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The Courts Government News

Reno Proposes Global Anti-Cybercrime Network 151

Posted by emmett from the right-on-bill's-heels dept.
Mr. T writes "According to this story, Janet Reno has proposed the formation of LawNet, a global network to fight computer crime. One major issue would involve overcoming jurisdictional questions - where do you prosecute?" Personally, I wish the government would spend less time trying to crack down on miscreants and more time educating the public. Prevention starts at the end-user, Janet!
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Reno Proposes Global Anti-Cybercrime Network More

Reno Proposes Global Anti-Cybercrime Network

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  • Just like governments the world over the US is trying to tackle the symptoms of the problem rather than the causes. It's not just computer crime either, how many governments try to educate drivers rather than impose rediculous blanket speed limits. They are simply doing something for the sake of being seen to do something. This way is cheaper, quicker and easier, but utterly pointless. Think of it as a cold cure remedy, makes you feel better but does nothing to get rid of the cold!

    'Eagles may fly but a weasle will never be sucked into a jet engine'
  • Janet Reno, the mild mannered alter ego of the crime fighting super-heroine Attorney General, the only woman that is feared by Microsoft.

    She is about to lose all the positive Karma she gained as a MS buster, by fighting against what the, according to most, what US stands, for. It is called Freedom.

    Reno said LawNet would also need to focus on privacy issues, protecting consumers from invasions like the CD Universe extortion case.

    To protect us ? Isn't there quite a lot of crime in the real world, the real world, that is within the jurisdiction of the police force ? Doesn't few instance of crime on the internet pale in comparison ?

    Tell us the truth, Janet, Is this LawNet newspeak for Thought Police ?

  • She is just jumping on the 'internet' bandwagon.

    That is where all the hype is and she is just cashing in on it.

    Of course, not everyone on the net understands it. This can be taken (in some cases) to the point where they fear it, and are going to approve of such a blanket/smothering approach to controlling what they feel venurable to.

  • $5 says lawnet.* get's dos'ed within the first week of service.
  • In many cases, fighting the symptoms is good enough - in this case I am not so sure... I was originally going to post that there is really not much crime of this sort that affects me even tho I use the internet daily and for work. OTOH, the example in the article - stealing CC#s for ransom - and my personal experience of having my # illegally used once are real problems. My question becomes - what is the cause vs. what is the symptom? The symptom is theft - so address it. The cause is probably unique-enough for each theif to not warrant being addressed with blanket policy. Other symptoms of computer crime also exist - and the means she used to address it seem reasonable. Namely, create a community of people that care about the problems so that they can find ways of dealing with them. Even if _I_ don't want to be a policeman doesn't mean that I don't appreciate those who do.
  • I'm not into US politics, so I can't really comment on the actual meaning of this and/or the relevance of the people involved... But I must say that the name "LawNet" has a real trashy, failed-SF-attempt sound to it. You can almost imagine it in some trashy movie. Yuck!

  • Utterly pointless exercise (Score:5)

    by arivanov ( 12034 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @12:38AM (#1380888) Homepage
    At first there are things that are considered computer crime in one country and are not in another. A typical example is reverse engineering which is treated differently in almost any country. There is no single rule of thumb about it.

    Also, even for things that are considered to be crime everywhere, there is no real definition of computer crime usable for prosecution. If you cut out financial crime, copyright violation, p0rn, prostitution, etc there is only cracking and hacking left.
    These:
    1. Are not subject to prosecution in many countries as a computer related offence (they are quite often handled as petty crime, destruction of property, etc).
    2. Even in countries with explicit computer related laws the same case may be treated very differently.

    So this utterly pointless exercise has:

    1. Very small scope
    2. Very small common ground and common interest to start with.

    Its only common interest may be the attempt to gain cheap political divididends...
  • If you don't want to look at the banners on the MSNBC site, here's all the interesting stuff from the article...

    An FBI survey of Fortune 500 companies found 62 percent reported computer security breaches during the past year, [Reno] said.

    Reno said LawNet would also need to focus on privacy issues, protecting consumers from invasions like the CD Universe extortion case.

    And finally, my favorite... if anyone is willing to explain to me what is meant by this, please do so:

    "It is perhaps not Big Brother we should be worried about, but big browser," said New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. "We need to be fearful that the aggregation of information, if it is misused, is very terrifying."

    --

  • "According to this story, Janet Reno has proposed the formation of LawNet, a global network to fight computer crime" i remember reading on hackernews that this was supposed to be a national american network, not global? in any case, i don't think the rest of the world is waiting on yet another american "global" initiave that will only wind up being controlled by the american government. hmmm...that wasn't a very relevant post. but what the hey. "avalanche? - yeah? - you stupid"

  • Cold chill on my shoulder (Score:3)

    by Oscarfish ( 85437 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @12:43AM (#1380891) Homepage
    Reno said LawNet would also need to focus on privacy issues...

    Does this mean protecting or privacy, or doing away with it as LawNet sees fit? I'm sorry, I see this in a very strong Orwellian light. Notice how the article emphasized one (totalitarian) law enforcement agency. Integration means less choices, bar none...

    I've always considered most things online to be intellectual in nature, rather than physical (barring E-Commerce sites, etc., of course) and what I'm afraid of is this huge law enforcement agency can define cybercrime any way it wants to - will this extend past what we know to be illegal into...thoughtcrime?

  • "It is perhaps not Big Brother we should be worried about, but big browser," said New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. "We need to be fearful that the aggregation of information, if it is misused, is very terrifying."

    It seems we need Big Brother to fight Darth Browser, because Darth aggregates info somehow, and that is terrifying, but wait a minute, Big Brother also knows everything about you, so it must be addressed, but .... %-/
  • Thats easy !

    Roughly translated:
    We need to be fearful of ignorant people in powerful positions

    If this guy had half-a-clue about the internet he would be terrifying !

  • Here is a good idea. Why not place the Los Angeles Anti-Gang Unit in charge of the LawNet. Then we would all be assured of at least a couple of years of arests of all the usual suspects.
  • ...what US stands for. It is called Freedom.
    I thought it was "United States".
    Am I missing something here? The US also stands for doughnuts, piss beer and home gun ownership.

    Strong data typing is for those with weak minds.

  • It *may* be a good idea... (Score:3)

    by Future Linux-Guru ( 34181 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @01:38AM (#1380898)

    The internet is going to be a pervasive part of human society in the coming years---and as with all things some very undesirable elements will come in.

    We *will* need protection against those elements and that protection has to be global in nature as is the internet.

    But who watches the watchers and what is their morality? Every human belongs to a nation first and the global community second. How do we assure ourselves that the watchers will act in the best interests of us all...and not their country? Not themselves?

    We need definitive answers to those questions before anything of this nature is attempted...

  • Battling the symptoms and not the cause (Score:3)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @01:40AM (#1380899)
    Doesn't the Interpol already offer this kind of coordination-between-authorities thing?

    But: coordination and information exchange between authorities via a dedicated network does not cut down crime. In the modern society, wherever there's money or other goods of high value, there is crime. It just is like that, because nobody does anything to change the basic bad architechture of the whole system. Some people have a hard time staying alive, or they feel that the society they live in has not given them anything, so they resort to crime. High crime rates or very full jails are an indication that people do not feel well.

    Some silly "LawNet" does not make people feel better. They can't eat it, they can't live in it, it doesn't keep them warm and it can't be drank.

