Slashdot Mirror

Too bad it's not a secure PDF file, I was looking forward to trying Elcomsoft's software that Dmitri wrote.

But the Elcomsoft site had it available earlier today as a free (as in beer) download (which I downloaded out of protest). Now it is not.

It is impossible to regulate internet commerce in this way when the comes to information. the cat is out of the bag and the only way to make it unavailable is to make it unavailable to everyone. I don't think that this is likely so it will probably be findable in certain ways in a few days.

Now for some ideas. I like in the US and it is pretty clear what US laws say about these issues. But knowing that Adobe's licensing terms violate consumer rights laws in Russia, and other countries, how likely is it that some people could help get lawsuits going in those countries to force Adobe to stop making their eBooks available to citizens of such countries under such draconian technologies.

Sig: Tell all your friends NOT to download the Advanced Ebook Processor:

Why don't you read all the literature and past articles before you make the god-damned "the law is the law" argument for the 4000th time?!?

Read the facts... it isn't clear than ANY law was broken when you read history of the situtation. There is definitely no smoking gun.

Stop being a right-wing law and order facist for 10 minutes and look to see what is going on.

Also.. why not read http://www.elcomsoft.com/aebpr.html and see what type of tactics Adobe was using before this all happened. They lied to a number of ISPs and used other shady tacticts.

If you don't know the facts. SHUT UP!

However, on July 16, Russian computer programmer Dmitry Sklarov was arrested by the FBI for writing a computer program and presenting a paper on it at a security conference in Las Vegas.

Also, I recently applied for a position as a software engineering manager at Adobe, which would be a good job for me and for which I feel I am qualified. Times have been tough for me and my little family and for quite some time I thought I might not speak out in a public way on this matter.

But long ago I decided that staying quiet was the wrong thing to do, so after quaking in fear for a while I decided I'd copy the following letter to the nice lady in the Adobe HR department who has been considering my application.

Subject: Free Dmitry

Friends,

I have long held the belief that computer programs are constitutionally protected free speech. They are, after all, how us programmers communicate with each other. This is also the opinion of at least one federal court, although it is yet to be tested by the Supreme Court.

However, on July 16, Russian computer programmer Dmitry Sklarov was arrested by the FBI for writing a computer program and presenting a paper on it at a security conference in Las Vegas.

His paper, "eBooks Security: Theory and Practice", exposed the woefully inadequate security schemes used to copy protect Adobe eBooks ("secure" electronic publications, basically encrypted PDF files).

If you have PowerPoint, you can get his presentation here:

http://www.download.ru/defcon.ppt

You can purchase, and download a free trial version of Advanced eBook Processor here:

http://www.elcomsoft.com/aebpr.html

Rather thank thanking him for revealing their engineering flaws, Adobe made a complaint to the FBI, and the FBI arrested him under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. He is being held without bail, out of communication with his wife and children, in a foreign country, facing a $500,000 fine and five years in federal prison.

The digital millenium copyright act is clearly unconstitutional, not just in that it violates free speech for programmers, but that it violates fair use - the right of citizens to make limited copies of copyrighted materials for certain uses such as backup and academic research.

If you want to know more about Dmitry's case, please visit:

http://www.boycottadobe.com/

You'll find pictures there of Dmitry, and of his wife and children, who I am sure miss him greatly.

And please consider joining the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is pressing two other court cases to try to have the DMCA ruled unconstitutional and will lend his support to Dmitry once the U.S. Marshalls tell them where he is, you can do so here:

http://www.eff.org/support/

Please pass this mail on to anyone who might be interested to hear it.

Ever Faithful,

Michael D. Crawford
GoingWare Inc. - Expert Software Development and Consulting
http://www.goingware.com/
crawford@goingware.com

Tilting at Windmills for a Better Tomorrow.

And those are just from one quick google search. Sounds like that PD needs to get an AOL account and a clue. I'm also sure the services provided by "someone better equipped" were rather overpriced. I do however agree with your point that law enforcement doesn't have much chance. As has been usual throughout history, they will catch the dumbshit crooks who use insecure MS passwords or 128-bit keys, and the smart ones will continually get away, MOTHER FUCKER

And those are just from one quick google search. Sounds like that PD needs to get an AOL account and a clue. I'm also sure the services provided by "someone better equipped" were rather overpriced. I do however agree with your point that law enforcement doesn't have much chance. As has been usual throughout history, they will catch the dumbshit crooks who use insecure MS passwords or 128-bit keys, and the smart ones will continually get away, MOTHER FUCKER

If I were to encrypt a Word document with the built-in encryption (no matter how feeble the encryption), it would be considered copy protected. Someone should sue someone about this.

I guess it's different when a large company's "revenue stream" is in jeopardy.