Here's an interesting case involving the use of the anon.penet.fi remailer for journalistic purposes, in a sensational trial in Canada that the the Canadian goverment has declared a press ban on. (You may recall that issues of "Wired" were seized because a short article dared to mention the press ban.) The Karla Homolka-Paul Teale case allegedly involves Karla and her husband killing her own sister during forced sex, kidnapping and rituallistically torturing and murdering at least one other woman, videotaping the tortures to show later victims, and--some say--cannibablism. Karla Homolka (known to some as Karla the Kannibal) confessed. The judge in the Teale trial declared a press ban a year or so ago. Since then, several major Usenet newsgroups have--it is said, though I have no way to verify this-been barred in some or all parts of Canada. Ditto for newspapers and magazines. But "information wants to be free," and information is reaching Canadians via many other routes. This is causing calls for crackdowns on the Net. Of direct interest to Cypherpunks. (There are those who talk about Teale's need for a "fair trial." A press blackout for over a year, and the threat that anyone who seeks information or discussed the case will be thrown into the Bastille is not consistent with the ideals of even a semi-free society. In my personal opinion, the evidence against Teale is so heinous, so overwhelmingly convincing, etc., that the trial could and should have been completed in about 2 weeks after their arrest. I favor decriminaling almost everything, of course, and then swiftly and decisively pursuing and punishing murdereres, rapists, thieves, and child molestors. Sounds fair to me.) Anyway, as many of you may not be reading alt.fan.karla-homolka (which is banned in Canada as I hear it...any of our Northern readers want to confirm or refute this?), here's an excellent summary of how some amateur journalists are using Julf's anonymizing service to get the truth out: (Note that the article was also posted via anon.penet.fi) Message-ID: <233332Z11051994@anon.penet.fi> Newsgroups: alt.fan.karla-homolka From: an52708@anon.penet.fi (Neal the trial ban breaker) X-Anonymously-To: alt.fan.karla-homolka Organization: Anonymous contact service Reply-To: an52708@anon.penet.fi Date: Wed, 11 May 1994 23:27:33 UTC Subject: Id Article Lines: 253 This was a particularly well written article that gives some interesting background to the the plight of yours truly and a couple of collegues :> The Electronic Ban Breakers How three computer users are getting information out about the Karla Homolka trial - and why the government can't do a thing about it. by Chad Skelton Word count : 1896 The day after Gordon Domm was arrested for distributing information about the Karla Homolka case, "Abdul" sat in the Ontario legislature, listening intently to the MPPs discuss the publication ban. As Attorney General Marion Boyd fended off criticism about the ban, Abdul sat quietly in the gallery. No one in the legislature that day could have known that while they were discussing a man who had distributed information on the trial to 50 people, Abdul, who is responsible for sending some of that same material to almost a thousand individuals, was watching them all from above. Abdul is one of a hand-full of computer users dedicated to getting information about the Karla Homolka trial out to the public, in a manner which is more quiet, and much more efficient, than anything the many other trial ban breakers have done. With the help of a computer system in Finland, three users known only as Abdul, Neal, and Lieutenant Starbuck, are becoming the most influential players in this illicit trade of information. While newspaper pages are filled with stories on the printed ban breakers, like Gordon Domm, and Frank magazine - the story of these electronic ban breakers hasn't been told. Interviewed for the first time, by any member of the media, the three men gave detailed accounts of their connections to the case, their methods of distribution, and their reasons for getting involved. The first person to tell the electronic community about Karla Homolka and Paul Teale was Neal, who posted information on the case before any of the international press stories broke. Neal, self described resident of cyberspace, and, "freedom fighter", claims to have several direct or indirect connections to the case. These contacts, he claims, include the pathologist's office, a nurse at a Southern Ontario Hospital, and a police officer. Based on the information he received from these sources, Neal posted one of the first notable messages in the "alt.fan.karla-homolka" newsgroup. His message contained details about the killings, the evidence, and the accused - all in sickening detail. Neal delights in the freedom of the