Got questions about your computer?
Mm-hmm.
Want to know about the latest electronics?
Yeah.
Are you confused by high-definition TV?
A little.
Well, tune into WBAI every Wednesday at 8 p.m. for The Personal Computer Show.
Yeah?
Yeah, that's every Wednesday on WBAI 99.5 FM.
Oh.
So why don't you tell a friend?
Well, okay.
And tell your boss.
Well...
Hey, call your mom and tell her about The Personal Computer Show
every Wednesday at 8 p.m. on WBAI 99.5 FM.
Oh, okay.
What about questions about my computer?
Any thought questions about your computer?
Not my coffee over in my keyboard.
Do you think that's a problem?
No, not for me.
Hmm.
What does it mean by working right, do you mean?
I'd buy a new one, you know what I mean?
Okay.
That really has got to be there.
It's like the best.
It's The Personal Computer Show.
And it's 7 o'clock.
You're listening to WBAI New York.
Time once again for Off The Hook.
The telephone keeps ringing
So I ripped it off the wall
I cut myself while shaving
Now I can't make a call
We couldn't get much worse
But if they could, they would
Von Diddley Bonk for the best, expect the worst
I hope that's understood
Von Diddley Bonk!
I hope that's understood
Von Diddley Bonk!
And the phone keeps ringing
So I ripped it off the wall
I cut myself while shaving
Now I can't make a call
We couldn't get much worse
But if they could, they would
Von Diddley Bonk!
And Gutenberg by the program is Off The Hook.
Emmanuel Goldstein here with you on this
this Wednesday evening. Joined tonight by Mike. Hi. Gus. Oh hi. Jim. Hello. Dot Rett.
Eh loop. Voltaire. Hi. Rob T. Firefly. Good evening. And down in Philadelphia, Bernie S.
Greetings from Philadelphia. And yeah, here we are again talking about all kinds of
technical issues, previewing the HOPE conference coming up in July, going over
the week's news. I saw an interesting piece in the news this week, which kind of threw me for
a loop. Basically the, the title of the story, and this, this was something on CNN. It really
made me, made me think for a second. A quarter of the kids in the United Kingdom have tried
hacking. Yeah. That new is dangerous drug. A quarter, 25% of children have tried hacking.
What do we do about this? It says the majority of children agree that computer hacking is wrong,
but more than a quarter of those in England have tried it. 26% of children surveyed said
they had tried hacking, breaking into someone else's account. That's how hacking is defined
according to CNN. At some point of those who had hacked more than a quarter, 27%
had targeted accounts on the popular social networking site, Facebook, and 18% went after
their friends' email accounts, the survey found. The study of 1000 children in London
and 150 from the Northern English County of Cumbria was conducted two weeks ago by the Cumbria
Constabulary and Tuffin Technologies, an international IT security firm. No doubt it's
going to profit nicely from this somehow. The findings came despite 78% of respondents agreeing
that it is wrong to hack and 53% of them saying they feel it is illegal. The children who said
they had hacked were split almost evenly between girls and boys. Of those who admitted guilt, 47%
were girls. Most of the hacking, 27% was done from the children's bedrooms, but 22%
was done in internet cafes, 21% was done in the school computer lab, and 19% was done on a friend's
machine. The most common reason for hacking was for fun. Oh my God, when did it turn into this?
Most common reason for hacking was for fun. 46% of respondents giving that answer, 21%
said they intended to cause disruption, and 20% thought they could generate an income from hacking.
Well, where do you begin with a story like this? It's incredible, Gus.
Because of the fact that in England there's another word, another meaning for the word
hacking, and it usually means riding around on a pony. Are we sure that there's not some
sort of confusion? I'm pretty sure that's not what they mean here. They don't mean
pony hacking. Bernie, I'm sure you have a good perspective on this.
Well, I was listening to the BBC last night, and they were using the term hacked off,
meaning to annoy someone. You can say that?
The hacked off is in the British vernacular. Wait, you really hacked me off just now. I
can say that? Yes, you can. Wow, I like this. I like this. I like it too.
Can we tell someone to go hack themselves? Probably not.
No? You could tell a hack driver that.
Yeah, I could get bleeped. But I'm not surprised that that percentage...
I kind of like that. Go hack your own machine or something. Yeah, this is...
Go hack your mother's machine, huh?
I think the mother's machine is already hacked.
Oh, see?
Go hack your mother's box.
Yeah, this really could do all kinds of interesting things to the language.
Go ahead, Bernie, you were saying?
To answer your question, I think that percentage estimate is low. I think probably more kids have
tried that and not admitted it. And there's all kinds of hacking. Besides the CNN definition of
breaking into somebody else's computer, there's all kinds of other hacking. And I'd bet virtually
all kids have tried hacking some sort of system one time or another, whether it's a computer
system or a telephone system or some other type of electronic system or some social system or
just something.
Yeah, well, it's a healthy thing to do.
It's human nature.
Yes, to try something out and to experiment. And I think that's... I'm more concerned with
people thinking that it's wrong to try these things. And yeah, okay, trying to do something
to your friend's Facebook account, you know, it's mischief. It's not a crime. Now, I'm concerned
with the people that say they want to make an income doing this, because obviously that's
something that doesn't seem very nice.
Yes, it is wrong. If someone tells you this is only what it's supposed to do and you try
to use it in some other way, you are wrong.
Well, yeah, that's been hammered into my head over and over again. Mike?
It's clear we need to get the kids back on heroin. They won't be able to do all this, you know?
Well, I wonder how many people have tried heroin as opposed to trying hacking. It's just
amazing to see a headline like this where hacking is seen to be something that's really
dangerous and evil.
It's kind of strange that they just limited it to like opening up somebody else's account
too. Like that's just sort of a weak and a weird and a very broad definition.
Well, that's the mass media definition of hacking. It's breaking into other computers.
But it's not even computers. It's just like a social networking site.
Do they say how many of these 25% were successful, successfully got into their friends' accounts?
They never get into that. They don't get into who actually succeeded in getting through.
No, this is cause for alarm. What's cause for alarm is that the kids aren't hacking
at the command line. Like that's what we need to be worried about, I think.
