A secure democratic Net is a fundamental right

There was already the request for the official emails of Palin and the Bush White House, but now it is coming down to lower levels of office. The newspaper Mercury News asked and got all the internal emails between the police department and the City Hall of Oakland when they decided to break up the Occupy movement there in october 2011 with nearly military enforcement and riots as a consequence, leading to hundreds to be arrested or detained (and making the international headlines)

After the Freedom of Information request more than 4000 internal recent emails were released to the press who published them on Documentcloud which is a platform used by several newsorganizations (why do it yourself if you can do it better together) where they can host thousands of documents in seperate databases, making it easier to search and archive and connect documents and people.

After the publication a crowd-searching analysis was set up by which people online got as fast as possible through the thousands of documents trying to find the most interesting or astonishing, the contradictions and connections. This was coordinated through Twitter with a special hashtag.

An example of an email who by this way came to the attention of the journalists is here (you have to allow all services in your browser if you have a high level of protection). This example shows that the local economic development manager went to local business after the raid to get quotes the mayor could use to show the "business support" for his intervention.

You may also find the emailaddresses also of the people who protested against this operation with an email and maybe didn't intend to be known as such.

So do we have to prepare our officials to the fact that everything they do during their worktime or that has something to do with their official business (in whatever emailaddress) can and will be public at some time in the future (or much sooner than that) ? I am always so astonished to what people write in emails - as if that is a private and secure conversation. Emails will NOT go away, even if you throw away your own copy.