electronic network. Asked why the courts instituted a ban, Neal concludes the decision was "wishful longing (on the part of the courts) to be back in the 19th century before the days of the electronic medium." Asked if he thought his actions were criminal, he replied, "There comes a time when you have to resist the tyranny of the state. Did the Americans holding the Boston Tea Party think they were criminals? In the eyes of the British law they were - but in their own, they felt they were fighting to uphold some basic freedoms. And that's what I'm doing!" Neal says he decided to tell the network what he knew to, "get the snowball rolling downhill - if I could post some details, others could perhaps tell what they [knew] as well." And others did. Several people posted rumours and speculation on the case into the Homolka newsgroup. Soon the rumours required some sort of organization, so Lt. Starbuck decided to make a FAQ. FAQ stands for "Frequently Asked Questions". As somewhat of an institution on the network, FAQs serve as useful information files on a given topic. They exist for sex, atheism, movies, and television, just to name a few. But in September of 1993, a different kind of FAQ was created. September saw the debut of, "The Paul Teale/Karla Homolka Frequently Asked Questions List". Lt. Starbuck, the moderator of the FAQ, is a student of Science at a Southern Ontario University. In his mid 20s, Starbuck updates the FAQ regularly as new rumours and information are made available. The latest version, "Version 2.1", was released on February 1st, 1994. Starbuck posts the FAQ on several newsgroups, and sends it out in electronic mail to those that request it. Asked to estimate how far his FAQ has reached he said it was, "impossible to know how many people have seen the FAQ posts in newsgroups like `alt.censorship' and `alt.true-crime', in addition to people who regularly access (other computers that have it available)." Starbuck doesn't claim that all, or even most, of the rumours are true. In fact, even while widely distributing the FAQ, Starbuck believes the rumours may be harmful. "The existence of the ban", he says, "And the speculation that followed it, are just as dangerous as not having (a ban)." Abdul, known as, "the Electronic Gordon Domm", is unquestionably the most influential of the electronic trial ban breakers. In the first few months of the "alt.fan.karla-homolka" newsgroup, Abdul (still using his real name) was one of the most active rumour posters. A student at a Toronto University, in his early 20s, and living in Scarborough - Abdul found himself hearing plenty of rumours about the case, which he quickly posted to the newsgroup. In addition to the rumours, however, he also knew people with connections to the case, including someone he met at a party that knew Karla Homolka's sister Tammy, and a friend whose father was the Durham Region Staff Sergeant. In the beginning, Abdul posted the information he had on the case to as many newsgroups as possible - but this led to mainstream groups, such as "soc.culture.canada" being banned from network sites, angering many people. So, as an alternative, Abdul decided to begin an electronic mailing list, by compiling the electronic mail (e-mail) addresses of people that wanted to be sent information on the case. Newsgroups are like newspapers, and electronic mail is like a private letter. Very few network sites will search e-mail, as they consider it private and confidential. This allowed Abdul a method of getting the information about the case out - even though "alt.fan.karla-homolka" was rapidly being banned at universities and network sites all across the country, including the University of Guelph, Toronto, and Waterloo - and Canada Remote Systems, a computer bulletin board. As he worked out the logistics of the electronic mailing list, Abdul was, as he put it, "getting tired of reciting the FAQ at every party." So he decided that in addition to his electronic efforts to get information out, he would also help to distribute facts about the case in more conventional ways. This led Abdul to collect all the articles and rumours he had on the case, and organize them into one large file he called the, "Teale Tales Digest". Using three printer ribbons, and a full box of computer paper - he printed over 50 copies of the digest. "(I) gave them to everyone I knew, and some I didn't," Abdul recalls, "I left five on the TTC and three in the washrooms of a Toronto university." Talking to people he gave the digest to, he says, "some of their copies have been photocopied up to fifteen times." And while his conventional methods of distributing information match those of his namesake, Gordon Domm, Abdul's most notable breach of the ban was, and is, electronic. When interviewed, Abdul's electronic mailing