Slashdot Mirror

yet another coward writes "The New York Times reports on new measures against spam. (Sperm sample required, sorry ladies) Microsoft has increased efforts to track and prosecute spammers. Hotmail receives 2 billion (2 * 10^9) spam messages per day. In a twist of weirdness, the Direct Marketing Association is funding investigators who cooperate with the FBI on spam investigations. Spamhaus also gets a mention."

unassimilatible writes "The Washington Times reports that the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security are developing a database that will allow private companies to submit lists of individuals to be screened for a connection to terrorism. The database will eventually allow private-sector entities, such as operators of critical infrastructure facilities or organizers of large events, to submit a list of persons associated with those events to the U.S. government to be screened for any nexus to terrorism. All of this won't be cheap either; total terror-related IT spending by US federal and state governments will run past $100 billion in 2004. But don't feel left out Europeans, since the EU is considering a terror database as well, although France and UK are reluctant to share intel."

Supp0rtLinux writes "Looks like the FBI is giving a new anti-piracy seal for entertainment and software products. Looks like now the RIAA and MPAA pursuits will add a new federal level to future prosecutions." I'm pretty sure that our forms of media already contain warnings against unauthorized duplication, rebroadcasting, and public performance, but now it's in logo form!

Rob Flickenger writes "This month's freely downloadable SeattleWireless TV show is out. Continuing with the Big Brother theme, Drew from WiFimaps.com interviews Special Agent Tom Grasso of the National Cybercrime, Forensics, and Training Alliance (at the FBI) about wardriving and wireless. This episode also features Gerry Curry's deployment of wireless in the rural Nova Scotia, Canada, and Danny Dinneen from Ireland introduces the Cork Wireless community network project. The show is downloadable in Windows Media, RealMedia, and BitTorrent MPEG formats."

pgrote writes "So you're a guy on the run - you decide to switch towns, put down some roots and start dating again. But if your special new friend happens to be someone who checks her potential dates by searching on Google, you're in trouble. Seems that LaShawn Pettus-Brown was caught by his date's discovery of him on an FBI site of fugitives, even after local Cincinnati news media couldn't find him. Score one for the Internet."

BWJones writes "National Geographic is running a story this month on surveillance. I received my copy today and the article is reasonably extensive (for National Geographic) and well written, covering many issues that get attention here on Slashdot both good and bad. There is coverage of what's good with the technologies (a program called Poseidon that helps ensure folks don't drown in swimming pools) and what's bad (death of privacy). In between are some additional details on backscatter X-ray and a taste of some of the security for the 2002 Winter Olympics here in SLC. I got to see a little bit more than the average person of the security during the winter games as our building was the emergency backup headquarters if anything went wrong and was routinely crawling with FBI and other folks including the Secret Service making for some interesting nights at the lab."

An anonymous reader submits "The SANS Institute (together with the FBI) published today an updated version of its list of The Twenty Most Critical Internet Security Vulnerabilities. As usual, part of the news is that not too much has changed. The list is split into 10 Unix and 10 Windows vulnerabilities. Leaders are BIND and IIS (last year it was RPC on the Unix side). But some issues (weak passwords) made it into both lists. For last years version, see here. In addition to this list, and a lot of other stuff, the SANS institute is behind DShield and the Internet Storm Center."

blamanj writes "The FBI's National Crime Information Center (NCIC), which compiles a huge database on criminals, arrest warrants, missing persons, etc., no longer has to put up with the pesky problem of ensuring the data is accurate. I guess the Justice Department isn't particularly concerned with justice anymore." The full text of the provision which the main FBI criminal database will no longer have to adhere to is: "Each agency that maintains a system of records shall ... maintain all records which are used by the agency in making any determination about any individual with such accuracy, relevance, timeliness, and completeness as is reasonably necessary to assure fairness to the individual in the determination."

theBraindonor writes "SANS Institute and the FBI have compiled a listing of the The Twenty Most Critical Internet Security Vulnerabilities. The list is broken down into two groups: Windows Systems and Unix Systems." The list of Unix vulnerabilities is also a list of the network programs I (and presumably many others) use most. It's a good thing there's BugTraq.

The House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet held a hearing in my home town yesterday: "Chatting On-Line: A Dangerous Proposition for Children." Six witnesses came to Kalamazoo, Michigan and described the perils of on-line chat to Rep. Fred Upton (R-Michigan) and Rep. Charles Bass (R-New Hampshire). The most surprising and welcome news of the afternoon was that, despite the alarmist title, there was not a panicked call for additional legislation.

The hearing launched with Congressman Upton touting his internet record -- notably the .kids domain, now .kids.us. Personally, I like the idea of .kids.us, though some disagree.

The witnesses were Katie Tarbox, who in 1995, at age 13, had been inadequately briefed on the "rules of the net" and disasterously agreed to meet a child predator she'd chatted with online; two local law enforcement personnel, John Karraker and Jim Gregart; Ruben Rodriguez, the Director of the Exploited Child Unit for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children; Caroline Curtin, the Director of Children's Policy for AOL; and Kathleen Tucker, the Director of Curriculum Development for I-Safe America.

Everyone was concerned about keeping children safe online. It goes without saying that this is a desirable goal, as long as it's done in accordance with the Constitution and doesn't interfere with everyone else's legal use of the internet.

The problem is a serious one. Real kids are being lured into dangerous relationships over the internet; charges were filed in one more case here in Kalamazoo County just last week.

The preferred pickup method for child molesters nowadays is the internet: chat, instant-messaging, and email. The old tricks of "would you like some candy?" and "your parents were in an accident, I'll drive you to the hospital" -- those are yesterday's news. Kids growing up now need to be aware of different dangers, ones involving formation of long-term relationships, questions about online identity, and trust.

I wasn't able to find any reliable statistics on how often children are victimized using the internet. The best numbers I found were from a phone survey of 1,501 children, ages 10 to 17, who used the internet regularly. Of them, 19% had "received an unwanted sexual solicitation" (imprecisely defined) but only 3% had been solicited with "attempts or requests for offline contact" or actual offline contact.

And precisely 0 of the 1,501 children said they had been sexually contacted or assaulted due to online solicitations. This seems significant to me, given that 21% of all children -- statistically, hundreds of the children in the phone survey -- are sexually abused (by some definition of the term) before age 18. Unfortunately, 0 is not a number that extrapolates well to estimate how many of the United States's 70 million children will be physically victimized with help from the internet. But if I understand the numbers, it seems the internet is not the most likely source of danger.

A study called JOVIS is in the works and should provide some concrete numbers. According to Mr. Rodriguez, we can expect data from it in four to five months.

In any case, the message our lawmakers heard yesterday was not that we need more laws.

All six witnesses said, using almost the same words, that there is no substitute for parental involvement. Three called for more money and training for law enforcement, to give existing laws teeth. It sounds like law enforcement, especially at the state and local level, is still coming up to speed on this issue. And Ms. Curtin, for AOL, emphasized that ISPs were already taking steps, and suggested patience to allow them to develop an industry standard.

