Lavabit 2nd Hearing Transcript

7/27/2019 Lavabit 2nd Hearing Transcript

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/lavabit-2nd-hearing-transcript 1/15

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

EASTERN DISTRICT OF VIRGINIA

ALEXANDRIA DIVISION

IN THE MATTER OF THE

APPLICATION OF THE UNITED

STATES AUTHORIZING THE USE

OF A PEN REGISTER/TRAP AND

TRACE DEVICE ON AN

ELECTRONIC MAIL ACCOUNT

IN THE MATTER OF THE SEARCH

AND SEIZURE OF INFORMATION

PREMISES CONTROLLED BY

LAVABIT, LLC

IN RE GRAND JURY SUBPOENA

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NO . 1 , 13 EC 297

NO . 1 : 13 SW 522

NO . 13 - 1

UNDER SEAL

Alexandr ia , Virginia

August 1, 2013

10 : 00 a.m.

TRANSCRIPT OF HEARING

BEFORE THE HONORABLE CLAUDE M. HILTON

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

APPEARANCES ,

For th e United States :

For th e Respondent :

James Trump, Esq.

tHchael Ben' Ary, Esq .

Josh Goldfoot , Esq .

Jesse R. Binna l l , Esq .

Court Reporter : Tracy L . West fa l l , RPR, CMRS, CCR

25 Proceedings reported by machine shorthand, t ranscr ipt produced

by computer - a ided t ranscr ipt ion .

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Tracy L . Westfall OCR-US!)C/EDV'



UNDER SEAL

1 PRO C E E D IN G S

2 THE CLERK : In re : Case Nos . 1 : 13 EC 297, 1:13 SW 522,

3 and Grand Jury No . 13- l .

4 MR. TRUMP : Good morning . Jim Trump on behalf of the

5 United Sta tes .

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7

THE COURT : Good morning.

MR . BINNALL : Good morning , Your Honor. Jesse Binnal l

8 on beha l f of Lavabit and Mr . Levison .

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THE COURT : All r ight .

MR . BINNALL : May it please the Court . We're before

11 the Court today on two separa te motions, a motion to quash the

12 requirement of Lavabit to produce i t s encryption keys and the

13 motion to unseal and lift the nondisclosure requirements of

14 Mr . Levison.

15 Your Honor, the motion to quash in th i s ar ises because

16 the privacy of users i s a t - - of Lavabi t ' s users are a t stake .

17 We're not simply speaking of t he t a rge t of th i s invest igat ion.

18 We're ta lk ing about over 400 , 000 indiv idua ls and ent i t i e s tha t

19 are users of Lavabit who use t h i s se rvice because they bel ieve

20 t he i r communications are secure .

21 By handing over the keys, the encrypt ion keys in t h i s

22 case , they necessari ly become l e ss secure . In t h i s caseit

i s

23 t rue tha t the face of the warrant i t s e l f does l imi t the

24 documents or - - and communications to be viewed and the spec i f ic

25 metadata to be viewed to the t a rge t of the case,

Tracy L. Westfa l l OCR-USOC/EOVA





UNDER SEAL

1 message and i n t e rp r e t the message as wel l?

2 MR . BINNALL : My unders t and ing i s t h a t it does , Your

3 Honor, but because t h a t ' s not my t ech n ica l ex p e r t i s e , I 'm not

4 going to represen t to the Court anything on tha t one way or

5 another . But my unders tand ing i s t h e re i s one genera l key here

6 tha t i s a t i s sue .

7 THE COURT : ~ " e l l , why would you s e t up such? I mean, a

8 te lephone, you 've go t t e lephone numbers and __

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MR . BINNALL : Corr ec t .

THE COURT : those can be t r aced very eas i ly without

11 any look a t th e conten t of the message t h a t ' s t he re . You-al l

12 could have s e t up something the same way .

13 MR. BINNALL : We could have, Your Honor . Actual ly , if

14 yo u ' re to - -

15 THE COURT : So i f anybody's - - you ' r e blaming the

16 government fo r something t h a t ' s overbroad , bu t it seems to me

17 t h a t your c l i e n t i s the one t h a t s e t up the system t h a t ' s

18 designed not to pro tec t tha t informat ion, because yo u know tha t

19 t he re needs to be access to ca l l s t h a t go back and for th to one

20 person o r another . And to say you can 't do t h a t j u s t because

21 you've se t up a system t h a t everybody has to - - has to be

22 unencrypted , i f t h e r e ' s such a word, t h a t d o es n ' t seem to me to

23 be a very persuas ive argument .