They don't know anything. When they're hacking this way, they're not really learning anything
about how the machines work. What they're learning is just, you know, like, I don't
even know. Stuff they could have learned just by bullying on the playground anyway.
That means they're not hacking if they don't know how it works.
And I'm sure a lot of people don't even know what a command line is.
And that's something that's really important to mess around with, to experiment with.
Okay, so that was a fun little story to see. Then there is this that I guess we knew was
going to happen at some point. And this comes out of Mississippi. House Bill 872,
as sent to the governor, an act to create the Caller ID Anti-Spoofing Act. That's right.
To prohibit entering or causing to be entered false information into a telephone caller
identification system with the intent to deceive, defraud, or mislead. To prohibit placing a call
knowing that false information was entered into the telephone caller identification system
to provide that any violation of this act constitutes an unlawful trade practice
under the state consumer protection laws and for related purposes.
Bernie, can you translate this for us?
Well, it's a classic example of legislators not understanding this technology they're trying to
write laws about. I mean, it's got problems written all over. A lot of legitimate people
spoof Caller ID companies, for instance.
Well, let's just to explain to people who might not be familiar with the practice,
on your Caller ID box, that number that shows up can be manipulated. It can be changed. There
are services that allow you to put whatever number you want in there. There are PBXs,
private phone systems that allow you to do this. And like you say, some companies do this. Why
would they change their number? What's the legitimate purpose for this?
Well, a lot of companies have a lot of phone lines or DID, you know, inward dial numbers.
And they want a consistent number to show when they're making calls to their customers or
business partners. And they just want to show their main number when they call out.
So a lot of them have systems set up, not to spoof, but they just have the program set up to
show to whoever they call that they're calling from this one main number when, in fact, they'd
be calling from some DID number in the company. I read the statutory language in this law there,
and there's no exception for that. Oh, there's the classic exception for law enforcement
and intelligence officials. There always is for all criminal laws. They can spoof Caller ID all
they want. And there's serious penalties for this too. What does the article say? It's something
like a year in prison and a fat fine? Was it a misdemeanor or a felony? I wasn't
really sure, to be honest. Reading bills tends to give me a headache. I'll try and... All right,
what do you have? I'll go into this. I'm not sure how much of an issue that will be. Something I
heard Emmanuel just say out loud was the key word with intent to deceive or defraud. So if a company
is spoofing a number to their main line, I mean the Caller ID, that may not be considered intent
to deceive or defraud. I found the penalty. Any person who violates this act shall be guilty of
a misdemeanor and upon conviction thereof shall be subject to a fine of not more than $1,000
or shall be imprisoned in the county jail not exceeding one year, or both, or both. Rob? So
the purpose behind this seems to be to stop fraud, but fraud is already illegal, is it not?
Well, it depends who you are, I think. It depends who you are. So you're not allowed to use this
system to do something illegal anyway, though, but I think they're overregulating it. Well,
this will probably only be prosecuted against people who are committing fraud or people who
the government otherwise decides it doesn't like, but there is this additional category of deception
and not all deception is fraud. If I just want to trick you into something and I spoof Caller
ID to do so, that may not be fraud, but it could be illegal if this statute passes. But Mike,
when I make phone calls sometimes on the air here, oftentimes I say I'm somebody I'm not,
or I don't say who I really am. Wouldn't that be the same thing? Right, so that's not necessarily
illegal, but if this bill passes and you spoof Caller ID while doing so, then it will be illegal.
But I can spoof my own voice. I can I can lie. I can say I'm somebody I'm not. And
okay, I'm just, you know, if you piss off the wrong person,
they'll probably find something to get off the wrong. Okay. Yes, Gus.
The other case, of course, is the usual. If an abused woman decides to spoof or block her ID
in order to, you know, deceive a former partner who's abusive, like is that does that end up being,
you know, it's deceptive, but it's deception in the sense of self preservation.
At the same time, hang on, you haven't introduced yourself yet. Late again,
my work schedule seems orthogonal to my actual schedule.
Okay, why don't you just not set your clock ahead or something? Just do you know,
go to a different time zone, then you'll be here on time. Redhacked.
I'd be an hour early. So but I mean, there are other ways for people who you know,
I mean, if someone is an abuse victim, they can go to the authorities. They don't have to I mean,
I don't I don't understand what the case is where they would need to spoof Caller ID.
You just block your phone number. Yeah.
Well, that doesn't always work. As in use a payphone.
I've demonstrated that many times to people. They think they're blocking their number and they're
not but most normal people wouldn't have the ability to undo the block.
Well, normal people aren't the problem, are they?
And normal people wouldn't be able to spoof a number either.
Rob, but there are also ways to make strange things come up on the caller ID that aren't
necessarily you trying to do it. I use Skype a lot to call regular phone numbers. And that that
usually comes up on a caller ID is something weird, like 12345 or something. And so am I am I
inadvertently breaking this law every time I make a call with that Skype?
Probably, probably. All right. Interesting story there. Here's another really interesting
story that this was on the front page of CNN. It was the main story, main story being Walmart
appalled at racist order over loudspeaker. Now, I mean, just that headline alone.
That's the that's the most important story in the country, the world, according to CNN,
that somebody made a racist remark over a loudspeaker in a store. Here's what happened.
New Jersey authorities, yes, right next door, are investigating an announcement. And I believe
they already found the culprit. But this is when the story came out. They're investigating an
announcement made over a public address system at a southern New Jersey Walmart telling all blacks
to leave the store shortly before 5 p.m. Sunday. An unidentified male access the public address
system at the Turnersville, New Jersey, Walmart Supercenter store. And basically said the incident
is being investigated by law enforcement agencies as a suspected bias intimidation crime. Walmart
corporate spokesman Lorenzo Lopez said the company is just as appalled by this as anyone. He emphasized
that Walmart, the world's largest public corporation, is working with law enforcement
officials and investigating the incident. Whoever did this is wrong. In an inappropriate manner,
understatement of the year. Clearly, this is unacceptable. What I find amazing here is that
all this attention is being drawn towards Walmart, when obviously it's just some joker
accessing their public address system. And it's got nothing to do with Walmart employment policies
or how big they are or anything like that. And it's just weird to see how the story evolves.
