Randal Schwartz's Charges Expunged 219
After 13 years, Randal Schwartz has had his conviction expunged. In effect, legally it never happened.
If you haven't heard about this one before, my take is that as a contractor at Intel, Randal did some over-zealous white-hat cracking free-of-charge; this embarrassed some people in management (he pointed out that their passwords were terrible) and management then chose to embarrass themselves further by having him convicted of a felony under an 'anti-hacking' law. More info can be had from the Friends of Randal Schwartz.
Congratulations (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Congratulations (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Congratulations (Score:5, Insightful)
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The whole point about expungement is that the court thinks you were guilty but is letting you off anyway because you've filled certain statutory criteria.
The most usual criterion (other than turning 18) is the passage of time.
This isn't justice delayed. The delay is the whole point. The court still thinks he's guilty but is letting him off anyway.
This means he can stop fighting REGARDLESS on whether or not the justice system thinks he was gui
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Re:Congratulations (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, maybe, but what I always find interesting in cases like this is: How much money did it cost?
All too often, when the "little guy" wins, he's also bankrupt.
Anyone know what the bill was for all this legal action?
Similar to SCO vs IBM (Score:3, Funny)
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What did you do, beat someone to death with a laptop?
Re:Congratulations (Score:5, Informative)
Objection! Assumes facts not in evidence, your honor!
Sustained.
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> Objection! Assumes facts not in evidence, your honor!
Ok sorry, just Intel [mit.edu].
Sorry for implying you're an asshat, but that linked document made you sound like one. Guess i should read more about it [lightlink.com] from your perspective before passing judgement.
Glad your legal battle is finally over.
Re:Congratulations (Score:5, Interesting)
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I can't blame Intel for what they did.
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Its about damned time this was cleared. (Score:5, Insightful)
--
Cheers Gene
Re:Its about damned time this was cleared. (Score:5, Insightful)
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But thats just me, an honest old fart & cynic that still thinks whats right is whats right, and whats wrong should be quickly punished, a bit like Willy N. and "Whiskey for my men, beer for my horses" song. Sometim
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Are you kidding? Responsibility? What kind of nut are you, anyway... why should anybody take responsibility
for their actions? Didn't you know that everybody is a victim, and everything bad that happens is the fault of
the evil capitalists? And furthermore, didn't you realize that we're all entitled to live in a world where everybody
gets the fairy-tale ending (and a pony) no matter how lazy, incompetent, or untalented they might
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Where the hell does
Or are you just new here?
--
Cheers, Gene & this time I'll paste my usual sig in. Enjoy.
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
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The smart form corporations.
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Ah the good old days when people were hanged the same day they were charged.
Actually come to think of it in the old days the copper barons and the railroads would have just killed the guy themselves if they thought he was stealing from them.
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The most important thing about this (Score:2)
I don't have my gun possession rights restored yet, but apparently that's
merely a formality with the BATF, and I'll be taking care of that soon.
(sarcasm on)
Well Thank God because it's a miracle that you survived these past 13 years without a gun. Certainly this is the most important part of getting your name cleared.
(sarcasm off)
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--
Cheers, Gene
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
the terrible thing about character assassination (Score:3, Interesting)
The terrible thing about character assassination is that the event never had to happen. All you have to do is start a rumor about travel expenses and the victim is as good as blacklisted at big dumb companies where lip service is given to leadership but obedience and conformity are valued above all else.
Legally Never Happened (Score:5, Insightful)
And all the effects can never be erased.
For example any "lists" he's been added to over the last 13 years will not be updated to reflect his new 'never was a criminal' status. Be it terrorist watch lists, no fly lists, FBI persons of interest list, or whatever else, not to mention his prints will remain in the system, etc, etc.