24 MR . BINNALL : I unders tand th e Co u r t ' s point , and t h i s

25 i s the way t h a t I unders tand why it's done t h a t way .

Tracy L. w e ~ t f a l l OCR-USDC/EDVA



UNDER SEAL 5

1 There ' s d i f fe ren t secur i ty aspec ts involved fo r people

2 who want to p ro t ec t t h e i r pr ivacy , and t h e re ce r t a i n l y i s th e

3 ac t u a l conten t o f the message themselves . That ' s ce r t a i n l y what

4 I would concede i s the highes t secur i ty i n t e r e s t .

S But there ' s also the securi ty in te res t to make sure

6 tha t they ' re communicating with who you want to be communicating

7 with. That i s equal ly of a concern fo r privacy issues because

8 t h a t i s , a t th e end of the day, one o f th e th ings tha t secures

9 the conte nt of the message .

10 In t h i s case it i s t rue t h a t most In te rne t service

11 providers do log , i s what they c a l l it, a lo t o f the metadata

12 t h a t the government wants in t h i s case wi thout t h a t necessar i ly

13 being encrypted , things such as who something is going to, who

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i t ' s going from, the time i t' s being sent , the IP address from

which it i s being sent .

Lavabit code is not something tha t you buy off the

shel f . I t i s code tha t was custom made . I t was custom made in

order to secure privacy to the l a rges t e xtent possible and to be

the most secure way possible for mult iple people to communicate,

and so it has chosen spec if ica l ly not to log tha t in f ormation .

Now, tha t is actual ly information tha t my cl ien t has

22 offered to s t a r t logging with the par t icu la r user in th i s case .

23 I t is , however, something tha t i s quite burdensome on him . I t

24 is something tha t would be custom code tha t would take between

25 20 to 40 hours for him to be able to produce . We believe tha t

Tracy L. Westfall OCR-VSOC/EDVA



UNDER SEAL

1 i s a b e t t e r a l t e rn a t i v e than t u rn ing over the encryp t ion key

2 which can be used to ge t the da ta fo r a l l Lavab it users .

3 I hope t h a t addresses the Co u r t ' s concern kind of with

4 r egard to the metadata and why it i s no t more - - why Lavabi t

5 h a s n ' t c rea ted an encryp t ion system t h a t may hones t ly be more

6 with in the mains t ream, but t h i s i s a prov ide r t h a t s p ec i f i ca l l y

7 was s t a r t e d in or de r to have to p r o t e c t pr ivacy i n t e re s t s more

8 t han the average I n t e r n e t se rv ice prov ide r .

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9 THE COURT : I can unders tand why th e system wa s se t up,

10 b u t I t h i nk the government i s - - government ' s c l ea r ly e n t i t l e d

11 to the i n fo rmat ion t h a t they ' r e seek ing , and j u s t because

12 you-a l l have s e t up a system t h a t makes t h a t d i f f i c u l t , t h a t

13 d o esn ' t i n any way l e ssen the government ' s r i g h t to r ece ive t h a t

14 in format ion j u s t as they ;.!ould from any t e l ephone company or any

15 o t he r e-mai l source t h a t could provide it eas i l y . Whether

16 it's - - in o t he r words, the d i f f i cu l t y o r the ease in obta in ing

17 the informat ion doesn ' t have anyth ing to do with whether or not

18 the government ' s l awfu l ly e n t i t l e d t o the in format ion .

19 MR . BINNALL : I t i s - - and we d o n ' t disagree t h a t the

20 government i s e n t i t l e d to th e in format ion . We ac tu a l ly

21 THE COURT: Well , how a re we going to ge t i t ? I 'm

22 going to have to deny your motion to quash .It's

j u s t not

23 overbroad . The government ' s ask ing fo r a very narrow, sp ec i f i c

24 b i t o f in format ion , and it's in format ion t h a t t h ey ' r e e n t i t l e d

25 to .

Tracy L . l . ~ e s t f a l l OCR-USDC/.e:DV



UNDER SEAL

1 Now, how are we going to work out t ha t they get i t?

2 MR . BINNALL : Your Honor, what I would s t i l l say i s the

3 bes t method for them to get it i s , f i r s t of a l l , there be some

4 way fo r there to be some sor t of accountabi l i ty other than ju s t

5 re ly ing on the governme nt to say we ' re not going to go outs ide

6 the scope of the warrant .