  • They mean us, don't they? (Score:3)

    by Paul Crowley ( 837 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @01:46AM (#1380900) Homepage Journal
    They mean evil DeCSS "pirates" and reverse engineers, shrinkwrap license breakers, and crypto exporters. They mean those who provide security information that they'd rather was kept obscure. They mean software patent violators, Napster providers, Xenu $cientology mirrors, anonymous proxies and mail systems, and people who provide ways around filtering proxies. Basically, they mean to act to bolster their power against most everything that Slashdot holds dear.

    I'd like to believe I'm being paranoid about this, but they've never given me a reason to feel otherwise. If they'd prefer that I was less paranoid, perhaps they should hold off legislation (eg UCITA) making things like the above more illegal. It would also help if they didn't pass legislation legitimising genuinely odious practices like spam.

    I'd be happier, I think, if I could believe they were doing this to make us all safer, but I'm afraid that possibility doesn't move the meter from 0 on the credibilityometer.
    --
  • Well, a symptom is a problem in it's own right, and should be treated as such. It must be kept in mind, though, that there is an underlying problem, and if that problem is not addressed, any symptomatic treatment will invariably be temporary.

    In the quest for the underlying causes of these problems, though, I have a number of observations:

    - There is more than one cause.

    - There is probably several layers of problems between these problems and their root cause(s).

    - The root problems are at best intractable, and at worst, totally insoluble.

    A fellow by the name of Karl Marx had the idea that private property was the cause of these ills. A vast experiment was carried out to test this (well, that wasn't what was on the minds of the people involved, but it was an experiment, none the less.) The experiment got off track before it even began. The details of exactly how this happened can be read in any history textbook dealing with the early 20th century.

    So, the experiment really didn't prove anything that wasn't already known. Even had it been successful, and private property was indeed a cause of world problems, it is likely that it isn't the only cause. So these states would likely still have problems.

    So, if anyone wants to take up the challenge of identifying the root causes of the world's problems, go ahead. There's undoubtedly a Nobel prize in the offing for anyone who can do this. Likely, though, individuals of the required calibre aren't hanging around Slashdot. :P
  • Hey, Maybe next week, she will try to get anybody who uses encryption made a fellon, and be able to monitor your computer for the rest of your life.

    Dosen't this seem like 1983, and not long to 1984.
    It sure seems 1084ish

  • LOL (Score:2)

    by Kaufmann ( 16976 )

    error 'ASP 0113'

    Script timed out

    /news/355783.asp

    The maximum amount of time for a script to execute was exceeded. You can change this limit by specifying a new value for the property Server.ScriptTimeOut or by changing the value in the IIS administration tools.


    Ayway, you guys have fun with your little totalitarian state. Those of you who can, relocate ASAP (Rob and Jeff, the Caribbean is always a good choice...); those who can't, prepare to forget the meaning of freedom in the coming years. Me, I'm in Brazil, which is not exactly the freest of countries either, but just in case anybody tries to bother me, I'm going back into my bunker and get my shotgun - it might turn out to be useful after all...
  • It is the lack of jurisdiction of national governments and legislatures on the Internet that has resulted in this single most free environment on the planet.

    Not surprisingly, their lack of direct control over it has got them scared shitless --- just imagine, too much of this and the little people might get the idea that their "leaders" perform no useful function in the offline world either.

  • Need a global network to fight telephone crime (Score:3)

    by SurfsUp ( 11523 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @02:29AM (#1380906)
    I mean, look what happens when cell phones fall into the hands of *Drug Dealers*. Plus, many men are using telephones with the intention of *getting women to have sex with them*. People *swear* on telephones, and talk about *bad things they shouldn't. Telephones are polluting the minds of our sons and daughters, something has to be done.

  • Hacking and Deterance (Score:3)

    by PG13 ( 3024 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @02:35AM (#1380908)
    While we readers on slashdot feel some connection with illicit hackers, even if we personally deteste the thought of cracking into someone's box it will eventually become necessery to have serious law enforcement power to protect our machines. Sure most hackers are doing it just to see if it can be done or for the fun of it this doesn't mean there aren't malicious hackers out there. With the growth ofthe internet and the increasing commercialization *real* computer crime won't be far behind. Already we have seen examples of organized crime moving in on the action.

    The easy anonimity and facelessness of the crimes opens up the doors for criminal activity on a massive scale. While it might be slightly interesting that 300,000 credit cards were recently stolen when this escalates it will become a serious problem.

    Can prevention stop this problem? Experience says no. Even big companies with expert know-how get hacked not to mention the huge difficulty getting the masses to routinely upgrade their personal computers (which will probably have permanent connections within ten years).

    Can current law enforcement adequatly deal with this problem? Probably not. If I route my attack through 10 countries (which would be easy enough to do) it would take reams and reams of paper work to get the necessery warrents for all ten countries to track me down. If this is happening on a widespread scale the government could not cope.

    I will mourn the free-wheeling days of the internet but like the coyboys in the old west the needs of civilazation must necesserily squash the independent gunslinging culture of the internet. (Yes gun sligning...sheriffs on the net are few and far between people are left to secure their own hardware and match their skill vs. that of the hacker).

    P.S. I used hacker intentionally here so please no "use cracker" posts. It is a lost cause the rest of the nation has already adopted the new vocabulary. Besides its just a word why do you care?
  • Separate the rhetoric from the substance and all you find is the usual legal travesty: the global controls will limit what the ordinary man can do, not the outlaw who can and does ignore the laws with impunity.

    The only "undesirable element" that will get curbed by this is the freedom of the people. But then, it has always been the goal of those in power to put a firm cap on that. No change.

  • First we need to rethink what crime is (Score:4)

    by Zemran ( 3101 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @02:48AM (#1380910) Homepage Journal
    It is great to spout on like that but nothing is really being said. This is obviously not a global thing until the global community can decide on what is legal and what is not. After that the next thing to decide is how best to safeguard ourselves from crime. And lastly, how to catch and convict criminals.

    The porn issue has been discussed elsewhere, but in brief if a site is hosted in a country that has liberal censorship then no crime is being commited by the site host and America has to re-think its own attitude to these issues rather than try and tell other people how they should live.

    The CD Universe issue is a red herring as extorsion is a crime in any country and as Max appears to be Russian I would think that the authorities should help the Russians catch him and let him get prosecuted and sentenced under Russian law (not nice).

    The greatest problem is one of letting go. It is just like bringing up a child. When the child reaches a certain age you have to let go. It is really hard to release your control and let the child take control of its own life, but you have to do it.

    If you are a good parent you will have taught your child what to look out for, and how best to protect his/her self. Has anyone seen any gov/aol/msn advice on how users should protect themselves? Can you imagine MSN telling people they should not use Win98 online as it has very weak security?

    Catching the criminals is not as hard as it sounds. Remember the Melissa virus? Other techniques can be used to track traffic etc. but, as with all crime a proportion of criminals will get away with it. The biggest step here is to learn to concede jurisdiction to the relevant authority. The FBI are not going to find it easy playing a subordinate role to the Russians if they want to catch Max. So Max will probably get away with it thanks to a childish power struggle.
  • So, if anyone wants to take up the challenge of identifying the root causes of the world's problems...

    There is one underlying cause and it has been the same for the entire history of man: SIN.

