Slashdot Mirror
Famous Criminal Opines that Technology Breeds Crime
jcatcw writes "In an interview with Computerworld's editor in chief, Don Tennant, Frank Abagnale spoke about his life of crime and crime prevention. Abagnale is a notorious criminal, whose exploits were portrayed in the movie 'Catch Me If You Can.' Abagnale claims: 'It would be 4,000 times easier to do today, what I did 40 years ago, and I probably wouldn't go to prison for it. Technology breeds crime — it always has, it always will ... I really think the more technology there is in the world, the more you have to instill character and ethics. You can build all the security systems in the world; you can build the most sophisticated technology, and all it takes is one weak link — someone who operates that technology — to bring it all down." This would seem to echo commentary in a New York Times article about the rise of Russian hackers in recent years.
For everything that benefits society, along comes those who seek to use said benefits for personal, illicit gain. I don't think it's so much that "Technology Breeds Crime" as "Crime Feeds On Technology".
It only makes SOME crimes easier.
When you had to walk into a bank to empty someone's bank account, you were limited by how far you could travel.
Now, when you can do it across the 'Web, you are not limited in the same way.
The problem is that the security model has not kept pace with the concept of "web services" offered by the banks. But if the banks were 100% liable for any loss, you'd see them focusing on the security.
It isn't that technology breeds crime; it is that technology is a form of human enhancement, and some humans are criminals. However, technology also enhances law enforcement, brings new ethical and moral issues to the table for society (or the ruling political junta) to rule on, and empowers people further and further down the economic scale as technology itself becomes inexpensive.
I don't think we ought to be "criminalizing" technology as a whole. We simply need to keep considering, and re-considering, the ethical and moral issues of the day in the light of what our current society can tolerate without infringing on the liberties of individuals and the security of the group.
If we have a fault, it is an inability to change quickly when we see social regulation - like the drug war, or the current pogrom against sexuality - isn't working. That's a political problem, and one we (speaking as a US citizen) have been roundly unable to address.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Oh, you're not stuck, you're just unable to let go of the onion rings.
"The person operating the technology" ... A stick, a rock, a screwdriver, all tools. Can I kill somebody with a screwdriver? A Glock, on the other hand, is designed for a reason.
The better a tool is a doing crime, the more we need to ask: who designed it and why?
Do computers make some crimes easier? Yeah. But they also make detecting and preventing crimes easier. They're general-purpose tools.
Nothing has changed in 2000 years about how much character it takes to avoid criminality. So if there's more crime, there's less instilling or more unbridled greed.
I'd blame the latter. Leadership sets the example.
"You must try to forget all you have learned. You must begin to dream." -- Sherwood Anderson
...but it also makes it far more traceable (along- sadly- with more legitimate activities). The potential intrusiveness of technology into our lives and the trail of electronic fingerprints we leave is far greater than most people are aware of, and it's going to get worse before- if- it gets better.
For one simple example, what about the trail that your mobile phone leaves with the network when you leave it switched on and are travelling somewhere?
This isn't even counting the fact that with future improvements in technology, it's quite feasible that activities that you can "get away" with today could leave a trail that is inciminating with tomorrow's forensics and analysis technology. I'll bet that people who committed murders 30 or 40 years ago didn't even consider the possibility of their getting nabbed by DNA tests in the future.
And in all honesty, even if the data we have available to us today isn't able to tell us much, this might change with improved data mining/analysis tools. Something that someone does today might not be enough to get them prosecuted immediately, but what happens when improved tools come along in the future and spot things that had been missed previously?
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
For everything that benefits society, along comes those who seek to use said benefits for personal, illicit gain.
I will not stand for your impugning politicians in that manner!
All the intelligent criminals are already at the top. They simply made what they do legal.
Deleted
Anyone know what it means to be 'Notrious'? Is that 'not nutritious'? Damned editors...
Qxe4
And a tool is neither good or evil. It only empowers the one able to wield it to use it for good or evil. Take whatever invention ever created and you will see that it can be used for both.
Weapons are of course an easy example, but everything human ever invented works. It is something that gives the one able to use it a power edge over someone not equipped with it. Knowledge works a similar way, but to a lesser degree.
And having more power than someone else can be used to exploit him. Ever been that way, ever will be. Technology is power. Superior technology allowed the exploitation of Africa and Asia as colonies. Superior technology (or rather, superior knowledge of technology) allows a trojan writer to exploit the "clueless" user with his infected machine.
But that doesn't make technology a device for more crime. It makes technology a device of power. Not more, not less.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
What a funny way to make perfectly ordinary statements seem moonbat extremist.
We all know the Mayan long cycle is coming to a close as we realign with the galactic core ushering us into the dawn of the age of Aquarius. The Rapture is coming, but who will be the Antichrist come 2012? As always, the answer has been hidden in plain view.
Let us take the name
President Hillary Rodham Clinton
We rearrange the letters and the truth comes to light!
Rapid hell Antichrist demon, no rly
We further rearrange these letters to complete the damming message:
Antichrist lol no rly I'd dampen her
Ignore the evidence at your own peril. Vote Ron Paul!
Abagnale has some good points. Forgery is much easier than it used to be. Printing and paper quality are no guarantee of anything.
A point Abagnale didn't make to the interviewer is that social engineering is easier, too, because people are more used to remote requests for information. Many of Abagnale's scams required him to physically go someplace and deceive someone. Most people can't act well enough to pull off a con like that. Now, much more can be done remotely. "Identity theft" barely existed before the Internet; a few times a year somebody might pull something off, but it wasn't widespread.
It helps, sure. It's not really possible though.
Because even if you create identical access to all parts of the school-system and job-market, having rich parents will still be a great help. It'll allow you to study full-time and not need part-time jobs on the side. More importantly, having *educated* parents means you have the kind of parents who think that education matters. Which transfers to the kids in a million little ways.
The school-system in my part of the world already works pretty close to identical-access. There's still a large (not as large as in USA, but still large) difference between how kids of well-off parents do and how kids of poor parents do.