7 This i s nothing tha t i s , of course, personal aga ins t

8 the government a nd the , you knmi, very profess iona l law

9 enforcement off i ce rs invo l ved in th i s case . But quite simply,

10 the way the Con s t i tu t ion i s se t up, it ' s s e t up in a way to

11 ensure t ha t there ' s some sor t of checks and balances and

12 accountabi l i ty .

13 THE COURT: What checks and balances need to be se t up?

14 MR. BINNALL : Well - -

IS THE COURT: Suggest something to me .

16 MR. BINNALL : I th ink tha t the l eas t r e s t r i c t ive means

17 poss ib le here i s t ha t the governme nt essen t i a l ly pay the

18 reasonable expenses, meaning in th i s case my c l i en t ' s extensive

19 labor cos ts to be capped a t a reasonable amount .

20 THE COURT : Has the government ever done t ha t in one of

21 these pen r e g i s t e r cases?

MR . BINNALL : Not tha t I 've found, Your Honor .2

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THE COURT : I don ' t think so . I ' ve never known of one.

MR . BINNALL : And Your Honor ' s cer ta in ly seen more of

25 these than I have .

Tracy L. ~ e ~ t f a l l O C R - U S D C / ~



UNDER SEAL

1 THE COURT : So would it be reasonable to s t a r t now \<Jith

2 your c l i en t ?

3 MR. BINNALL : I t h ink everyone \-.'Quld agree t h a t t h i s i s

4 an unusual case . And t h a t t h i s case , in or de r t o p ro t ec t the

5 privacy of 400 , DOO-plus other users , some sor t of relat ively

6 smal l manner in which to c rea t e a log system fo r t h i s one user

7 to g ive the government the metadata tha t they ' re looking for is

8 the l eas t res t r i c t ive mean here, and we can do tha t in a way

9 t h a t d o es n ' t compromise the secu r i t y keys .

10 This i s actual ly a way tha t my c l i en t

11 THE COURT : You want to do it in a way tha t the

12 government has to t r u s t you

MR. BINNALL : Yes, Your Honor.

THE COURT : - - to come up with the r ight data.

MR. BINNALL ; That ' s co r rec t , Your Honor.

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16 THE COURT: And you won't t ru s t the government. So why

17 would the government t rus t you?

18 MR. BINNALL : Your Honor, because tha t ' s what the basis

19 of Four th Amendment law says is more accep tab le , is t h a t the

20 government i s the e n t i t y t h a t yo u real ly need the checks and

21 balances on .

22Now, my - -

23 THE COURT : I don ' t knOl-l tha t the Fourth Amendment says

24 tha t . This i s a criminal inves t igat ion .

25 MR . BINNALL : That is absolutely correct .

Tracy L. Westfa l l OCR-USDC/EDV



UNDER SEAL

1 THE COURT : A cr iminal inves t iga t ion , and I don I t know

2 t h a t th e Fourth Amendment says t h a t the person being

3 invest . igated here i s en t i t l ed to more leeway and more r ights

4 than th e government i s . I don ' t know .

5 MR . BINNALL : The r e cer ta in ly i s a balance of power

6 there . I , o f course , am not here t o r ep resen t the i n t e r e s t of

7 I 'm here speci f ica l l y l ooking over my client. who

8 has sens i t ive data - -

9 THE COURT : I unders tand . I 'm t ry ing to th ink of

10 working ou t something . I ' m not sure you're suggesting anything

11 to me other than e i the r you do it and the government has to

12 t rus t you to give them whatever you want to give them or you

13 have to t r u s t the government t h a t they ' re not going to go in to

14 your othe r f i l e s .

15 Is there some othe r route?

16 MR . BI NNALL : I would sugges t t h a t th e government

17 I 'm sorry - - t h a t the Court can c r a f t an orde r to say t h a t we

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18 can - - t h a t we should work in concer t ,,1ith each other in order

19 to come up with t h i s coding system t h a t gives the government a l l

20 of the metadata t h a t we can give them th rough t h i s logging

21 procedure t h a t we can i n s t a l l i n the code, and then us ing tha t

22 as a l e a s t r e s t r i c t i v e means to seeif

t h a t can ge t the

23 government the informat ion t h a t t hey ' re looking fo r on the

24 spec i f i c account .

