Conference 7.286::digital

VNS TECHNOLOGY WATCH:                           [Mike Taylor, VNS Correspondent]
=====================                           [Nashua, NH, USA               ]

              Drive to Counter Computer Crime Aims at Invaders
                 Legitimate Users Voice Worries Over Rights

              By John Markoff {New York Times Sunday 3-Jun-90}

    From Los Angeles to Atlanta, Federal and state law-enforcement agents
    have begun an intense battle against computer operators who break
    into government and business data systems.

    The agents, under mounting pressure from corporations and lawmakers,
    say the crackdown is needed to halt a growing threat to commerce,
    research and national security.

    But increasingly, civil liberties experts and even some computer
    industry executives say the crackdown is affecting computer users who
    are not breaking the law. These experts say such users are being
    intimidated and are suffering illegal searches and violations of
    their constitutional guarantees to free speech.

                      Crimes `in the Blink of an Eye'

    In many ways the computer crackdown parallels the campaign against
    drugs, with officials responding to an outcry over a serious problem
    only to confront another outcry over assaults on civil rights.

    "It's a whole new era," said Stephen McNammee, United States Attorney
    for Arizona, who has been a central figure in Government efforts to
    counter computer crime. "Computers are providing a new avenue for
    criminal activities. It is possible to transmit computer information
    for an illegal purpose in the blink of an eye."

    But Representative Don Edwards, a California Democrat, said the
    authorities had gone too far. "Every time there is a perceived
    crisis, law-enforcement agencies and legislators overreact, and
    usually due process and civil liberties suffer," Mr. Edwards said.
    "The Fourth Amendment provides strict limits on rummaging through
    people's property."

    The largest of several investigations under way around the country is
    a two year old Federal effort called Operation Sun Devil, in which
    about 40 personal computer systems, including 23,000 data disks, have
    been seized from homes and businesses.

    The seizures, resulting from 28 search warrants in 14 cities, halted
    the operation of some computer bulletin boards ... little or any of
    the confiscated equipment has been returned. In all, seven people
    have been arrested so far.

    One computer game maker who has not been charged says he is on the
    verge of going out of business since investigators seized his
    equipment.

    In related inquiries, the Secret Service has surreptitiously
    eavesdropped on computer bulletin boards and telephone conversations,
    and in the process agents have entered these networks posing as
    legitimate users and traded information.

    In an unrelated investigation of the theft of an important program
    from Apple Computer Inc. last year, dozens of experts and hobbyists
    have recently been interrogated by the [FBI].

    Civil libertarians and some business executives have begun to
    organize defenses. Among them is Mitchel D. Kapor, creator of the
    nation's most popular software program, the Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet,
    who is planning to help finance a legal defense fund of several
    hundred thousand dollars for some of those accused.

                       Legal Protections Are Unclear

    Harvey Silverglate, a Massachusetts lawyer and civil rights expert
    who is working with Mr. Kapor, said, "You have innocent people who
    are being terrorized as well as investigations of people who have
    broken the law." He termed the Government actions a "typical American
    solution: throw your best and brightest in jail."

    Officials of the Secret Service, which since 1984 has been the
    primary Federal enforces of computer fraud laws, believe that an
    alarming number of bright young computer enthusiasts are using
    computers illegally.

    "Often," said Gary M. Jenkins, Secret Service assistant director, "a
    progression of criminal activity occurs which involves telecommunications 
    fraud, unauthorized access to other computers, credit card fraud, and
    then moves on to other destructive activities like computer viruses."

    A 1986 Federal law on computer fraud and abuse make it a crime to
    enter computers or take information from them without authorization.

    But Mr. Kapor of Lotus said he believe the danger posed by the
    computer joy riders had been greatly exaggerated. "Now that the
    Communists aren't our enemies any more, the American psyche has to
    end up inventing new ones," he said.

    He and other experts are also alarmed by new investigative techniques
    that employ computers. The power of advanced machines multiplies the
    risk of search and seizure violations, these experts say, because
    they can perform so many simultaneous tasks and absorb and analyze so
    much information.

    Moreover, civil liberties advocates say the perils are greater
    because legal precedents are not clear on how the First Amendment
    protects speech and the Fourth Amendment protects against searches
    and seizures in the electronic world.

                           Government Surveillance

    In response to a court-enforceable request under the Freedom of
    Information Act, the Secret Service has acknowledged that it has
    monitored computer bulletin boards. In its answer to the request,
    made by Representative Edwards, the agency said its agents, acting as
    legitimate users, had secretly monitored communications on computer
    bulletin boards. The agency also disclosed it had a new Computer
    Diagnostic Center, in which the data on computer disks seized in
    raids is evaluated by machines operating automatically.

    Civil liberties specialists view such practices as potentially
    harmful.

    "Computer mail unrelated to an investigation could be swept up in the
    Government's electronic dragnet if the law is not carefully tailored
    to a well-defined purpose," said Marc Rotenberg, Washington director
    for the Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility.

    The Government's Operations Sun Devil was set up primarily to fight a
    loose association of several dozen computer hobbyists, including
    teen-agers, who referred to themselves as the Legion of Doom. Members
    in various cities stayed in touch through computer networks and
    bulletin boards and exchanged technical information on how to break
    into computer systems.

    In February a Federal grand jury in Chicago indicted two members:
    Craig Neidorf, 20 years old, and Robert J. Riggs, 21, for exchanging
    a six-page document describing the operation of the Southern Bell 911
    emergency system.

                        Private Document Distributed

    The indictment, under the 1986 computer fraud law charges that in
    December, 1988, Mr. Riggs broke into a company computer and stole the
    document, which the company valued at slightly more than $76,000. He
    transferred it to Mr. Neidorf by electronic mail on a bulletin board
    in Lockport, Ill., the indictment said, and Mr. Neidorf later
    reproduced it in an electronic newsletter.

