THIS is fucked up. 😦

https://www.wired.com/2017/03/feds-rather-drop-child-porn-case-give-exploit/

03.07.17
Time of Publication: 9:00 am.

The Department of Justice filed a motion in Washington State federal court on Friday to dismiss its indictment against a child porn site. It wasn’t for lack of evidence; it was because the FBI didn’t want to disclose details of a hacking tool to the defense as part of discovery. Evidence in United States v. Jay Michaud hinged at least in part on information federal investigators had gathered by exploiting a vulnerability in the Tor anonymity network.

“Because the government remains unwilling to disclose certain discovery related to the FBI’s deployment of a ‘Network Investigative Technique’ (‘NIT’) as part of its investigation into the Playpen child pornography site, the government has no choice but to seek dismissal of the indictment,” federal prosecutor Annette Hayes wrote in the court filing on Friday. She noted that the DoJ’s work to resist disclosing the NIT was part of “an effort to balance the many competing interests that are at play when sensitive law enforcement technology becomes the subject of a request for criminal discovery.”

In other words, the feds are letting an alleged child pornographer free so that officials can potentially catch other dark-web using criminals in the future.