Speaker Johnson Explains Holdup In Releasing Jan 6 Tapes: ‘We Have To Blur Some Of The Faces’ To Protect Them From The DOJ

Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world to Not The Onion@lemmy.world – 437 points –
Speaker Johnson Explains Holdup In Releasing Jan 6 Tapes: ‘We Have To Blur Some Of The Faces’ To Protect Them From The DOJ - Lemmy.World
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I'm not a lawyer, so I'm probably wrong, but wouldn't that be obstructing justice, or something?

It is the exact textbook definition of obstruction of justice. It doesn't get any more obstruction of justice than to literally hide identities with the express stated goal of obstructing the work of the Department of Justice.

He's taking a page out of Trump’s "it's not a crime if you brag about it on tv" playbook.

Fortunately for the FBI, and for anyone who still believes in democracy, most of these idiots brought their smartphones with them so video hasn't even been necessary to secure convictions. And lots of them recorded video themselves, OF themselves, in order to brag about their crimes online.

Of course, why take precautions? They didn't expect to lose. They expected King Trump to be crowned and bring his chosen people to paradise, and they wanted to make sure they weren't left out.

Yeah, although something tells me that a lot of them aren't exactly the type who think very far ahead regardless of what they expected the outcome of that day to be.

They then uploaded the videos to parlor which had no security on their API, so anyone with the address could download every video.

That's hilarious, I forgot about that part. Parlor probably didn't bother to strip out the metadata either, did they? So, full GPS coordinates with every image and video... hahahaha

Worse, DOJ certainly had them before Congress so it makes no sense.

This is the dumbest part about this whole thing. It's just grandstanding.

Edit: He's already recanted it. Instead saying they are blurring to protect their identities from the public.

Meanwhile, any little suspect from small time crime gets their face plastered all over local news anyways.

Its grandstanding and posturing.

But there is actually a good argument. Someone who the DOJ have decided wasn't worth the hassle to properly investigate might still be identified and reported by a co-worker or neighbor. Which then begins to force the DOJ's hand (they are still cops so they might ignore it but...). I personally think everyone who crowded outside the building deserves to be locked up, but I can see an argument that only people who entered the building or who actively caused damage should be charged.

Because yes, facial recognition and DMV databases are already a thing. But, much like with a red light ticket, a decent lawyer can work wonders to argue out "a robot claims that I commit a crime". Whereas having a human in the loop removes that gotcha. Hell, if my cousin is any indication, you don't even need a lawyer to argue against a red light camera or an automated speed trap and just need to care enough to show up to the courthouse for a few hours.

Also, regardless, this is indeed (attempted) obstruction of justice to protect insurrectionists.

Or people think they recognize faces in the crowd, and we get a whole slew of Richard Jewells and Sunil Tripathis

any little suspect from small time crime gets their face plastered all over local news

Only if they're black or hispanic. There's a narrative to push, don't you know.

It’s theater for their deep state struggle fundraising. Gotta shake down the marks for the cash. You think he’s got a sugar daddy? He’s not a Supreme Court justice………

He said this at a press conference, was there no push back from any journalist, or was that edited out?

That's the murmur sound you hear at the very end of the clip as he's about to finish talking: a slew of reporters either pointing out that he just casually admitted to a serious criminal conspiracy or lauding him for protecting the conspirators, defending on the specific media outlets they're from.

“Protect them from DOJ”

PaRtY oF LaW anD OrDEr, everyone!

Fuck this asshole. Post their faces on every billboard in Times Square. Dox them all. Anyone associated with Jan 6 should all be shot out of a cannon into the Atlantic or Pacific ocean, whichever is cheaper. Imagine what would have been going on in this country had they succeeded. That’s what the punishment should be based on.

You give them the glory of such a cool death? Give them a humiliating death, living with a felony criminal record and unable to vote.

I though it was all leftists, antifa, and FBI plants? Why would Johnson want to hide their faces? Unless the GOP has been lying about that. But they wouldn't do that, would they?

"We blurred their faces so you can't prove it's not!"

It's interesting that they would choose to blur them if it's that sensitive considering blurring things isn't actually destructive and if you were to figure out the settings they used to blur then you can easily apply the opposite effect to unblur the image. To be truly destructive they should use black boxes over faces.

