-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- - -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Mark Terka writes:

Ok, here is the text of the story about the "Forged Bob Rae Posting" from the Toronto Globe and Mail. An examination of the story only indicates how far our journalists and politicians have to go in understanding the Internet!

Indeed. Let's examine some of the apparent misconceptions.... [quoted text from here to the end is from Rusk & Mittelstaedt of the Globe & Mail]

A furious Mr. Rae criticized Mr. Harris outside the legislature, accusing him of leading to the "Americanization of Canadian politics" through the use of "dirty tricks.

(ouch :) [...]

Ont.general is a computer bulletin board on which Internet users discuss life and public issues in the province, said Larry Sherman, president of Internet Seminars of Woodbridge. A message can be removed from the board only by whoever posted it,

No, anyone with a moderately flexible newsreader and a little bit of knowledge about news control message syntax can cancel someone else's article. Tying this in to the discussion about using a newsgroup as a message pool, notice that news articles are far easier to wipe out than mail messages. This is potentially a major vulnerability of any such system, given current news software. Widespread unauthorized cancellations (other than for spam) are greatly frowned upon, though, so a concerted attack would probably set up a major clash of powers on the net. [...]

The source of the message was an account that provides a service that allows people anonymous access to the Internet, she said.

mail forwarding =/= net access

Mr. Sherman said it is very easy to post a false message on a bulletin board and to make it appear that it came from a computer different from the one that sent it.

True, but that's a claim about forgery, not remailing; this is a worrisome confusion of terms reminiscent of the hacker/cracker problem.

By going through a California bulletin board, "obviously someone has gone way out of their way to send that in," Mr. Sherman added.

One hopes that Internet Seminars pres. Sherman isn't responsible for the absurd implication I infer from this: sending mail via a geographically distant site requires going out of one's way. Is there some more sensible interpretation ? It seems obvious that someone posting an article purporting to emanate from the Canadian PM would try to transmit it with some level of indirection. [...]

Last months, the Tories played pranks at an NDP convention sending in a camera crew that shot pictures ridiculing Mr. Rae, including a doctored video sequence that seemed to give the Premier a stutter. The picture were broadcast as dinner-time entertainment at a Conservative convention the same weekend.

Who's learning slimy politics from whom ? - - -L. Futplex McCarthy; PGP key by finger or server "We've got computers, we're tapping phone lines; I know that that ain't allowed" --Talking Heads - -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.1 iQCVAwUBLuwUnmf7YYibNzjpAQHqQAP+LPVNyr0dFCMDlSmF9GiLzK6ODmCgpopC Pke/Qk9esB+vWA5bPpxtbD1Z61rCGJgvZU++g1+vovmbcSzduoQMauEKKoX5+V9m oGEcfyvu1KqnsVL83jN6YHTMANs/DxHCPVf8jWusJOgQJ+LzZN9xPxlcKDBRFiS1 wyBTHvaOlaQ= =Lism - -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- - --- [This message has been signed by an auto-signing service. A valid signature means only that it has been received at the address corresponding to the signature and forwarded.] -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Gratis auto-signing service iQBFAwUBLuwV9yoZzwIn1bdtAQHkUAF/QCXYBhzma2Y8rrT+hWnIeZYkjlNzi+8s Nf3pPrzjc34nCOsxcwz9aJ9AjhPvWJEV =wOms -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----