Re:Legally Never Happened (Score:5, Funny)
@files = ("terrorist_watch_list.txt", "no_fly.doc", "fbi_persons_of_interest_list.ppt");
foreach $file (@files) {
unlink($file);
}
Re:Legally Never Happened (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh, actually, this program doesn't do the right thing. Surely the right thing to do is not to delete the files but to remove Randall's name from them. Some people deserve to be on those lists.
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something like
map({open IN, "<$_";open OUT, ">$_.tmp";foreach $line(<IN>){ $line=~s/Randal Schwartz/Bill Gates/i; print OUT $line; }close IN; close OUT;rename($_.tmp,$_)},["terrorist_watch_list.txt" , "no_fly.doc", "fbi_persons_of_interest_list.ppt"]);
Assuming of course, his name is in plaintext in the doc and ppt files... otherwise, just need to pass it to something that can filter those to text and back.
Tm
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Yeah, because that no-fly is full of people so dangerous that it is just not safe to let them ride in an airplane, yet so innocent that we can't even arrest them.
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Well, approximately 95% of them don't. And I can accept a 5% failure rate.
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Ditto; FBI can still see it (Score:5, Interesting)
Basically it means he can tell a police officer he's never been arrested and doesn't need to disclose it on a non-clearance employment application or any "low grade" background check like rentin an apartment.
With that out of the way, Randal has helped me out on comp.lang.perl (right before it went moderated) so
Re:Ditto; FBI can still see it (Score:5, Informative)
A. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, and
B. The Oregon State Police, and
C. The Oregon State Corrections Division, and
D. The Arresting Agency, Portland Police Bureau.
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Sort of like instructing a jury to disregard testimony. They might be able to try, and I'm sure they do their level best, but its never really gone.
Re:Ditto; FBI can still see it (Score:5, Insightful)
As someone who has gone through a security background check, worked at Intel and read the decision of the appeals court: I would be fairly surprised if Randal was able to get a security clearance even even if no conviction had occurred. The undisputed portions of the case suggest that Randal lacked an ethical barrier between him and either his curiosity about things for which he did not have access or his desire to gain respect by demonstrating his skill. This was 13 years ago maybe he has changed, I don't know.
Whether his intentions at the time were noble or not: he logged onto a system for which he knew his account should have been deleted; he ran a gate program on the system (after previously being told to stop running a gate on other systems); he cracked one of the passwords to someone with higher access on the system; he then logged on to the system using the cracked user's account; he transferred the password file to another machine; he ran crack on this other machine; he turned up 35 weak passwords; he said nothing; he left for a while to teach a class; he came back; he still said nothing; he re-ran crack on another faster machine (this is apparently what eventually got him caught).
Randal claims he did all this to re-gain respect at Intel's supercomputer division. I have no reason to doubt this is honest. The fact that he so freely gave so much information to the police suggests to me that he was trying to convey that he had no intention of harming Intel's business. However it is very, very bad judgment. Now if you were the agent assigned to his security background check, looking to see if his character demonstrates a likelihood of compromising sensitive information, even unintentionally, what would you think?
Re:Ditto; FBI can still see it (Score:5, Insightful)
I was once working as an engineer at a secure facility, where one of my friends explained to me that he had never actually planned on working there. He figured he'd let them pay them while the background check was in progress, but never expected to actually be cleared (the interview with the Feds went something like Q: "So what about all these hits of acid they found in your refrigerator?", A: "Well, they were there.")
But they did indeed give him a clearence, I would infer because they concluded he wasn't vulnerable to blackmail on the point, and so on.
And I have to say that the opinion of "someone who has gone through a security check" isn't terribly authoritative, unless you were turned down for having a similar background to Randal's.
Depends on the check - and why they need you (Score:5, Insightful)
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But I'm very happy for Randal. I exchanged some email with him after I was made aware of the news, and wrote up an account at TidBITS [tidbits.com]. I had written a letter supporting a pardon to the Oregon governor a few years ago, and was delighted that his day out of court has finally arriv
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Re:Legally Never Happened (Score:5, Informative)
I never lost my right to vote. Only four states do that, not Oregon.
