Today cryptography, tomorrow ??
AP 4/8/94: A federal grand jury indicted an MIT student Thursday on charges he ran a computer bulletin board that allowed people to copy more than $1 million worth of copyrighted software for free. [...] The bulletin board, named Cynosure, allowed people on MIT's computer network to copy business and entertainment software, the indictment said. [...] Internet users also were able to illegally copy the software, Stern said.[..] Many of the Cynosure users hid their identities by using an Internet address in Finland that provided an anonymous forwarding service for the pirated programs, according to the indictment. .... Like to include more but ..uh.. "fair use" and all that .... Wonder how come he didn't encrypt?
Many of the Cynosure users hid their identities by using an Internet address in Finland that provided an anonymous forwarding service for the pirated programs, according to the indictment.
Does this mean we will soon be seeing Julf in chains on the evening news with his coat over his head? After all, the United States long ago awarded itself kidnapping priveleges against anyone it claims has violated US law, with no concern for the laws of the country in which the person resides. Just ask Manuel Noriega. -- Mike Duvos $ PGP 2.3a Public Key available $ mpd@netcom.com $ via Finger. $
nobody@shell.portal.com wrote:
Many of the Cynosure users hid their identities by using an Internet address in Finland that provided an anonymous forwarding service for the pirated programs, according to the indictment.
Although mentioned in the indictment, appearantly Julf's server really played no part in the software piracy distribution. Cynosure was an FSP server run on an unattended workstation at MIT (which David LaMacchia did not own and did not have permission to use as an FSP server). It was not a mail server, and there is no mention of any pirated software being sent through anon.penet.fi. Instead, the feds just wanted to use the indictment as a soap box to badmouth Julf's anon-server. The indictment is on http://the-tech.mit.edu They list some twenty charges against LaMacchia. Interestingly, one of the charges was that LaMacchia created an anonymous mail pool for PGP messages on his FSP server. It looks like the government folks have found themselves a test case with which to make a statement against piracy, and, more importantly, to try to criminalize PGP and the anonymous remailers. This is bad news. :(
participants (3)
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Matthew J Ghio -
mpd＠netcom.com -
nobody＠shell.portal.com