    Computer security experts say documents like the 911 description are
    usually not taken for profit, but rather for the challenge of doing
    it. Some members of the computer underground create elaborate manuals
    on how to violate computer security as a sport or hobby.

    But law-enforcement officials do not see it as a game. Because modern
    society has come to depend on computers for some much of its
    government and commercial business, officials view intrusions as
    threats not only to private property, but also to the very operation
    of the systems.

    In another part of the Sun Devil investigation, Secret Service agents
    in March confiscated computers and other equipment from Steven
    Jackson Games, a small Austin, Tex., company.

    Mr. Jackson, the company's president, said the agents were seeking a
    rule book for a fantasy game that deals with "cyberpunk," the science
    fiction world where high technology and outlaw society intersect.

    Mr. Jackson said he still did not know why his company had been
    searched. He said Secret Service officials had promised three times
    to return his equipment and software but still had not done so. He
    said that he had been forced to lay off 8 of his 17 employees and
    that the company was on the verge of going out of business.

    "It raises First Amendment questions," said Mr. Jackson. "It's a
    frightening precedent. I don't think they would have done it to
    IBM."

    Law-enforcement officials say they have difficulty returning seized
    computers and software promptly; William J. Cook, an assistant United
    States Attorney in Chicago, said thorough examination took a long
    time because of the "levels of information you find in a computer."

                            A Sweep in 14 Cities

    The largest operation in the Sun Devil investigation came on May 8
    when more than 150 Secret Service agents, plus state and local
    law-enforcement officers, served the 28 search warrants in 14
    cities. In all, seven people, including Mr. Riggs and Mr. Neidorf,
    have been arrested.

    In a separate investigation, the FBI has been searching for a year
    for members of a group that stole basic programming information from
    Apple Computer and mailed copies to people in the press and the
    computer industry. The group said it stole the software, which is
    fundamental to the operation of Macintosh computers, to protest
    Apple's refusal to let other makers copy the Macintosh.

    The group calls itself the Nuprometheus League, from the character in
    Greek mythology who stole fire from the gods.

    Organizers of an annual West Coast computer meeting known as the
    Hackers' Conference said at least a dozen of the several hundred
    people who attended last year's event had reported being recently
    questioned by FBI agents about the Apple theft.

    The Hackers' Conference began in 1984 after the publication of the
    book "Hackers" by Steven Levy, Anchor/Doubleday, an account of
    computer industry pioneers at MIT and in Silicon Valley.

    There is no evidence that the Apple theft was linked to people who
    attended the Hackers' Conference, and Leo Cunningham, assistant
    United States Attorney in San Jose, Calif., would not comment on any
    facet of the case.


                 MARYLAND MAN INDICTED FOR COMPUTER HACKING
                      by Karen Warmkessel
                         {The Baltimore Sun}

    A 31-year old Middletown man,who prosecutors said was part of an
    illegal computer hackers' group known as the "Legion of Doom" was
    indicted yesterday for allegedly helping others break into computer
    systems throughout the country.

    In addition to facing federal computer fraud charges, Leonard Rose
    Jr.,a computer consultant, is charged in an alleged scheme to steal
    and give out closely guarded software for AT&T Unix computer systems.

    Breckinridge L. Wilcox, the U.S. attorney for Maryland,said the
    indictment - the third in a series of related prosecutions of the
    Legion of Doom - had "far reaching" implications for the security of
    computer systems in the United States.

    "The activities of this guy and his group are disturbing" Mr. Wilcox
    said.

    He said the investigation, which started in Chicago, and expanded to
    Georgia, and Maryland, had revealed that Mr. Rose and his
    confederates gained access to computer systems belonging to federal
    research centers,educational institutions and private businesses, but
    he declined to name them.

    Mr. Wilcox said that because the hackers covered their tracks,
    authorities had not yet determined whether any harm resulted. "We
    know what computer systems were accessed," he said. "It may be very
    difficult, if not impossible, to determine what, if any damage was
    done. "We don't know if it was done for fun,to see if it could be
    done, or if it was done form some more malignant motive."

    One law enforcement source said there were indications that Mr. Rose
    may have been paid for some programs but that he gave others to his
    fellow hackers.

    Mr. Rose, who, according to authorities lives on Willow Tree Drive,
    and used the name "Terminus," could not be reached for comment last
    night. He is charged with two counts of computer fraud and three
    counts of interstate transportation of stolen property.

    If convicted of all counts, he faces a maximum possible prison
    sentence of 32 years and a maximum possible fine of $500,000.

    "He is a fairly sophisticated Unix user who decided to take advantage
    of that knowledge to work his way into other people's systems" one
    law enforcement said.

    The investigation is continuing,and others in Maryland reportedly
    could be charged.

    The Unix program, originally developed by AT&T, is an "operating
    system" that governs the core functions of a computer system. An AT&T
    spokesman said yesterday that about one million Unix computers are in
    use in the country, many of them on college campuses.

    David P. King, an assistant U.S. attorney, said that Mr. Rose not
    only gave the stolen Unix software to others, but also used it to
    develop two so called "Trojan horse" computer programs, with
    seemingly innocuous functions that conceal their true purpose.

    One of these programs was allegedly designed to collect "superuser"
    passwords, which give the user unlimited access to computer
    systems,including the ability to change the programs and insert new
    programs.Another program which would have allowed users to use a
    computer system without authorization.

    Mr. Rose allegedly used the programs himself and gave them to others
    hackers in Michigan and Chicago.

    One of the men was a member of the Legion of Doom, according to Mr.
    King.

    He said it was unclear where Mr. Rose had obtained the stolen Unix
    software.

    There are other federal indictments pending that involve Legion of
    Doom members in Atlanta and Chicago, Mr. King said.

    The assistant U.S. attorney said authorities believe that the Legion
    of Doom is a "small" group of hackers nationally. He said he was
    unable to estimate their numbers.

    The indictment alleges that the group used various methods to gain
    access to computer systems such as masquerading as authorized users,
    password scanning, and Trojan horse programs.