I can probably still get out of jury duty, since I now have a bias about criminal convictions. {grin}
I can't possess firearms yet. I have to apply to the BATF separately. I plan on doing that, but it's not yet in progress.
Re:Legally Never Happened (Score:4, Insightful)
Having personally sufferred through a miscarraige of justice, you still don't don't see the point of the jury.
And people wonder what's wrong with the legal system these days.
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an unfortunate encounter (Score:2, Interesting)
Congratulations Mr. Schwartz.
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Whither $68k? (Score:3)
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Re:Whither $68k? (Score:5, Insightful)
Most of the 'controversial' pardons are granted the last day of office, so there is not enough data to compare the current president and former. Report back in 2008 when there is more data.
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- Lewis "Scooter" Libby
- Donald "Rummy" Rumsfeld
- Richard "Dick" Cheney
Note that like most mobsters, W's friends have nicknames. And yes, I know none of these people have been convicted for anything, but there's still time.Re: (Score:2)
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>>Schwartz appealed the conviction. A decision by the State of Oregon Court of Appeals in April 2001 upheld the convictions on all counts, but reversed the restitution order and sent this issue back to the original court for reconsideration.<<
So it looks like the restitution was either reduced or eliminated, as the original restitution order was overturned on appeal.
Re:Whither $68k? (Score:5, Informative)
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If you're going to blow the whistle (Score:4, Funny)
Don't touch the CD's with your fingers.
Destroy the CD burner when you're done.
Buy the CD burner secondhand at a garage sale. Pay cash.
Steal the CDs from a college student.
Don't leave the CD in a place where there's a camera.
What else. Help me out here.
Rely on someone else to find the data and spread it around. No need to get yourself into trouble. Have some Common Sense. Do you know what I am speaking of?
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Getting in trouble for improving corporate security is absolutely insane.
Re:If you're going to blow the whistle (Score:5, Informative)
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Also, as MishgoDog pointed out, 's' is normal to me and strangely enough that makes your post out right confusing and I find it hard to see your logic. Odd how language works isn't it.
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Perhaps his point is just that as it's our native tongue it's bizarre to claim we misspell words. That would imply that American spelling is more correct than ours, which is exactly what you appear to be railing against.
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They're also security experts, every last one of them. They'll know *exactly* what that zero day exploit with example code is.
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Steal the CDs from a college student...Steal the CD burner from a college student.
But how will that starving college student make his illegal CD mixes now? Think of the consequences! Do the ends justify the means?
In other news... (Score:3, Funny)
In other news:
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-nB
Laugh, it's a joke (and I voted for the other, other guy anyway!)
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Now that's just silly...
Expungement is the sealing of a criminal record (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Expungement is the sealing of a criminal record (Score:4, Informative)
Indeed, a pardon cannot become effective unless you admit to wrongdoing - then you are "forgiven" and the penalty is dropped.
In this case, he could argue that he never broke the law to begin with, because he was (albeit overzealeously) exposing security issues to his own employer. So accepting a pardon would be saying, "Yeah, I did break the law, sorry." In this case, he does not have to admit wrongdoing. In this case, Randall is instead being told, "Yeah, you didn't break the law, sorry."
Honestly every one who knows Randall probably knows about this legal blemish, and probably don't care about it.
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So how was Gerald Ford able to pardon Richard Nixon for "any and all crimes he may have committed"?
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Moral Of Story: CYA (Score:4, Insightful)
The independent contractor shall...
The in-house employee shall...
May not seem a good use of time, unless you consider the value of staying out of the criminal legal system.
Re:Moral Of Story: CYA (Score:4, Insightful)
No, the real moral of this story, and others like it, is simple:
The bottom line is that corporate management doesn't give a shit about the actual security of their system. They only care about the illusion of security, and they'll bring their full wrath against anyone who dares shatter that illusion.
