[WEB4LIB] Re: Magic Lantern

[Daniel Messer]

    Hear hear! I was reading an article through Netscape yesterday that Ashcroft
deemed the new anti-terror laws to be necessary and that critics who keep bringing
up Constitutional rights are helping the terrorists. Quite frankly, Ashcroft
scares me. That man looks just a little too much like the cigarette smoking man in
X-Files and his schemes are just as twisted. Once again, let's take a look at the
update for the scoreboard on American freedoms... We have:

* 2600 DeCSS appeal: Lost

* EFF & Felten vs. RIAA: Thrown out

* Dimitry Skylarov: Free, but confined to Northern California for "violating" a US
Law on Russian soil

* The FBI now has pretty much free reign to use Carnivore and Magic Lantern as
they please, complete without search warrants

* Citizens can now be tried before military tribunals with no right to attorney
client privilege

* Coders and scientists in America are now afraid to try publishing information
and studies because of the DMCA.

* The manufacturer of the most prevalent computer operating system in the world is
receiving concessions and settlements from the United States government. Now it is
brought up that Magic Lantern seeks to invade computers illegally using the
security holes scattered throughout this operating system. It could be a
coincidence, but it's a very strange one.

    To be honest, personal liberty and right to privacy in America is quickly
becoming a thing of the past. The government has said time and again that we shall
not change our way of life because to do so would be conceding defeat to the
terrorists. Well, from the looks of it, the terrorists are winning.

Dan


Raymond Wood wrote:

> Broadly speaking, privacy is under attack - even moreso since
> Sept. 11.
>
> Anyone concerned about this should be getting behind the EFF
> (Electronic Frontier Foundation) as a lobby group.  At a
> personal level, I would be implementing public key encryption
> such as PGP or GnuPG for personal email.  All this traffic is
> currently being scanned by Carnivore and similar schemes.
>
> As for PC backdoors, the sooner people start training themselves
> to use non-compromised operating systems such as Linux, the
> better.
>
> Consider it, ummm, an investment. ;>
>
> My $0.02,
> Raymond

--
Mondai wa
The subject in question...
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Daniel Messer, Technology Instructor
Yakima Valley Regional Library
102 N 3rd St Yakima, WA 98901
(509) 452-8541 x712
dmesser at yvrls.lib.wa.us
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When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.
                     -Hunter S. Thompson