    Doesnt seem like such a revelation now doesnt it? And I dont think anyone is going to stop people from sinning any time soon...
    Dilbert: I have become one with my computer. It is a feeling of ecstacy... the blend of logic and emotion. I have reached...
  • Reno has been digging herself a larger and larger hole for years now. It started with waco and the numurous other confrontations and moved to her every plan. The media is now starting to realize that she's an extreemist that doesn't know what she's talking about. If you want proof, just watch one of her press conferences. I've seen very few recently where a number of reporters actually pay attention. Mostly they seem to get the gist of what she's saying, write it down, and then doodle for the rest of the hour or so.
  • Since the US army recently announced they were going to set up a cyberwarfare unit, then she should go and arrest the commander, or doesn't the law apply to them?
  • Reno said LawNet would also need to focus on privacy issues, protecting consumers from invasions like the CD Universe extortion case.

    How is this a privacy issue? Consumers gave their CC#s to CD Universe to obtain services from them. Maybe a retailer that sent you CDs for free is indeed a great idea, but it's probably not much of a viable business plan.

    The only problem with CD Universe is that they were cracked.

    That they were then blackmailed is no great issue since there are already perfectly adequate non-Internet-related anti-blackmail laws.

    According to The Register [theregister.co.uk] the crack was caused by a hole in NetVerify. Personally it seems to me that credit card processor connection software like ICVerify's actually does very little for what it costs and it would be a Really Good Thing if it could be replaced by free software, for security reasons as well as lowering the cost of entry to e-commerce.

    Anyway, haven't we already got pretty good information exchange on the computer security front without LawNet's help? If law enforcement isn't currently reading the likes of CERT advisories, that's it's own stupid fault IMHO.


    --
    This comment was brought to you by And Clover.
  • P.S. I used hacker intentionally here so please no "use cracker" posts. It is a lost cause the rest of the nation has already adopted the new vocabulary. Besides its just a word why do you care?

    I've never been real fond of the word anyway. I thought that it implied a lack of skill ("I didn't know how to do it so I hacked something together"). I like to think my code is a little better than that...

  • And finally, my favorite... if anyone is willing to explain to me what is meant by this, please do so:
    It is perhaps not Big Brother we should be worried about, but big browser," said New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. "We need to be fearful that the aggregation of information, if it is misused, is very terrifying."
    Newspeak-to-English Translation: "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain wiping his ass with the Constitution."
    /.
  • This might just get me back into writting scripts for the kiddies.

    If 62% of fortune 500 got hit, whats with the other 38% that didn't but were targets? Maybe the Reno just wants a safe area where people don't need to lock their front door or even have one.
  • Don't protect my system for me, thats my job. People are afraid of having their credit cards stolen from ecommerce, don't use it. Don't want our children seeing the 'vile filth' of the world? Use filters, moderate what they see and when they can see it, and don't dare come to me when your kids won't listen to you anymore because you kept them in such a sheltered life. By controlling peoples technology, what do we have? more ebullshit.com of everything, and more lawsuits. A waste of money on an open battle field in which (i hope) the government will lose. Computer crimes result because of someone who is smart enough to figure out where someone else didn't do their job. Which frightens and/or repulses YOU more? Walking the streets seeing the homeless, the drug dealers, the possible rapist or theif. Or the computer gurus?
  • Oh come on.

    Even though anti-abortion activists call themselves "Pro-Life," how come you've never heard anyone call themselves "Pro-Death"? How about "pro-choice" opponents calling themselves "pro-mandate"?

    The point is, nobody would ever, ever, ever use the word "privacy" as something to get rid of, except maybe when dealing with prisoners, companies, or politicians. (When the word "privacy" suggests something inherently evil)

    The case reno cited was people's credit card numbers being revealed. Are you advocating this? Or are you suggesting we slashdot the hackers to prevent this from happening?

    Notice how the article emphasized one (totalitarian) law enforcement agency.

    Interpol, Hello? Back when international crime had to involve people or contraband Physically Crossing borders this was necessary. Why wouldn't it be that much more necessary on the internet?

    You know, I just read the email again ... (honestly) was it a joke? I'm stupid. Sorry :P

  • Excuse me, but I am going to reply in a vituperous manner to this post.


    What the **** kind of **** is this ****ing message saying? You must be the most ignorant piece of **** ever to escape the death squads!


    Coresh's compound was broken into and torn down by the BATF with no attempts at peaceful negotiation! At the time you could have viewed film footage taped by locals with cameras on Public Access TV showing tanks shooting fire breaking into the compound!


    Findings: There was no abuse of children going on, there was no manufacturing of drugs, there was none of the BULLSHIT they tried to feed to the ignorant, docile American Joe "Fuck Me Up The Ass" Smith!!!


    That was a local event which in which extreme force was used and the mass media was fed lies and cover-up stories to ensure that the truth did not escape.


    If you live in America, you are in a dictatorship more absolute than any that ever existed -- only sugar-coated so the _average_ citizen does not know this.

    Be careful how you respond,

  • At first I didn't see any harm or problem with LawNet as long as it boiled down to an agreement between countries to assist in tracking down internet based crime. This would mean that if the appropriate level of law enforcement in the US contacted the appropriate level of law enforcement in some other country a channel would be cleared for the rapid finding of facts, gathering of evidence and so on. Then I started thinking of the current state of extradition between countries. Extradition has been denied in serious crimes against people such as kidnapping or murder. The chances of any real cooperation in light of this would appear to be nil.

    Second of all as far as the government goes for protecting privacy in actuallity it is against privacy, or at least against meaningful privacy. If they were in favour of privacy there would be no encryption restrictions, or if there were encryption restrictions it would be against snake oil encryption. My bet is that this stance won't change until the lack of strong encryption enables a third party to intercept and decode a message which from the governments point of view should have been kept private. Either that or perhaps a real war where letters exchanged with people back home might be intercepted and reveal information valuable to the enemy.
  • One day hackers may decide to shift their homework to bots/agents.
    Maybe less exciting but certainly safer.
    And for those who really don't want to code the whole thing perhaps MS will come up with some useful DLL, just like MAPI 8) Go ahead.. bust my bot ! ciaox
  • It is perhaps not Big Brother we should be worried about, but big browser," said New York Attorney General
    Eliot Spitzer. "We need to be fearful that the aggregation of information, if it is misused, is very terrifying."

    That perhaps people are fearful of the government (All of Slashdot Except Me), but perhaps they have more to fear from some guy who steals their credit card number. Or a company that aggregates legally available information that, when brought together, violates privacy, then distributes it.

    Generally, unless you're kevin mitnick, you have more to fear from criminals and unethical people than from the government. A novel idea, I'm sure.


  • There is one underlying cause and it has been the same for the entire history of man: SIN.


    Sir Isaac Newton? Really? :)


    Doesnt seem like such a revelation now doesnt it?


    You haven't identified anything. You've merely stuck a label on it.


    And I dont think anyone is going to stop people from sinning any time soon...


    If you merely bundle all the world's ills together and give them a label, then it is indeed hopeless.

    If you want to have any chance at all at actually solving them, you'll have to be _much_ more specific.
  • A ball-tearingly obvious way to dramatically reduce computer breakins and cracks would be for people to actually bother securing thier systems and applying security fixes. Wow!! what a radical idea!

    At the end of 98 a group did a bulk scan of most of the internet for 18 common remotely exploitable security vulnerabilities. Here is a summary:

    BEGIN TIME: 02:00, Dec 01, 1998 GMT

    END TIME: 08:00, Dec 21 1998 GMT

    Scanning nodes: 5
    Jobs Per Minute: 250
    Scan time: 20.24 days

    Vulnerabilities tested: 18

    Domain count: 7 three letter domains, 214 national domains (see suffix item 3)
    Host count: 36,431,374
    Vulnerability count: 730,213
    Vulnerable host count: 450,000

    That's at least 450,000 vulnerable (read: r00table) hosts. Also remember that one vulnerable host if often enough to allow compromise of a whole network of machines. There is no reason for any machines to show up in this scan. Fixes are available.

