How insanely insecure are Apple products that this phone--presumably carried by someone who has been given serious lectures on security since he was holding a prototype--could be easily broken into enough to get facebook photos of the owner? If my N900 is stolen (found?), the user gets to know the current time and date, and gets a refresher on the numbers 0 through 9 when they see the keypad. (I really need to put my phone number on the case somewhere...my E62 showed my phone number when turned on, and was returned to me by a streetcorner panhandler due to this feature.)

This should be a HUGE embarassment to Apple, not just because of the lost prototype, but because of how easily the private data inside was accessed.

I really don't want to see any criminality here. I am sick of the idea Apple (and others) promote that it is wrong and illegal simply to look inside their products and understand how they work. I doubt there is an outright theft of property here (i.e. someone pickpocketed the phone holder), but there is definitely the possibility that there was no actual middleman between facebookdude and Gizmodo (or that Gizmodo pre-arranged the deal with the phone-finder), which would be something that would cause the type of investigation where you bust down a door and take all the computer equipment. But it is more likely that it happened exactly like Gizmodo describes it, and that Apple is abusing their position of potential crime victim (within the bounds of the law, but outside the bounds of good taste) to demand investigations and ensure that the Gizmodo dude feels sufficient pain and hardship to avoid pissing off Apple in the future and to be a lesson to others.

By the way...I remember about a thousand pre-release articles on the N900 replete with pictures, teardowns, speculation, etc. It is what made me want to buy the thing (and let me understand what I was getting). Apple has a different strategy, which clearly works well for them (but turns me off their products).

that new iphone does look very nice, and i suppose ill have to commit some cardinal sin somewhere to get hold of one, but its still gonna be running that icrap OS (made for girls and children!)
even if it is v4.0 multitasking (like an 8 year old symbian phone!)
and still no keyboard!
but at least there trying to compete with nokia
who knows in 10 years time they may even be level! (he he!)

Didn't someone at Apple get fired for showing Woz the iPad before it came out?

now now...be nice...we can't send all the little kiddies to jail...

Someone should call Fox News and/or CSNBC to tell them they're not "journalists" if your definition is true. Maybe you should take your own advice and "get educated". According to the laws in the state this happened in, this topic has already been decided in the courts, and blog writers are in fact considered to be journalists. (The case this was decided in is even cited in the article linked to in post 1 of this topic.)

The laws as they're written and applied could in fact mean the warrant used in this case in violation of state and federal laws. That doesn't mean they can't still go after the company or the editor for purchasing stolen goods. It just means they can't use anything found via the warrant as evidence, and local government agencies may be sued for issuing and executing the illegal warrant in the first place.

Personally, I think the Gizmodo chaps could easily see a fine, or possibly some jail time for the charges of purchasing stolen goods. Especially since they basically admitted to doing it to the world just a few days ago. This will just muddy the waters and cause more problems during the trial. I highly doubt any of them will spend time in jail though, and the real winners will be the same as most court cases, the lawyers.

Shame on Gizmodo guy for supporting apple
Now i think he going to hate apple for it

Wrong. Apple doesn't need to do anything for police to look into theft cases.

The matter of fact is that Gizmodo knew they were purchasing a stolen item, and at best the guy only allegedly attempted to contact Apple (and no proof of this). Even if he was unable to return the item to Apple, he should've gone to the police and leave it there, rather than start a bidding war between Engadget and Gizmodo.

This will also easily be proven by going through the email records (which is why the computers were seized in the first place).

They had it coming.

Good write up from legal perspective:

http://www.technovia.co.uk/2010/04/h...one-story.html

Seems like Gizmodo is screwed.

Unfortunately this seems like a calculated risk by the higher ups in gawker media (giz's parent company), at the cost of sacrificing their foot soldiers (chen).

I hope they get fined to the fullest extent of the law

I'm skeptical of that. To be in the device blogging business as long as they have and they were all ignorant of probable consequences? That would be one naive staff.

Please explain further. Have you seen the warrant? I'm betting it was worded to support current police action.

In the end, protection of journalism sources won't be the real issue. It will all come down to the purchase of the prototype.

iphone 4g Prerelease (Dr. Evil), i demand 100 million dollars muahaha