[jstarfish]

It's unlikely to happen. The incentives for both detectives and prosecutors both align with putting someone behind bars. They do know damn well that IP addresses != identity, but if the circumstances are convenient enough they'll press forward with cases regardless to keep their case closure/conviction rates up.

It's the public, the yokels on the jury, that you need to correct the perceptions of. When most of them get their CS understanding from daytime television crime procedurals, you have a lot of work ahead of you.

[Buttons840]

Ah yes. The final layer of protection, a jury of my "peers", none of which work in the same industry or understand the most basic principles of what I do (as a programmer).

[jstarfish]

It doesn't help that people specifically like yourself tend to be weeded out of jury pools under voir dire.

An educated person such as yourself might be able to influence the other jurors (or at least hang it), and we can't have that. It's much easier if everybody simply accepted the prosecutor's explanation of how IP addressing works.

[jandrese]

So when defense lawyers get smart about proving just how weak IP == Identity is? They'll keep doing it as long as it puts perps behind bars.

[otakucode]

It doesn't matter what the defense lawyers know. They are not permitted to present that information in court. If they tried to, the prosecution would raise an objection that the defense was attempting to 'bamboozle' the jury with technobabble and it would be suppressed.

[jandrese]

What is the point of a defense lawyer if they are not allowed to argue for their client?

[thomastjeffery]

That's a good question.