The real question is not the time taken to recover or the method. Instead it should be (in light of another./ article today on patent law), would we be able to afford the royalties to rebuild?
Given the sudden "gold rush" of patents on cyber law, which some amazingly way have been passed by the US PTO, could you imagine the bonanza that would be created by the aforesaid disaster?
Imagine a world where all electronic records are lost. Oops, there goes the PTO's database of prior art, and not to mention all of its patents granted in the last 10 years....
Imagine trying to rebuild that world where every business-savy individual is out patenting every variation possible on building computing because they thought of it first, and abstract thought is patentable isn't it. Imagine trying to rebuild a technology base where you are forced to pay fifteen different individuals, fifteen different royalties just to build a motherboard.
That, my friends, is the real horror behind the question..... Technology legal madness cubed....
If I've read this correctly, this guys has broken into a web site without the authors permission and stolen confidential information regarding its users.
Now regardless of whether the site is engaged in illegal actions or not, what right does he have (as he admits himself that he is not a law enforcement agency) to perform this sort of electronic crime? Surely he is breaking the law himself, and should be duely punished?
On the other hand.. if anyone can set themselves up as "warez trading" police without any sort of government or legal endorsement, cruise the net looking for offending web sites, then hack into them and steal information from them where will we be in a year?
What if the offending site contained credit card numbers or other private information not related to the illegal activities? What protection do these people who are engaged in legal activities have from vigilanties from this guy?
Slashdot Mirror
The real question is not the time taken to recover or the method. Instead it should be (in light of another ./ article today on patent law), would we be able to afford the royalties to rebuild?
Given the sudden "gold rush" of patents on cyber law, which some amazingly way have been passed by the US PTO, could you imagine the bonanza that would be created by the aforesaid disaster?
Imagine a world where all electronic records are lost. Oops, there goes the PTO's database of prior art, and not to mention all of its patents granted in the last 10 years....
Imagine trying to rebuild that world where every business-savy individual is out patenting every variation possible on building computing because they thought of it first, and abstract thought is patentable isn't it. Imagine trying to rebuild a technology base where you are forced to pay fifteen different individuals, fifteen different royalties just to build a motherboard.
That, my friends, is the real horror behind the question. .... Technology legal madness cubed ....
If I've read this correctly, this guys has broken into a web site without the authors permission and stolen confidential information regarding its users.
Now regardless of whether the site is engaged in illegal actions or not, what right does he have (as he admits himself that he is not a law enforcement agency) to perform this sort of electronic crime? Surely he is breaking the law himself, and should be duely punished?
On the other hand.. if anyone can set themselves up as "warez trading" police without any sort of government or legal endorsement, cruise the net looking for offending web sites, then hack into them and steal information from them where will we be in a year?
What if the offending site contained credit card numbers or other private information not related to the illegal activities? What protection do these people who are engaged in legal activities have from vigilanties from this guy?
Scary stuff if you ask me..