[mirimir]

There's a better approach that depends on third-party scraping. You publish the canary on a schedule, but take it down as soon as it's been scraped. So there's nothing to take down when you get the warrant, NSL, etc.

Edit: And then you don't publish the canary as scheduled. Before you got the warrant, NSL or whatever, you were subject to no court order. So you were free to speak. After getting it, can you be compelled to speak falsely?

[ori_b]

> After getting it, can you be compelled to speak falsely?

Why not? Given that secret warrants arguably already circumvent your right to face your accuser, this seems like a very small stretch.

[AdamJacobMuller]

My understanding is that, no, the government cannot compel you to speak falsely or, generally, to do other things you don't want to do.

As I understand it, this is related to the argument that Apple was using vs the FBI recently, that while the FBI could compel Apple to produce things in its possession (like Farook's iCloud backups) it could not compel Apple to do things like produce a custom version of iOS.

IANAL, but, this is mostly based on what I remember reading last year when the whole warrant canary idea first started getting publicized.

[kobayashi]

IANAL: I don't believe that secret warrants 'trip' one's right to face their accuser, as that is a right for courtroom proceedings, which are significantly different from the warrants about which you speak.

[CamperBob2]

They have more guns than you do. They can compel you to do pretty much whatever.

[mirimir]

Well, canaries ought to be signed with GnuPG or whatever. But then, we're back to https://xkcd.com/538/ ;) But that would be harder against a corporation.

[nitrogen]

Hypothetically, what would happen if somebody made them use their force in a very public, visible way (that is, refuse to comply, and post live video on multiple video sites)? How big of an operation can be kept secret by physical violence?

[deong]

There wouldn't be some sort of black-ops, Bruce Willis style operation. You'd simply be someone being arrested by some FBI agents for violating federal law, and they could do that at noon on a Tuesday smiling to TV cameras if they wanted to.

[mirimir]

But that would nullify the canary, no?