    I leave it as an exercise for the reader to work out what people should be doing before setting up a "global, round-the-clock anti-cybercrime network". I fear that it might take a few more CDuniverses to shock business into taking security seriously.

    Details are here: The Internet Auditing Project [securityfocus.com] - It's actually quite an interesting read. Also features details on how one of thier highly secure linux boxes was cracked with an amazing super-crack. This is a good example of how one cracked host and bring down other secure machines.

    --
    Simon

  • This sounds more like a premise for a TV show more than anything.


    "oh no! hackers are on the loose in the network!"

    "No fear! CYBER-CRIME POWERS ACTIVATE!!"
  • That perhaps people are fearful of the government (All of Slashdot Except Me), but perhaps they have more to fear from some guy who steals their credit card number.

    They've capped my tax/fee/fine liability at a level lower than the $50 credit-card liability cap? Great!!

    Or a company that aggregates legally available information that, when brought together, violates privacy

    You mean like the Census Long Form? (Oops, that's not a company. Never mind....)

    Generally, unless you're kevin mitnick, you have more to fear from criminals and unethical people than from the government.

    One cannot draw a firm distinction between groups which overlap so extensively.
    /.

  • Well, the army's purpose is to do things during wartime that would be highly illegal during times of peace...
  • a very very small 2X4...

    Fook
  • > Yes gun sligning...sheriffs on the net are few
    > and far between people are left to secure their
    > own hardware and match their skill vs. that of
    > the hacker.

    Widespread sheriffs won't relieve you of the responsibility of locking down your machine. You lock your house, car, and bike, don't you?

    Ryan

  • So in your world, if I don't lock my door, hire an alarm service and have guard dogs, it's my fault if you decide to break in and steal something.

    Do you also drive around the neighborhood and conduct surveys of which homes can be burglarized?

    Or do you stroll through malls and see which stores have security cameras and guards, and which ones don't?

  • > Some silly "LawNet" does not make people feel
    > better. They can't eat it, they can't live in
    > it, it doesn't keep them warm and it can't be
    > drank.

    LOL! As if the average computer criminal is starving. Tell 'em to sell their computer.

    Ryan
  • I aggre with all you explain. It's an political issue. A try to up in an uncultured people that like to think that the politicians have al the answers because they're on top and probably have a general view of the problems.
    We cannot agree with all the politicians nor the media. We need to shape ours thoughts using knowledge. We need to fight for more education and widespread of all kind of information. Knowledge is power that that can conduct to responsibility or not. We need reinforce our responsability trought right education, the right for information.
  • Personally, I wish the government would spend less time trying to crack down on miscreants and more time educating the public. Prevention starts at the end-user, Janet!


    Agreed .. but educating the end-user makes it harder to create a technocracy, which seems to be what *everyone* at the top levels of government wants to do. If technocracy is the goal, then cracking down on miscreants is a perfect strategy because it gets us fighting among ourselves and distracts everyone from the real issues.
  • Personally, I wish the government would spend less time trying to crack down on miscreants and more time educating the public. Prevention starts at he end-user, Janet!

    This statement annoys me to no end. So many people on this site are completely against the end 'User' protecting themselves from conventional crime, yet expect them to completely secure themselves from all harm when it comes to the 'net and their PC.
    How would you feel if you got mugged and the response by the people you talked to was nothing but 'Well, you should have downloaded the easily available patch Remington .45 and you would have been secure against that exploit.' ?
    Either it is the end users job to protect themselves from everything or nothing. I vote for Everything.

    Kintanon
  • You mean like the Census Long Form? (Oops, that's not a company. Never mind....)

    Ummm, I think I was talking about aggregating and disclosing personal data without your permission, not asking you for personal data with your permission and then not disclosing it as Part of A Large Number (#,###,### people Speak Only Spanish At Home). Sorry if I didn't make myself transparent.

    Generally, unless you're kevin mitnick, you have more to fear from criminals and unethical people than from the
    government.

    One cannot draw a firm distinction between groups which overlap so extensively.

    "Oh yes, since I had No Idea that any unethical people or criminals are running any part of the government, you must be correct!" Nobody claims that. I simply believe that the government is composed of mostly non-corrupt people (like any large organization) and frankly has a lot more crappy laws governing itself than governing the real world. Why did Red Hat have to team with another company to market itself to the government? It's hiring an expert in government regulations -- acquisitions and contracts.

  • Already we have seen examples of organized crime moving in on the action...

    Yes. I'm gonna make you an offer you can't refuse...

    Your Don wishes root on your machine. For this favor, he will be our friend for life. Union problems, they may disappear...

    With apologies to Mario Puzo, may he rest in pe ace

  • How did you get moderated to 5 for this? Your criticism is like saying "the police shouldn't use speed radar because (1) small scope (2) speed limits differ and (3) people can use radar detectors." On Slashdot, of course, everybody would say "yeah!" "yeah!" and meanwhile, the police will be pulling people over left and right for... you guessed it, speeding! And though the police probably could lie and say you were speeding when you weren't, it'll turn out that so many people are speeding, they don't need to.

    First, you rule out "financial crimes etc."? Why? Reno didn't rule them out, or did I miss something?

    Second, the example cited in the article of breaking into a large commercial site and stealing people's personal and financial information and holding them for ransom, is illegal (and should be), if not everywhere, than in enough places that having international cooperation of police forces arranged in advance is both feasible and effective at combatting crime.

    Crime is a Bad Thing, being safe, secure and protected are Good Things. I'm not in favor of abuse of police powers in meatspace and I share the concerns about cyberspace. But don't stick your head in the sand. Just like they trace phone calls of people who phone in bomb threats, they're going to be tracerouting packets of people who download other people's credit cards. In order to score more cheap political dividididends for our side, I say, "Thank you Janet Reno, you're doing a great job... let me work with you to make sure that people's privacy is in fact protected.

  • I assume that you're referring to firearms control?

    If so, there's a problem with your analogy -- software patches are free, and weapons are not.

    If all levels of weaponry were free, and none of them could be used for evil purposes, then your analogy would hold.

    However, weapons are not free, and they CAN be used for evil purposes -- unlike software patches.

    Ever accidentally patched your TCP/IP stack with a SCSI patch? I thought not. Ever missed a target with a bullet? I thought so.

    This doesn't mean that your underlying point is equally flawed, but you'll need to elaborate on it a bit more . . .

  • Ooooohhhh... that really hurts man.
  • What in the heck is wrong with trying to prosecute someone for breaking into my system?

    Emmet in the story post seems to imply with his statement "Prevention starts with the end user, Janet!" that it's the victim's fault! So, I'm to blame because I'm actually trying to run a business and have neither the time to become a security expert nor hire one, and some asshole with too much time on his hands and not enough work decides to learn how to crack systems and targets mine.

    Bullshit. That's like saying if you get mugged and beat up by some menacing brute on the sidewalk, it's your fault for wanting to live your life and not get a blackbelt. Reno and the police shouldn't prosecute the mugger because "prevention begins with the pedestrian". What a load of hooey..
  • Simon, would you argue that a sys admin who's left a box wide open should be found guilty of criminal neglect (assuming consequential loss of data/money)? I'm curious to hear insightful arguments for and against this.

    I'd say it's one thing to accidentally leave your business's front door unlocked one night and quite another to quite visibly never have installed a door at all.

