**************************************************************************** >C O M P U T E R U N D E R G R O U N D< >D I G E S T< *** Volume 1, Issue #1.01 (March 31, 1990) ** **************************************************************************** MODERATORS: Jim Thomas / Gordon Meyer REPLY TO: TK0JUT2@NIU.bitnet SUBSCRIBE TO: INTERNET:TK0JUT2@NIU.BITNET@UICVM.uic.edu COMPUTER UNDERGROUND DIGEST is an open forum dedicated to sharing information among computerists and to the presentation and debate of diverse views. -------------------------------------------------------------------- DISCLAIMER: The views represented herein do not necessarily represent the views of the moderators. Contributors assume all responsibility for assuring that articles submitted do not violate copyright protections. -------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************** *** Computer Underground Digest Issue #1.01 / File 3 of 4 *** *************************************************************** An article in the AUSTIN-AMERICAN STATESMAN by Kyle Pope is perhaps the most balanced news story to cover the Legion of Doom indictments and the related confiscation of equipment at Steve Jackson Games in Austin. We had intended to reprint the entire article. However, when we called the AUSTIN-AMERICAN STATESMAN (are there no "stateswomen," or is the A-AS still a bastion of macho sexist swinery?), we were informed that on no account would they allow the article to be distributed over the nets. When we asked how much of the article they would allow us to extract, they told us that we could excerpt *NONE* of it. Not even a single line? "None of it!" Well, perhaps the A-AS has contracts with other news services who sell computerized versions of the story, but "None of it?" C'mon! "Fair use doctrine" allows reasonable reproduction of a copyright article, and after consulting with an attorney, we reproduce well under the accepted norm. So, we can only assume that the A-AS, while to be commended on a fair summary of events, as some very uptight anal-retentive types in the managing editor's office who confuse company policy with Constitutional protections! The following is drawn from a variety of sources, but all quotes come from: "U.S. Computer Investigation Targets Austinites" by Kyle Pope (%cr% Austin-American Statesman, March 17, 1990: Pp A-1, A-12). The article summarizes the background of the Legion of Doom indictments (see CuD, 1.00, files 4, 5). In the continuing investigation, federal agents and Austin police appeared at the home of a Steve Jackson Employee, greeting him with guns drawn at 6:30 a.m. They confiscated his equipment, and also took a number of books and other documents, including the M.A. thesis of CuD co-moderator Gordon Meyer. Why this document is considered worthy of confiscation escapes us, unless academic research is now considered subversive, and its possession evidence of evidence of criminal mischief. One of the concerns of federal agents was the Cyberpunk science fiction work being written at Steve Jackon's. Influenced by science fiction novel's such as William Gibson's NEUROMANCER and John Brunner's THE SHOCKWAVE RIDER, Cyberpunk mixes science fiction, computer fantasy, and alienation in futuristic techno-societies. The A-AS interviewed one writer who explained the need for realistic detail in the genre: Bruce Sterling, an Austin science fiction writer and one of the world's best-known Cyberpunk writers, said Jackson's game and its computer-related discussions are hardly unusual for the genre. "Cyberpunk is thriller fiction," Sterling said. "It deals to a great extent with the romance of crime in the same way that mysteries or techno-thrillers do." He said the detailed discussions in the Jackson games are what draws people to them. "That's the charm of simulation games," he said. "You're simulating something that's supposed to be accurate. If it's cooked up out of thin air, the people who play these games are going to lose interest." Jackson, though, said he has been told by Secret Service agents that they view the game as a user's guide to computer mischief. He said they made the comments when he went to the agency's Austin office in an unsuccessful attempt to reclaim some of his seized equipment. "As they were reading over it, they kept making outraged comments," Jackson said. "When they read it, they became very, very upset. "I said, 'This is science fiction.' They said, 'No. This is real.'" (A-AS, p. A-12). In their zeal to obtain information about reproduction of an E911 training document from a Georgia telecommunications company, federal agencies confiscated printers, monitors, CPUs, files, and other equipment from Jackson because of suspicion that one of his employees, Loyd Blankenship, had contacts with Legion of Doom: Jackson's attorney said federal officials have told him that the 911 information pilfered from Bell South has surfaced on a computer bulletin board used at Steve Jackson games. But the information apparently has not been traced to a user. Jackson said that neither he nor any of his employees is a member of the Legion of Doom. Blankenship, however, did consult with the group in the course of researching and writing the Cyberpunk game, Jackson said. Further, the group is listed in the game's acknowledgments for its aid in providing technical information used in Cyberpunk (A-AS, p. A-12). ---------------------- These confiscations raise a number of issues. First, it seems that any of us can have our equipment, and therefore our livelihoods, threatened by any connection law enforcement officials make between an offense and an alleged possessor of information. Second, as of this writing (March 30), to our knowledge none of those being investigated in this incident has been indicted. Only the equipment has been arrested. This, to us, suggests the frightening spectre of confiscation of the equipment of innocent people and disruption of lives. The A-AS article indicated that the confiscation is having a devastating impact on the economic fortunes of Steve Jackson Games. Third, it appears that laws originally intended to fight drugs and organized crime now are being used to thwart the "dreaded computer underground." Confiscation of any personal property that creative agents can claim "good faith" potential relationship to either an offense or to information about an offense, can be confiscated, including an M.A. thesis or a draft of a novel in progress. In addition, if, in their search, agents happen upon a few seeds of marijuana, they can, under federal anti-drug law, incarcerate the searchee without bail. Gary Marx has argued that we lose our freedoms not with a sweeping crackdown, but gradually. Laws originally intended to fight one "menace" now are being applied to another. This "other" menace is, we argue, largely a creation of media hysteria, law enforcement ignorance of the nature of the computer underground, and a complete failure to recognize the need to balance protection of the public commonweal with protections of civil liberties. In a recent government publication (NIJ REPORTS, Jan/Feb '90, pp 2-10), the authors lump software piracy in the same category as theft of computer chips, computers, or trade secrets. In this classification, it seems that stealing a new IBM 486 and giving a copy of Norton Utilities to a friend are identical! Uploading that pirated copy from New York to a BBS in Atlanta would, therefore, constitute a federal offense that subjects the "felon" to the full weight of federal prosecution. Our point is that, in a rapidly changing techno-world, laws are being used in a way perhaps appropriate for addressing such predatory crimes as listed in the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports, but they hardly address the problems of perceived computer abuse, real or imagined. The use of laws intended to combat one type of unacceptable behavior, such as racketeering or drug abuse, hardly seem appropriate to their current use by federal agents to combat computerists. Disrespect for law begins with its oppressive misuse, and we suggest that, ultimately, the apparent attempt of federal agents and prosecutors to define a social menace, and then make their careers saving the world from it, will subvert the respect for and rule of law in the long run. A final note to the A-AS: It is within an author's legal rights to write a number of DIFFERENT stories, excerpting different parts of a news article in each, and ultimately reprint, legally, the entire story. We are not petty enough to do so, but we find it somewhat ironic that a company whose existence derives from a free press so arrogantly responses to a legitimate request to reprint with a categorical statement that *NOTHING* can be reprinted. Is there something wrong with this picture, or did your managing editor just have a bad day? We will print a reply if you wish to make one. Jim Thomas (CuD co-moderator) =+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+ + END THIS FILE + +=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+===+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=  Downloaded From P-80 International Information Systems 304-744-2253 12yrs+