The testimony and discussion was so removed from proposing new legislation, in fact, that Rep. Bass seemed a little bored and annoyed. He had to remind everyone twice that he and his colleague were lawmakers: "As a member of Congress, I would like to hear what recommendations you have for what we might do -- I haven't heard anything about that so far. ... If I could reiterate: we make policy. This is a very interesting problem, but precisely what suggestions would you have for us as policymakers? If you could draft the bill, what would it say?"

Proposals were hesitant. Our local prosecutor suggested mandated inclusion of a CD with every new computer sale, which would explain how to keep children safe online. I'm not sure why existing explanations (here's one) are insufficient; why not just link? And Kathleen Tucker of I-Safe suggested standardizing on "digital certificates," client-side certs issued by an authority which confirms your identity using proof ranging from photo ID up to DNA (!) -- thus allowing children to verify that screen name BritneyRulez333 does not actually belong to a 45-year-old man.

That excepted, Ms. Tucker's testimony was refreshingly sound. She squarely faced the problem of child predators, and quoted Judith Krug of the American Library Association's Office of Intellectual Freedom: children "need to be taught the skills to cope in the virtual world just as they are taught skills to cope in the physical world."

Parents aren't there to watch over kids every minute. Just as they learn to cross the street without holding an adult's hand, so they need to learn how to wander the internet safely. "The value of empowering our children, through education," she concluded, "with the knowledge and critical-thinking skills that they need to be able to independently assess the every-day situations they will encounter while online cannot be overstressed... Education and empowerment are key."

In my opinion, that's exactly right.

But I wonder how effectively government will be able to help alleviate the problem. Knowledge is key, but kids are, as usual, embracing and understanding change, while bored Congressmen sit behind tables and listen to prepared speeches. Last week, I contacted three students, ages 14 to 17, and asked them about their experiences chatting online.

What they thought, and what they reported their friends thought, was pretty savvy. They understand the dangers, are well aware of the internet's advantages, and know how to stay safe. One student reported:

If kids know not to give out their personal information, and what could happen if they do, then there is really no danger. I would feel like I was missing out on a lot if I didn't have the opportunities to communicate online. It gives me a chance to stay in touch with my current friends, make new friends, meet interesting people, and find a group where I feel like I belong.

Another student reported:

I chat to other people almost every night, or whenever I get the chance to. I do not see chatting on-line as being dangerous, or otherwise harmful. Sure you always hear those stories about 12 year old girls chatting with 45 year old men, but I see online chatting as a way for people with similar interests to discuss and debate interesting topics. ...I strongly believe that if you chat online with people that you do not know personally, you should figure out what this person is really like, and if you can trust them or not.

Finally, I traded several emails with one girl who had chatted online extensively for years, and has met in person "at least 10 or so" other kids whom she first found on AOL -- including a meeting with some boys from another state.

This might seem like a recipe for disaster. But, not only was her protocol for establishing trust detailed and thorough -- paranoid even -- but she readily explained to me her reasoning for each step along the way. She's a poster child for "education and empowerment." And I doubt she's unique:

How did I know to be careful about creeps on the internet? It would be hard not to know nowadays. With an Oprah special about it practically every week, and news documentaries and polls, the facts are pretty much right out there for you. It's like taking candy from a stranger, it's common sense I guess... The types who would fall prey to an online creep would just as easily be a victim to a creep in real life... If the topic of internet chat comes up in school, teachers will almost always preach about safety and weirdos and such. So pretty much the topic of internet safety is inescapable -- it just depends on how well you listen to it.

I hope that's true for every young person.

meow meow cat chow writes: "Fred Jerome of the Gene Media Forum has recently written a book called "The Einstein File: J. Edgar Hoover's Secret War Against the World's Most Famous Scientist." The book talks about how the FBI spied on Einstein and identifies some of the people who said he was a spy. Jerome sued the government to obtain access to the 1,427 page file which can be found at (http://foia.fbi.gov/einstein.htm) The New York Times has an article about the book."

securitas writes: "The Electronic Privacy Information Center is suing the US government over its contracts with companies that are data-mining and profiling citizens' personal information for law enforcement agencies like the FBI, DEA, INS, IRS and ATF. ChoicePoint and Experian '...sell information on [individual] U.S. citizens, including credit information, property records, state motor vehicle records, marriage and divorce data' and international assets. The question that springs to mind is who else has access to these detailed profiles besides the government, now that massively expanded investigative powers are being used following 9/11?"

Slashback this evening brings you news and updates on several previous stories, including (not limited to) @home service, Linuxgruven, and some followups to Slashdot book reviews.

More news you can use on the @home front. Anubis333 writes: "After a while talking with customer support, I have learned that Comcast@Home (Soon to be ATT Broadband) has instituted a network-wide cap on user upload to 15KB! (Thats not much more than dialup) Also, they have now capped Usenet news access. What am I paying 50 dollars a month for again? More info on usenet here.

Upon even longer hold times, I found out that when Comcast switches over to ATT the cap will be set to 128KB and the usenet caps will be lifted, also they will support more groups. The full change over will be complete by the end of Feb. Any users in the Savannah Ga. Area, they will start here Jan. 15 and end in early feb. Call support for exact local dates if interested."

Yessir, about oh, yea big by a few more inches ... Dave contributed a link showing a side-by-side comparison of the current Apple laptop line, including the new bigger iBook. Shame about the resolution, though ...

By their fruits ye shall know them. zsazsa writes: "According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon has sued James Hibbits and Michael Webbs, the two founders of Linuxgruven for deceptive business practices. He alleges that interviewers were actually salespeople paid to enroll job applicants in training programs costing up to $3,150."

Would the FSF call Sun "GNU-minded"? maitas writes: "It seems that Sun has removed Solaris for Intel from its free download list. It's really sad to see a company that promotes its 'GNU minded' culture to go back on the few good things it had made. They even removed the Solaris source code from their site! Sad, sad, sad."

That them thar' book larnin' Stardance points to an interview at Salon with Steve Grand, in which the "designer of the artificial life program 'Creatures', talks about the stupidity of computers, the role of desire in intelligence and the coming revolution in what it means to be 'alive.'" You may remember Grand's book Creation: Life & How to Make It, reviewed on these pages. Speaking of reviews, several readers have contributed links to the New York Times' review of Lawrence Lessig's new book.

Drew writes: "The Washington Post is reporting on the FBI's new spyware called 'Magic Lantern.' According to their article, 'At least one antivirus software company, McAfee Corp., contacted the FBI on Wednesday to ensure its software wouldn't inadvertently detect the bureau's snooping software and alert a criminal suspect.' It is ridiculous that the software companies that are supposed to help us protect computers purposefully leave in loopholes for the FBI to operate their spyware."