    It's members allegedly wanted to break into the system to steal
    computer software from the companies that owned the programs; to use
    computer time at no charge; to steal the original text of software
    and other information; to make telephone calls at no charge; and to
    obtain and use credit histories of individuals other than themselves,
    the indictment said.

    This is the second computer fraud case to be brought by federal
    prosecutors in Maryland. Mr. Wilcox said the other case was dismissed
    by a federal judge.

    {Contributed by Jerry Leichter to TELECOM Digest Special: LOD - Part I
     Contributed by Wes Plouff to VNS}

I have hidden reply 1139.2 because it is 1266 lines long, an unreasonable
size for an article to be posted to a notesfile.  The item is one that has
already been circulated widely around the net - the author is John Perry
Barlow and is titled "Crime and Puzzlement".  If you haven't seen this and
wish to, you could contact SPICE::PECKAR, who posted .2, by MAIL and request
it be sent to you.

					Steve

    re: .0
    
    My name is now on a U.S. Secret Service list of potential "hackers".
    I live in Austin, I own a couple of Steve Jackson games, and I had
    accessed his BBS, which was later seized by the Secret Service as
    part of Operation Sun Devil.  Hopefully, the Secret Service "experts"
    who are sorting through SJ's files will figure out that all I did
    was ask for game hints, not national secrets, but the thought that
    my house could be searched, my PC impounded, and my reputation be-
    smirched is still ever-present in the back of my mind.  
    
    I guess there are always certain risks in being at the leading edge
    of a new technology or a new social phenomenon.  I use the network
    at Digital every day; it is a crucial part of my job.  After I got
    a PC at home, I found a whole new range of networks available to
    support non-business activities, ranging from Compuserve to the
    BBS run by the church down the street.  What we learned at Digital
    years ago (the synergy of information networks) is just now filtering
    into the lives of the consumer population.  But the government seems
    to view this as a threat somehow, that private citizens are creating
    their own networks outside of any corporate or governmental authority.
    
    On the one hand, Digital must take all possible steps to safeguard
    the security of our internal networks, since they are the company's
    lifeblood.  Hackers, with malice or without, are a threat to that
    security, and hence to the corporation.
    
    On the other hand, it looks like our biggest threat is no longer the
    hacker, but instead is now the Government in pursuit of hackers, not
    caring who gets stepped on in the process.  Today, it is just the
    little guys and individuals, but who's to say that it can't happen
    to Digital?   Even though we have the cash to pay lawyers, file
    legal briefs, and ride out potential losses of equipment or services
    without foundering like Steve Jackson Games did, it still seems like
    a high price to pay for government "protection".
    
    Geoff Unland

RE:  < Note 1139.3 by QUARK::LIONEL "Free advice is worth every cent" >

>I have hidden reply 1139.2 because it is 1266 lines long, an unreasonable
>size for an article to be posted to a notesfile.  The item is one that has
>already been circulated widely around the net - the author is John Perry
>Barlow and is titled "Crime and Puzzlement".  If you haven't seen this and
>wish to, you could contact SPICE::PECKAR, who posted .2, by MAIL and request
>it be sent to you.

>					Steve

I have deleted 1139.2, but I have not been asked to by a moderator or anyone
else, nor was I informed that the note was set hidden.  The article is crucial
to this discussion and I wonder if its content, rather than its length, had
anything to do with Steve Lionel's heavy-handedness?  I make no accusations,
Steve, but feel bad that pre-emptive measures were taken aganst my attempts to
communicate an issue which I believe should be of great concern to the Digital
community.  I thought that notesfiles were created as a depository for
information such as this, so as to reduce the need for widely circulating such
articles through E-Mail, etc. Sorry if I'm wrong about this.

Please do NOT send me E-Mail requesting copies of this article. Instead, copy 
the file from mpgs::user3:[peckar]barlow.txt; preferably during off hours. 

Thanks,

Mike

    I'm sure Steve's motives were above-board. Very long notes (1266 lines
    definitely qualifies) are very anti-social to those of us who use
    DECwindows notes, since it pulls the entire note in before you can do
    anything else. This is clearly a deficiency (read, "bug") in DECwindows
    notes, but until people can prevail upon them to *fix* it, it's very
    annoying to be reading notes and have your session freeze up for five
    minutes because someone posted an enormous note.

RE:  .6

	o.k., maybe I am a little paranoid, but still, as a co-moderator of
another conference, I always inform an author that his/her note has been acted
upon, and it is to that issue that I felt the need to speak out. Again, sorry
to all DECWindows noters whose terminals got bogged down...

Below, I have extracted from Barlow's article "Crime and Puzzlement", the very
last few paragraphs which explain in essence what will become the charter of 
the Computer Liberties Foundation.  I still encourage those interested to read
the entire article!

I recieved E-Email from someone who told me that DEC will not meet
contributions if this organization does not hold the 501(c)(3) tax exemption,
but I'm am very interested in guaging the Digital Community opinions on this
organization and on the actions of the certain U.S. government agencies. Should
DEC take a stand on this?

Mike

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
But as of today (in early June of 1990), Mitch and I are legally constituting
the Computer Liberty Foundation, a two (or possibly three) man
organization which will raise and disburse funds for education, lobbying,
and litigation in the areas relating to digital speech and the extension of
the Constitution into Cyberspace.
 
Already, on the strength of preliminary stories about our efforts in the
Washington Post and the New York Times, Mitch has received an offer
from Steve Wozniak to match whatever funds he dedicates to this effort.
(As well as a fair amount of abuse from the more institutionalized
precincts of the computer industry.)
 
The Computer Liberty Foundation will fund, conduct, and support legal
efforts to demonstrate that the Secret Service has exercised prior restraint
on publications, limited free speech, conducted improper seizure of
equipment and data, used undue force, and generally conducted itself in a
fashion which is arbitrary, oppressive, and unconstitutional.
 
