Terrorized
The only thing we have to fear is fear itself---and the internet.
On October 26, 2001, US President George W. Bush signed the USA PATRIOT Act into law—a bill whose name alone should have set of warning bells across that nation. I can imagine the thought process now:
“Let’s see. I have a bill that contains some pretty contentious stuff. I want to get it passed without any serious debate. I know, I’ll title it PATRIOT Act so that that anyone voting No is clearly a filthy, un-American traitor!”
Brilliant! But what did the act contain? Here’s a quick summary, care of the EFF:
[the Patriot act includes] Dramatic increases to the scope and penalties of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
This includes:
raising the maximum penalty for violations to 10 years (from 5) for a first offense and 20 years (from 10) for a second offense;
ensuring that violators only need to intend to cause damage generally, not intend to cause damage or other specified harm over the $5,000 statutory damage threshold;
allows aggregation of damages to different computers over a year to reach the $5,000 threshold;
enhance punishment for violations involving any (not just $5,000) damage to a government computer involved in criminal justice or the military;
include damage to foreign computers involved in US interstate commerce;
include state law offenses as priors for sentencing;
expand definition of loss to expressly include time spent investigating, responding, for damage assessment and for restoration.
The PATRIOT Act covers a lot of ground, but two of the more significant things it accomplishes is giving the US Government the right to spy on its citizens’ internet activities without a warrant, and forcing anyone convicted of a violent crime to place their DNA in a central database.
The problem here isn’t intention—it’s practice. Realistically, at least one, if not both of these topics should have generate at least a little debate. Due to timing and nomenclature, however, no real debate ensued. Even ignoring these “pesky little Rights and Freedoms issues,” however, this Act puts the most minor of computer-related crimes on par with terrorism—$5,000 damages, over the course of a year, including time spent investigating. Is there any activity that could possibly be excluded under that definition?
The definition of “terrorist act” deserves some serious consideration. Conceptually, it is simple—terrorist acts are defined as large-scale attacks against a population or its infrastructure; i.e. the power grid, the phone network, or even cellphones—but attacks against “the internet?” Is “I can’t get to yahoo.com really on par with blowing up California’s power plants?
Terrorist acts are designed to provoke widespread fear and panic. Is waking up and discovering that your Web Site has been defaced going to make you afraid to send your children to school?
Think about this. Some idiot 12-year old sends out mail with the contents:
To: dumbass@wherever.com
From: "A trusted source" <satan@hackyourass.net>
Subject: This is not a virus!
This is not a hoax. Run the attached program called
**format_my_hard_drive_and_mail_myself to_all_your_friends.exe**
to see Anna Kournikova naked.
and when you click on it, suddenly, the neighbour’s kid has committed a crime on par with taking down the towers. This isn’t terrorism—it’s idiocy. And if $5,000 worth of investigation time later they actually throw that neighbour kid in jail, I would go as far as to say they are locking up the wrong idiot.
My real problems with PATRIOT and other such legistlation are threefold.
First, these bills are getting fast tracked through their respective Congresses and Parliaments. They effectively have a yellow post-it on top saying “Vote Yes, or you are siding with the Terrorists.” Fundamental changes to our rights and freedoms deserve debate. That’s how democracy is supposed to work.
Second, everyone and their dog is tacking on their pet piece of legislation into these bills. Consider the issue of DNA samples for violent offenders. I’m not a big fan of rapists either, but what is this doing in the terrorism bill? What good is DNA from a suicide bomber?
Changes in how the $5,000 in damages for felony computer crimes is beyond ridiculous. If the “crime” under consideration is causing damages that hover around the $5,000 mark (including “time spent investigating, responding, for damage assessment and for restoration”) then I’m pretty sure we can rule out terrorism. In fact, I’m pretty sure the crime should have the word petty- prepended to it.
Finally—and this is the real kicker—these and other laws relating to technology all seem to be written by 60-year-old grey hairs who just haven’t “been able to get the hang of them computer things yet.” These people don’t understand the technology they are legislating. They can’t—they’re afraid of it!
And perhaps that’s where the terrorism comes in: “Computers terrify me. Let’s legislate them out of existence!”
One upon a time, the only thing we had to fear was fear itself. Now we have to fear everything. Do you get the impression the terrorists have already won?
kj · PDDXX
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