For the past two weeks, Washington has been in the depths of a discussion about the best way to stop the online theft of intellectual property. The content created by movie makers and others is being stolen by overseas web sites who, sometimes quite blatantly, offer the pirated material to users. The debate has revolved around two bills, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA). There are serious concerns about these two bills ranging from issues of cybersecurity, to freedom of expression, to a broader …
Is Congress about to limit freedom of speech on the Internet? Two bills wending their way through the Senate and the House may do just that. The proposals, known as the Protect IP Act (PIPA) and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) are aimed at stopping foreign-based Web sites from distributing copyrighted material, such as Hollywood movies, in violation of U.S. law. Such online “piracy” is a real problem, and since many of the so-called pirate sites distributing content are based off-shore, they have been able to operate without interference. …
Sometimes my friends and colleagues wonder why I fixate on cybersecurity and the Internet. I tell them all the time that it is the single most important and misunderstood problem in the world today, but often I don’t think they understand the scale of the problem. So it was fascinating to see this end-of-year summary of the incredible things that happen on the Internet every minute. It isn’t often that we get a good understanding of just how BIG the Internet really is. So, consider: Today there are more than …
As the ball dropped in Times Square and bells across the globe rang in the new year, the cyber world reminded us, yet again, that the new year brings significant new challenges. To recap quickly, Stuxnet was a wild, malicious computer virus that infected the Iranian nuclear program, causing the machines that Iran uses to purify nuclear fuel to malfunction. By all accounts, Stuxnet set back the Iranian nuclear weapons program by a year. But it also infected servers around the globe in India, Indonesia, and the United States. Nobody …
The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) is a well-meaning law that is hopelessly overbroad. It starts from an unobjectionable premise—there ought to be a law that makes it a crime to hack into someone else’s computer without their permission—but it has gone off the rails. The policy prescriptions to fix it offered by the trio of Senators Chuck Grassley (R–IA), Al Franken (D–MN), and Mike Lee (R–UT) are far superior to the competing effort being advanced by Senator Patrick Leahy (D–VT), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The problem …
On November 8, officials in Springfield, Illinois, discovered that cyber hackers had gained remote access to the city’s water utility. As The Washington Post reports, the hackers first stole the password and access codes from a local company that develops Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems. SCADA systems are operating systems that run many manufacturing plants around the globe. The hackers then used the stolen codes to manipulate the utility’s operational system. As a result, at least one water pump was damaged and burned out. According to a Department …
Do you know all the laws of the United States? Do you know all the laws of each of the 50 states (not to mention the assorted territories, Indian reservations, and other enclaves)? Probably not. And yet “ignorance of the law is no excuse” has been a maxim of criminal law since time immemorial. The result is an ever-expanding discretion for prosecutors – who now can pick a target for an investigation and then scour the statutes for a suitable crime with which to charge him. As Lavrenti Beria, Stalin’s …
The law, increasingly, is becoming a tool used by opponents of American power to harass American officials and, through the courts, limit America’s freedom of action. A case in point is the lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of Amir Meshal (an American citizen). Meshal, who lives in New Jersey, says that in 2006 he travelled to Somalia “to enrich his study of Islam.” At that time, parts of Somalia were under the control of the Islamic Courts Union – a fundamentalist militia. Later that year …
You have to love this story. Apparently, WikiLeaks is plagued by … you guessed it, leaks! Confronted with the fact that some of its volunteers and employees are talking to outsiders about WikiLeaks and about some of the materials it has collected but hasn’t yet published, WikiLeaks is now demanding that everyone sign a confidentiality agreement and promise to keep everything about WikiLeaks secret unless authorized to release the information. The agreement says that anyone who violates its terms will be subject to a penalty of $20 million (we kid …
Congress did something important yesterday: It took a stand on behalf of American security, and it did so at the risk of angering our European allies. That took some guts, but it was the right thing to do. The European Union is a critical partner for America in maintaining our national security. Europe serves as a gateway for travel to the U.S. and a welcome trading partner for our goods. European nations have sent troops to fight in Afghanistan and—under the umbrella of NATO—to Libya. Our own security benefits from …