In addition, we will work with the Computer Professionals for Social
Responsibility and other organizations to convey to both the public and the
policy-makers metaphors which will illuminate the more general stake in
liberating Cyberspace.
 
Not everyone will agree. Crackers are, after all, generally beyond public
sympathy. Actions on their behalf are not going to be popular no matter
who else might benefit from them in the long run.
 
Nevertheless, in the litigations and political debates which are certain to
follow, we will endeavor to assure that their electronic speech is protected
as certainly as any opinions which are printed or, for that matter,
screamed. We will make an effort to clarify issues surrounding the
distribution of intellectual property. And we will help to create for
America a future which is as blessed by the Bill of Rights as its past has
been.
 
 
 
John Perry Barlow
barlow@well.sf.ca.us
Friday, June 8, 1990
 

I hid the note only because of the pain it causes to those reading using
DECwindows and also those who extract notes in batch.  Also, long notes
take up a lot of disk space.  My philosophy is that such lengthy texts are
better made available through other means.  And since this particular text
had already been widely circulated through the company (at who knows how
much cost in disk space and network bandwidth), I didn't see much point
in having it here too.  But I didn't delete the note - I left it here so
that the author could extract it if he didn't have a copy.

My personal view of the subject did not enter into this decision at all.


As for DEC matching gifts - DEC generally doesn't match donations to
organizations whose purpose for being is to lobby for changes in the laws,
which is what it sounds like the CLF will be doing.  Personally, I support
the CLF's goals (though not its condonement of "browsers"), but I don't
expect that DEC will provide any support.

				Steve

    Just out of curiosity... If you "hide" a note, does that recover any
    disk space?  
    
    I'm not being sarcastic...I really don't know how "hiding" works, or
    much about NOTES at all, for that matter.
    
    tony

re: .9

Hiding does just what it says... no disk space in the host conference is
saved. Un-hiding the note makes it readable again.

Read what the moderator said:  He hid it so that the author could make a
copy of it _before_ it was deleted, in case the author had no other copy.

/john

    Along related (to the original topic) lines, the June 18, 1990 edition
    of INFORMATION WEEK has a cover story entitled "A Question of Privacy"
    which discusses the situation of an EPSON employee who was terminated
    when she protested that the company was reading electronic mail between
    employees.  The article (which I had thought about OCR'ing and posting,
    but in light of the .2 saga I won't) also discusses the legal status of
    such practices and the ethical issues.  It certainly is relevant to the
    discussion of due process in a computing environment.
    
    Steve

    Just to change the direction of the discussion for a minute....

    This weeks issue of one of the local freebie papers here in the 
Westboro to Framingham market had a cover story of two Framingham computer 
hackers and how they use stolen information to gain free telephone access 
to call around the world. The excuse is that the big companies can afford 
it and it hurts no one. The Liberty Defense group was mentioned in the same 
article as being in the side of these guys, that they should have free 
access to networks and computers around the world and let someone else foot 
the bill. 

    Well, what these hackers do is still stealing, no matter what else you 
call it. The Defense group should recognise that and admit that it is still 
wrong, no matter who you steal from. The big corporations (I would guess 
these "heros" in the article steal plenty from DEC, they are right around 
the corner) are owned by lots of us little people who depend on the big 
corps for our living, our future retirement income, and to help us in many 
other ways. So stealing from big DEC/any_other_biggie is nothing more than 
stealing from you and I, your neighbor, the retired couple down the 
street,etc. Maybe they don't steal much, but if they steal $1,000 a year, 
and 10,000 of them each try to steal that much, how long can we ignore it?

    Sorry for the soapbox there, but the logic in their attitude is not 
logical at all, and I have to call a spade a spade. It is interesting that 
Mr. Kapow of Lotus 1-2-3 fame is part of the core group, yet Lotus has 
itself gone to court with many spreadsheet look-alikes to prevent others 
from using the "look and feel" of 1-2-3. There is some lack of consistancy 
in the two actions. 

    I don't agree with heavy handed gov. tactics to confiscate private 
computer equipment, but they certainly need to put these hackers out of 
business. How would you feel if they got into DEC personnel records and 
found out all your personal history,etc and used it in some way? It might 
be years before you found out about it. Or published your credit history, 
or hurt your credit rating? Not all these hackers that the Liberty group is 
looking to defend are nice honest kids just looking to make a few free 
phone calls and use the networks to talk to their friends across the 
country, many of them are trying to make a buck off what they find, and it 
is your/mine/our bucks they are after.

    Vic H

    re:  previous
    
    One of the things that amazes me about this topic is the willingness
    of "computer professionals" to accept anything the popular press has
    to say about hackers.  Why is this?
    
>wrong, no matter who you steal from. The big corporations (I would guess 
>these "heros" in the article steal plenty from DEC, they are right around 
    
    I not really sure what you're referring to here as stealing.  Stealing
    time?  I know of scads of employees who give their children access to
    computer systems to play games, write papers, send mail, etc.  Does
    this make them "hackers"?
    
    Speaking of "big corporations", why should "big corporations" be more
    entitled to have a network than a bunch of guys with PC's?  Why should
    we think that if the government is willing to spy on the PC network and
    seize their equipment indiscriminately, that they are not willing to do
    so with us?  Because we can afford better lawyers, right?
    
    The issue is not whether or not hackers should be caught and punished.
    The *real* issue is whether or not the government has the right to
    abandon the due process of law just because they are dealing with a
    technology they are scared of.  Why would a person in his right mind
    use a computer terminal at home, or even be in the computer business
    in the first place, if he was giving up his right to due process?
    This is the real motivation of the legal defense fund.
    
>be years before you found out about it. Or published your credit history, 
>or hurt your credit rating? Not all these hackers that the Liberty group is 
    
    I'm sorry to disappoint you here, but all it takes to look up your
    credit rating is a few tidbits of information and $15.  In theory, I
    need a release from you, and you would be able to find out that I did
    it.  In practice, neither usually happens.  TRW regularly sells your
    credit history to all sorts of companies who use it to determine what
    kind of mailings to send to you, based on what you can afford.
    