25 THE COURT : HO i'; long does i t t ake to i n s t a l l tha t?

Tracy L. W e s t f a l l O C R - U S D C / ~ ; D V



UNDER SEAL 1

1 MR . BINNALL : I mean , 20, 40 hours . So I would sugges

2 t ha t would probably be a week to a week and a h a l f , Your Honor,

3 al though I would be wil l ing to t a lk to my c l i en t to see i f we

4 can g e t t ha t expedi ted .

5 THE COURT : To i n s t a l l i t ?

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MR . BINNALL : Well, to wri te the code .

THE COURT : You don ' t have a code r igh t a t the moment .

8 You would have to wri te something?

9 MR . BINNALL : That ' s co r rec t . And th e por t ion of the

10 government 's b r i e f t h a t t a lks a bout the money t h a t he was

11 looking fo r i s t h a t reasonable expense fo r him bas ica l ly to do

12 nothing fo r t ha t per iod of t ime but w ri t e code to i n s t a l l in

13 order to take the data fro m nct put it in a way tha

14 th e government w i l l see the logged metadata involved .

15 THE COURT : A ll r igh t . I th ink I understand your

16 pos i t ion . I d o n ' t th ink you need to argue t h i s motion to

17 unsea l . This i s a grand jury mat te r and p a r t o f an ongoing

18 cr imina l inves t iga t ion , and any motion to unseal w i l l be denied

19 MR . SHINALL : I f I could have th e Cour t I s a t t en t ion

20 j u s t on one i s sue of the nondisc losure prov is ion of th i s . And

21 unders tand th e Cour t ' s posi t ion on t h i s , but there i s o th e r

22 pr iv i l eged communicat ions i f the Cour t would be so generous as

23 to al low me very br ie f ly to address t h a t i ssue?

24 There ' s other F i r s t Amendment cons idera t ions a t i ssue

25 with not necessar i ly j u s t the sea l ing o f t h i s , but what

Tracy L. We:st.fall OCR-OSDC/EDV



UNDER SEAL 1

1 Mr. Levison can disc lose and to whom he may disclose i t .

2 The Fir s t Amendment, of course, doesn ' t jus t cover

3 speech and assembly, but the r ight to pe t i t ion for a redress of

4 grievances . We're ta lking about a s ta tu te here, and, honestly,

5 a s ta tu te t ha t i s very much in the public eye and involving

6 issues tha t are current ly pending before Congress .

7 I thin k the way tha t the order current ly i s writ ten,

8 besides being - -

9 THE COURT : You're ta lking about the seal ing order?

10 MR . BINNALL : I ' m ta lking about the seal ing order and

11 the order t ha t prohib i ts Mr . Levison from disclosing any

12 information .

13 Now, we don ' t want to disc lose - - we have no intent ion

14 of disc los i ng the ta rget , but we would l ike to be able to , fo r

15 ins tance , ta lk to members of the l eg i s la ture and the i r s ta f f s

16 about rewri t ing th is i n a wa y t ha t ' s

17 THE COURT : No . This i s an ongoing criminal

18 invest iga t ion , and there ' s no leeway to disc lose any information

19 abou t it .

20 MR. BINNALL : And so a t tha t point i t wil l remain with

21 only Mr . Levison and h is lawyers, and we ' ll keep i t at tha t .

22THE COURT : Let me hear from Mr . Trump .

23 Is the r e some way we can work th is out or something

24 tha t I can do with an order tha t wil l help th i s or what?

25 NR . TROMP : I don ' t bel ieve so, Your Honor, because

Tracy L. We3tfa l l CCR-OSOC/EDV



UNDER SEAL 1

1 you 'v e already ar t icu la ted the reason why i s tha t anything done

2 by Nr. Levison in terms of wri t ing code or whatever, we have to

3 t ru s t Mr. Levison that. we have got ten the informat.ion tha t we

4 were ent i t l ed to get s ince June 28th . He's had every

5 opportunity to propose solut ions to come up with ways to addres

6 h is concerns and he simply hasn ' t .

7 We can assure the Court t ha t the way tha t th i s would

8 operate, while the metadata stream would be captured by a

9 device, the device does not download, does not s tore, no one

10 looks a t it . I t f i l t e r s everything, and a t the back end of the

11 f i l t e r , w'e get what we' re required to get under the order .