Well, they ended up catching the person. They used the security camera footage in the store.
It was some 16-year-old and his friends.
Yeah, I can do the same thing in Home Depot. You can pick up the phone and dial two digits and you
can be addressed. In fact, I've used that to get help because oftentimes you don't get any help
unless you have to, you know, hunt somebody down. Or you call them on the phone.
That was exactly what it was. They just picked up one of those phone things in the store and
were able to speak over the whole story.
There's another potential aspect to all of this. And I believe, Bernie,
you know something about this. There are some stores where you can actually
access this kind of system from outside.
Yeah, and this is nothing new. I remember from like the early 90s this was a problem where
Kmart, for instance, were subjected to this kind of a prank by a lot of phone prankers.
And I think that it's been mentioned in 2600 Magazine.
It's interesting you should say this, Bernie, because I happen to have right here
an excerpt from 1997. Do you remember the Beyond Hope conference?
I do.
Yeah. Well, this is from the social engineering panel at the Beyond Hope conference.
We have actually this in two pieces. In 1997, we had somebody on stage known as Net Weasel.
And what he is attempting to do here is call a local Kmart here in New York City
and get the digits that need to be dialed in the first place. I think he already knew what
the digits were because he had done this before. But to get what digits you have to dial in order
to access the public address system from anywhere, really. And obviously,
all you have to do is get transferred to that. Let's hear how he got the information first.
Thank you for calling Plaza Kmart. May I direct this call?
Yeah. Can I get the clothes section?
For men or women?
Men.
How do I start?
Always try to hack a system while you're on hold.
So here he is on hold with all kinds of amazing music being played.
And keep in mind, we're in an auditorium with like a thousand people listening to this and
trying to keep quiet and not laugh too hard.
I don't think hold music is this good anymore.
Transfer your call, sir.
Hello?
Mintwear?
Yeah, yo, this is Mark over in auto. Can I get an outside line?
Excuse me?
This is Mark over the front desk. I got an outside line. Can I speak to the manager?
Yeah, hold on a second.
Ken?
Hello, this is Ken. Can I help you?
Hi, this is Mark from the Broadway store.
Hi.
Hi, how you doing? We're having trouble accessing our intercom.
Are you guys having the same problem?
Nope.
Damn it.
As in the PA system?
The PA system, yeah. We usually use 50.
50?
Yeah, we just transferred. It's just an extension over at our store.
I've never heard that number before in terms of PA systems.
Do you know the number to call for service?
No, not really because...
Well, I've never had a problem with the PA system before. I'm not used to the company, so
I can't really help you.
What extension do you guys use?
To the PA system?
Yeah.
Feature 631.
Feature 631?
Yeah.
Okay, thank you. Bye.
And that is how you do it. That's how you get the information and
it was met with much celebration.
I am not a criminal.
Not yet, but Bernie, do you remember this?
I remember that well, and this was a very popular trick, as I remember. People could actually call
in to a Kmart and supposedly other stores, too, that use similar systems and ask to be transferred
to that extension. And then they could announce whatever they wanted over the PA system
from the privacy of their own home or wherever they happen to be. And that caused,
as you can imagine, all kinds of problems.
It caused a bit of turmoil, but as you can see, what Netweasel is doing in this first
instance here was getting the information. I believe, like I said, he already had the
information, but by calling up and winning the confidence of somebody in a company,
getting them to tell you something because you're having a problem, they want to help you out.
Now you can go into a situation with more confidence and know that this is how it works.
So in the second excerpt, he approaches the situation from a totally different angle.
Let's listen.
Okay.
Good evening. It's the police Kmart calling speaking. Can I help you?
Hi, can I speak to someone in shoes?
Hold on.
Thank you.
Hello, Shoemart Radio speaking.
Hi, this is John from the Pennsylvania Plaza store.
Hi, do you guys have a lot of sandals? Because we didn't get our shipment in.
Sandals?
Sandals, like the beach sandals.
Actually, can you transfer me to 631?
631?
Yeah.
All right.
Attention Kmart shoppers, everything in aisle four is free.
Oh boy.
Uh, yeah.
I suggest getting out of town now.
Damn it, Rebel, why'd you do that?
All right.
Next question, try to keep us out of trouble.
770 Broadway.
770 Broadway, I'll go see what happens.
He's on his way over to the store now.
Yeah, in fact, we did send somebody over to the store.
And in fact, yeah, there was a bit of turmoil over there
because the announcement didn't make it out.
Wow.
Yeah, I imagine the statute of limitations has expired for that 1997.
That was from the Beyond Hope conference.
This gives you an example of the kind of fun we have sometimes.
But also, yeah, not to make an offensive act by some idiot that did this,
or actually did this without any cleverness at all,
simply by picking up a phone in the Walmart down in New Jersey.
There are always ways of figuring out methods to get around the system
and doing something a little bit more imaginative, I think, right?
I'm also a little bit unclear.
He's being threatened with a year in juvenile detention.
And the guy in New Jersey made the racist remark.
Yeah, and I didn't know.
I mean, obviously, there's lots of reasons not to make racist remarks,
but I didn't know it was illegal.
Well, I mean, I think it's an overreaction as far as just
this can be solved by simply convincing the person that he acted like a real idiot
and is embarrassed and let's move on, you know,
and maybe protect the system a little bit better would be nice.
They'll never do that.
Yeah, that's true.
I mean, after all this time, it's still pretty easy.
Gus?
Actually, this reminds me of the...
I think they've got a new game show, is it in France,
where they're basically recreating Stanley Milgram's experiments?
Yeah, I heard about this.
I heard about that.
And so it's just sort of like, I mean, what I keep thinking is,
if I heard something like that over the PA, I'd be like,
okay, somebody hacked into the PA, you know?
It's how much do we believe and why?
Yeah, the real disturbing thing is that that's what people gravitate towards
is something offensive and racist.
And that's what we have to focus on is why people do that.
But tell us more about that experiment,
because this is fascinating, what's happening in France right now.
The original experiment.