Troodon writes: The Register reports on Forensics Explorers' NetWitness. Rather than relying upon the FBI's 'fail-safe' separation of Carnivore Operators and Case Agents to discriminate between legitimate data and that inadmissably, incidentally siphoned up along with it and submitting to the installation of a mysterious black box within their network, ISP's can comply with CALEA in-house for approximately $2,500 per collector and between $35,000 and $45,000 for an analysis station. Should you fancy a little development, another cheaper alternative exists: Altivore." Not sure any of this is much comfort -- the lesser of two evils is still evil.

GMontag writes: "The Washington Post Tech Section is running this story FBI's 'Carnivore' Might Target Wireless Text. Apparently, since the industry can't provide big brothering to the satisfaction of the FBI the FBI will will do it *for* them. This is a collector's item too, with no mention in article of DCS1000 being used to "save" children!"

mtDNA writes: "The New York Times has an article on the eighth annual robotic firefighting contest at Trinity College." The contest's home page has contestant rankings as well as some great photos and the rules contestants had to live by. Next year promises to be even more challenging. Anyone there to offer some first-hand reports?

mtDNA writes: "There's an article in the New York Times about the strategies SETI is using to avoid fraudulent reports. One trick they're using is multiple analyses of the same data. Another strategy is the use of "ringer" data, where they send you fake data for which they know the results." One of the researchers has several postscript papers on his home page - Incentives for Sharing in Peer-to-Peer Networks, Uncheatable Distributed Computations, Distributed Computing with Payout. In related news, ProcessTree apparently sent out an email to participants indicating it is closing up shop, so although SETI seems to be chugging along, the idea of distributed computing as a business model is perhaps a bit premature.

deran9ed writes: "Interesting outlook from an article on IDG detailing the use of encryption, and the negative campaigns against it. "When the Feds -- be they CIA, FBI, NSA, or Treasury Department -- discuss crypto, they make it sound as if anyone using it must be a child pornographer, drug smuggler, or terrorist." I wonder if the government feels the same about corporations encrypting their business plans in order to avoid having them stolen. Here's the article." The author has a point. SSL and SSH (or whatever it's called now) are widely used. But how many people routinely encrypt their email?

DaHat writes "ABC News.com is reporting that the latest round of Big Brother Awards are out. This years list includes the FBI's carnivore system being named "Most Invasive Proposal." The NSA won a "Lifetime Menace" award for, allegedly, "50 years of spying" on Americans and others and even the Florida company ChoicePoint was named "greatest corporate invader," for their actions during the Florida recount. Get the whole scoop and whole article here." We should have a different award, the Stalin award or something for entities advancing the destruction of the first ammendment. We can nominate the evil organizations oppressing freedom of speech like the RIAA, the MPAA, and Slashdot.

Steve writes: "CNET News.com reports that the FBI has changed the name of Carnivore to DCS1000. The DCS stands for 'Digital Collection System.' According to the article, 'A spokesman for the FBI denied that the name change stemmed from worries that the name Carnivore made the system sound like a predatory device made to invade people's privacy. But the Illinois Institute of Technology, which last fall issued an analysis of the system at the request of the Justice Department, recommended that the name be changed for just that reason, according to an IIT analyst.' The article does not say which of the IITRI recommendations were incorporated other than the name change." The FDA requires prominent, nominally truthful labels on food, but apparently not all TLA agencies feel quite the same way. I thought "Carnivore" was a beautiful flash of truth in labelling, so this move is a shame.

Steve writes: "CNET News.com reports that the FBI has changed the name of Carnivore to DCS1000. The DCS stands for 'Digital Collection System.' According to the article, 'A spokesman for the FBI denied that the name change stemmed from worries that the name Carnivore made the system sound like a predatory device made to invade people's privacy. But the Illinois Institute of Technology, which last fall issued an analysis of the system at the request of the Justice Department, recommended that the name be changed for just that reason, according to an IIT analyst.' The article does not say which of the IITRI recommendations were incorporated other than the name change." The FDA requires prominent, nominally truthful labels on food, but apparently not all TLA agencies feel quite the same way. I thought "Carnivore" was a beautiful flash of truth in labelling, so this move is a shame.

Popocatepetl writes "Apparently, you can get a job if you tell Indian government officials you can "hack" a government web site. This story is short on details, but may be interesting nonetheless, especially since the FBI is mentioned."

AftanGustur writes "Everybody should be familiar with FBI's Carnivore by now and the possibilities of abuses that come with it. An interesting article on Cryptome gives an example of what can happend when you are monitored 24 hours a day and then manipulated into committing a crime.. It also tells about the existance of the Secret FISA Court that FBI has regularly used to get permission for wiretaps and monitoring, and also the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Program. Interesting read for everyone." The FISA court is an abomination against the Constitution, and it's good to see news entities taking more of an interest in it.

tregoweth writes "CNet has a report about the FBI's release of new information concerning Carnivore, the result of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Contradicting what the FBI has previously said, Carnivore can capture and archive 'unfiltered' Internet traffic."

The word "Internet" was uttered precisely once in last night's presidential debate, and I don't have to tell you the context. You already know the topic was Columbine, and you already know the Net was being blamed for mass murder. What our Republican candidate failed to mention is that his party's bogeymen, the evil Internet and its evil twin violent entertainment, have brought about a new era of peace. If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.

"Columbine spoke to a larger issue, and it's really a matter of culture. It's a culture that somewhere along the line we begun to disrespect life, where a child can walk in and have their heart turn dark as a result of being on the Internet, and walk in and decide to take somebody else's life."
- George W. Bush, presidential debate, October 11, 2000

The term we're looking for is "manufactured crisis." That's what we need to start calling it, this supposed violence in our schools.

I don't need to provide you with more quotes from Bush, Gore, Cheney and especially Lieberman about how disgustingly violent our culture has become. You can't pick up a paper without seeing at least three people moaning about violent movies, the violent internet, and worst of all violent video games. They're infecting the minds of our children, don't'cha know. It'd be the new national pastime if it weren't 200 years old: grumping about those damn kids.

Let's counter disinformation with some real numbers. Here's an annotated timeline showing the increase in violent imagery, and the corresponding decrease in actual violence.

1993
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,438,200.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 49.1.

Let's consider 1993 our baseline year, the pre-Doom year. That blockbuster was not released until December 1993, so I think we are safe to assume that it did not begin darkening hearts until 1994 or later. By the end of 1993, the internet's two million host machines include 500 webservers.

Demolition Man, Kalifornia and Falling Down are in the theaters.

1994
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,424,200: a 1% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 51.2: a 4% increase from the previous year.

In 1994, shareware Doom, downloadable from the evil internet, shatters existing gaming records. Its bloody graphics and Satanic imagery shock and offend many who are easily shocked and offended. In an era where 200,000 is a great-selling title, 1994 sees the first of fifteen million gamers who download and play Doom.