12 So the re ' s no agents looking through the 400,000 other

13 bi t s of information, customers, whatever . No one looks a t tha t

14 no one s tores i t , no one has access to it . All we ' re going to

15 look a t and a l l we' re going to keep what i s cal led for under

16 the pen reg is te r order , and t ha t ' s a l l we're asking th i s Court

to do .7

18 THE COURT : A ll r ight . Well, I think t ha t ' s

19 reasonable. So what i s th is before me fo r th i s morning other

20 than th i s motion to quash and unseal I-lhich I 've ruled on?

21 MR. TRUMP : The only thing i s to order the production

22 of the encryption keys , which jus t - -

23 THE COURT : Hasn 't tha t already been done? There 's a

24 subpoena for tha t .

25 MR. TRUMP : There ' s a search warrant for i t , the motio

Tracy L. W e ~ t f a l l OCR-U$DC/EDV



1 to quash .

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UNDER SEAL

THE COURT : Search warrant .

MR . TRUMP : Excuse me?

4 THE COURT : I said subpoena , but I meant search

5 warrant .

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6 MR . TRUMP : We issued both, Your Honor, but Your Honor

7 author ized the se izure of tha t information. And \.;e would ask

8 the Court to enforce t ha t by direct ing Mr . Levison to turn over

9 the encryption keys.

10 I f counsel represents tha t t ha t wi l l occur, we can not

11 waste any more o f the Court ! s time . I f he represents tha t

12 Mr . Levison wil l not turn over the encryption keys, then we hav

13 to discuss what remedial act ion t h i s Court can take to require

14 compliance with tha t order .

15 THE COURT : Well, I wil l order the production of

16 those - - of those keys .

17 Is tha t simply Mr . Levison or i s t ha t the corporation

18 as well?

19 MR . TRUMP : That ' s one and the same, Your Honor .

20 Jus t so the reco rd i s clear . We understand from

21 Mr . Levison tha t the encryption keys were purchased

22 commercially . They're not somehow custom craf ted by

23 Mr . Levison. He buys them from a vendor and then they ' re

24 i n s t a l l ed .

25 THE COURT : ~ v e l l I wil l order tha t . I f you wil l

Tracy L. W e ~ t f a l l OCR- USOC/EDV



UNDER SEAL 1

1 present an order to me, I'll ente r it l a t e r on .

2 MR . TRUMP : Thank you .

3 MR . BINNALL : Thank you, Your Honor .

4 As fa r as time frame goes, my c l i en t did ask me i f the

5 Court did order t h i s i f the Court could give him approximately

6 f ive days in order to actual ly physical ly get the encryption

7 keys here . And so i t wil l be - - or j u s t some so r t of reasonable

8 time frame to get the encryption keys here and in the

9 government 's hands . He did ask me to ask exact ly the manner

10 tha t those are to be turned over .

11 MR . TRUMP : Your Honor , we understand tha t t h i s can be

12 done almost ins tantaneously , as soon as Mr . Levison makes

13 contact with an agent in Dallas, and we would ask tha t he be

14 given 24 hours or less to comply . This has been going on for a

15 month .

16 THE COURT : Yeah , I don ' t th ink 24 - - 24 hours would b

17 reasonable . Doesn 1 t have to do it in the next few minutes, but

18 I would th ink something l ike th i s , it's not anything he has to

19 amass or get together . I t ' s jus t a matter of sending something

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So I th ink 24 hours would be reasonable .

MR . BINNALL : Yes . Thank you, Your Honor .

THE COURT : A ll r igh t . And you ' l l present me an order

MR . TRUMP : We \·Jill, Your Honor. Thank you .

THE COURT : All r igh t . Thank you-a l l , and we' l l

25 adjourn un t i l - - or stand in recess till 3 o 'clock . Well,

Tracy L. West fa l l OCR-USDC! ED



UNDER SEAL

1 recess till 9 o 'c lock tomorrow morning .

2 * * *

3 (Proceedings concluded at 10 : 25 a.m . )

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9 CERTIFICATION

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11 I cert i fy , th is 19th day of August 2013, tha t the

12 foregoing i s a correct transcr ipt from the record o f proceeding

13 in the above - en t i t l ed matter to the bes t o f my ab i l i t y .

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Tracy Westfal

Tracy L. Westfall OCR-USDC/ED

Documents

Lavabit 2nd Hearing Transcript