Raising the stakes
Tech blog Gizmodo got what will probably be the scoop of the year last week when it published photos of Apple's next-generation iPhone. But the scoop came at a price - literally and now metaphorically.
Late yesterday, Gizmodo published a story entitled: Police Seize Jason Chen's Computers. The improbably named Rapid Enforcement Allied Computer Team (makes a catchy acronym; what a coincidence - Ed) of California had obtained a warrant to enter the house of Gizmodo editor Jason Chen and take all his computer equipment. He wasn't in when they arrived, so they broke his door down.
Gizmodo's legal stance is to invoke ‘shield law', which protects journalists from prosecution if they refuse to reveal their sources. Publisher Nick Denton tweeted: "Do bloggers count as journalists? I guess we'll find out." When the story broke and the speculation is now about not just the law regarding Gizmodo's actions, but what the scope of the police action is and what forces are behind it.
When we first brought you the news of this unfolding soap-opera we speculated about what Apple could do about this leak. The damage is already done and there are PR considerations, on the other hand, Apple seems to be of the opinion that some of its property had been stolen, and thus be keen to see justice done.
In another tweet, Denton linked to a Yahoo News report querying Apple's role in the raid. It turns out that REACT - which was set up to fight large-scale cyber-crime - has, on its steering committee, a technology company by the name of Apple.
There are a lot of other large tech companies on this steering committee and, of course, there's no evidence suggesting Apple directly influenced the decision to take this action. But if Gizmodo does suffer legal consequences from the 4G iPhone scoop without Apple having to suffer the negative PR of being directly associated with any prosecution, we imagine that would constitute quite a satisfactory resolution to this affair for Apple.