  • heh (Score:1)

    by lucid ( 7390 )
    She sure has a way with words:

    "The Internet is indeed a splendid tool of wonder, but there is a dark side of hacking, crashing networks and viruses that we absolutely
    must address," she said.

    nice parallel structure. but wow, first its the information superhighway! now its a splendid tool of wonder! in a couple of years, i bet Janet will be claiming she invented it.

    and this guy, here, very eloquent:

    "It is perhaps not Big Brother we should be worried about, but big browser," said New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. "We need to be fearful that the aggregation of information, if it is misused, is very terrifying."

    "we need to be fearful that the aggregation of information is very terrifying"?

    how very telling.
  • This is open to the public. I wonder how many points are really going to be represented. It seems that the speakers are all hands off or pro-government regulation. Is anyone thinking of attending? Would be nice to see a report on what occured.

    ISOC CHAPTERS UPDATE

    * D.C. CHAPTER'S PUBLIC MEETING ON PRIVACY

    The Washington, D.C., chapter of the Internet Society will hold a public meeting on Internet privacy issues on 12 January 2000. Privacy is a broad topic that touches all of us in so many ways and raises lots of concerns. Some people are looking out for us, while others are looking at us. Is the government going through our e-mail and listening to all of our phone calls? If so, is that ok because of the threats of terrorism and gangsters? How much control should vendors have over the use and dissemination of information about us; how much should we? If you want to hear opinions on multiple sides of the issues, come to the meeting. It will be held from 7-9 p.m. at Booz-Allen at Tysons Corner, Allen Building, 8283 Greensboro Drive, McLean, VA. Speakers include Declan McCullagh, Washington bureau chief for Wired News; Kawika Daguio, Executive Vice President of the Finanicial Info Protection Association; and Mike Vatis, Chief of the National Infrastructure Protection Center. For more information on the meeting and for more detailed
    biographies of the speakers see the dc chapter's site. [www.dcisoc.org]
  • I assume that you're referring to firearms control?
    If so, there's a problem with your analogy -- software patches are free, and weapons are not.

    If all levels of weaponry were free, and none of them could be used for evil purposes, then your analogy would hold.

    However, weapons are not free, and they CAN be used for evil purposes -- unlike software patches.

    Ever accidentally patched your TCP/IP stack with a SCSI patch? I thought not. Ever missed a target with a bullet? I thought so.

    This doesn't mean that your underlying point is equally flawed, but you'll need to elaborate on it a bit more . . .





    first, not all software is free. Second, it is much easier to learn how to use a gun than learn how to effectively patch every security hole in your system. Most people who own computers don't have time to spend cruising BugTraq and downloading patches to keep their system secure up to the minute, if they did that they would never get anything else done on their system.
    Patches CAN screw up a system, one of the patches for my V3 screwed my sound card up, requiring me to get a second patch for my sound card, the V3 patch also screwed up my DVD player, which had no patch available, so no more DVD capability on my PC. No big deal to me, but still annoying.

    Anyways, I'm drifting from my point...
    My first POINT is that if the meatspace cops can't protect me from some back alley mugger then why should we expect these guys to protect us from crackers? And my SECOND point is, since the government can't protect the average user, how is the average use supposed to secure their system?

    Hopefully that isn't too muddled.

    Kintanon
  • New York Attorney General Spitzer fears the misuse of aggregated information. He is a politician, and his biggest fear is rapid unemployment and loss of job benefits. If he is like many, he has severely abused his privileges and milked his job for everything he could get. I have no vested interest in being right, and would be delighted if someone could prove me mistaken in this case. Be aware that politicians are usually promoting their own freedom, not yours. When Patrick Henry said,"Give me liberty or give me death." he was referring to the liberty of Patrick Henry, chiefly from English creditors, not the liberty of slaves, servants, peons, trappers, fisherman, craftsmen, small farmers, etc.
  • Crime is a Bad Thing, being safe, secure and protected are Good Things.

    Yes, of course, but TANSTAAFL. The simplest way to be safe, secure, and protected is to live in a police state. Nazi Germany had very low crime rates. Moscow, before the Soviet Union imploded, was a very safe city to live in (anybody convicted of a crime was forbidden to live closer than 100 km to Moscow). The issue is not whether being safe and secure is a Good Thing. The issue is the price you are willing to pay for it.

    But don't stick your head in the sand. Just like they trace phone calls of people who phone in bomb threats, they're going to be tracerouting packets of people who download other people's credit cards.

    Sure. No problem with that. But, again, you are putting up a strawman. Nobody is arguing that the police should never, ever be able to trace a packet across the 'net. The issue is completely different -- it has to do with the major shifts in the ease/cost of monitoring and storing information. These shifts affect the balance of power between the government and the individual. How this balance of power should look on the 'net is a big and complicated question. Saying "police keep me safe and sound, great job, Janet" doesn't cut it.

    work with you to make sure that people's privacy is in fact protected.

    Government has no interest in promoting the privacy of the individuals. In fact, quite the opposite is true (cf. anti-encryption efforts). Government wants people's lives to be easily monitorable and checkable. It is willing to take some measures to curb the ability of corporations to gather data (as a smokescreen and to prevent competition), but just try suggesting measures that will prevent *anyone* from getting data on people, and see how far you get.

    Kaa

  • Prevention and education just isn't entertaining. It's hard work, and that's just not what America is about.

    Cops ride-along-video shows, news, and movies of big crime make money.

    Education costs money.

  • Maybe it's time we alter the way we think about online security. Instead placing the power and responsibility of protection in the hands of the government (which seems to be the way things are going), maybe we should *gasp* hold the companies responsible for their own security! Tight security = fewer crimes

    I mean, come on! If you own a real world business, you don't depend on the police for the general protection of your business. You lock your doors, you pull down the metal shield in front of your windows (in NY at least). You DON'T expect to have police every 10 feet making sure robbers don't break into your store. If some regular CD store down the block took all the money they made and left it in an unlocked drawer with a simple lock on the front door, you wouldn't be hearing about it when the dumb asses got robbed. And if you did, you'd laugh at them. If CDUniverse was hacked it's their own fault. I congradulate the hacker on exposing the weakness of the business. Attempting to extort the money is BAD, but the cracking of the system is GOOD. You take active measures to ensure your own property's safety. At home, if someone breaks into your home, you greet them with a shotgun. Will this philosophy ever catch on for Internet businesses? Will we see a shift towards Gibson-esque corporate defense systems that track down the hacker and fry their machine (or worse)?

    I personally don't want to see another crackdown on harmless hackers like in 1990. I highly recommend The Hacker Crackdown [eff.org] by Bruce Sterling for a good read on hacker history and to a degree, philosophy. And it's open source.

    do the evolution
  • I can't hold a conversation with an AC; anyone nameful care to raise the issue?
    --
  • What I believe the good man is trying to say is that the mass collection of information, if misused(as he percieves it to be misused), is terrifying...now to me this sounds like he is trying to back up control of the masses by limiting the amount of information they have access to which is basically what the government has been about anyways in recent years. I would love for him to define his perception of misuse. Misused so that it puts a hole in his nice happy little lifestyle whereas he can work the system to his advantage without anybody knowning any better or misused in that people might start thinking for themselves and this may change society and the world as he knows it and he doesn't know if he can handle that.
  • As I see it, about half of the internet "crime" wouldn't be considered crime in any other placement.

