Immunizing the Internet

jonny4001 writes "The Harvard Law Review has published a student-written article that argues that hackers, worms, and viruses are good for network security and that the law and public policy should encourage 'beneficial' hacking. From the article: 'Exploitation of security holes prompts users and vendors to close those holes, vendors to emphasize security in system development, and users to adopt improved security practices. This constant strengthening of security reduces the likelihood of a catastrophic attack -- one that would threaten national or even global security [...] Current federal law, however, does not properly value such strategic goals.'"

Comments

Finally!

[Anonymous Coward]

Totally telling the FBI slashdot said it was 'ok'.

Wow! Who knew?

[Heavyporker]

Darwin operates perfectly online! Now all we need is to set up the digital version of the Darwin Awards. Now, granted, idiot users aren't permanently removed from the gene pools, but if they ram enough computers into the dirt, they'll be dirt-poor and thus unsuitable as mates, hence they won't reproduce. Right?

Re:Wow! Who knew?

[Mark Hood]

Yeah, but you just try going around sneezing on babies....

Mark

For those who won't RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure plenty won't click the link, so you are missing out on the great title that was left out of the summary:
IMMUNIZING THE INTERNET, OR: HOW I LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE WORM

Taquila Sunrise

[Joebert]

How I learned to stop worrying & love the worm.

Looks like I found a new Taquila drinking buddy.

Re:Taquila Sunrise

[Joebert]

I'm drinking a bottle of rotted juice, with a worm in it, & you expect me to know how to spell it ?!

Re:Does this work for offline crime?

[KlaymenDK]

Might be a good idea, as long as you make the Robbers' Guild (wrong name I'm sure?) hand out receipts so nobody gets mugged more than three times a year. :)

Re:Why Shouldn't it :-P

[badfish99]

No, it's trickle-down economics in action. The banks recover the cost from their customers, who are mostly rich businessmen. So some of the wealth of those rich people ends up having trickled down to the poor robbers. Isn't that how things are supposed to work?

The rich people were probably just going to donate their spare wealth to charity to help the poor: robbery saves them the trouble of having to do that, too. It's a win-win situation!

Re:The well is poisoned.

[vistic]

I'll have you know that Dr. Bunsen Honeydew is a very good coder!

It's easy to immunize the internet...

[Rich7ejr]

... just kick all the homeless people off of it.