CameronDev, 8 months ago

Wikipedia does claim that patriot act subpeonas can penalise any disclosure of the subpeona. But i am not a lawyer, and afaik this is untested (or at least undisclosed :/ )

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warrant_canary

Some subpoenas, such as those covered under 18 U.S.C. §2709© (enacted as part of the USA Patriot Act), provide criminal penalties for disclosing the existence of the subpoena to any third party, including the service provider’s users.

In September 2014, U.S. security researcher Moxie Marlinspike wrote that “every lawyer I’ve spoken to has indicated that having a ‘canary’ you remove or choose not to update would likely have the same legal consequences as simply posting something that explicitly says you’ve received something.”

I think my point is that a gag order with a long time out essentially kills the canary, even if it doesnt affect the vast majority of the services users.

Thanks for your response though, I appreciate the additional information.