Meanwhile, the web grows at an annual rate of 341,000%, becoming the 2nd-most popular type of data; among the three million machines on the net, there are too many webservers to count.

The movies Pulp Fiction, Timecop, True Lies, Children of the CornIII, and the politicans' favorite Natural Born Killers are all released in 1994.

1995
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,290,000: a 9% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 2,169.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 46.1: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

In 1995, the web becomes the most popular internet service among the net's four million machines. Shareware Doom continues to rack up downloads. Doom II: Hell On Earth, released last October, takes over as the violentest game ever, with an initial release of half a million units.

The Basketball Diaries, Braveheart, Se7en, and Die Hard3 are released.

1996
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,134,400: a 12% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,683: a 22% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 41.6: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

1996 is a banner year for violent images. Doom II continues on its track to eventually sell two million copies. Duke Nukem 3D, aimed at the young teenage male market, gives our nation's young boys a healthy mix of strippers, jokes, and mass slaughter with machine guns. Soon after, the breakthrough title Quake offers unprecedented visual accuracy: blood, gore, and murder are now illustrated with detail that makes Doom and Duke Nukem look cartoony.

Scream is released in theaters to tremendous success, along with Broken Arrow, CrowII, Sling Blade, and the excellent Fargo. Meanwhile, there are now 9 million hosts on the net.

The effects of all that horrible media violence in 1996 appear in 1997's statistics...

1997
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,055,200: a 7% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,457: a 13% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 38.8: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1997, there are 16 million hosts on the net. At year's end, QuakeII is released, and is quickly banned in Germany for its even-more-realistic violence. And Con Air, Face/Off, Starship Troopers, and Scream2 are released in theaters.

1998
Total under-18 murderers: 1,169: a 20% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 36.0: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1998, Quake II hits its sales stride and begins corrupting young minds. Grand Theft Auto, one of the more vilified and censored video games, is released. The web crosses the 300-million-page mark.

Brace yourself for the movie list: Lethal Weapon4, Saving Private Ryan, American HistoryX, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Ronin, Urban Legend, Blade, and the crappy remake of Psycho hit the theaters.

The result?

1999
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 32.1: an 11% decrease from the previous year.

There it is. In the four years between the release of Doom and Quake II, the number of killers under the age of 18 in this country plummeted. A drop of 46% in just four years is nothing short of astonishing.

Long-term graphs are even more valuable. Click through to these, they're small and quick:

• The homicide rate, 1900-1998. We are experiencing the longest and steepest sustained dropoff in violence since the Great Depression.
• Homicide offenders grouped by age, 1976-1998. The number of teenage killers is steadily falling.
• Average age of homicide offenders, 1976-1998. The average age of the American killer has been rising since 1993.

Last month, I watched CNN as my friend Bennett Haselton got grilled opposite Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). After CNN's introduction telling us what to think - cutting straight from footage of Doom to footage of crying Columbine students - the Senator explained how violent games cause children to commit violent actions. He wants to keep dangerous weapons like Quake away from our kids.

That's how the Senator - who voted against secure handgun storage, and twice against child safety locks - positioned himself as our noble defender of children.

How do the posturing panderers justify their crisis-du-jour? How'd we end up with the phantom of media-created child violence as a major election issue, while violence plummets?

The facts speak for themselves. If seeing violence has any effect on children's actions, it obviously makes them calm and peaceful.

So here's the slogan for my campaign: our kids deserve the best in first-person shooters. In my America, every family will have free movie tickets, 300 megatexels, and low-ping broadband. Let's put an end to frame rates under 30Hz. For our country - for our safety - we can leave no child behind.

(Sources: US DOJ 1, 2, 3; OJJDP 1, 2, 3; FBI UCR; Blues News; crime.org; poynter.org.)

The word "Internet" was uttered precisely once in last night's presidential debate, and I don't have to tell you the context. You already know the topic was Columbine, and you already know the Net was being blamed for mass murder. What our Republican candidate failed to mention is that his party's bogeymen, the evil Internet and its evil twin violent entertainment, have brought about a new era of peace. If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.

"Columbine spoke to a larger issue, and it's really a matter of culture. It's a culture that somewhere along the line we begun to disrespect life, where a child can walk in and have their heart turn dark as a result of being on the Internet, and walk in and decide to take somebody else's life."
- George W. Bush, presidential debate, October 11, 2000

The term we're looking for is "manufactured crisis." That's what we need to start calling it, this supposed violence in our schools.

I don't need to provide you with more quotes from Bush, Gore, Cheney and especially Lieberman about how disgustingly violent our culture has become. You can't pick up a paper without seeing at least three people moaning about violent movies, the violent internet, and worst of all violent video games. They're infecting the minds of our children, don't'cha know. It'd be the new national pastime if it weren't 200 years old: grumping about those damn kids.

Let's counter disinformation with some real numbers. Here's an annotated timeline showing the increase in violent imagery, and the corresponding decrease in actual violence.

1993
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,438,200.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 49.1.

Let's consider 1993 our baseline year, the pre-Doom year. That blockbuster was not released until December 1993, so I think we are safe to assume that it did not begin darkening hearts until 1994 or later. By the end of 1993, the internet's two million host machines include 500 webservers.

Demolition Man, Kalifornia and Falling Down are in the theaters.

1994
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,424,200: a 1% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 51.2: a 4% increase from the previous year.

In 1994, shareware Doom, downloadable from the evil internet, shatters existing gaming records. Its bloody graphics and Satanic imagery shock and offend many who are easily shocked and offended. In an era where 200,000 is a great-selling title, 1994 sees the first of fifteen million gamers who download and play Doom.

Meanwhile, the web grows at an annual rate of 341,000%, becoming the 2nd-most popular type of data; among the three million machines on the net, there are too many webservers to count.

The movies Pulp Fiction, Timecop, True Lies, Children of the CornIII, and the politicans' favorite Natural Born Killers are all released in 1994.

1995
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,290,000: a 9% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 2,169.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 46.1: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

In 1995, the web becomes the most popular internet service among the net's four million machines. Shareware Doom continues to rack up downloads. Doom II: Hell On Earth, released last October, takes over as the violentest game ever, with an initial release of half a million units.

The Basketball Diaries, Braveheart, Se7en, and Die Hard3 are released.

1996
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,134,400: a 12% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,683: a 22% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 41.6: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

1996 is a banner year for violent images. Doom II continues on its track to eventually sell two million copies. Duke Nukem 3D, aimed at the young teenage male market, gives our nation's young boys a healthy mix of strippers, jokes, and mass slaughter with machine guns. Soon after, the breakthrough title Quake offers unprecedented visual accuracy: blood, gore, and murder are now illustrated with detail that makes Doom and Duke Nukem look cartoony.

