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I like to point people at this nifty bit of reading.

It's probably about time to mention the fact that the expansion Machine Access Code is in wide use, even if it is not the expansion you like.

Examples;

• UCSF ITFS: Wireless Networking and Security Standards: Legacy host based authorization systems utilizing the machine address code (MAC) may continue to be used until June 30th 2010
• Bluetooth essentials for programmers: 1.2.1: "Identical to the Machine Access Code (MAC) address for Ethernet"
• Source: Computer Crime Research Center, for another user's Ethernet address (known as a MAC or Machine Address Code)
• Book of the Dead, Patricia Daniels Cornwell; "Sandman's IP doesn't correspond to any MAC at the port. That's the Machine Address Code. Whatever computer the Sandman is using to send his e-mails, it doesn't seem to be one at the port,"
• Symantec.com, "When a host wants to join an IP Multicast group, it sends an Internet Group Multicast Protocol (IGMP) join message specifying its Machine Address Code (MAC) address and "
• Valparaiso University, Finding Windows System information, " 5. The Ethernet Address will be listed as the Physical Address. Machine Address Code (MAC)"
• PostgreSQL: A comprehensive guide, Korry Douglas, Susan Douglas; pg 106; "The acronym MAC stands for one of the following: Machine Address Code, Media Access Control, or Macaroni and Cheese"
• [1]
• Temple University, "Please note that you must first register the machine address code (MAC) of your laptop with Computer and Media Services before you can take advantage of this service. "
• Pharmacology Information Technology, "To register your computer, you'll need to know your computer's Machine Address Code (MAC) address, basically the serial number of your ethernet port."
• Chaminade Univeristy, "Examples of information which we receive, and may store, include (although are not necessarily limited to) the Internet protocol (IP) address used to communicate with us; the Machine Address Code (MAC) number of your computer"
• eHow: How to Find the Machine Address Code on a PowerMac

there is nothing laughable

But this is very laughable, as is this and this. Now imagine what we don't know about!

Can anyone tell me why this shouldn't move people over to Mac, Linux, etc.?

I know about malware that can be spread using MS Office, from infected PC to Mac to fresh PC, in the same manner the woman spread the Rage virus in the film '28 Weeks Later'. The Mac itself doesn't get affected by the virus / worm / trojan, even if it has it inside. Besides, I'm using NeoOffice at home without using macros so [raspberry]!![/raspberry]

I know about proof-of-concept 'viruses'. Someone says "you could, hypothetically, use this loophole to write malware" on a Monday, and the hole is usually closed on the Tuesday. It's like hearing that an infected batch of meat in Thailand could infect the world and ...ah, they destroyed the shipment. Carry on...

To me, it's just infuriating. Seeing people deliberately buying products that have gaping flaws, flaws that have been 'features' of the OS for years, and then spending all that time and money and effort to collectively try and polish the turd (as they defiantly defend their bad decisions, which is a bad decision in itself)? I've never understood it ...but then again, I've never found myself staying in a destructive relationship / bought anything expensive based on advertising instead of Consumer Reports reviews / voted for anyone based on looks, lawn-signs, catch-phrases / found myself asking 'friends' or family to repay the thousands of dollars they've owed me over the past x years either.

Yes, I guess I'm calling a lot of people sheep, or gullible, or uninformed. In other news, the sun rose in the East this morning, details and analysis at 11...

Here's my thinking, please pull it apart. Computer fraud is a cash cow for organized crime. It's worth billions. If any one criminal group could cash into the untapped 5%(?) Mac sector, that would be worth an incredible amount of exclusive money. So you'd have thought there would have been a great push to own this Mac portion of the computer fraud market especially because Mac owners, and I'm one of them, have been lulled into a sense of security with the lack of OS X - related reports of identity theft. I'm like a country yokel in the big city for the first time. Never had to worry about concealing a wallet, so I have a big roll of fifties sticking out of my back pocket. DAMMIT, MUG ME! Yet my money is still secure after all these years.

I'm a practical and pragmatic person. And, taking KRS One's idea of being "criminally minded" to heart, I figure that someone would have cracked a way to get all this extra income off us Mac users using the same techniques in the PC world if they could, because 5% of a billion dollars is still fifty million bucks (if the same ratio of Mac users fall for it the way PC users do).