Yeah, the original Stanley Milgram experiment.
And Milgram is sort of cited as the guy who's the reason why
academics now have to do all kinds of review before they do their research,
just so they're not doing anything bad to people that scars them for life.
So Stanley Milgram was the guy who put an actor in one room
and put his subjects in the other room with a pane of one-way glass
so that the subjects could see the guy, the actor in the other room.
And they presented him with a row of buttons that I think basically did nothing.
And he said, you know, press this button, you'll give the guy a range of electric shocks.
You'll have one button over here that's for low electric shock
and one that is like, you know, going to cause him serious pain.
And so the actor reacted when they pressed the button as if he had been shocked.
And Milgram's point was basically that you could just sort of ratchet up
and people will do what they're told by a guy in a white lab coat.
And also people sort of developed this authoritarian complex about them,
that they had control over this person.
I guess sort of like a cop-like mentality.
Voltaire?
I think you can see that actually with the Princeton experiment,
which is something different.
But I think the main point of the Milgram experiment was that they had,
at the end of the level of electricity that you shock them with,
there's a point where it said lethal, do not push up to this level.
And the people would say, oh, well, as long as the people in white lab coats
say it's okay, then I'll do it anyway.
And like 99% of them did it.
Just following orders.
Yeah.
But I don't think the percentage was that high.
But it was 100% in the French one, from what I heard.
I don't think they could see the actor, though.
I think they just could hear them.
I think they were asking them questions.
And if they answered it wrong, they would shock them.
Well, in the French one, that just happened.
You're confusing it with a Ghostbusters movie,
was the asking questions thing, yeah.
But I believe everybody was visible in the French TV show.
Yeah, I'm not really sure about the details of the French TV show.
But basically the deal is that now in France,
they've basically turned the same experiment into a TV show.
And everybody's sort of reeling from that a little bit.
Uh-huh.
They're trying to one-up the English for Big Brother.
But actually, with the original experiment,
Milgram tried it in many different ways.
Some samples, he let the person see the person.
Some examples, they didn't see the person.
Some example, they actually had to touch the person.
Like they actually had to, I forget what,
or actually put the person's hands onto the thing that would shock them.
And what he was able to find was that if you had to have physical contact
and put the person's hand onto the thing that's going to shock them,
then the chance of you pushing the level up to lethal would go down to like 9%.
And so in human rights studies,
one of the main ways that people use to promote human rights
is to humanize the people behind the conflict.
And that all comes out of the Milgram experiment.
So if a cop just touches you,
he's not going to brutalize you nearly as much.
Is that what we're getting at?
That's what he touches you with.
Yeah.
Because that hasn't been my experience.
All right.
Rettig, do you have something else?
Okay.
Bernie, what do you think about all this?
Well, I think it just demonstrates the principle that
if you give people unlimited control over another person's life,
scary things can happen.
And you see that a lot with law enforcement and intelligence officials
and other people that have pretty much unfettered authority
with not much oversight,
that things will typically get out of control.
And it's not limited to cops.
It's anybody.
You give them authority,
they are apt to abuse it.
Not necessarily will, but power corrupts.
And I still end up thinking about the recipient side too.
I mean, there's a mediated voice over a Walmart loudspeaker.
Do you do what it says?
If you are not the target of it,
do you help move the target people of it out of the store?
I mean, I think there's also,
while we need to make sure that people don't have power
where they can abuse it,
we all need to also ask ourselves,
why are we doing this?
Yeah.
It all comes down to the fact that in an authoritarian society,
people will obey any voice of authority that's thrown at them.
And they want to.
People want that authority in their lives,
whether it's parental or through the schools
or through employment or through the military.
It's scary.
All right.
Shall we talk about Google and what's going on in China?
Yes.
Yeah.
Okay.
Who wants to start this?
So what they're doing now,
I haven't actually checked myself.
I don't know what happens if you try to go to google.cn from here,
but I know if you do it from there,
you get rerouted to google.hk,
which is Hong Kong Google.
And apparently the Chinese authorities filter that as well.
So what's the significance here?
Does it mean that everybody in China now
is able to get unfettered access to the internet?
The same thing happens if you visit google.cn from the United States,
you get redirected to the Hong Kong site.
And I think there's .co.hk or some other letters in there.
But I think it's .com.hk.
I'm going to try it right now.
It's very exciting.
You'll see Google in Chinese with some wacky animated characters
that we don't get in the US version.
It's very advanced.
What's the significance of them doing this?
Basically, they're routing from one part of the region to another
and can't the same...
Censorship.
The advantage is that the Chinese government
does not exert the same sort of censorship on Hong Kong
so that the servers in Hong Kong do not have to censor themselves
in the way that servers in mainland China do.
But the tricky bit is that the Chinese government
is apparently able to filter the connection
between Hong Kong and mainland China.
So the effect to the end users is a little bit questionable.
All right.
I've just connected to google.cn.
Yes, just go to google.com.hk.
But have the Chinese reacted at all?
Have they filtered .hk?
They said they're very disappointed with Google
and they did exactly the wrong thing.
I think that's what their quote was.
But they haven't done anything.
Because I mean, they could very easily block this.
They could, I suppose.
I don't know.
I'm asking.
I thought I saw something on CNN.
I heard they're filtering.
CNN, you know what they are capable of
as far as defining things.
I think this gives them the opportunity to actually block.
But it's going to make them look really bad.
Voltaire?
I think what they have done is actually
blacked out the entire Google search engine through China.
But they have left a few Google services
that they're able to use, but still filtered, I guess.
There's actually an entry on Google's blog describing this change
and also linking to a page that Google put up
which shows which of Google services are
and aren't available in mainland China.
In the form of a checklist and in the form of dates.
So you can see what's changed from day to day.
Well, this is what they say on that blog.
They say, figuring out how to make good on our promise
to stop censoring search on google.cn has been hard.
We want as many people in the world as possible
to have access to our services, including users in mainland China.
Yet the Chinese government has been crystal clear
throughout our discussions that self-censorship
is a non-negotiable legal requirement.
We believe this new approach of providing uncensored search
in simplified Chinese from google.com.hk
is a sensible solution to the challenges we faced.