Let them have their illusion. If they ever get seriously 0wn3d, as is likely (it's only a matter of time), you can laugh your ass off at them, because it'll be evil people getting the shaft from other evil people. But today there is nothing but a whole lot of pain for the good guys in the world. Welcome to the real world, where evil usually wins in the end thanks to the world's inherent tendency towards chaos. You can try to fight it if you want, but you'll probably lose, so why bother? You're probably better off just keeping your own affairs in order and letting the others get fucked up the ass for their stupidity.
Education (Score:2)
Would you please give me written permission to read slashdot during my breaks, so that I can better understand the current issues with computer security and unauthorized use of company computers. And would you mind signing that with a blue pen and giving me the original and you can keep the photocopy.
Thank You.
What about Chip? (Score:4, Informative)
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How's that for revisionist history? (Score:5, Insightful)
- His position at Intel was not involved in security, intrusion detection, or other areas that might actually call for "white hat hacking" as part of the job function. He was a contractor, not an Intel employee, which I'm sure made Intel even more concerned about his security violations.
- He had installed backdoors on Intel machines, which allowed him to access the Intel network from outside the company.
- He took passwd files and ran cracking tools against them to break other users passwords.
- Not only was he cracking password files from Intel organizations, he was using Intel systems to crack password files from other companies, including O'Reilly and Associates.
See this writeup [mit.edu] for information from the person involved in shutting him down.
Whether this was "white hat" hacking could be debated. In any case, it was fucking stupid. Bypassing network security for an inbound back door?!? Cracking password files from other companies on Intel computers?!? These are just stupid moves, which anyone should expect to get fired for doing.
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Mr. Schwartz decided that he wanted far more computing power then what he legally had access to. He then found some, used it and got caught. Sheer stupidity and he's bloody lucky to this ruling.
Hopefully he's learned his lesson.
Oh, and for those that think what Mr. Schwartz did was "white hat", it in no way shape or form is that. Hell, it's not even Grey. Yah, installing backdoors. That's soooo
Re:How's that for revisionist history? (Score:5, Informative)
Wrong, I was a systems and network administrator. According to job description, that's part of the job.
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Eivind.
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You'd already been reprimanded for a security violation of the SSD facility after your contract there had expired. You were using resources (on a machine you had been told not to use) to crack the passwords of not only an Intel facility you no longer worked at, but also another company. You installed a backdoor that while you may argue it was secure, allowed external access to the Intel network without having approval to do so. Every employer I have worked at would look on these unauthorised actions as gros
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Re:How's that for revisionist history? (Score:4, Insightful)
I mean just look at the fine to revenue ratios. And who got a criminal record because they were involved in the sony rootkit thing?
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By your own argument he was therefore absolutely responsible for the breach of security on the network that he himself caused. And yes, it was a breach, installing a backdoor for offsight access without permission - or at the very least notification to IT - is a breach of security.
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Complaint brought by Mr. Schwartz's client, the Intel Corporation
Intel v. Randal Schwartz: Why Care? [eff.org] by Jeffrey Kegler, February 4, 1996
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tji wrote:
I remember reading this in a column in a free weekly computer rag, shortly after it happened. The author of the column wasn't willing to mention "Intel" by name... but he was willing to mention that a vice-president of the company was using the password "vicepresident".
Re:How's that for revisionist history? (Score:5, Informative)
Great news (Score:3, Informative)
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A good follow-up would be to read John M Barrie's The Great Influenza to find out how 1984 was in part inspired by the US under the administration of Woodrow Wilson.
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Pretty much the same thing would happen. The onlt changte is that managment may not have done it at all.
and "un-person". sheesh. Less 1984, more Moby Dick for you.
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However, they do have a management culture problem. In that management doesn't understand that is is a good thing to see failure coming, and then say something to either adjust the project path or kill the project.
This is not a unique problem at Intel, but what is odd is that there is a lot of process and methods in place to do this, but people have become afraid.
What Intel really needs is for a manager who is about