    Geoff Unland
    

>    <<< Note 1139.13 by CARTUN::VHAMBURGER "Whittlers chip away at life" >>>
                  -< Misguided might describe this group.... >-

>    This weeks issue of one of the local freebie papers here in the 
>Westboro to Framingham market had a cover story of two Framingham computer 

>it and it hurts no one. The Liberty Defense group was mentioned in the same 
>article as being in the side of these guys, that they should have free 

 
	  A Chemical Industry trade mag was bemoaning the fact that
	  the popular press consistently presented false, misleading and
	  generally unfavorable stories about chemical engineers and their
	  work. They said that they now could commiserate with the National
	  Rifle Association on that score.
	  I guess we can add computer users to that category.

	  (Please, no flames about chemicals or guns.)

	  					Jack P.

<><><><><><><><>  T h e   V O G O N   N e w s   S e r v i c e  <><><><><><><><>

 Edition : 2107             Thursday 12-Jul-1990            Circulation :  8289 


 Legal - Mitch Kapor, Steve Wozniak, another for the defense in computer field
	{The Boston Globe, 11-Jul-90, p. 33}
   Concerned that the rights of computer users are being threatened by a
 nationwide crackdown on computer crime, Mitchell D. Kapor, founder of Lotus
 Development Corp., Tuesday announced the creation of the Electronic Frontier
 Foundation that will promote computer education and fund legal efforts to
 extend First Amendment protection to electronic media.
   At a news conference, Kapor was quick to note the foundation does not
 condone hackers and will not serve as a hackers' legal defense fund.
   "Our mission is not to defend people who break into computer systems," said
 Kapor, who has suggested that the government is overemphasizing the dangers
 posed by hackers.
   Kapor said that he and Steve Wozniak, who co-founded Apple Computer, had
 each donated "a six-figure sum" to get the foundation off the ground, as did a
 third contributor, described by Kapor as a "Silicon Valley high-tech pioneer
 who wishes to remain anonymous." He declined to disclose the total amount
 raised but said the Cambridge, Mass.-based foundation will seek outside
 support and has already received hundreds of inquiries from people interested
 in computing.
   The foundation's first action was to award a $275,000 grant to the Computer
 Professionals for Social Responsibility, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based public
 advocacy group. The two-year grant will be used to sponsor the group's ongoing
 educational and policy-setting efforts in protecting the civil liberties of
 computer users, said Marc Rotenberg, director of the group's Washington
 office.
   Formation of the foundation comes as the Secret Service continues a two-year
 investigation, called Operation Sun Devil, that has already resulted in seven
 arrests and the seizure of some 40 computers and 23,000 disks of data. Law
 enforcement officials say that Operation Sun Devil and other investigations
 are a response to a dramatic rise in computer crime that threatens personal
 privacy and the security of government and corporate computers.
   But Kapor said that the foundation is concerned that the anticomputer crime
 campaign is infringing on the rights of legitimate computer users to the
 freedom of speech and subjecting some of them  to illegal searches. The
 foundation is already paying the legal expenses of Steve Jackson, the founder
 of a small game manufacturer in Austin, Texas.
   According to Jackson, Secret Service agents armed with a search warrant
 raided his company's offices last March, seizing computers, software and all
 copies of its next product, a fantasy gamebook. Jackson, who says the
 confiscation nearly put him out of business, was told the book was a
 "handbook for computer crime."
   Neither Jackson, who insists his book is merely a futuristic simulation
 game, nor any of his employees have been charged with a crime. It took several
 months to get the seized gear back from the Secret Service, and much of it was
 damaged beyond repair. A spokesman for the Secret Service, which enforces
 federal computer crime laws, did not return a telephone call seeking comment.
   Harvey Silvergate, a prominent Boston Attorney who is assisting Jackson,
 said it was especially disturbing that the federal agents seized Jackson's
 electronic bulletin board used to post promotions of the company's products as
 well as provide customers a place to exchange comments and ideas. Silvergate,
 whose fees are being paid by the foundation, said the seizure raised serious
 questions about whether electronic media such as bulletin boards and
 electronic mail systems are afforded the same First and Fourth amendment
 rights as newspapers and other traditional media.
   The foundation has also filed a  "friend of the court" brief in the case of
 Craig Neidorf, who has been indicted on charges of wire fraud and transporting
 stolen documents over state lines. Neidorf, a 20-year-old student at the
 University of Missouri, had published in his electronic newsletter a document
 describing an emergency 911 system that he obtained from someone who had
 allegedly stolen it from the telephone company's computer.
   William J. Cook, an assistant US Attorney in Chicago who is prosecuting
 Neidorf, declined to comment on the case. While he praised the foundation for
 addressing educational issues, he defended the aggressive battle against
 computer crime, saying it cost the US economy anywhere from $500 million to
 $5 billion in areas such as stolen data, credit card fraud and expenditures to
 make computer networks more secure.
   And citing a case in Atlanta, in which three men - including Robert J.
 Riggs, accused of stealing the document published by Neidorf, on Monday
 pleaded guilty to computer fraud charges related to data stolen from BellSouth
 Corp., Cook said personal privacy had been threatened as well. "Hackers have
 the ability to break into a telephone company and eavesdrop on the
 conversations of private citizens."
   Gail Thackeray, an assistant attorney general in Arizona, defended tactics,
 including eavesdropping on electronic bulletin boards, used by law enforcement
 officials to combat computer fraud. "When you have an explosion in any kind of
 crime, you get a strong response," drawing an analogy to the crackdown on
 drunk driving, which has included random police stops and searches.
   The foundation will also support the development of tools such as computer
 games that teach about computers, and software that makes them easier to use.
   Kapor said that he had made the foundation his principal activity outside
 his family and running ON Technology Inc., the Cambridge software company he
 founded after leaving Lotus. Although some in the industry have criticized him
 for defending computer hackers, Kapor said he didn't think his funding of the
 foundation would jeopardize ON's relationship with the industry.
   "Anyway, I'm not out to win a popularity contest," he said.