It's entirely legal and will meaningfully increase
access to information for people in China.
We very much hope that the Chinese government respects our decision,
though we are well aware that it could at any time
block access to our services.
We will therefore be carefully monitoring access issues
and have created a special webpage
where I will be updating regularly every single day
so that everyone can see which Google services are available in China.
It just seems to me, you know, didn't we know all this before
that google.cn was blocking all kinds of things?
Why is this an issue now?
Why did Google seem to be the last people to realize
that it's a very restrictive society
and this kind of thing does need to be challenged?
I think Google did know about it
and I think the ultimate, they knew how this would all pan out
and I think they were looking forward to correcting their mistake
but doing it in such a way
so that they look like a superhero basically.
They look to their customer base, which is us here
and the rest of us in the West, that, you know,
oh, they're doing the right thing.
They're going up against the big bad Chinese government
but all they're doing is correcting a mistake
they shouldn't have made in the first place perhaps.
I think, I disagree because when they first went in,
they got a lot of flack just for going in
and having a censored service
and like basically placating the Chinese authorities.
And I think, but I think now they're finally,
they haven't actually apologized for going in the first place.
I think that's something they definitely should do
but I think it's much better
than having the censored service as they were doing before.
Okay, I'm looking at that updated website right now
and they have basically sort of like a checklist
for three days that they've been doing this,
the 21st, 22nd and 23rd of March
and they have either a check or an X
depending on if something is allowed or not allowed.
Web search, images, news, ads, Gmail and mobile all get checks.
YouTube gets an X.
Sites, I'm not really sure what sites mean
but that's blocked as well as is Blogger.
And partially blocked are Picasa and Groups and also Docs.
So that's the update.
I think they might have shot themselves in the foot
a little bit with this, at least with doing business
with companies over there
because now their content is politicized
and any deals they have going on
with any other companies in China.
If you're talking about some patriotic people,
they're going to not want to do business with them
and now they might lose access to a very large country
which if they didn't do this in the first place,
they might not have had this problem.
Naive question.
How about like the Google search appliance
and other people's webpages?
Does that still, I'm imagining that's not accessible.
It would have to go through to Google and it would.
To Google, yeah, so there's the, yeah, okay.
Yeah, okay, well that's where it stands.
It's kind of, Mike.
On the off chance that we have any listeners in China,
there are ways that people in China
can get around this sort of filtering.
Tor is a really good one.
You can look that up.
T-O-R.
Yeah, but the issue is that this affects mostly people
who don't have the technical skills to avoid the blocking.
I was surprised I couldn't use AIM when I was in China,
that that was blocked.
I was able to get around it with a web client,
but it still, that surprised me.
I was able to get through to CNN, no problem,
and various other things, but not AIM.
It might also depend on if they're filtering
ports, certain, if they're filtering certain ports
or services or only allow certain ones,
so they may only allow web browsing,
but not the OSCAR protocol port.
Okay, Bernie, any thoughts on this?
Yeah, about three years ago when Google
decided to do business in China and provide search services,
they agreed in writing with the Chinese government,
and the Chinese government is announcing this
all over the place, that Google agreed to censor
its searches in writing,
and that they have violated their agreement.
So, you know, Google had a choice about this
three years ago, and they went into it,
I think, rather naively,
and it wasn't until, what, a few weeks ago
when Google servers in China got hacked
and then allegedly lost some serious source code
to whoever hacked them in China,
and again, that's supposedly the Chinese government
that hacked those servers.
Then Google got all upset about it
and decided to do something about it.
The biggest loss to Google apparently now,
and on the business articles I'm reading,
is the cell phone sales,
cell phone and mobile services that Google is providing.
Right now, the Chinese government is now telling
all the cell phone companies in China
to not sell any Google phones anymore.
So, any Android phones, forget it.
You can't buy them in China now.
It seemed to me that Google's reaction
to that quote-unquote hack attack
that occurred allegedly from within China
was a bit overblown.
I mean, don't services get hacked all the time,
invaded all the time?
It just seemed like they politicized that a lot
and made it an assumption that it had to be coming
from within the Chinese government
or some kind of a policy decision,
and just seems to me like that was something that,
I don't know, maybe they were planning this out
from the very beginning.
They knew this was gonna go down this road.
Voltaire?
I think the reason why they got so upset
about the quote-unquote hacking
of the Google properties in China
or from Chinese IP addresses
was because it wasn't just that
they were hacking Google sites.
It was that they were trying to hack
the individual email that were hosted by Google,
but it was the email belonging
to human rights activists and such in China.
And that kind of, I guess, got them to wake up
and realize how unethical
their whole situation was in China.
And I mean, it obviously came three years too late,
but it's still better than nothing.
Okay, we're gonna take phone calls,
212-209-2900.
We do have a couple other stories to focus on,
including the sexting story.
The first federal appeals court opinion
dealing with sexting,
the transmission of sexually explicit photographs
by cell phone.
A three-judge panel,
the United States Court of Appeals
for the Third Circuit,
ruled, was that today?
Actually, that was last week, last Wednesday,
that parents could block the prosecution
of their children on child pornography charges
for appearing in photographs
found on some classmates' cell phones.
Bernie said that was in Philadelphia.
Yeah, that's where the Third Circuit
federal court is based here in Philadelphia.
The legal opinion there was that
just because some minor students' pictures
appeared on other people's cell phones
and were being swapped like baseball cards,
doesn't mean that that particular minor themselves
was responsible for violating
the child pornography law.
I mean, you know,
just because someone has a picture taken of them
and maybe not without their permission,
that doesn't mean that person should be disciplined.
So that was what this law was about.
Parents were like,
well, you know,
prove that my child violated the law here.
So that's what the law was about,
what this decision was about.
Sorry, I can't hear Bernie,
so I don't know what to talk.
But I was actually gonna say a similar story
to this that I read about today.
In Florida, they're trying to pass a new law
to make sexting illegal,
which would block prosecution
under child pornography laws,
but would have other penalties associated with it.
I think fines and things like that.
Is that text sexting or specifically image sexting?
This is an unspecified term, sexting.
I believe it's images.
