Globe and Mail Article On Forged Posting

17 Dec 2003

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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!
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Tories cause uproar in legislature

Rae furious after Harris distributes prank letter circulating on
Internet

- From THE GLOBE AND MAIL, Toronto, December 9, 1994 pg A6

  BY JAMES RUSK
  and MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT
  Queen's Park Bureau

TORONTO - Progressive Conservative Leader Michael Harris caused an
uproar in the Ontario Legislature yesterday by presenting a prank
letter circulating on the Internet computer system that is
purported to have been written by Premier Bob Rae.
  The computer message has Mr. Rae making tasteless references to
Ontario's Attorney-General Marion Boyd and commenting on the trial
of Karla Homolka, who was convicted in the slayings of two Ontario
schoolgirls.
  A copy of the letter obtained by The Globe and Mail warns that
"this message is NOT from the person listed in the from line. It is
from an automated software remailing service" in California. This
message was on the letter from the time the company received it and
passed it on to the computer bulletin board where Internet users
can read it, said Gwen Rachlin, director of operations for Portal
Communications of Cupertino, Calif., through which the message was
posted.
  However, the copy distributed by the Conservatives yesterday did
not contain any notice that it was a fake, and Mr. Harris made the
sensational claim that the letter could indicate a security lapse
in the Premier's Office.
  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.
  "I really do think that Mr. Harris has reached a genuine new low.
I think it's a low that I hadn't anticipated he would hit, but in
my book he's hit it," Mr. Rae said.
  It is relatively easy for an Internet user to send fake messages
on the system, which links millions of computer users around the
world.
  But Mr. Harris said a lapse could have occurred in the Premier's
Office, allowing someone to send the letter. Mr. Harris told
reporters that he raised the issue out of a sense of worry that
foreign governments could get on the Internet and place fake
messages about the province.
  He was quick to add that he didn't think the Premier wrote the
letter.
  "Clearly it didn't come from the Premier or anyone close to the
Premier. But it does raise the security question," Mr. Harris told
reporters.
  Mr. Rae lashed out at what he called "the dirty tricks stuff, the
right-wing nonsense that he's coming up with every day. . . and
then this stuff."
  When Mr. Rae found out Mr.Harris's aides had distributed the
letter to the media, he said he couldn't believe the party "would
engage in that kind of tactic. This is unbelievable. Today, you
have managed to lower the tone of this place. "
  The Premier then stormed out, and the Speaker called a 15-minute
recess to allow the tempers of the MPPs, many of whom were shouting
at each other, to cool.  It was the last day of this sitting of the
House.
  The copy of the letter distributed by the Tories to the media had
the obscene references blacked out, although Mr. Harris had given
Mr.Rae an original copy. 
  A press release issued by the Conservatives referred to Mr. Rae
as "road-kill on the Information Highway," and exulted, "Internet
Bob: the hacker is hacked. "
  Mr. Rae called these comments "bizarre."
  The phony message, which was posted on Saturday in a computer
bulletin board called ont.general, was discovered by the Premier's
Office on Tuesday, but the office decided that it could do nothing
about it. Mr. Rae recently announced that he had an address on the
Internet.
  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, and it was decided that to make a fuss about it would draw
unnecessary attention to it, an official in the Premier's Office
said.
  The official, who asked not to be named, said the office has not
launched an investigation into where the message came from.
  Ms. Rachlin said the company received a call from police about
the letter yesterday afternoon. But she said the company had
already had "some incidents" with the source of the message. She
added that she was ready to co-operate with the police.
  The source of the message was an account that provides a service
that allows people anonymous access to the Internet, she said.
  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.
  By going through a California bulletin board, "obviously someone
has gone way out of their way to send that in," Mr. Sherman
added.
  Even so, the message can be traced, said Rick Broadhead, co-
author of The Canadian Internet Handbook. "If they [the sender]
have gone through a service, it is going to take some more work to
trace it," Mr. Broadhead said. But looking at the log records of
the computer service, police can follow the message back to the
originating computer.
  The use by the Conservatives of the fake letter again puts the
spotlight on the party.
  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.  
  The Tories also bought a copy of a labour bill sold at an NDP
fund raising and paraded it around their convention like captured
trophy.

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