Is anything Cisco did illegal....in China?
Click to expand...

The CCP are the ones who used it so, yes. There is no rule of law in China, well except when it suits whoever is in power. If you mean could a Chinese company do this also yes unless it somehow tries to undermine the CCP.
 
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Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

All of this murky business would be solved if we just held companies based in the US but operating overseas to the same legal standards that we hold companies that DO operate in the US.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

Beaudreaux said:
Eebul corporations. It's never the government, just the eebul corporations. If the courts didn't get them, with ALL the US laws that hold corporations and their officers liable for what they do overseas, they must not have done what they have been accused of doing. Other than that comment above, I don't know enough about this to say whether the courts were right or wrong in their conclusion.
Click to expand...

Our laws on these sorts of issues are not as robust as you might think. There is no corporate liability for active participation or complicity in human rights abuses committed on foreign soil.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

KevinKohler said:
All of this murky business would be solved if we just held companies based in the US but operating overseas to the same legal standards that we hold companies that DO operate in the US.
Click to expand...

You are suggesting that companies should be required to ignore the laws in the countries in which they operate? They wouldn't get very far doing that. Who is to decide what higher standards means? Wouldn't that be a matter of culsture? When U.S. companies operate in other countries can they ignore competition in those countries? Do we want to hamstring them by telling them how they should operate? The government has shown itself to be competent at running businesses or determining how they should be run. I guess you can tell I disagree completely.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

Hamster Buddha said:
Is Cisco locking up Falun Gong members? No? Then stop blaming them. If it wasn't Cisco that created this system, then it would of been someone else, possible even a Chinese corporation. At least in this instance it supported American jobs and American taxes.
Click to expand...

That's a remarkably weak defense of Cisco and their employees who were as much a part of the process, and responsible for what happened to those individuals, as the torturers.

When I read stories like this, I always wonder how the people involved in the project go home to their family and sleep at night. You do your job very well, and MORE people are rounded up and tortured..... Maybe a defense like the above is the way they deal with it.
 
Re: Court Lets Cisco Systems Off the Hook for Helping China Detain, Torture Religiou.

fmw said:
You are suggesting that companies should be required to ignore the laws in the countries in which they operate? They wouldn't get very far doing that. Who is to decide what higher standards means? Wouldn't that be a matter of culsture? When U.S. companies operate in other countries can they ignore competition in those countries? Do we want to hamstring them by telling them how they should operate? The government has shown itself to be competent at running businesses or determining how they should be run. I guess you can tell I disagree completely.
Click to expand...


I am fine with companies not doing business in countries that might require them to literally aid in human rights abuses.That is how it should be.Companies that willingly engage in or assist in engaging in human rights abuses should not be able to business with the US or any business contracted with the US. If a Timothy McVeigh walked into most hardware stores and ask the clerk there for the materials needed to a bomb the clerks in those stores will have the human decency to tell him to piss off and call the cops.It wouldn't matter if there was a handful of stores that would recommend and sell the materials needed to make a bomb.
 
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