I think it generally applies to images, though,
at least in the context of people getting prosecuted.
According to this,
sexting is defined as explicit photographs,
but I could see where sexting could be text as well,
based on the word,
but I don't know how many people actually would do that.
But what's interesting about this
is that the parents are the ones
who can block the prosecution of their children.
I can't imagine what parent wouldn't want
to block the prosecution of their own children.
Yeah, I mean, basically,
like you're protecting your child
from not only going through the trauma
of like being subject to a legal case,
but also, you know,
having the stigma of having,
you know, possible child pornography charges against you,
which could really screw up your life.
I mean, like these days,
seeing as they have like,
you know, they tell you where you can live,
where you can't live,
things like that as somebody
who's considered a predator against children.
Right, well, a lot of this also just doesn't make sense.
I mean, you have like these laws against child pornography
because you don't want children being used and whatnot.
But when these photos are on another minor's phone,
how exactly is this minor
somehow being abused by somebody else?
Because that minor,
the other minor is going to grow up someday,
and they're going to save that picture,
and then that'll be-
Future crime.
Yeah, exactly.
Have to protect the children,
even if we have to prosecute them in order to do so.
I think even by coming up with bizarre explanations,
you're giving them more credit than they deserve.
I think there is actually no explanation
for these prosecutions.
Really?
How Kafka-esque?
It seems like that's just a legal technicality
that just event,
that started popping up once people start,
gained the ability to send photos over their phones.
Right there.
It's just basically overly panicked parents
that are worrying about the kids being sexual,
doing normal activities that,
on technology, they don't understand.
That sounds like a theme that we keep coming back to.
Rob.
I am just so grateful my child predates this whole phenomenon
because I did some damn stupid things as a kid.
Your childhood, you mean?
Yes, my childhood.
Okay.
Yes.
Okay.
And again, our phone number,
202-209-2900.
One more story,
and then we're going to take some phone calls.
And this could be rather interesting.
A bill introduced in the U.S. Senate yesterday
could compel the White House,
or would compel the White House,
to identify international cybercrime havens
and establish plans for cleaning them up.
The International,
oh boy,
the International Cybercrime Reporting and Cooperation Act,
did that spell something?
ICRA.
It takes on a growing problem for banks
and U.S. businesses,
the ability for cybercriminals to operate with impunity
across international borders.
The bill is co-sponsored by Senators Kirsten Gillibrand,
she's one of ours,
from New York,
and Orrin Hatch,
a Republican from Utah.
Now, in recent years,
cybercriminals have mastered techniques
for hacking into consumer
and small business bank accounts
and moving money overseas.
They've also become adept at converting
hacked personal computers
into botnet computer networks,
which then can be used for spam,
distributed denial-of-service attacks,
and ID theft.
The bill would shine a spotlight on countries
that are thought to be soft on cybercrime
and introduce new protocols
for addressing the problem.
Under the proposed legislation,
the president would provide an annual assessment
on international cybercrime
and would be able to suspend aid,
financing,
or trade programs with countries
that fail to improve.
Now, Bernie,
I know you were very concerned about this,
and I don't see any of your concerns
reflected in the opening paragraphs.
Tell us what those concerns would be.
Well, it seems pretty vague
and maybe overbroad
that there are hacker spaces
all over the world,
some of which I visited
in really remarkable creative places
where people do some amazing work.
None of it fraudulent.
I fear that some of these hacker spaces
are going to end up on this list
and being used for political purposes.
This is the highest levels
of our government now.
Demonizing countries
that provide a safe haven for hackers.
I just see this going down a bad road.
No, but this isn't something
to talk about hacker spaces.
They're talking about havens
as in like tax havens
and for instance,
things that go on in cyber criminals
that work out of Russia
and do stuff in the US or China.
It sounds like this is more of dealing
with the international arrangements
that these countries have.
Bernie, you think it could be
applied towards hacker spaces?
Absolutely.
The law does not provide
any exception for hacker spaces
where people just gather and have fun
and develop cool things.
I think this is a dangerous road
to the highest levels
of our government
to provide political pressure
to countries to provide
a safe haven to hackers
whether or not those hackers
are actually committing fraud.
This proposal doesn't require
that that be the case.
I think, Bernie,
that this is probably
just going to end up
being just another way
for the US government
to make lists of countries
it doesn't like.
They have this same list
for countries that are
supposed to be drug havens
but basically the way
to get off the list
is to make the US government
like you in some way
that has nothing to do
with drug policy.
It wouldn't surprise me at all
if this just becomes
like another list of countries
that the president likes.
All right.
Very quickly, Gus.
I was just worried
this would become a way
to hate on Iceland
because of their support
of WikiLeaks.
Okay, you opened up that door.
We haven't really talked about this.
This is something actually
that's been going on for a while
and it was discussed at length
at the CCC Congress
in December in Germany
about Iceland becoming a haven
for journalistic freedom
and all kinds of democratic ideals.
Does anybody want to dive
into what this is all about?
For our listeners?
What the Icelandic...
People know that the government
in Iceland basically
has fallen apart.
The economy in Iceland
has fallen apart.
So there's all these new people
in the Icelandic parliament.
Somehow when governments fall apart
in some parts of the world
it gets better for people.
Well, I'd like to try that here sometime.
So there's all these people
in parliament who are like,
what should we do?
We've got nothing else to do.
We're in parliament now.
And what they did
is with the help of WikiLeaks
and some other organizations,
they took basically
the best media regulations
from around the world.
So shield laws,
protection of sources,
those sorts of laws.
They took them all
and they made one big law
called the IMMI
and the website is immi.is.
And this bill,
I don't know if it's fully passed yet,
but it appears to have wide support
in the current parliament.
So basically if you publish something
in Iceland,
it will be really hard
to take it down.
All right.
We're definitely gonna be talking
about this more in the weeks ahead.
We know some of the people involved
in this whole process.
It's gonna be fascinating,
fascinating developments.
And one bit of sort of news
that's yet unclear,
WikiLeaks is apparently being
followed around by some people
from the U.S. State Department.
They're posting this
on their Twitter.
What do you mean followed around?
It's a website.