    It is as if you were walking around town, only half of the buildings have closed windows, most buildings are missing doors. None of the cars are locked and they all have the keys sitting on the seat. You lean against a brick wall and suddenly you are inside the building. Most merchants have a pile of cash on the counter instead of using cash registers. Instead of fences, some businesses have small signs saying "Unauthorized Entry is Prohibited".

    In some places, maybe most, it is your fault if you leave the keys in the car, unlocked, and it is stolen.

    Legally, the operators of a server that is hacked, or the software designers, should be partly responsible if the vulerability has been known for a month or more.

    For example, an ISP where I worked had a line ping flooded, but it was a 56k line, and they had source routing enabled on the routers (a vulerability known for 5 years at that time). Sure, the attacker was partly to blame, but so were we.

    The problem with most "computer crime" prosecution that I have heard, either it is completely ignored, or the prosecution dosen't understand the network and they charge a person for mass murder when they are guilty of breaking and entering.

    Education is definately needed.
  • 'home gun ownership' is why we're free in the first place.
    Mmmm, I'm sure that a bunch of NRA enthusiasts will be able to easily defend their homesteads against a "wayward" government... They've got missiles, rockets, helicopters, spy satellites, cruise missiles et al. Still, the NRA's can buy Uzi 9mm, so I guess that evens it out a bit...
    I seem to remember that the Waco compound was quite well defended... Who won there?

    Strong data typing is for those with weak minds.

  • Just because locks can be picked doesn't mean that you don't try to catch burglars. Sure, you encourage people to get deadbolt locks, keep the entrance lit, and have neighbors look out for each other and call the police if they see something suspicious. Duh.

    Similarly, nobody says that burglarizing people's homes and businesses is ok if the locks were weak. So, yeah, if you get hit, you have yourself to blame to a certain extent, but that doesn't make what the burglar did OK. Insurance companies should (maybe do?) make routine computer security a deduction on policies.

    Janet Reno's job isn't about deterrence only, it is also about punishment/vengance. What's she doing? Coordinating across enforcers. What is the problem with that? It's the cops' job to protect the weak and the stupid. The strong and the smart most often won't need them.

  • If I can't abide by a shrinkwrap software license, I don't use the software.

    Bullshit. Did you read that license? I don't think so. If you haven't, how do you know you are going to abide by it?

    Besides, if a click-shrink license is a "normal" contract, I'd like the ability to negotiate it and opt-out of certain of its provisions. Please tell me how to do it.

    Kaa
  • /Prevention starts at the end-user, Janet!/ Yes, this is true. Talk to the NRA about it. How long have they been around, and pushing so we can keep our right to bear arms?? They keep saying [nraila.org] education reduces the number of firearm related injuries than anything else (see the section called "Education Is The Key"). But still the laws get more restrictive. OTOH, I almost welcome the LawNet or whatever it is. Looking back, these types of things have always made us smarter. One quick example, when all the parents seemed real hot on restricting what their kids could see on the internet. The kids said, "Okay, NP, I'll be a good boy/girl." Then they go installed another browser and go exploring with no restricions. LawNet (or something like it) may be coming. Oh well.... I don't think it will be so terrible... hell, it might even give us something exciting to play with.
  • The article is quite useless to judge the intentions of what the agency should do. The reason is that no mention is made of what they want to do, and more importantly, Why. Do they want to set up an agency where people or companies can ask questions? Do they want to be a `public lawyer' which sues people/companies when people can't do it themselves? Do they want to indicate where there are omissions in laws? And which laws? Answers to the questions "Why" and "How" will indicate how usefull such an agency will be. And it will also show for who they are doing it -- for people living in the USA, or for everyone globally? For companies, for individuals or both? Or do they just want to map the current situation (which will be hard on itself)? My conclusion is that this article is a piece of propaganda, which mainly runs on sentiment (just look at the two examples). If they had given any good view on one of those examples, and said something *usefull* or new about it, I'd have more convinced that anything usefull will come out of this. For now, it seems just like some hyped babbling on a recent news item. -- Erik.
  • The BBC has an arti cle [bbc.co.uk] about Internet fraud which mentions 'national cyber-crime police units' in the US, UK and other nations, which would prsumably cooperate closely with one another. It's worth reading. Perhaps Janet Reno's proposal is more about combatting fraud than the occasional defaced webpage.
  • I believe he was referring to something along the lines that, if you educate users and business on how to protect themselves from being the victims of computer crime, then that will do more to eliminate the problem, than merely upping the police state.

    It's analogous to the mugging an earlier poster made reference to. To be sure, it isn't the pedestrian's fault that he walked down the dark, unprotected alley and got mugged. But if someone had 'educated' him on the dangers of walking down dark unprotected alleys, maybe he wouldn't have been as vulnerable to attack.

    If he had known it would be much safer to take the well-lit busy street, he probably wouldn't have been mugged. It takes a much higher level of skill (if you want to call it that) to mug someone on a bright, busy street, and it rules out vulnerability to maybe the lesser petty thiefs.

    Ok, this relates to computers in a similar manner, I promise. :)

    Say a sysadmin had a server set up straight out of the box and then never paid any attention to possible problems, he would be walking down that dark alley. Because we all know that software will always have holes that can be exploited with relative ease, sort of like the mugging in a dark alley. Neither takes much intellect or skill.

    Now, if we educate users/sysadmins/business on how to protect themselves through keeping a watchful eye to possible security issues and keeping them patched, then they are staying on the brightly lit path by keeping themselves fairly well protected against the untalented hole exploits.

    This isn't to say that it will take care of all computer crime, but it *will* do more toward prevention than a "global monitoring network", not to mention keeping the government out of the privacy issues hot water.

    And still, there are plenty of ways to deal with other crimes besides Big Brother'ing. Encryption is one of them, security certificates are another.

    While all of this may be just political dillying around, some day it may become serious, and this is what many of us find disturbing. Maybe you understand now.
  • police will be pulling people over left and right for... you guessed it, speeding!

    HOW can victimless crimes really be a crime? But more importantly WHERE do the police get the jurisdiction to give you a ticket in the first place since the roads ARE PUBLIC!?

    Probably because you don't have the Manufactor's Statement of Origin for your automobile:
    Vehicle Manufacturer's Certificate/Statement of Origin [geocities.com]
    Manufacturer's Statement of Origin - Key To ownership [205.218.170.194]

    When you buy a new autmobile, WHY does the goverment want you to surrender the MSO?
    Title transfer [mason.wa.us]
    Licensing your new vehicle in Washington [clark.wa.us]
    LOUISIANA OFFICE OF MOTOR VEHICLES VEHICLE REGISTRATION & TITLE [state.la.us]
    Massachusetts Title Law [state.ma.us]

    Travelling is a RIGHT, Driving is a privilege. You DON'T need a license to travel. I travel without one, and have yet to be given a ticket for speeding or for driving without a license.

    Here is a list of DOCUMENTED rulings.
    Driver Licensing vs. the Right to Travel [cmu.edu]

    Speeding is NOT a crime, UNLESS you went to the government asking for permission (DRIVER'S LICENSE) to use their property (REGISTERED VEHICLE.) If you don't want to be harassed by the good law officers, you can get an International Driver's Permit, which is valid in over 200 countries. No Socialist Slave Number is required.

    Research the above links and see for yourself.

    Cheers

  • (h|cr)acker, dammit! (Score:3)

    by jabber ( 13196 ) on Wednesday January 12, 2000 @08:19AM (#1380981) Homepage
    You know, of all the articles to post to, with such a defeatists attitude, one on civil liberties should be the last.

    There is a difference between hacker and cracker. It's not just a word, any more so than nigger, faggot, heeb or any other slurr. It has a meaning, given to it a long time ago.