Scream is released in theaters to tremendous success, along with Broken Arrow, CrowII, Sling Blade, and the excellent Fargo. Meanwhile, there are now 9 million hosts on the net.

The effects of all that horrible media violence in 1996 appear in 1997's statistics...

1997
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,055,200: a 7% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,457: a 13% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 38.8: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1997, there are 16 million hosts on the net. At year's end, QuakeII is released, and is quickly banned in Germany for its even-more-realistic violence. And Con Air, Face/Off, Starship Troopers, and Scream2 are released in theaters.

1998
Total under-18 murderers: 1,169: a 20% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 36.0: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1998, Quake II hits its sales stride and begins corrupting young minds. Grand Theft Auto, one of the more vilified and censored video games, is released. The web crosses the 300-million-page mark.

Brace yourself for the movie list: Lethal Weapon4, Saving Private Ryan, American HistoryX, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Ronin, Urban Legend, Blade, and the crappy remake of Psycho hit the theaters.

The result?

1999
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 32.1: an 11% decrease from the previous year.

There it is. In the four years between the release of Doom and Quake II, the number of killers under the age of 18 in this country plummeted. A drop of 46% in just four years is nothing short of astonishing.

Long-term graphs are even more valuable. Click through to these, they're small and quick:

• The homicide rate, 1900-1998. We are experiencing the longest and steepest sustained dropoff in violence since the Great Depression.
• Homicide offenders grouped by age, 1976-1998. The number of teenage killers is steadily falling.
• Average age of homicide offenders, 1976-1998. The average age of the American killer has been rising since 1993.

Last month, I watched CNN as my friend Bennett Haselton got grilled opposite Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). After CNN's introduction telling us what to think - cutting straight from footage of Doom to footage of crying Columbine students - the Senator explained how violent games cause children to commit violent actions. He wants to keep dangerous weapons like Quake away from our kids.

That's how the Senator - who voted against secure handgun storage, and twice against child safety locks - positioned himself as our noble defender of children.

How do the posturing panderers justify their crisis-du-jour? How'd we end up with the phantom of media-created child violence as a major election issue, while violence plummets?

The facts speak for themselves. If seeing violence has any effect on children's actions, it obviously makes them calm and peaceful.

So here's the slogan for my campaign: our kids deserve the best in first-person shooters. In my America, every family will have free movie tickets, 300 megatexels, and low-ping broadband. Let's put an end to frame rates under 30Hz. For our country - for our safety - we can leave no child behind.

(Sources: US DOJ 1, 2, 3; OJJDP 1, 2, 3; FBI UCR; Blues News; crime.org; poynter.org.)

The word "Internet" was uttered precisely once in last night's presidential debate, and I don't have to tell you the context. You already know the topic was Columbine, and you already know the Net was being blamed for mass murder. What our Republican candidate failed to mention is that his party's bogeymen, the evil Internet and its evil twin violent entertainment, have brought about a new era of peace. If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.

"Columbine spoke to a larger issue, and it's really a matter of culture. It's a culture that somewhere along the line we begun to disrespect life, where a child can walk in and have their heart turn dark as a result of being on the Internet, and walk in and decide to take somebody else's life."
- George W. Bush, presidential debate, October 11, 2000

The term we're looking for is "manufactured crisis." That's what we need to start calling it, this supposed violence in our schools.

I don't need to provide you with more quotes from Bush, Gore, Cheney and especially Lieberman about how disgustingly violent our culture has become. You can't pick up a paper without seeing at least three people moaning about violent movies, the violent internet, and worst of all violent video games. They're infecting the minds of our children, don't'cha know. It'd be the new national pastime if it weren't 200 years old: grumping about those damn kids.

Let's counter disinformation with some real numbers. Here's an annotated timeline showing the increase in violent imagery, and the corresponding decrease in actual violence.

1993
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,438,200.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 49.1.

Let's consider 1993 our baseline year, the pre-Doom year. That blockbuster was not released until December 1993, so I think we are safe to assume that it did not begin darkening hearts until 1994 or later. By the end of 1993, the internet's two million host machines include 500 webservers.

Demolition Man, Kalifornia and Falling Down are in the theaters.

1994
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,424,200: a 1% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 51.2: a 4% increase from the previous year.

In 1994, shareware Doom, downloadable from the evil internet, shatters existing gaming records. Its bloody graphics and Satanic imagery shock and offend many who are easily shocked and offended. In an era where 200,000 is a great-selling title, 1994 sees the first of fifteen million gamers who download and play Doom.

Meanwhile, the web grows at an annual rate of 341,000%, becoming the 2nd-most popular type of data; among the three million machines on the net, there are too many webservers to count.

The movies Pulp Fiction, Timecop, True Lies, Children of the CornIII, and the politicans' favorite Natural Born Killers are all released in 1994.

1995
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,290,000: a 9% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 2,169.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 46.1: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

In 1995, the web becomes the most popular internet service among the net's four million machines. Shareware Doom continues to rack up downloads. Doom II: Hell On Earth, released last October, takes over as the violentest game ever, with an initial release of half a million units.

The Basketball Diaries, Braveheart, Se7en, and Die Hard3 are released.

1996
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,134,400: a 12% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,683: a 22% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 41.6: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

1996 is a banner year for violent images. Doom II continues on its track to eventually sell two million copies. Duke Nukem 3D, aimed at the young teenage male market, gives our nation's young boys a healthy mix of strippers, jokes, and mass slaughter with machine guns. Soon after, the breakthrough title Quake offers unprecedented visual accuracy: blood, gore, and murder are now illustrated with detail that makes Doom and Duke Nukem look cartoony.

Scream is released in theaters to tremendous success, along with Broken Arrow, CrowII, Sling Blade, and the excellent Fargo. Meanwhile, there are now 9 million hosts on the net.

The effects of all that horrible media violence in 1996 appear in 1997's statistics...

1997
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,055,200: a 7% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,457: a 13% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 38.8: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1997, there are 16 million hosts on the net. At year's end, QuakeII is released, and is quickly banned in Germany for its even-more-realistic violence. And Con Air, Face/Off, Starship Troopers, and Scream2 are released in theaters.

1998
Total under-18 murderers: 1,169: a 20% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 36.0: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1998, Quake II hits its sales stride and begins corrupting young minds. Grand Theft Auto, one of the more vilified and censored video games, is released. The web crosses the 300-million-page mark.

Brace yourself for the movie list: Lethal Weapon4, Saving Private Ryan, American HistoryX, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Ronin, Urban Legend, Blade, and the crappy remake of Psycho hit the theaters.

The result?

1999
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 32.1: an 11% decrease from the previous year.

There it is. In the four years between the release of Doom and Quake II, the number of killers under the age of 18 in this country plummeted. A drop of 46% in just four years is nothing short of astonishing.