I mean, followed around.
Like they're real humans
behind the website
and you can follow them around
if you want.
Is this a game?
No, no, no, no.
They feel that they're being surveilled
by the U.S. government.
All right.
Well, that's always fun.
So okay.
Worth watching.
We'll keep an eye on that situation as well.
212-209-2900.
Let's hear what our listeners have to say.
And good evening.
Wait until we start talking
before you start talking.
Go ahead.
Good evening.
You see, you see,
you start talking
before I start talking.
I'm gonna have to cut you off
because I have no choice.
It's really, it's really,
it's really kind of,
you know, easy to figure out.
Good evening.
You're on off the hook.
Hey, Emmanuel.
It's RenderMan.
See, you did it right.
You did it the proper way.
Yes.
You're Canadian.
So you know something about protocol.
Yes.
What's on your mind?
I just had a couple of comments
on some of the things
you're talking about.
First, with the data havens.
And correct me if I'm wrong,
but isn't the United States
the biggest source for spam right now?
Well, I don't know if you're giving us
too much credit,
but we certainly try.
We might be exceeded by some places.
But since the U.S.
will never be put on a list of countries
that the U.S. doesn't like,
I think we're safe.
Self-aiding nation.
Yes.
And anything else?
The other one was the whole sexting thing.
I think the whole source of that problem
is that people have this knee-jerk reaction
that, oh, child pornography
must do something bad.
But the laws haven't caught up
with modern technology
in that you can actually have a minor
be both simultaneously perpetrator
and victim in a crime.
So if they take a picture of themselves,
they're both the victim
and the perpetrator.
So it's this weird,
well, we need to prosecute
and do something bad to the perpetrator,
but at the same time,
they're the victim.
So the law is just kind of...
But we also have to send a message,
more importantly.
It's all about sending messages.
Communication.
RedHack.
At the same time,
don't you think that they've kind of
gotten the message?
I mean, they've been, you know...
What's the message?
I don't know what the message is supposed to be.
If they find, you know,
if they're being prosecuted,
it's probably because this image
has been disseminated.
They're probably already embarrassed about it
and realized that they were an idiot.
So why do we have to also then,
you know, label them a sex offender?
It doesn't make any sense.
And dragging them to the court
suddenly makes it better by, you know...
I maintain that it's private communications
between people.
You can transmit whatever you want,
you know, pictures or drawings or words.
I mean, who are these other people
that are discovering this
and prosecuting people?
They're the ones in...
You might not even have sex.
You just can't take pictures.
Yeah.
Okay.
All right.
Thanks, RenderMan.
Hope to see you soon.
Have a good one.
Take care.
212-209-2900.
Good evening.
You're on Off The Hook.
Hi, how's it going, guys?
Hi, what's up?
Yeah, I actually made a pledge to your show
and I'm not much of a computer expert myself,
but I just find it fascinating
what you guys talk about on a week-to-week basis.
Oh, that's great.
Yeah, you're exactly the kind of demographic
we're after.
People that aren't techies themselves,
but find what we talk about to be interesting
and hopefully learn and contribute something.
And I actually made a pledge through my company,
which is a nascent company called earthdriver.org.
I would love if you guys check it out for two seconds.
It's an independent record label.
We have some really good music.
And my question to you, I guess, technically is,
I'm so ignorant that I was just introduced
to the concept of SEO, search engine optimization.
Could you make any recommendations
as far as, is there such thing as poor man's SEO?
Like, what could I go?
All right, well, Gus is making the most
severe facial reaction to this.
So go ahead, you start.
SEO is full of lies.
It's made of lies.
It's, I just feel there's better ways
to promote your website, honestly, because SEO's-
Tell the people who have no idea what that means.
Search engine optimization basically means
making your search sites or your site's web rankings
or their rankings in search engine findings go up.
And frequently involves putting stuff on your page
that has nothing to do with your site at all.
Uh-huh, okay.
Walter?
Yes, so basically search engine optimization
boils down to putting an invisible text
on your website, stuff like sex
and links to porn websites that people won't see,
but Google will be able to see.
And it's a really bad idea.
Anybody that tried to sell you on SEO
is basically just a snake oil salesman.
Don't do it.
And yeah, just stay away from it.
Companies trying to get more traffic
would probably be better to use things like Google's ads
where they actually are getting the audience
that actually might care about their product
and seeing the ad event, you know?
Yeah, that's basically what I was gonna say,
as well as the great way to have a successful website
is to be a good provider of what it is you do.
Yeah, exactly.
The way to get highly ranked
is to actually have a good product.
And that's what's gonna bubble to the top
and all this stuff is just trying to trick the system,
but really what's gonna always land on top.
I can't disagree with any of this.
And we're all being a little bit too harsh.
There is what is known as white hat SEO
where people are trying to do well.
But I mean, so what this consists of
is just writing a better website.
Make sure that you have all the keywords
that are relevant to what you do.
You just wanna make sure,
especially if you have things that are in images,
the things that are in video,
make sure those are all written out
for all the people who appear in your video
and things like that,
because that is more likely,
that you're just gonna get more people
finding the things that you actually provide in that way.
So that's something you wanna start looking into.
Okay, thanks for that caller.
Let's move on to the next question.
Good evening, you're on Off The Hook.
Yes, what I would like to see with the health program-
It's Rebel.
Rebel, did you hear you were referenced
in that tape from 1997?
Even then, we were blaming you for everything.
Oh, well, I'm not listening to the show now,
but I've just been-
Oh, no.
How do you even know it's on then?
Well, I just take a ticket.
I know, you know, to tune in.
Well, not tune in, but I know that Tuesday nights-
Rebel, this is the most distorted type of phone
you've ever used.
What are you, on Spaces?
No, I'm on Sprint PC.
Oh, okay, enough said then.
Well, what I'd like to see
at the whole conference this year
is a TSPS or TOPS operator console.
Or maybe a TOPS operator will show up
because there's no use for them anymore.
No, they show up at the whole conference.
I've seen them at the whole conference.
Okay, well, you know, you really got to change providers
or change phones or something like that.
But yeah, it's a good idea.
Some retro phone equipment
or retro computing, things like that.