    The definition of 'hacker' is quite elusive, but as such it gives us a sense of searching for identity - like any emerging culture. 'Cracker' OTOH is well defined and there are few who misunderstand it north of the Mason-Dixon line.

    'Hacker' hails from doing things roughly, as with an axe or hack-saw. It suggests solving problems in the 'ad-hoc' style. (Contrast with 'Engineer', as few engineers see themselves as hackers and few hackers are formally schooled to be engineers) Over time, the definition evolved to imply a certain virtuosity to the method of problem solving - hence a hacker is a talented programmer.

    The idea is an immortal virus. For so long as one person holds true to the definition of a word, and makes a point of educating the 'differently-informed', the idea lives, and the history of the word, and whence it came, is carried on.

    'Communist' and 'socialist' are just words. Too few people stand up for what they really mean. The 'reat of the nation' has the incorrect connotation, and the misconception just gets deeper. If I were to claim to be a communist in the middle of town square, it would get the undesired sort of attention.

    Freedom is a word, yet people have fought, killed and died for it over centuries. Liberty and privacy are just words. If you're so willing to give up on 'hacker', then why even take part in a discussion on 'privacy'. Let someone else (i.e. the Federal Gummint) define it for you.

    I know that this is being very dramatic, but a bit of drama is needed IMO. As soon as you let someone who is uninformed define who you are, you cease to be yourself. If the general population is steered to see 'hacker' as nefarious, then they will regard hackers with fear and suspicion. Most of us don't warrant that attitude. This is why we keep on fighting for that label, for the clean reputation of the term we use to describe ourselves.

    If the rest of the nation adopts the idea of abortion as a valid means of chosing the gender of a child, would that suddenly make it ok to do so?

    What's more, with AOL TW in charge of the 'big picture', if it seems that the rest of the nation has accepted something, does that mean that they really did?
  • The difference between your strawmen and mine, is that yours disprove your point :) I wouldn't agree with you that one is safe and secure in a police state. I think you meant to say that the way to make sure that the littering crime rate is zero is to have a police state, but I wasn't advocating anything even close to that.

    I don't really want to go back and forth on a critique of what I wrote outside of the context of the original post. I think my criticisms of the original post are valid but I'm not sure if you are defending the original. By the time a cybercrime has taken place, it is too late to traceroute: logs are required. And if my downstairs neighbor breaks into my computer to leave me a death threat, it's a crime, all in the U.S. even if he goes through a box in the Czech republic. International cooperation is the only way to track that down. Yes, there are all sorts of ways in which such a tracking system could be abused, but lets talk about how to stop the abuse. The tracking system is coming (hi Echelon) and it is not a +5 comment to say "this will never work because it is impractical, but we need to fear it because it is practical." I recognize the impulse behind the comments, but I think it's kinda naive.

    Government has no interest in promoting the privacy of the individuals Strictly as an aside, I wouldn't want to let this pass. Governments have all sorts of interests in promoting the interests of their citizens. Where do you live, Cuba? Yes, individuals within governments who are given narrow responsibilities often see their own jobs made easier by "violating" privacy -- for instance, tracking a tuberculosis epidemic, like tracking down looters, like footnoting a term paper, is simpler if you have info. The question is how do we balance the individual's interests against the group's, and this is what governments do, and they do a pretty good job of it, at least in Western countries.

  • HOW can victimless crimes really be a crime? But more importantly WHERE do the police get the jurisdiction to give you a ticket in the first place since the roads ARE PUBLIC!?

    Funny, the thousands of people, including me, who have lost relatives to reckless drivers would hardly call it victimless. Police have the strongest jurisdiction on public property. Who else is going to protect it?

    And btw, an International Driver's License is meaningless in Georgia (and probably most other states) unless accompanied by a valid license from another country. Anyone who tells you otherwise is probably running a scam to sell them to unsuspecting illegal immigrants.

  • By your logic, if a woman doesn't wear a chastity belt, it is her fault if she is raped.

    Breaking and entering, whether into a building, or a computer, is still illegal.

    The victim may be stupid for leaving security vulnerabilities, but the criminal is still at fault and should be prosecuted to the fullest extent possible.

  • Shame on the hacker for being unsuspecting. Should have taken security measures to prevent the unwanted intrusion.
  • > And btw, an International Driver's License is meaningless in Georgia (and probably most other states) unless accompanied by a valid license from another country

    Thats not what the law officer's have told me.

    The International Driver's Permit IS recognized in over 200 countries, the States included.

    I personally know sovereigns who don't even bother with any kind of license. They freely travel.

    Cheers
  • > HOW can victimless crimes really be a crime? >But more importantly WHERE do the police get the jurisdiction to give you a ticket in the first place since the roads ARE PUBLIC!?

    > Funny, the thousands of people, including me, who have lost relatives to reckless drivers would hardly call it victimless.

    The discussion was on SPEEDING, NOT ON the right to infringe on someone else's right to LIFE, LIBERTY, or PROPERTY.

    Please don't confuse the two issues.

    Cheers
  • "Law enforcement" cannot protect your machine. It is purely a reactive measure. It can hunt down and prosecute the offending intruder, but it cannot prevent the break-in from happening. Even house security alarms don't prevent things from being stolen or intrusions from occurring - they only alert the police sooner.

    People basically have two choices when it comes to computer security:
    1) Use security/firewall programs properly, and keep staff on hand to react to alerts, or,
    2) Don't connect the machine to the network.

    Laws defining computer crimes are fine, but don't think that's going to stop anyone from stealing your data. *You* have to pay attention to your own site security and blocking measures.

  • SiN (Score:1)

    by Mazurbul ( 35820 )
    Actually, Sin is not just a label, everything else comes from it, not the other way around. Sin is, simply, disobeying God. Unfortunately, we are rather prone to sin, and the only way to stop sinning is to allow Him to take over for us. We can't possibly stop sinning on our own. (Sorry for what most of you will consider Christian garbage, but I believe that this is the truth, and if anyone wants to argue with me without stereotyping Christians, I'm very willing to hear). But because people are selfish, and want to control their own lives (imagine that), God can't help them, so things continue to go along in the same way as always. The whole situation will continue to go down hill until the end of the world. So trying to come up with a grand social scheme is a lost cause right from the get-go.
  • nobody won that one.
    Gentleman, you can't fight in here, this is the war room..
  • There is NOTHING to be said beyond that.

    The only real beer in the U.S. is imported.

    - A.P.
    --


    "One World, one Web, one Program" - Microsoft promotional ad

  • Not obsessively. I sincerely doubt the windows in my apartment would stop a stray BB gun; would you suggest that if somebody shot out my windows, it's my fault for not investing in thick "bulletproof" glass?

    Somebody who is a determined attacker and is willing to spend every day studying the process will have an advantage against somebody who actually has other foci in life.
  • Oh, I see, speeding is victimless until you actually hit something or somebody...

    Thanks for clearing that up. I was under the silly impression that "public safety" was a legitimate goal of law.
  • I think you meant to say that the way to make sure that the littering crime rate is zero is to have a police state

    Please do not put words into my mouth. Thank you. I am perfectly capable of saying what I mean to say.

    To reiterate my point, there is a trade-off between freedom and safety. In Big Brother kinds of countries crime is harder, sentences are harsher, and police's life is easier. All this works to make common people's life safer, and not from littering, but from crimes like murder, rape, etc. No, a police state is not the only way to reduce crime, but taking away some freedoms (anonymity and privacy included) is often the easiest way.