    The next two replies contain material from the Internet Telecom Digest
    from and about the EFF.  Reply .+1 outlines EFF's purpose and
    activities.  Reply .+2 discusses the two criminal cases in which EFF is
    involved.
    
    WARNING WARNING WARNING to Windows notes readers:  These replies are
    440 and 350 lines long, respectively.  Don't say you weren't warned!
    
    I think these articles are important for understanding what EFF is
    trying to accomplish, and that an earlier comparison with the ACLU is
    apropos.  It's worth asking again:  is it likely Digital will match
    contributions to EFF?
    
    Wes Plouff

TELECOM Digest     Wed, 11 Jul 90 20:55:00 CDT   Electronic Frontier  1 of 2
 
Inside This Issue:                         Moderator: Patrick A. Townson
 
    New Foundation Established To Encourage Computer Based Communications
    CPSR To Undertake Expanded Civil Liberties Program
    Electronic Frontier Foundation - Mission Statement
    Across the Electronic Frontier [Statement by Mssrs. Kapor and Barlow]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Sub: New Foundation Established to Encourage Computer Based Communications
Reply-To: eff@well.sf.ca.us
Date: Tue, 10 Jul 90 07:21:31 BST
From: the terminal of Geoff Goodfellow <geoff@fernwood.mpk.ca.us>
 
 
Contact: Cathy Cook (415) 759-5578
 
 Washington, D.C., July 10, 1990 -- Mitchell D. Kapor, founder of
Lotus Development Corporation and ON Technology, today announced that
he, along with colleague John Perry Barlow, has established a
foundation to address social and legal issues arising from the impact
on society of the increasingly pervasive use of computers as a means
of communication and information distribution.  The Electronic
Frontier Foundation (EFF) will support and engage in public education
on current and future developments in computer-based and
telecommunications media.  In addition, it will support litigation in
the public interest to preserve, protect and extend First Amendment
rights within the realm of computing and telecommunications
technology.
 
Initial funding for the Foundation comes from private contributions by
Kapor and Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer, Inc.  The
Foundation expects to actively raise contributions from a wide
constituency.
 
As an initial step to foster public education on these issues, the
Foundation today awarded a grant to the Palo Alto, California-based
public advocacy group Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility
(CPSR).  The grant will be used by CPSR to expand the scope of its
on-going Computing and Civil Liberties Project (see attached).
 
Because its mission is to not only increase public awareness about
civil liberties issues arising in the area of computer-based
communications, but also to support litigation in the public interest,
the Foundation has recently intervened on behalf of two legal cases.
 
The first case concerns Steve Jackson, an Austin-based game
manufacturer who was the target of the Secret Service's Operation Sun
Devil.  The EFF has pressed for a full disclosure by the government
regarding the seizure of his company's computer equipment.  In the
second action, the Foundation intends to seek amicus curiae (friend of
the court) status in the government's case against Craig Neidorf, a
20-year-old University of Missouri student who is the editor of the
electronic newsletter Phrack World News.
 
"It is becoming increasingly obvious that the rate of technology
advancement in communications is far outpacing the establishment of
appropriate cultural, legal and political frameworks to handle the
issues that are arising," said Kapor. "And the Steve Jackson and
Neidorf cases dramatically point to the timeliness of the Foundation's
mission.  We intend to be instrumental in helping shape a new
framework that embraces these powerful new technologies for the public
good."
 
The use of new digital media -- in the form of on-line information and
interactive conferencing services, computer networks and electronic
bulletin boards -- is becoming widespread in businesses and homes.
However, the electronic society created by these new forms of digital
communications does not fit neatly into existing, conventional legal
and social structures.
 
The question of how electronic communications should be accorded the
same political freedoms as newspapers, books, journals and other modes
of discourse is currently the subject of discussion among this
country's lawmakers and members of the computer industry.  The EFF
will take an active role in these discussions through its continued
funding of various educational projects and forums.
 
An important facet of the Foundation's mission is to help both the
public and policy-makers see and understand the opportunities as well
as the challenges posed by developments in computing and
telecommunications.  Also, the EFF will encourage and support the
development of new software to enable non-technical users to more
easily use their computers to access the growing number of digital
communications services available.
 
The Foundation is located in Cambridge, Mass.  Requests for
information should be sent to Electronic Frontier Foundation, One
Cambridge Center, Suite 300, Cambridge, MA 02142, 617/577-1385, fax
617/225-2347; or it can be reached at the Internet mail address
eff@well.sf.ca.us.
 
------------------------------
 
Subject: CPSR to Undertake Expanded Civil Liberties Program
Reply-To: eff@well.sf.ca.us
Date: Tue, 10 Jul 90 07:22:40 BST
From: the terminal of Geoff Goodfellow <geoff@fernwood.mpk.ca.us>
 
 
Contact: Marc Rotenberg (202) 775-1588    
 
Washington, D.C., July 10, 1990 -- Computer Professionals for Social
Responsibility (CPSR), a national computing organization, announced
today that it would receive a two-year grant in the amount of $275,000
for its Computing and Civil Liberties Project.  The Electronic
Frontier Foundation (EFF),founded by Mitchell Kapor, made the grant to
expand ongoing CPSR work on civil liberties protections for computer
users.
 
At a press conference in Washington today, Mr. Kapor praised CPSR's
work, "CPSR plays an important role in the computer community.  For
the last several years, it has sought to extend civil liberties
protections to new information technologies.  Now we want to help CPSR
expand that work."
 
Marc Rotenberg, director of the CPSR Washington Office said, "We are
obviously very happy about the grant from the EFF.  There is a lot of
work that needs to be done to ensure that our civil liberties
protections are not lost amidst policy confusion about the use of new
computer technologies."
 