Write to us, projects at hope.net
or volunteers at hope.net
if you want to get involved
in the Hope Conference at all.
If you want to submit a talk,
we're still accepting talks.
Speakers at hope.net,
all kinds of ways of getting involved.
But always good to hear Rebel's voice again.
Are we ever going to have a best of Rebel special?
Because this running gag really goes back.
Yeah, you know what?
You're hired.
You can listen to all the hundreds of hours of tapes
and figure out which one of those
is the one worthwhile.
Good evening.
You're on Off the Hook.
Yes, speak up.
Lord of the People's Republic of China,
you're a piece of work.
Unbelievable.
Good evening.
You're on Off the Hook.
Yeah, we don't need to hear it twice.
Good evening.
Turn down your radio, please.
Hello?
Yes, go ahead.
You're on the air.
Turn on your radio.
Oh, okay.
I was just calling.
I have a quick question.
I put the Verizon Ozone
because it was recommended to me
by the person who actually designed it.
Verizon Ozone?
Is that really what they call it?
Well, it's called the Ozone
and it has a talk feature.
All right.
I was sitting on the bus actually last week
and the person who designed the phone,
you know, he was watching me use my phone
and he was saying,
oh, use this phone.
I designed it
so I wouldn't ask about it the same day.
And I told this person specifically,
the salesman,
I don't want the internet service
because I already have Wi-Fi
or I'd rather just pick up Wi-Fi
and I asked him,
can I get Wi-Fi with this phone?
So long story short,
I have the phone,
but I have the internet service
because after I purchased the phone,
then he tells me,
well, I have to have
the mandatory internet service plan.
Did you purchase a phone
from somebody on a bus?
No, I went into the Verizon store.
All right.
I was a little worried there.
So the person who designed the Ozone
was on the bus.
I was talking to him
and he recommended the phone.
So my question is,
usually I can get around it.
I have an old phone that I had hacked
and I was able to get internet
using my Bluetooth connection.
So do you guys know any way around
me having to use the internet service
or should I just send back the phone?
Because it just arrived.
I didn't open it.
So I was just going to send it back.
Return the phone
because a lot of phones
require you to have
purchased an internet plan
and it sounds like this is one of them
and you could be wasting $20 a month
or something.
You basically are going to end up
signing a contract.
I'm assuming you got the phone on discount.
So what they're doing is-
No, I only do month to month.
Oh.
So I had to pay
just about full price for the phone.
Well, if you already bought the phone.
Well, if you bought the phone,
you should be able to call them
and say, I don't want you
to turn on the internet.
I don't know anything about the phone.
I can't tell you.
I mean, it might have Wi-Fi built in.
I would search the phone's name
on the internet and search for Wi-Fi.
But if you don't have a contract
with them that specifies
that you need to use their internet,
then I don't know
if they have to provide it.
Okay, thanks for that call.
Good luck with that.
Ozone?
Do you think it has a big hole
in the middle of their coverage?
I don't know.
That's not a name I would choose.
All right, good evening.
You're on off the hook.
I'm sorry, you understand that?
You imperialist.
How do you have?
How many phones?
The sad thing was,
I didn't turn them up right away.
So we didn't get the beginning
of his clever remarks.
Good evening.
You're on off the hook.
Yeah.
Hi there, Daniel.
My name's Brian from Baltimore.
I just wanted to call everybody's attention
to the fact that it's Ada Lovelace Day.
Ada Lovelace is a...
Oh, wow.
Yeah, she's a woman who helped out
Charles Babbage with the difference engine.
And so today's the day to celebrate
all the women that are in technology.
Awesome.
I think we mentioned this last year too.
And that's really good
that someone called to remind us of this.
And if you want to celebrate,
learn the Ada programming language.
It's awesome.
Yeah.
I mean, but she's also regarded
as the first computer programmer,
I think, in the world,
because she designed basically a program
to work on one of his engines.
I don't remember which one.
All right.
212-209-29...
Actually, I'm not gonna give the phone number out anymore
because we only have time for one more call.
Good evening.
You're on off the hook.
Hey, how are you doing?
I have a quick question for you.
You know, how do you...
What's the quickest way of turning off
an automated telemarketing thing
when you've obviously made it clear to the company
that you don't want it anymore?
And they're like, oh, okay, we will, we will.
And you still get the call.
Are you on the do not call list?
Yeah, I'm on the do not call list.
I'm on the do not mail list.
Okay, well, the first thing you want to do
is file a report, file a complaint.
Well, the only thing that I know
that they're getting around is
because I used to be a customer
of them, it's Terminex basically.
But I'm telling you on a weekly basis
and it has to be at 6 p.m., you know, every night,
they call and say, you know,
an automated voice says, you know,
we have this wonderful plan for you.
And I'm like saying, excuse me, but...
You need to put the fear of the Lord into them
and say, you know, the next person that calls
is going to be responsible
for a multimillion dollar lawsuit.
And, you know, somebody's gonna write that down somewhere
and say that, you know, that this person means business.
Let's not call him again, Gus.
He's saying it's an automated call though.
And that's a problem.
I get that a lot too.
Well, okay, an automated call,
eventually you can talk to a human
if you're interested in buying something.
So just express interest, get to a human.
And I think that's the only way you're gonna stop this.
Right, once you get one of the representatives on the line,
tell them to be taken off the list.
And, you know, you can be nasty about it,
especially if it's bothersome and tell them,
look, if you don't stop calling me,
I'm never gonna be your customer again,
this, that, and the other.
Especially if it's a real company
with a real address that can really,
like, suffer problems,
you can file a complaint
with either the Federal Trade Commission
or your state's attorney general
and reputable companies
will actually be afraid of these entities.
Yeah, and now that you've mentioned
the name of the company over the air,
I'm sure that they will be paying attention to this.
We'll see.
All right, that's it for us.
Write to us, oth at 2600.com.
Yeah, let's listen to some 8-bit music on the way out.
Talk to you later.
Good night.
I love you very, very much.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am looking for your touch.
I am looking for your touch.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I am your bird on the computer.
I love that song, that was great, I gotta get a copy of that thing.