list was growing at an incredible rate. He claimed to have over 800 e-mail addresses, with 200 of those having signed up within the last week. Having directly given the information to at least 800 people, Abdul believes that he has already been indirectly responsible for giving information on the case to about 10,000 people. A number that is increasing every day as the electronic articles and rumours are printed out, photocopied, and distributed - over and over again. In addition to sending regular updates to interested individuals, Abdul is also equipped to provide computer users with exactly what they want. With computerized copies of everything from the Washington Post article on the trial, to a transcript of the tabloid show "A Current Affair", Abdul has virtually everything that has ever been printed or broadcast in the foreign press about the case. And each article can be requested individually from his electronic mail address. Abdul promotes these articles, and the mailing list, by posting messages in over 30 newsgroups, telling people how to get them. Although what Abdul is doing is on a scale much larger than that of Gordon Domm, or any of the other trial ban breakers, Abdul insists he isn't afraid of being arrested. In fact, all three electronic trial ban breakers said they don't feel they will ever be arrested for what they're doing. This is due mainly to the common link of the electronic trial ban breakers - a computer service in Finland and a Finnish computer user named Julf. Julf is a self-employed businessman living in Helsinki, who runs what is called, "The anon.penet.fi Anonymous Server". The server, originally intended for Scandinavians, allows computer users to post messages and send electronic mail anonymously - by bouncing it off the Finnish system. Traceable electronic mail addresses are replaced with generic anonymous accounts, which conceal the location and name of the sender, making it next to impossible for the messages to be traced back to their original source. Julf's service has existed for over a year. He says his intentions with the server are to, "provide a means for discussion on sensitive topics without having to fear repercussions from peers, employers, totalitarian regimes and fussy mothers." Julf hasn't actively been involved in distributing information on the trial, even though his service is involved in cloaking the information sent by others. Julf, for whom English is a third language, isn't even particularly interested in the case. He only learned about it when computer users complained that his service was being used to post information on the trial. However, as Julf puts it, "it is impossible, and unethical, for me to monitor the over 4000 messages handled by my server every day." Julf says the only way that investigators in Canada could possibly track down Abdul, Neal, Lt. Starbuck, or any other user posting information on the trial, would be to seize his computer, in Helsinki, which contains logs of where mail has been sent. However, Julf isn't concerned. "It would definitely take a Finnish court," he stresses, "And involve a fair bit of international jurisdiction juggling." However, that may all be irrelevant, as it's not even clear as to whether the police, or Attorney-General's office, are actively pursuing the electronic ban breakers. While Abdul, Neal, and Lt. Starbuck are very hard to identify and locate, they are easy to contact through the Finnish server. And all three say they haven't received anything in electronic mail from law enforcement or government agencies. Barbara Krever, of the Attorney-General's Office, refused to comment specifically on the electronic trial ban breakers, saying all potential breaches of the ban brought to the attention of the Attorney General's office are reviewed. Asked whether there were people qualified to deal with the electronic breaches of the ban, Krever refused to "talk about specifics". She also refused to comment when asked why the people mentioned in this article hadn't been contacted. In the meantime, Abdul's electronic mailing list continues to grow. When asked if he had a message for those trying to enforce the ban, Abdul had this to say: "There is no way you can stop us. For years you have tried to regulate us ... Now we can go wherever there is a phone line, without you looking over our shoulder. You'll have to shut down every phone, every radio transmitter, to keep us quiet." ------------------------------------------------------------------------- To find out more about the anon service, send mail to help@anon.penet.fi. Due to the double-blind, any mail replies to this message will be anonymized, and an anonymous id will be allocated automatically. You have been warned. Please report any problems, inappropriate use etc. to admin@anon.penet.fi. --