Long-term graphs are even more valuable. Click through to these, they're small and quick:

• The homicide rate, 1900-1998. We are experiencing the longest and steepest sustained dropoff in violence since the Great Depression.
• Homicide offenders grouped by age, 1976-1998. The number of teenage killers is steadily falling.
• Average age of homicide offenders, 1976-1998. The average age of the American killer has been rising since 1993.

Last month, I watched CNN as my friend Bennett Haselton got grilled opposite Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). After CNN's introduction telling us what to think - cutting straight from footage of Doom to footage of crying Columbine students - the Senator explained how violent games cause children to commit violent actions. He wants to keep dangerous weapons like Quake away from our kids.

That's how the Senator - who voted against secure handgun storage, and twice against child safety locks - positioned himself as our noble defender of children.

How do the posturing panderers justify their crisis-du-jour? How'd we end up with the phantom of media-created child violence as a major election issue, while violence plummets?

The facts speak for themselves. If seeing violence has any effect on children's actions, it obviously makes them calm and peaceful.

So here's the slogan for my campaign: our kids deserve the best in first-person shooters. In my America, every family will have free movie tickets, 300 megatexels, and low-ping broadband. Let's put an end to frame rates under 30Hz. For our country - for our safety - we can leave no child behind.

(Sources: US DOJ 1, 2, 3; OJJDP 1, 2, 3; FBI UCR; Blues News; crime.org; poynter.org.)

The word "Internet" was uttered precisely once in last night's presidential debate, and I don't have to tell you the context. You already know the topic was Columbine, and you already know the Net was being blamed for mass murder. What our Republican candidate failed to mention is that his party's bogeymen, the evil Internet and its evil twin violent entertainment, have brought about a new era of peace. If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.

"Columbine spoke to a larger issue, and it's really a matter of culture. It's a culture that somewhere along the line we begun to disrespect life, where a child can walk in and have their heart turn dark as a result of being on the Internet, and walk in and decide to take somebody else's life."
- George W. Bush, presidential debate, October 11, 2000

The term we're looking for is "manufactured crisis." That's what we need to start calling it, this supposed violence in our schools.

I don't need to provide you with more quotes from Bush, Gore, Cheney and especially Lieberman about how disgustingly violent our culture has become. You can't pick up a paper without seeing at least three people moaning about violent movies, the violent internet, and worst of all violent video games. They're infecting the minds of our children, don't'cha know. It'd be the new national pastime if it weren't 200 years old: grumping about those damn kids.

Let's counter disinformation with some real numbers. Here's an annotated timeline showing the increase in violent imagery, and the corresponding decrease in actual violence.

1993
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,438,200.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 49.1.

Let's consider 1993 our baseline year, the pre-Doom year. That blockbuster was not released until December 1993, so I think we are safe to assume that it did not begin darkening hearts until 1994 or later. By the end of 1993, the internet's two million host machines include 500 webservers.

Demolition Man, Kalifornia and Falling Down are in the theaters.

1994
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,424,200: a 1% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 51.2: a 4% increase from the previous year.

In 1994, shareware Doom, downloadable from the evil internet, shatters existing gaming records. Its bloody graphics and Satanic imagery shock and offend many who are easily shocked and offended. In an era where 200,000 is a great-selling title, 1994 sees the first of fifteen million gamers who download and play Doom.

Meanwhile, the web grows at an annual rate of 341,000%, becoming the 2nd-most popular type of data; among the three million machines on the net, there are too many webservers to count.

The movies Pulp Fiction, Timecop, True Lies, Children of the CornIII, and the politicans' favorite Natural Born Killers are all released in 1994.

1995
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,290,000: a 9% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 2,169.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 46.1: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

In 1995, the web becomes the most popular internet service among the net's four million machines. Shareware Doom continues to rack up downloads. Doom II: Hell On Earth, released last October, takes over as the violentest game ever, with an initial release of half a million units.

The Basketball Diaries, Braveheart, Se7en, and Die Hard3 are released.

1996
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,134,400: a 12% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,683: a 22% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 41.6: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

1996 is a banner year for violent images. Doom II continues on its track to eventually sell two million copies. Duke Nukem 3D, aimed at the young teenage male market, gives our nation's young boys a healthy mix of strippers, jokes, and mass slaughter with machine guns. Soon after, the breakthrough title Quake offers unprecedented visual accuracy: blood, gore, and murder are now illustrated with detail that makes Doom and Duke Nukem look cartoony.

Scream is released in theaters to tremendous success, along with Broken Arrow, CrowII, Sling Blade, and the excellent Fargo. Meanwhile, there are now 9 million hosts on the net.

The effects of all that horrible media violence in 1996 appear in 1997's statistics...

1997
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,055,200: a 7% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,457: a 13% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 38.8: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1997, there are 16 million hosts on the net. At year's end, QuakeII is released, and is quickly banned in Germany for its even-more-realistic violence. And Con Air, Face/Off, Starship Troopers, and Scream2 are released in theaters.

1998
Total under-18 murderers: 1,169: a 20% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 36.0: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1998, Quake II hits its sales stride and begins corrupting young minds. Grand Theft Auto, one of the more vilified and censored video games, is released. The web crosses the 300-million-page mark.

Brace yourself for the movie list: Lethal Weapon4, Saving Private Ryan, American HistoryX, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Ronin, Urban Legend, Blade, and the crappy remake of Psycho hit the theaters.

The result?

1999
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 32.1: an 11% decrease from the previous year.

There it is. In the four years between the release of Doom and Quake II, the number of killers under the age of 18 in this country plummeted. A drop of 46% in just four years is nothing short of astonishing.

Long-term graphs are even more valuable. Click through to these, they're small and quick:

• The homicide rate, 1900-1998. We are experiencing the longest and steepest sustained dropoff in violence since the Great Depression.
• Homicide offenders grouped by age, 1976-1998. The number of teenage killers is steadily falling.
• Average age of homicide offenders, 1976-1998. The average age of the American killer has been rising since 1993.

Last month, I watched CNN as my friend Bennett Haselton got grilled opposite Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). After CNN's introduction telling us what to think - cutting straight from footage of Doom to footage of crying Columbine students - the Senator explained how violent games cause children to commit violent actions. He wants to keep dangerous weapons like Quake away from our kids.

That's how the Senator - who voted against secure handgun storage, and twice against child safety locks - positioned himself as our noble defender of children.

How do the posturing panderers justify their crisis-du-jour? How'd we end up with the phantom of media-created child violence as a major election issue, while violence plummets?

The facts speak for themselves. If seeing violence has any effect on children's actions, it obviously makes them calm and peaceful.

So here's the slogan for my campaign: our kids deserve the best in first-person shooters. In my America, every family will have free movie tickets, 300 megatexels, and low-ping broadband. Let's put an end to frame rates under 30Hz. For our country - for our safety - we can leave no child behind.

(Sources: US DOJ 1, 2, 3; OJJDP 1, 2, 3; FBI UCR; Blues News; crime.org; poynter.org.)