The fact that it hasn't happened yet, for an OS that has been out since 2001, tells me either that the criminals don't like easy money, or it's not easy at all.

So again, at the risk of a flame-war: can anyone tell me why this shouldn't move people over to Mac, Linux, etc.?

I would like to send you some links to publications about my criminal case. I was forced to confess to the possession of internet digital pictures of porn in deleted clusters of my computer hard drive. My browser was hijacked while I was browsing the web. I was redirected to illegal sites against my will. Some illegal pictures were found on my hard drive, recovering in unallocated clusters, without dates of file creation/download. I do not know how courts can widely press these charges on people to convict them, while the whole Internet is a mess. This is my story in inquisition21.com. There is all information about case written by Irish writer Brian Rothery. You can see a lot of violations of law by police http://www.inquisition21.com/article~view~7~page_n um~3.html This is publication in Wired news http://www.wired.com/news/infostructure/0,1377,633 91,00.html This is publication in Theregester http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/05/13/browser_hi jacking_risks/ Article in Globe and Mail newspaper http://ctv.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20040617.gttwhijac17/tech/Technology/techBN/ctv-t echnology Article in ZDnet http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-5344831.html This is article in Washington Times, May 22, 2004 There is information about my case. http://www.cato.org/cgi-bin/scripts/printtech.cgi/ dailys/05-30-04.html Article in Crime research center: http://www.crime-research.org/news/07.22.2004/506/ Article in Dallas, TX Newspaper http://www.crime-research.org/news/24.12.2004/862/ Child porn law was declared unconstitutional in Hennepin County, Minnesota, USA' http://xbiz.com/news_piece.php?id=11750 "I came here to the US as political refugee from the former Soviet Union, and, now like many other people in the US, I feel shame that all of this can happen in the US - supposed to be the greatest democracy in the world."

I would like to send you some links to publications about my criminal case. I was forced to confess to the possession of internet digital pictures of porn in deleted clusters of my computer hard drive. My browser was hijacked while I was browsing the web. I was redirected to illegal sites against my will. Some illegal pictures were found on my hard drive, recovering in unallocated clusters, without dates of file creation/download. I do not know how courts can widely press these charges on people to convict them, while the whole Internet is a mess. This is my story in inquisition21.com. There is all information about case written by Irish writer Brian Rothery. You can see a lot of violations of law by police http://www.inquisition21.com/article~view~7~page_n um~3.html This is publication in Wired news http://www.wired.com/news/infostructure/0,1377,633 91,00.html This is publication in Theregester http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/05/13/browser_hi jacking_risks/ Article in Globe and Mail newspaper http://ctv.globetechnology.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20040617.gttwhijac17/tech/Technology/techBN/ctv-t echnology Article in ZDnet http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105_2-5344831.html This is article in Washington Times, May 22, 2004 There is information about my case. http://www.cato.org/cgi-bin/scripts/printtech.cgi/ dailys/05-30-04.html Article in Crime research center: http://www.crime-research.org/news/07.22.2004/506/ Article in Dallas, TX Newspaper http://www.crime-research.org/news/24.12.2004/862/ Child porn law was declared unconstitutional in Hennepin County, Minnesota, USA' http://xbiz.com/news_piece.php?id=11750 "I came here to the US as political refugee from the former Soviet Union, and, now like many other people in the US, I feel shame that all of this can happen in the US - supposed to be the greatest democracy in the world."

Please RTFA.
http://www.crime-research.org/news/2002/08/Mess190 1.htm

Or if you are too lazy here are some quotes:

In police affidavits obtained by the Citizen, the judge admitted that he authored the journal. The judge has not been charged with any crime for keeping the electronic diary, but has been charged with possession of more than 100 images of child pornography. Since that indictment, an alleged molestation victim has come forward and the judge now also faces sexual-assault charges dating back to 1976.

Another quote -

The judge, a Little League umpire, had contact with numerous boys at ball games, in a mall and at a private health club -- where he befriended vulnerable young boys with the hopes of exploiting them.

"You can't just charge in like you did with (a boy). How do I encourage him without pursuing him too hard? You have great entrÈ in the separation of his parents," says an entry dated June 6, 2000.

