[ale] DMCA Protests]

[Greg]

Yes, the crime rate here in Kennesaw is the lowest in the Atlanta Metro
area...  ;-)  This is due to the fact that when I have had to call the
police twice (small things) they responded in about 3 minutes.  When I cycle
(about an hour a day) I generally see the police about 3 or more times.  The
active police, the law (yes, it is one !) about citizens being required to
own guns, and the generally anti-crime stance here and in Cobb County is the
reason for this.. Wolves only prey on sheep and not on lions.  Enforcement,
prosecution, and vigilance are the keys to security.

To extrapolate this to the IT world..   <rant warning...>   IF
cyber-criminals were locked up in the maximum security prisons for at least
5 yrs w/ parole in addition to paying damages, IF the FBI actually
prosecuted ALL cyber crime (cracking and corporate invasions of citizens
privacy) and IF the FBI were capable of knowing the technology, and IF every
person was held responsible within reason for any actions of their p.c.
(within reason i.e.... if on a DSL/cable link you had to have a firewall of
some sort and virus protection against being "used" by crackers / script
kiddies) - and this specifically includes parents of "little crackers" (try
the parents for the kid's crimes also, I mean they are allegedly responsible
for them until they are 18 years old) THEN the Internet would be a safer
place... but we seem to live in a world where accountability for one's
actions are non existent and we reward cyber criminals with high-paying jobs
in the IT business.

</rant over> In the words of John Belushi in "Animal House"... "Sorry"

-----Original Message-----
From:	owner-ale at ale.org [mailto:owner-ale at ale.org] On Behalf Of Michael
Barker
Sent:	Tuesday, July 24, 2001 3:13 PM
To:	ale at ale.org
Subject:	Re: [ale] DMCA Protests]

Alan Hightower wrote:

> On Tue, 24 Jul 2001, Jonathan Rickman wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 24 Jul 2001, Joseph A. Knapka wrote:
>>
>>> Absolutely. If it's illegal to make security-defeating tools, then
>>> there is no real security, only the illusion thereof. If Adobe or
>>> anyone else is using the DCMA as an excuse to avoid supplying real
>>> security in their products, they're idiots, because mere illegality
>>> never stopped anyone. (OK, it stops some people, but not everyone.)
>>
>> You just hit the nail right on the head. I enjoy computer security
>> research. Thus, I am in posession of tools and exploit code that
>> serves absolutely NO purpose other than circumventing / testing the
>> security of a given system. Were this made illegal, I'd have to give
>> up that part of my research. The bad guys, however, are already
>> breaking the law. Thus, they could care less about the "tools of the
>> trade" being illegal.
>
>
> Next thing you know it will be illegal to posses knowledge of
> vulnerabilities in existing eCommerce solutions - i.e. Win2k et. al.
> Heaven forbid a smart kid might discover one and deface the FBI
> web site rather than alerting CERT.  In fact lets go one step further
> and make it illegal to even think about commiting a crime.  That
> will make me sleep better at night.
>
This current line of discussion reminds me of two books I read  a few
months ago about the developement of cryptography in this country and
the UK.

Singh, Simon, The Code Book: The Secret History of Codes and
Code-breaking (London: Fourth Estate Limited, 1999)

Levy, Steven, Crypto: Secrecy and Privacy in the New Code War (London:
Allen Lane, 2001)

Both books conatained stories of how our government (the NSA mostly)
fought hard to keep this technology out of public hands.  Their argument
was basically; if you have the technology then the criminals have the
technology.  We are here to protect you let us do it and don't worry
about your security.

Without going into personal privacy, according to the constitution I
have the right to protect myself and my property (the crime rate is
really low in Kennesaw according to those I know living there ;-)).

This action under the DMCA sounds like another attempt to keep security
in the governments hands.

That's all I have to say about that...

Michael

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