The word "Internet" was uttered precisely once in last night's presidential debate, and I don't have to tell you the context. You already know the topic was Columbine, and you already know the Net was being blamed for mass murder. What our Republican candidate failed to mention is that his party's bogeymen, the evil Internet and its evil twin violent entertainment, have brought about a new era of peace. If we really want less violence in our schools, we obviously need more violence on our Internet.

"Columbine spoke to a larger issue, and it's really a matter of culture. It's a culture that somewhere along the line we begun to disrespect life, where a child can walk in and have their heart turn dark as a result of being on the Internet, and walk in and decide to take somebody else's life."
- George W. Bush, presidential debate, October 11, 2000

The term we're looking for is "manufactured crisis." That's what we need to start calling it, this supposed violence in our schools.

I don't need to provide you with more quotes from Bush, Gore, Cheney and especially Lieberman about how disgustingly violent our culture has become. You can't pick up a paper without seeing at least three people moaning about violent movies, the violent internet, and worst of all violent video games. They're infecting the minds of our children, don't'cha know. It'd be the new national pastime if it weren't 200 years old: grumping about those damn kids.

Let's counter disinformation with some real numbers. Here's an annotated timeline showing the increase in violent imagery, and the corresponding decrease in actual violence.

1993
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,438,200.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 49.1.

Let's consider 1993 our baseline year, the pre-Doom year. That blockbuster was not released until December 1993, so I think we are safe to assume that it did not begin darkening hearts until 1994 or later. By the end of 1993, the internet's two million host machines include 500 webservers.

Demolition Man, Kalifornia and Falling Down are in the theaters.

1994
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,424,200: a 1% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 51.2: a 4% increase from the previous year.

In 1994, shareware Doom, downloadable from the evil internet, shatters existing gaming records. Its bloody graphics and Satanic imagery shock and offend many who are easily shocked and offended. In an era where 200,000 is a great-selling title, 1994 sees the first of fifteen million gamers who download and play Doom.

Meanwhile, the web grows at an annual rate of 341,000%, becoming the 2nd-most popular type of data; among the three million machines on the net, there are too many webservers to count.

The movies Pulp Fiction, Timecop, True Lies, Children of the CornIII, and the politicans' favorite Natural Born Killers are all released in 1994.

1995
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,290,000: a 9% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 2,169.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 46.1: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

In 1995, the web becomes the most popular internet service among the net's four million machines. Shareware Doom continues to rack up downloads. Doom II: Hell On Earth, released last October, takes over as the violentest game ever, with an initial release of half a million units.

The Basketball Diaries, Braveheart, Se7en, and Die Hard3 are released.

1996
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,134,400: a 12% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,683: a 22% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 41.6: a 10% decrease from the previous year.

1996 is a banner year for violent images. Doom II continues on its track to eventually sell two million copies. Duke Nukem 3D, aimed at the young teenage male market, gives our nation's young boys a healthy mix of strippers, jokes, and mass slaughter with machine guns. Soon after, the breakthrough title Quake offers unprecedented visual accuracy: blood, gore, and murder are now illustrated with detail that makes Doom and Duke Nukem look cartoony.

Scream is released in theaters to tremendous success, along with Broken Arrow, CrowII, Sling Blade, and the excellent Fargo. Meanwhile, there are now 9 million hosts on the net.

The effects of all that horrible media violence in 1996 appear in 1997's statistics...

1997
Students' nonfatal violent crimes: 1,055,200: a 7% decrease from the previous year.
Total under-18 murderers: 1,457: a 13% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 38.8: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1997, there are 16 million hosts on the net. At year's end, QuakeII is released, and is quickly banned in Germany for its even-more-realistic violence. And Con Air, Face/Off, Starship Troopers, and Scream2 are released in theaters.

1998
Total under-18 murderers: 1,169: a 20% decrease from the previous year.
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 36.0: a 7% decrease from the previous year.

In 1998, Quake II hits its sales stride and begins corrupting young minds. Grand Theft Auto, one of the more vilified and censored video games, is released. The web crosses the 300-million-page mark.

Brace yourself for the movie list: Lethal Weapon4, Saving Private Ryan, American HistoryX, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Ronin, Urban Legend, Blade, and the crappy remake of Psycho hit the theaters.

The result?

1999
Victims of violent crime per 1,000 population, all ages: 32.1: an 11% decrease from the previous year.

There it is. In the four years between the release of Doom and Quake II, the number of killers under the age of 18 in this country plummeted. A drop of 46% in just four years is nothing short of astonishing.

Long-term graphs are even more valuable. Click through to these, they're small and quick:

• The homicide rate, 1900-1998. We are experiencing the longest and steepest sustained dropoff in violence since the Great Depression.
• Homicide offenders grouped by age, 1976-1998. The number of teenage killers is steadily falling.
• Average age of homicide offenders, 1976-1998. The average age of the American killer has been rising since 1993.

Last month, I watched CNN as my friend Bennett Haselton got grilled opposite Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). After CNN's introduction telling us what to think - cutting straight from footage of Doom to footage of crying Columbine students - the Senator explained how violent games cause children to commit violent actions. He wants to keep dangerous weapons like Quake away from our kids.

That's how the Senator - who voted against secure handgun storage, and twice against child safety locks - positioned himself as our noble defender of children.

How do the posturing panderers justify their crisis-du-jour? How'd we end up with the phantom of media-created child violence as a major election issue, while violence plummets?

The facts speak for themselves. If seeing violence has any effect on children's actions, it obviously makes them calm and peaceful.

So here's the slogan for my campaign: our kids deserve the best in first-person shooters. In my America, every family will have free movie tickets, 300 megatexels, and low-ping broadband. Let's put an end to frame rates under 30Hz. For our country - for our safety - we can leave no child behind.

(Sources: US DOJ 1, 2, 3; OJJDP 1, 2, 3; FBI UCR; Blues News; crime.org; poynter.org.)

testcase writes: "... along with Mickey Mantel's, Elvis Presley's, William Faulkner's, Bertoldt Brecht's, the American Friends Service Committee's, etc. here. Of course the 'new FBI' doesn't collect this kind of info on citizens any more. Right? " I wonder what my file looks like.

Alex Prestin writes, "In an effort to control the recent distributed Denial of Service attacks which everyone's heard about, the FBI has released Linux and Solaris tools to detect the presence (or absence) of the various DDoS daemons. They're available in binary form only (for now). You can get them here." Quote from the page: "Recipients are asked to report significant or suspected criminal activity to their local FBI office." Update: 02/10 07:37 by H :Here's some more information:The author of the DDoS analyses (at staff.washington.edu/dittrich) has released a network scanner to scan for active agents on your network. It includes source, and is available here. PLEASE use it responsibly.