The next day, the author writes: "I gave a lot of thought today about this business of approaching these kids too fast ... He doesn't strike me as a lonely boy like (boy) was. You have to make them come to you or it just doesn't work," says a diary entry dated June 9, 2000.

After reviewing the journal, Det. Tracy Jacobson concludes in an affidavit that the author is a pedophile. "He refers to the child as 'gorgeous' and writes about how and when to approach the child, and plans his moves carefully. It is further my opinion these are the type of comments only a pedophile or a child molester would make," Det. Jacobson said.


These are the reasons I would have like to see him go down for longer. Try reading the articles linked too more often rather than typing stupid disclaimers like "As Far As I Know".

Worse yet, they're fleeting. They don't like your kind of legal system? They move away. They're nearly intangible, and what hurts more, their business revenue is hardly really taxable. The average corporation pays about half the tax (in percent, not in dollar) that you do.

It's also fairly hard to hold them liable for something. How do you imprison a corporation? What Sony did with the rootkit would have warranted a jail sentence in some countries. It has (almost) happened to juvenile "hackers" before. Instead they got off the hook with a laughable "agreement".

It's already "good practice" in the shadier areas of some businesses (for example the porn biz) to put up some front man who is nominally in charge (and gets paid well for doing essentially). If something falls down on the company, he goes to jail and the biz keeps rolling.

Now that some countries start putting more pressure on the heads of corporations (Enron comes to mind), corporations first of all move their HQs to countries that are much more lenient on corporations with shady practices, and they replace their heads with figure heads. So far, this isn't widespread practice yet, but as soon as the idea kicks in, they move essentially outside of the grasp of the legal body of whatever country they reside in.

This is actually the second time this has happened in NZ this year...

"Sahil Gupta, the second man charged over the Telecom voicemail hacking incident in April, walked free from an Auckland court last week.

Gupta was charged along with a teenager who cannot be identified for legal reasons. The teen was charged with unauthorised access of a computer system and pleaded guilty. Gupta was charged under the same section of the Crimes Act and faced up to two years in prison.

However two justices of the peace discharged Gupta saying there was no case to answer after a hearing in the Auckland District Court on Wednesday."

more @ http://www.crime-research.org/news/21.01.2006/1770 / and all over ya google.

Note: West Earl Township is in Pennsylvania, USA.

chat room deat threat leads to student's arrest

Date: December 10, 2003

Cybercrime A 12-year-old boy was charged Tuesday with making death threats against teachers and students at his school in an online chat room for fans of horror films, police said.

The boy attends a private school in north Lancaster County, but was not identified by police. Police also did not release the name of the school.

Police in West Earl Township went to the boy's home in Leola, near Lancaster, just after 7 a.m. Tuesday with a search warrant. A steak knife was found in the boy's school backpack, police said.

The boy was being evaluated at a hospital Tuesday night and was to be turned over to juvenile authorities, police said.

A woman in Portland, Ore., saw the online threats and called police Monday night.

"If I went to bed and woke up to find out he had killed people, I'd never forgive myself," said Stacey Weighall.

According to Weighall, the boy wrote under the message headline "I'm going insane," that "I'm going to kill my teacher and a lot of other people in my school."

A number of people communicating on the Web site _ www.horror.com _ told the boy he should get help and asked him to stop posting threatening messages, Weighall said.

The boy allegedly answered, "That will teach them not to take me as a joke. I'll show them all I'm strong. Make them fear me."

Weighall called police in Pittsburgh, who contacted the FBI Cyber Crime Unit there.

Authorities contacted the owner of the Web site just after midnight and he furnished the identity of the boy who was posting the messages.

"He was very cooperative in providing essential information which enabled us to locate and identify this person," said Lt. Kevin Kraus of the Pittsburgh major crimes division. "I also give high praise to this woman in Oregon who took immediate action."

The boy was "very cooperative" when police arrived, said Chief Brian Brandt of the West Earl Township Police Department.

He said the investigation was ongoing and would not comment further.

The boy was charged with making terroristic threats and criminal attempt to possess instruments of crime.

I hear confession is good for the soul. Why not go to your local church and ask for some help. You need it.

