[iwar] [fc:Bracing.for.the.Digital.Crackdown]

From: Fred Cohen (fc@all.net)
Date: 2002-08-24 07:50:04


Return-Path: <sentto-279987-5235-1030200588-fc=all.net@returns.groups.yahoo.com>
Delivered-To: fc@all.net
Received: from 204.181.12.215 [204.181.12.215] by localhost with POP3 (fetchmail-5.7.4) for fc@localhost (single-drop); Sat, 24 Aug 2002 07:52:07 -0700 (PDT)
Received: (qmail 16692 invoked by uid 510); 24 Aug 2002 14:48:05 -0000
Received: from n32.grp.scd.yahoo.com (66.218.66.100) by all.net with SMTP; 24 Aug 2002 14:48:05 -0000
X-eGroups-Return: sentto-279987-5235-1030200588-fc=all.net@returns.groups.yahoo.com
Received: from [66.218.66.95] by n32.grp.scd.yahoo.com with NNFMP; 24 Aug 2002 14:49:49 -0000
X-Sender: fc@red.all.net
X-Apparently-To: iwar@onelist.com
Received: (EGP: mail-8_1_0_1); 24 Aug 2002 14:49:48 -0000
Received: (qmail 53573 invoked from network); 24 Aug 2002 14:49:48 -0000
Received: from unknown (66.218.66.218) by m7.grp.scd.yahoo.com with QMQP; 24 Aug 2002 14:49:48 -0000
Received: from unknown (HELO red.all.net) (12.232.72.152) by mta3.grp.scd.yahoo.com with SMTP; 24 Aug 2002 14:49:48 -0000
Received: (from fc@localhost) by red.all.net (8.11.2/8.11.2) id g7OEo5020619 for iwar@onelist.com; Sat, 24 Aug 2002 07:50:05 -0700
Message-Id: <200208241450.g7OEo5020619@red.all.net>
To: iwar@onelist.com (Information Warfare Mailing List)
Organization: I'm not allowed to say
X-Mailer: don't even ask
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL3]
From: Fred Cohen <fc@all.net>
X-Yahoo-Profile: fcallnet
Mailing-List: list iwar@yahoogroups.com; contact iwar-owner@yahoogroups.com
Delivered-To: mailing list iwar@yahoogroups.com
Precedence: bulk
List-Unsubscribe: <mailto:iwar-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com>
Date: Sat, 24 Aug 2002 07:50:04 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [iwar] [fc:Bracing.for.the.Digital.Crackdown]
Reply-To: iwar@yahoogroups.com
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
X-Spam-Status: No, hits=0.0 required=5.0 tests=DIFFERENT_REPLY_TO version=2.20
X-Spam-Level: 

Bracing for the Digital Crackdown
By Brad King

Print this  €  E-mail it

2:00 a.m. Aug. 22, 2002 PDT

The government is preparing a national crackdown on file traders that
would crush the rogue swapping networks in the same manner hackers were
pushed underground 12 years ago. 

File trading has enraged music labels and movie studios since the
release of Napster in 1999.  The once-popular network was shuttered a
year later, but entertainment executives have been struggling to contain
the swapping phenomenon since.  In less than three years, 70 million
people have downloaded applications, such as Kazaa, that sprang up in
Napster's stead. 

Washington lawmakers have been crafting bills that would give the
entertainment industry the go-ahead to identify individual users,
disrupt file-trading services and prosecute anyone suspected of digital
piracy. 

The fear and loathing focused at the file-trading community is
reminiscent of 1990, just before the Secret Service and the FBI
conducted raids in order to smash the loosely affiliated hacker
organizations around the country, as chronicled by Bruce Sterling in The
Hacker Crackdown. 

"They are going after the same set of folks they were going after back
then," said John Perry Barlow, co-founder of the Electronic Frontier
Foundation, a nonprofit legal fund formed to defend people caught in the
hacker raids.  "They are going after people who are young and want to
share their ideas.  They are criminalizing the curious."

The hacker raids have faded into memory, but they shook the foundation
of the burgeoning BBS scene.  Billboards, as they were called, were
precursors to Web pages.  Instead of typing in a URL, people had to dial
directly into the computer that hosted the page. 

The national raids were staged in Arizona under the name Operation Sun
Devil and took down 25 billboards.  Several hackers faced lengthy prison
sentences, and many believe Sun Devil was only sidetracked when the
government mistakenly targeted Steve Jackson Games, an Austin, Texas
company that made Dungeons &amp; Dragons style games. 

Agents raided the business, shutting down the computer system because
they claimed it contained information on how to hack into phone systems. 
Eventually, they realized they had confiscated the specs for a new game. 
The resulting publicity took the wind out of the sails of the federal
agents. 

Civil liberty advocates are wondering how far the government will be
able to go in attacking file trading before the courts force the
government to stop. 

"(The Jackson raid) was a situation where a federal judge said that the
raid was crazy, but so far the early responses in the new era have not
been particularly helpful," said Cindy Cohen, the EFF's legal advisor. 

"A lot of people thought the actual prosecuting of Americans will be the
tipping point.  We're talking about 70 million people who use
file-trading services.  But honestly, I don't know where the 'wait a
minute' moment will come from."

Congress has shown its unwillingness to roll back the charging
entertainment industry, said Joe Kraus, co-founder of the rights group
DigitalConsumer.org.  Proposed legislation seems intent on providing
entertainment companies control over what people can do with digital
media. 

Sen.  Fritz Hollings (D-South Carolina) proposed legislation that would
put restrictive security chips in every piece of new hardware.  Sen. 
Joe Biden (D-Delaware) offered a bill that would make it illegal to
remove a digital watermark from any media file, even if it interferes
with the file's use.  Rep.  Howard Berman (D-California) introduced a
measure that would allow companies to block people from trading files
they believe to be pirated. 

Each of the measures assumes the user's guilt and attempts to create a
pre-emptive solution. 

"We're basically legalizing tactics that are, for all intents and
purposes, illegal for all other groups to do," said Kraus.  "The media
companies are launching a full-tilt assault on taking away fair use
rights from consumers.  The reason they are doing that (is because) they
are after far greater amounts of control over how consumers use media."

Until recently, people could be relatively safe in assuming that their
ISP would protect their identity.  That protection would also slow
attempts by the government to stage large-scale national raids. 

Many believe that eroding that protection is at the heart of the
Recording Industry Association of America court battle with Verizon. 

The RIAA asked the federal District Court of the District of Columbia to
force Verizon Internet Services to turn over the identity of a user who
allegedly made thousands of pirated songs available on Kazaa, the most
popular file-trading application. 

The company refused to comply with the order, arguing the entertainment
industry is presuming the guilt of its users without any due process. 
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act gives entertainment companies the
ability to have ISPs remove infringing users, however Verizon is arguing
that it doesn't given them the right to demand to get the identity of
individual users. 

"They are trying to attack peer-to-peer file sharing on many fronts,"
said Sarah Deutsch, Verizon's general council.  "They are trying to
shortcut the proper legal process to go after users."

------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
4 DVDs Free +s&p Join Now
http://us.click.yahoo.com/pt6YBB/NXiEAA/mG3HAA/kgFolB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

------------------
http://all.net/ 

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ 



This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : 2002-10-01 06:44:32 PDT