    Case in point: some locations in Great Britain installed video cameras at basically every street corner. As a result, street crime dropped
    dramatically. Of course, now you have the dubious pleasure of knowing that a cop probably watches you as you walk along the street. This is
    a fairly clear example of a safety vs. freedom trade-off. Some people (you, probably, among them) would say that this is a good trade-off, other people would disagree. Of course, when (not if) we have a good automated face recognition system, plugging it into this camera network will radically change the terms of the original trade-off, but that's a different discussion altogether. I am not saying that there is a one-size-fits-all answer -- some people need more freedom, and some people need more safety. However, the answer is clearly not as simple as saying "let's allow the police to do their work".

    By the time a cybercrime has taken place, it is too late to traceroute: logs are required

    And your point being? Sure, mandating universal global tracing/authentication/logging/etc will make the police's life easier and reduce the crime rate. But mandating that everyone wears an electronic anklet that transmits its location once a minute to a central police station will reduce the crime rate even more, much more. So why don't we pass a law forcing everyone to wear these? Because there is a trade-off, and one should at least carefully examine what one is giving up before jumping to defend some proposal.

    lets talk about how to stop the abuse

    Let's. I believe the best way to stop the abuse is to construct the system in such a way as to make the abuse impossible. I would recommend a book by Lessig "Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace" for a very good treatment of the topic.

    Governments have all sorts of interests in promoting the interests of their citizens

    I think you are confusing "have" and "should have". In any case, this statement is way too broad to be meaningful.

    The question is how do we balance the individual's interests against the group's, and this is what governments do, and they do a pretty
    good job of it, at least in Western countries

    You are confused. The question is indeed how to balance the individual's rights against group rights, but the governments are exactly those groups against which the individual's right have to be balanced. This means, of course, that if the balancing is left to the government, it will tilt the scale in it's own favor. It is a well-accepted historical fact that bureacracies, governments among them, tend to accumulate as much power as they can get away with. YMMV, of course, but from my point of view, the governments, including the Western ones, are doing a very lousy job of balancing.

    Kaa
  • Do you think they'll call it drag.net?

    just the facts ma'am ;)
    _________________________

  • So, if I spray a neighborhood with bullets, but don't hit anyone or anything, I shouldn't be prosecuted. Fascinating.

    So, what color is the sky on your home planet?

  • You cannot begin to imagine how uninterested I am in your vapid arguments. You think that "the common people's life [sic] [is] safer" in a police state? You've repeated that in two posts now, rejecting the smarter words I tried to put into your mouth, and, to paraphrase Kaa's law, in any sufficiently large group of people that is still an jawdroppingly stupid position to take. Police states are among the most dangerous places to live.

    The original poster said that Reno's proposal would amount to nothing.He got a "5" and I thought it was worth pointing out that his argument was wrong, I think it will amount to something.

    You, on the other hand, think we are dealing with Big Brother. That means, compared to him, you are on my side, you think that this is about something, not nothing. Since you disagree with him more than you disagree with me, you should post back in the main thread or pour your energy into trying to nitpick him to death, just as soon as you have finished with your nitpicking reply to this message, of course.

  • Thanks for taking the time to clarify!

    Really.

  • Let's start with the CD Universe case, and how a "LawNet" might assist in resolving the case:

    1. Jurisdiction. If a cracker in Michigan breaks into a firm's corporate servers in California, and steals a Delaware man's credit card number, all 3 states have claims on jurisdiction. Coordinating the investigation and (eventual) prosecution through one federal office makes plenty of sense.

    2. Information gathering. LawNet could serve as a useful central bank for investigative units to share information with other units that are working on the same (or similar) cases. Using the above example, LawNet would provide the mechanism by which the California investigators report their findings regarding the intrusion, so the ones in Michigan know what direction to head in. Exchanging this kind of information quickly and effectively has huge potential benefits for the investigators.

  • You don't seem to understand--the feds didn't knock. They surrounded him with the army of a small nation and told him to come out or die.

    What would you do if the police didn't show *any* signs of peace or wanting to talk anything through? A lot of people would shoot.

    Waco was an embarrasment not because how it ended, but because of the way it started, was run, and finally ended.

  • Re:SiN (Score:1)

    by sec ( 20916 )

    Unfortunately, we are rather prone to sin, and the only way to stop sinning is to allow Him to take over for us.


    Yes, indeed. Just trust Big Brother. He'll take care of everything...


    But because people are selfish, and want to control their own lives (imagine that),


    Aha! You've managed to successfully split one smaller problem off of that monolithic block you call 'sin'. Congratulations! Keep it up; you might just get somewhere yet.


    The whole situation will continue to go down hill until the end of the world.


    You know, this already happened once, in approximately 500 AD. However, when people stopped thinking the way you think, and started focussing on practical ways to improve society, things got better.


    So trying to come up with a grand social scheme is a lost cause right from the get-go.


    One thing's for sure... if nobody tries, nobody is going to succeed.


    Sorry for what most of you will consider Christian garbage, but I believe that this is the truth, and if anyone wants to argue with me without stereotyping Christians, I'm very willing to hear


    I'm not going to argue with your religious beliefs. They're your beliefs, and you are entitled to them -- I certainly don't want them. :)

    I will point out, though, that your world view is spectacularly non-useful when it comes to the issue of improving the human condition. Perhaps a 'grand social scheme' will fail to solve the world's problems. There's always that risk. However, sitting idly by waiting for the world to come to rack and ruin will _inevitably_ fail to solve the world's problems.

    So, are you part of the problem, or part of the solution?
  • > So, if I spray a neighborhood with bullets, but don't hit anyone or anything

    And who's property does the bullets land on when they eventually come down?


    Speeding != Reckless driving. Stop assuming they are the same thing.
  • Slashdot linked to an article that used "hacker" incorrectly.
  • And you're doing it again now, only even worse, doubling your error to make it into a troll. I don't agree with the post you're answering though I often fall in line with majority - or at least vocal - opinions here.

    Your error is really very simple, and is identical to the error of the poster you're responding to: You're turning 'most vocal opinion' into 'slashdot's opinion.'

    People are just less likely to respond to the error in a post that arrogantly assumes the right to speak for all than they are in a post that insultingly slams all.

    In the future, you might try saying 'Many respondants to this story' or 'A number of posts I have seen' instead of flaming 'slashdot.' Flaming slashdot as some sort of composite, borg-like entity that is all of one piece is nothing more nor less than trolling, no matter the remainder of the content of the post. Someone who posts such posts is saying to each reader '-You- have commited this error', and people are inclined to get huffy when slammed for something they didn't even do.

    Think about it. And think about the fact that if you've been posting here long enough to know the 'trends' you are a slashdotter, therefore anything that 'slashdot' believes, you must also believe.



    --Parity

  • Just pointing out the daftness of the Reno quote - this still has nothing to do with on-line privacy. Which is an issue, just not one that could be resolved by LawNet as described in the article.

    Jurisdiction. If a cracker in Michigan breaks into a firm's corporate servers in California, and steals a Delaware man's credit card number, all 3 states have claims on jurisdiction. Coordinating the investigation and (eventual) prosecution through one federal office makes plenty of sense.

    It certainly does. But no more than in any other, non-e-commercy case, I'd have thought. But then I am British and don't 'get' how US state law works.

    Of course in this case the cracker was not so much in Michigan as in Russia. So unless the 'international agents' mentioned were in fact hitmen there's probably not that much LawNet can do about it. :-)


    --
    This comment was brought to you by And Clover.

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