The judicial panel said its investigation showed that in 2004, the judge sent a message to a blog that included a link to a video on the server. That link included "the name of the stuff subdirectory, compromising its 'security through obscurity' " on which the judge had relied, the opinion said.
After that, the directory containing the explicit files was indexed by Yahoo! and perhaps other search engines, the opinion said.
In 2005, the judge became aware that some people with whom he had shared links could view files and took steps to limit access, the panel found.
Late in 2007, the judge became aware that despite his steps to limit access, "it was still possible for uninvited people to access and browse" the files, the opinion said. At that point, he began deleting material from the site, but stopped after deleting three files because locating the material was "time-consuming, difficult and tedious" at a time when he was preparing to start his term as chief judge.
As previously reported, The Times was first alerted to the existence of the explicit files by Cyrus Sanai, an attorney in Beverly Hills. He is identified in the panel opinion as "a critic of the judge and other 9th Circuit judges, against whom he has previously filed complaints of judicial misconduct in connection with litigation involving his family."
The opinion said that "once the judge became aware in 2007 that offensive material could be accessed by members of the public, his inattention to the need for prompt corrective action amounted to a disregard of a serious risk of public embarrassment."
In his testimony, Kozinski said, "I recognize I should have been aware of the danger, and I should either have taken my server off line or worked diligently to remove the files that were sexually explicit and offensive.
"I was careless in that regard. And for that, I am very sorry and offer my sincere apology."
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scott.glover@latimes.com