And regardless of the method they use it really shouldn't take long to do either.

It's just an idiotic statement from him, considering the DOJ already had the raw footage since day 1.

...because they're the DOJ.

Also, he's already retracted his statement.

Makes sense. What a ridiculous statement to have made to begin with though.

Yeah, but the Insurrection Hunters didn't have access to these videos & now, thanks to #christofascist Mike Johnson, they still won't.

That depends on the algorythm and intensity of the blur. Blur is destructive. If you blur good it can't be undone. If you don't blur enough it can be undone to a certain degree, but not completely. I remember one criminal used a whirl instead of a blur and that thing had been undone almost completely.

That’s because these idiots struggle with email. They can’t conceive of what you just said

Can you please show an example of this unblurring happening in reality? In my understanding of video editing tools, once the file is exported with blurred details, there is not enough information present in the file to reconstruct the details of the unblurred source without access to the original unexported project files.

That's a fair point. I have never seen it done from a video before specifically, but I am positive that it is a technique which is theoretically possible given that there is enough data in the image. Obviously if the image was grainy to begin with then it doesn't matter what you do to it, you won't get anything better than the original. And regardless of how the file is exported, as long as you can take a screenshot of the video afterwards and there is enough definition in the image I don't see how this technique couldn't be applied.

Edit: and to be clear, I don't know what specific transformation(s) are traditionally used in video editing. For all I know it could be a long list of transformations that are all coded to happen with the click of a button to make it more difficult to unblur. But even that isn't entirely safe. There is just literally no reason to not use a black box/elipse or whatever in cases where the data is actually sensitive.

I hate to break it to you, but I’m pretty sure the only way unblurring would be possible is if you have the original unblurred source video. Blurred areas simply contain too little data to reconstruct the original. The artifacts of the unblurred face are not stored in the resulting video file for literally every video file type in existence today.

Even using AI to unblurr a video, you would need to show it at least one unblurred picture of the face to properly reconstruct the same face in the original video. Otherwise the AI would just guess and put a random face in place of the original. The regeneration technique you are describing is still science fiction and only exists in movies and television shows.

Edit: your edit is still incorrect. There is no such video editing tool called “unblur.” You can sharpen an image, but there is no way to undo a blur unless you still have the data from the original, which a final exported video does not. The act of blurring removes information, and you cannot rebuild a photo from information that no longer exists. Blacking out faces is in no way necessary for the reasons that you are suggesting.

Has anyone trained an AI with mug shots? 😅

Somehow, I have a feeling this effort will actually help the DOJ identify who these people are.

There is a long history of governments not knowing how to properly redact information. There are STILL redacted documents where you can just copy the text out in a pdf reader coming out as recently as (intentionally vague: Within the last year).

Fucking obstruction of justice for assholes committing treason....he should get the Santos treatment.. Straight to jail.

Why is Johnson protecting antifa?

Why can't antifa stop posing as right-wing nutjobs? There is a consistent habit of antifa posing as established right-wing nutjobs that have a flawless consistent history, as if they have been undercover for a literal lifetime. It is time that they stopped being right-wing nutjobs masquerading as antifa and be treated as who they are, lizard people posing as antifa posing as right-wing nutjobs with a venn diagram that overlaps with pedophiles, like a ring of fire eclipse's totality, persecuting people who live their lives differently than their narrow wold view allows.

Read your Bible sheeple, its all in there.

Where is this video coming from that the DOJ doesn't already have it?

Edit: from another article "We don’t want them to be retaliated against and to be charged by the DOJ,” the House speaker said. His office later noted that DOJ already has the raw footage.

Exactly as u/Kbin_space_program@kbin.social said below.

I imagine that the DOJ absolutely has it.

But telling the cult of Trump that "good ol' Mike" is blurring their faces to "protect them from the DOJ" is an effort to endear himself to the rabid cult mob that doesn't know any better.

That was my thought as well, especially coming from the party of drama queens.

Maybe from those of the traitors who were such geniuses that they recorded their own crimes and then didn't permawipe the data from their devices? AKA the constituents of Jericho Johnson.

I watched livestreams of it as it was happening, they were never thinking it through

Johnson will always put the interests of the Christian right before those of democracy.