Alex Prestin writes, "In an effort to control the recent distributed Denial of Service attacks which everyone's heard about, the FBI has released Linux and Solaris tools to detect the presence (or absence) of the various DDoS daemons. They're available in binary form only (for now). You can get them here." Quote from the page: "Recipients are asked to report significant or suspected criminal activity to their local FBI office." Update: 02/10 07:37 by H :Here's some more information:The author of the DDoS analyses (at staff.washington.edu/dittrich) has released a network scanner to scan for active agents on your network. It includes source, and is available here. PLEASE use it responsibly.

Disgruntled Goat sent us a review of Intrusion Detection, a text sure to be of interest to all those working in organizations. The author is a former NSA employee and has written this book as a text to convince upper-level types of the need for security and actually paying attention to it. Click below to read more. Intrusion Detection author Rebecca Gurley Bace pages 339 publisher Macmillan Technical Publishing, o01/2000 rating 9/10 reviewer Disgruntled Goat, disgruntled_goat@hotmail.com ISBN 1-57870-185-6 summary Very good InfoSec handbook for suits and junior suits. The Scenario Security books, quite frankly, are pretty much a dime a dozen, most of which are written by people in IT field security. What immediately separates this book from the rest is the background of the author. Ms. Bace is an ex-government employee, spending 12 years in everyone's favorite spook organization, the National Security Agency. She led the Computer Misuse and Anonmaly Detection (CMAD) Research Program for six years at the NSA. She also collaborated on Computer Crime : A Crimefighter's Handbook by Dr. David Icove of the FBI. She also won the Distinguished Leadership Award in 1995 from the NSA.

What's Bad? This book is sort of dry reading. It's akin to reading college CS textbooks for pleasure. Or law books. What I didn't like is the fact that she wasn't real clear on the distinction of "hackers", nor how she describes them. She worries that "hackers" wish to "corrupt the trust process". And the focus for the book is not primarily for techies. It's designed for CIO smacking. Generally, if you're in an organization like mine, your CIO has very little technical background. So, good for CIO bashing.
And, it's $50 also.

What's Good? This is good if you're in a position where you need to convince management of security threats. It's also good for the kiddies who want to get an idea of what to look for when they're gunning for targets to disrupt.
What made this good for me was the fact that I could have points to show to management for InfoSec issues. I work in a hospital and we tend to attract a large amount of famous people as patients. If something damaging was leaked to the media about a famous person's medical condition that was potentially embarassing, we're looking at a good multi-million dollar lawsuit. This book isn't a by-the-book "How to protect your systems", but more of a book on what to safeguard, and how to detect patterns that may indicate patterns of unauthorized usage.
One of the things that I liked was the chapter on Legal Issues. One of the sections in the chapter was "What Real Cases Have Taught Us". It did a few page review on Mitnick's case, cut and dry. It shows that Shimomura was no rocket scientist, and with cooperation from the courts, you can bust almost anyone. But it did bring up several good points, such as obtaining court orders, how laws work, and how it can be considered evidence.

So What's In It For Me? If you're a script kiddie, probably nothing. But for those who are achin' to topple some network, this may be for you.

For those with functioning brains who have vested interests in InfoSec and protecting their organization from people who wish to do harm, and getting real security info, rather than from those half-assed "Security Experts" like JohnP, then pick this up.

Pick this book up at ThinkGeek.

Table of Contents

1. The History of Intrusion Detection
2. Concepts and Definitions
3. Information Sources
4. Analysis Schemes
5. Responses
6. Vulnerability Analysis: A Special Case
7. Technical Issues
8. Understanding the Real-World Challenge
9. Legal Issues
10. For Users
11. For Strategists
12. For Designers
13. Future Needs

maney writes "This link got kicked over to me today. I thought that given the recent John Katz article on /. as well as all the furor over whether or not Y2K is a joke, that this would be a good place to bring it up. It seems that the FBI has a Project for "a strategc assessment of the potential for domestic terrorism in the United States undertaken in anticipation of or response to the arrival of the new millenium". Pretty interesting reading as it ties in all the usual suspects (NWO, The Turner Diaries, White Supremacists, Militias, et al.). Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader of course. "

A couple of readers pointed us to one of Wired's stories that is journaling the aftermath of a recent Slashdot story. The story was about a web hosting company that pulled a Y2K spoof movie, under pressure from the FBI. The disappointing part is the tone of the e-mails that were sent to the one-man operation. Wired has some samples from said e-mails. Please, before hitting send on e-mails and postings, think about the whole situation. In this case, after checking with legal people, the web-hosting company put back the movie and does not deserve the flame generated against it. The FBI is the culprit in this case, and rather then rail on one guy, we should be banding together to fight against actions like the FBI's. For more discussion read Thoughts from the Furnace, Rob's feature about flaming on the Web.

Addition: 11/30 by michael : I thought I'd chime in here, since I started the fracas.

Blaming the ISP is sometimes appropriate, and sometimes not. Huge national ISPs have legal staffs to evaluate whether something should or should not be pulled. In general, they display an astonishing lack of backbone in defending customer sites, because even minor hassle from law enforcement just isn't worth it to them, and they don't have much excuse when they knuckle under. Small ISPs are a much different matter. No legal staff, facing the loss of your entire business if you guess wrong. Let's say he stood up for this guy and refused to pull the site, and the FBI seized the ISP's computers. Would all you flamers have stood up for him, sent him money to fight the good fight, talked to his other customers and begged them to stay on even though their sites were down? Yeah, sure you would. He made the best business decision available to him. The difference between this guy and one of the national ISPs is that they wouldn't have put the site back up again at all.

And if Wired has it right and you people are writing to the ISP's other clients, that's just sad. Save your anger for someone who's actually done something wrong. You want to get pissed off, give the FBI a call and ask them how their "investigation" is going.

Loki writes "A few goverment reports on encryption. Mostly talking about the fears of letting the public have high grade encryption, and how that is a hindrance for law enforcment. " Somewhat older documents, and in .pdf format, but I guess that this is the FBIs justification. I'm so glad its all being challanged.

Alex Prestin sent us an article about a new crypto bill. This one has the distinct advantage of not including the key-recovery abilities that the FBI and others have been demanding. Let's hope they can keep their heads straight on this one.

To coincide with the release of the X-files movie, the FBI has released over 1600 pages of documents relating to the unusual phenomena. My father was thinking about writing a book about the same from France. He abandonned, and I have the French collection of scientific papers... some of which were quite fun to read.

To coincide with the release of the X-files movie, the FBI has released over 1600 pages of documents relating to the unusual phenomena. My father was thinking about writing a book about the same from France. He abandonned, and I have the French collection of scientific papers... some of which were quite fun to read.

In a statement that seems almost painfully obvious to those involved with computers, the FBI has made public that despite the attention of old media to hackers, they do not in fact represent the largest threat to computing. What does in fact represent the greatest threat, is Bi...I mean, insiders. The FBI goes on to talk a little bit about government preperation for electronic inflitration.