CPSR said that it will host a series of policy round tables in
Washington, DC, during the next two years with lawmakers, computer
users, including (hackers), the FBI, industry representatives, and
members of the computer security community.  Mr. Rotenberg said that
the purpose of the meetings will be to "begin a dialogue about the new
uses of electronic media and the protection of the public interest."
 
CPSR also plans to develop policy papers on computers and civil
liberties, to oversee the Government's handling of computer crime
investigations, and to act as an information resource for
organizations and individuals interested in civil liberties issues.
 
The CPSR Computing and Civil Liberties project began in 1985 after
President Reagan attempted to restrict access to government computer
systems through the creation of new classification authority.  In
1988, CPSR prepared a report on the proposed expansion of the FBI's
computer system, the National Crime Information Center.  The report
found serious threats to privacy and civil liberties.  Shortly after
the report was issued, the FBI announced that it would drop a proposed
computer feature to track the movements of people across the country
who had not been charged with any crime.
 
"We need to build bridges between the technical community and the
policy community," said Dr. Eric Roberts, CPSR president and a
research scientist at Digital Equipment Corporation in Palo Alto,
California.  "There is simply too much misinformation about how
computer networks operate.  This could produce terribly misguided
public policy."
 
CPSR representatives have testified several times before Congressional
committees on matters involving civil liberties and computer policy.
Last year CPSR urged a House Committee to avoid poorly conceived
computer activity.  "In the rush to criminalize the malicious acts of
the few we may discourage the beneficial acts of the many," warned
CPSR.  A House subcommittee recently followed CPSR's recommendations
on computer crime amendments.
 
Dr. Ronni Rosenberg, an expert on the role of computer scientists and
public policy, praised the new initiative.  She said, "It's clear that
there is an information gap that needs to be filled.  This is an
important opportunity for computer scientists to help fill the gap."
 
CPSR is a national membership organization of computer professionals,
based in Palo Alto, California.  CPSR has over 20,000 members and 21
chapters across the country. In addition to the civil liberties
project, CPSR conducts research, advises policy makers and educates
the public about computers in the workplace, computer risk and
reliability, and international security.
 
For more information contact: 
 
Marc Rotenberg 				Gary Chapman 
CPSR Washington Office                  CPSR National Office
1025 Connecticut Avenue, NW             P.O. Box 717 
Suite 1015                              Palo Alto, CA 94302 
Washington, DC 20036                    415/322-3778
202/775-1588 
 
------------------------------
 
Subject: Electronic Frontier Foundation - Mission Statement
Reply-To: eff@well.sf.ca.us
Date: Tue, 10 Jul 90 07:23:49 BST
From: the terminal of Geoff Goodfellow <geoff@fernwood.mpk.ca.us>
 
 
A new world is arising in the vast web of digital, electronic media
which connect us.  Computer-based communication media like electronic
mail and computer conferencing are becoming the basis of new forms of
community.  These communities without a single, fixed geographical
location comprise the first settlements on an electronic frontier.
 
While well-established legal principles and cultural norms give
structure and coherence to uses of conventional media like newspapers,
books, and telephones, the new digital media do not so easily fit into
existing frameworks.  Conflicts come about as the law struggles to
define its application in a context where fundamental notions of
speech, property, and place take profoundly new forms. People sense
both the promise and the threat inherent in new computer and
communications technologies, even as they struggle to master or simply
cope with them in the workplace and the home.
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has been established to help
civilize the electronic frontier; to make it truly useful and
beneficial not just to a technical elite, but to everyone; and to do
this in a way which is in keeping with our society's highest
traditions of the free and open flow of information and communication.
 
To that end, the Electronic Frontier Foundation will:
 
1.      Engage in and support educational activities which increase
popular understanding of the opportunities and challenges posed by
developments in computing and telecommunications.
 
2.      Develop among policy-makers a better understanding of the issues
underlying free and open telecommunications, and support the creation of
legal and structural approaches which will ease the assimilation of
these new technologies by society.
 
3.      Raise public awareness about civil liberties issues arising from
the rapid advancement in the area of new computer-based communications
media.  Support litigation in the public interest to preserve, protect,
and extend First Amendment rights within the realm of computing and
telecommunications technology.
 
4.      Encourage and support the development of new tools which will
endow non-technical users with full and easy access to computer-based
telecommunications.
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation
One Cambridge Center
Cambridge, MA 02142
(617) 577-1385
 
eff@well.sf.ca.us
 
------------------------------
 
Subject: Across the Electronic Frontier
Reply-To: eff@well.sf.ca.us
Date: Tue, 10 Jul 90 07:29:18 BST
From: the terminal of Geoff Goodfellow <geoff@fernwood.mpk.ca.us>
 
by:      Mitchell Kapor and John Perry Barlow
         Electronic Frontier Foundation
         Washington, D.C.
         July 10, 1990
 
Over the last 50 years, the people of the developed world have begun
to cross into a landscape unlike any which humanity has experienced
before.  It is a region without physical shape or form.  It exists,
like a standing wave, in the vast web of our electronic communication
systems.  It consists of electron states, microwaves, magnetic fields,
light pulses and thought itself.
 
It is familiar to most people as the "place" in which a long-distance
telephone conversation takes place.  But it is also the repository for
all digital or electronically transferred information, and, as such,
it is the venue for most of what is now commerce, industry, and
broad-scale human interaction.  William Gibson called this Platonic
realm "Cyberspace," a name which has some currency among its present
inhabitants.
 
Whatever it is eventually called, it is the homeland of the
Information Age, the place where the future is destined to dwell.
 
In its present condition, Cyberspace is a frontier region, populated
by the few hardy technologists who can tolerate the austerity of its
savage computer interfaces, incompatible communications protocols,
proprietary barricades, cultural and legal ambiguities, and general
lack of useful maps or metaphors.
 
Certainly, the old concepts of property, expression, identity,
movement, and context, based as they are on physical manifestation, do
not apply succinctly in a world where there can be none.
 