OK, I do agree with the access problems, based on state, here is a list of access laws by state, then do a search on the LAW number to get detail. http://www.crime-research.org/library/State.pdf I however can find no law about using a CAN,lol for CA or Sacramento County law

the foreign intelligence services and other spy types that are interested... oh and the Chinese Cyber Warriors... Oh - Organized crime is on the rampage such that the Feds miss old fashioned hackers. And Spammer botnets, and so on. Yep, way to blame those poor Stereotypical H4x0rz to get your name in the press yet again.

GDI: http://www.crime-research.org/news/28.09.2004/666/

cough cough cough .

Welcome to the 21st century.

They hold the third largest population of phishers scammers and hackers.
Ukrainian programmers won't be the first to land fat outsourcing contracts: they are as mob-ridden as Russia and better known for This kind of programmer than India is.

You're correct. Both articles talk about how Steve Jobs and Apple don't support "trusted" computing.

article on BT filtering

Only there's no levy on UK residents direct. One might argue that BT massages costs into it's charges *shrug*

You are completely overlooking several important facts, cap'n.

The exchange rate. Perhaps you don't know this because you don't buy Russian music, but ALL russian CDs are dirt cheap. The exchange rate might not mean much if you want a nice apartment in Kyiv or Moscow, but music from there - even after importation through "legit" channels - is dirt cheap. I have a whole stack of CDs here of Russian artists, and the most expensive one of the lot was six bucks.

To do business (legitimately) in Russian means complying with their laws - just as here. So, who do you think runs MTV Russia? Fully half the artists on the top ten over there are American recording artists - on labels like RCA and Elektra and Columbia. Even with all this evil mean and nasty piracy over there - by all estimates I've seen only about a third of the music sold in stores being legitimate copies, these companies still find it worthwhile to spend money there on mearketing and selling their wares.

Why haven't they complained about them doing business? These companies are legit under Russian law, and the record companies do business there of their own volition. There's simply nothing they can do except spend some of that barely earned money on lobbying for different laws - just as they do here (oh, and good luck with that).

It's not illegal for me to import for my personal use, and it's not illegal for them to sell abroad. Both Ukraine and Russia are Berne member states and WIPO signatories. What it comes down to is this: the very same factors - cheap communications, ease of international commerce - will have the net effect of lowering prices to the lowest common denominator. What goes around comes around... god bless the internet and new capitalism!

Okay then how about a real life example from my country (Australia). A "hacker" was using a computer to pump sewerage into a local river as described by this article. Now its entirely possible the same scenario could happen but instead using a widespread virus with a backdoor.

Is that example real enough and plausible enough for you?

Okay I agree its up to the individual to clean their systems. So when I goto an infected site its THEIR responsibility that they didn't keep their site clean. If they had I wouldn't have been infected. So therefore as soon as the site admin knows his site is infected he should shut it down. Just like companies withdraw products when they are faced with bribery by people who put poison inside the products.

"The Justice Department's spending on cybercrime would leap from the $157 million allocated by Congress for the 2003 fiscal year to $265 million. The agency's Internet Crimes Against Children program, which investigates child pornography and "enticement" cases, would receive a $2 million increase, to reach $14.5 million."

Even if the Justice Department "only" had $157M in 2003, you'd think there would be a bit more to show for it. But this is the US government we're talking about. There are doubtless a good number of motivated and competent people in the US government who are dilligently working to combat cybercrime.

The problem is that US government agencies are notoriously slow to adapt to change. Having worked in one before, I can attest to how frustrating it can be to try and get even simple, obvious tasks completed when groupthink prevails. It must be incredibly frustrating for the folks working in those departments who are trying to go after cybercriminals.

The worm had the potential to take power grids, etc offline.

The worm disrupted stock trading systems, organizations' Intranets, government systems, home users' systems, etc. Resulting in a denial of service in order to clean the worm off. Yes it did do damage, and while it did not blow anything up (thank goodness), it did instill a bit of terror into those who potentially could be infected.

While there was no apparent violence, there was damage to systems and a loss of service and more damage. There also was a spread of terror. Many people I knew were too afraid to even turn on their computers for fear that the Phatbot or Sasser worm would infect their systems.

Apparently you support this type of action and think the authors of said worms should be regarded as heroes? Well I do not, and think they should be brought to justice and held accountable for the damage they caused.