Melissa Creator tracked using MS's ID numbers?

So last week there was a lot of hype about Microsoft embedding IDs into documents that would allow tracing of authors. This week there was hype about Melissa- yet another lame doomsday macro virus (intentionally not posted here because I found it stupid). But mix the 2 together, and you get a story sent to us by stevew: the Melissa Virus can supposedly be traced to its creator using those annoying little ids. They don't have exact details, but the article says that it came from AOL.

Comments

hmm, very interesting.

[Scott Madin]

So how should we feel about this? The ZDnet article only discusses the facts of the situation, which is as if should be, though there's a slight air of "this privacy-invading software feature helped catch a bad guy so it's OK" to it.

Is it good that the author's been traced? yeah, I suppose so. Doesn't matter all that much really, but I dislike viruses and their authors as much as the next person. If there's good enough proof that this is the author, and some damage can be shown, then I suppose I'm all for prosecuting.

But I care a lot less about that than about the way they caught him. It seems to me we can't just go along, and say what the ZDnet article seems, ever so slightly, to be implying: that it's all right for MS (and by extension, Intel) to build identifiers like this into their products so that anything people who use those products do is traceable, just because once it helped catch someone who was doing something illegal. That's like saying "sure, the FBI can go ahead and install a wiretap on everyone's phone--fine by me, I'm not doing anything illegal, and only people who are would have to worry about that." I don't think anyone in their right mind would agree to something like that; and it violates all the principles on which our legal system is founded: "presumed innocent until proven guilty."

It's good that they caught the author of the virus, if that were all that this meant. But it's not. I hope they don't try to prosecute unless they obtain stronger evidence, through more valid means; and if they do prosecute, I hope they don't try to use the Office-ID-number-trace in court. If they do, we're all going to have to start worrying. And looking over our shoulders.