[lug] On NPR this morning

[D. Stimits]

Sean LeBlanc wrote:
> 
> On 12-11 10:03, Scott A. Herod wrote:
> > Actually, the business report on KUVO.
> >
> > There was a bit this morning about the FBI proposing to
> > write an email trojan horse that would infect computers
> > and send them encryption passwords.  If I saw the story
> > on the web I'd discount it.  Has anyone seen the story
> > crop up somewhere else?  I figured slashdot would have
> > it but saw nothing since Sunday.  Perhaps it is time to
> > finally start signing emails and encrypting stuff.
> 
> It actually popped up twice on Slashdot, I believe...over a week ago. Once
> for each major virus "protection" program that decided to opt out of
> scanning for it. I put "protection" in quotes because that's now a rather
> dubious claim. I think the articles did point out that at least so far, only
> Windoze and related virii-spreading tools will be impacted at the beginning
> - I think "infecting" my FreeBSD box via Mutt will be an interesting
> challenge to say the least. :)
> 
> However, I am reminded of that quote about the Nazis - something like "First
> they came for the Blacks, then the Communists...by the time they came for
> me, there was no one left to speak out"
> 
> And weren't we trying to get hacking classified as terrorism post-Sep 11? If
> the FBI is engaging in this, wouldn't they be engaging in terrorism (if
> hacking gets classified as such)?

Don't forget who owns the dictionary. More likely what would happen is
that anyone defeating the trojan, or writing open source antivirus
software which detects it, would be considered a terrorist. You'd then
lose some of the rights you'd have if you were accused of some other
non-terrorist crime. It has nothing to do with terrorism, unless the
writers of laws know what terrorism is, and give a damn (which means
they are out for justice instead of blood, even though blood can
sometimes be justice...subtle difference). Considering some of the
blatant attacks against open source software, it's a short distance to
call open source antivirus software a threat to national security and
thus damn it no matter what the people think.

D. Stimits, stimits at idcomm.com

> 
> All the posturing last week from Leaky Leahy last week about military
> tribunals - that's not even an issue, IMHO. The kind of stuff the FBI is
> doing/proposing against CITIZENS should be the topic at hand - not suspected
> non-citizen terrorists that are here on student visas that fit a certain
> profile(no, not RACIAL profiling!!!) being detained. Talk about misguided.
> 
> --
> Sean LeBlanc:seanleblanc at attbi.com Yahoo:seanleblancathome
> ICQ:138565743 MSN:seanleblancathome AIM:sleblancathome
> Don't vote, it only encourages them.
> (contributed by Chris Johnston)
> Management QOTD:Look, it doesn't matter if the change makes things better or
> worse as long as we recognize who our customers are and
> micro-manage the project farming.
> 
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