Sovereignty over this new world is also not well defined.  Large
institutions already lay claim to large fiefdoms, but most of the
actual natives are solitary and independent, sometimes to the point of
sociopathy.  It is, therefore, a perfect breeding ground for both
outlaws and vigilantes.  Most of society has chosen to ignore the
existence of this arising domain.  Every day millions of people use
ATM's and credit cards, place telephone calls, make travel
reservations, and access information of limitless variety. . . all
without any perception of the digital machinations behind these
transactions.
 
Our financial, legal, and even physical lives are increasingly
dependent on realities of which we have only dimmest awareness.  We
have entrusted the basic functions of modern existence to institutions
we cannot name, using tools we've never heard of and could not operate
if we had.
 
As communications and data technology continues to change and develop
at a pace many times that of society, the inevitable conflicts have
begun to occur on the border between Cyberspace and the physical
world.
 
These are taking a wide variety of forms, including (but hardly limited
to) the following:
 
I.      Legal and Constitutional Questions
 
What is free speech and what is merely data?  What is a free press
without paper and ink?  What is a "place" in a world without tangible
dimensions?  How does one protect property which has no physical form
and can be infinitely and easily reproduced?  Can the history of one's
personal business affairs properly belong to someone else?  Can anyone
morally claim to own knowledge itself?
 
These are just a few of the questions for which neither law nor custom
can provide concrete answers.  In their absence, law enforcement
agencies like the Secret Service and FBI, acting at the disposal of
large information corporations, are seeking to create legal precedents
which would radically limit Constitutional application to digital
media.
 
The excesses of Operation Sun Devil are only the beginning of what
threatens to become a long, difficult, and philosophically obscure
struggle between institutional control and individual liberty.
 
II.     Future Shock
 
Information workers, forced to keep pace with rapidly changing
technology, are stuck on "the learning curve of Sisyphus."
Increasingly, they find their hard-acquired skills to be obsolete even
before they've been fully mastered. To a lesser extent, the same
applies to ordinary citizens who correctly feel a lack of control over
their own lives and identities.
 
One result of this is a neo-Luddite resentment of digital technology
from which little good can come.  Another is a decrease in worker
productivity ironically coupled to tools designed to enhance it.
Finally, there is a spreading sense of alienation, dislocation, and
helplessness in the general presence of which no society can expect to
remain healthy.
 
III.    The "Knows" and the "Know-Nots"
 
Modern economies are increasingly divided between those who are
comfortable and proficient with digital technology and those who
neither understand nor trust it.  In essence, this development
disenfranchises the latter group, denying them any possibility of
citizenship in Cyberspace and, thus, participation in the future.
 
Furthermore, as policy-makers and elected officials remain relatively
ignorant of computers and their uses, they unknowingly abdicate most
of their authority to corporate technocrats whose jobs do not include
general social responsibility.  Elected government is thus replaced by
institutions with little real interest beyond their own quarterly
profits.
 
We are founding the Electronic Frontier Foundation to deal with these
and related challenges.  While our agenda is ambitious to the point of
audacity, we don't see much that these issues are being given the
broad social attention they deserve.  We were forced to ask, "If not
us, then who?"
 
In fact, our original objectives were more modest.  When we first
heard about Operation Sun Devil and other official adventures into the
digital realm, we thought that remedy could be derived by simply
unleashing a few highly competent Constitutional lawyers upon the
Government.  In essence, we were prepared to fight a few civil
libertarian brush fires and go on about our private work.
 
However, examination of the issues surrounding these government
actions revealed that we were dealing with the symptoms of a much
larger malady, the collision between Society and Cyberspace.
 
We have concluded that a cure can lie only in bringing civilization to
Cyberspace.  Unless a successful effort is made to render that harsh
and mysterious terrain suitable for ordinary inhabitants, friction
between the two worlds will worsen.  Constitutional protections,
indeed the perceived legitimacy of representative government itself,
might gradually disappear.
 
We could not allow this to happen unchallenged, and so arises the
Electronic Frontier Foundation.  In addition to our legal
interventions on behalf of those whose rights are threatened, we will:
 
% Engage in and support efforts to educate both the general public and
policymakers about the opportunities and challenges posed by
developments in computing and telecommunications.
 
% Encourage communication between the developers of technology,
government, corporate officials, and the general public in which we
might define the appropriate metaphors and legal concepts for life in
Cyberspace.
 
% And, finally, foster the development of new tools which will endow
non-technical users with full and easy access to computer-based
telecommunications.
 
One of us, Mitch Kapor, had already been a vocal advocate of more
accessible software design and had given considerable thought to some
of the challenges we now intend to meet.
 
The other, John Perry Barlow, is a relative newcomer to the world of
computing (though not to the world of politics) and is therefore
well-equipped to act as an emissary between the magicians of
technology and the wary populace who must incorporate this magic into
their daily lives.
 
While we expect the Electronic Frontier Foundation to be a creation of
some longevity, we hope to avoid the sclerosis which organizations
usually develop in their efforts to exist over time.  For this reason
we will endeavor to remain light and flexible, marshalling
intellectual and financial resources to meet specific purposes rather
than finding purposes to match our resources.  As is appropriate, we
will communicate between ourselves and with our constituents largely
over the electronic Net, trusting self-distribution and
self-organization to a much greater extent than would be possible for
a more traditional organization.
 
We readily admit that we have our work cut out for us.  However, we
are greatly encouraged by the overwhelming and positive response which
we have received so far.  We hope the Electronic Frontier Foundation
can function as a focal point for the many people of good will who
wish to settle in a future as abundant and free as the present.
 
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation
One Cambridge Center, Suite 300
Cambridge, MA 02142
 
(617) 577-1385
eff@well.sf.ca.us
 
------------------------------
 
End of TELECOM Digest Special: Electronic Frontier
******************************

TELECOM Digest     Wed, 11 Jul 90 21:33:00 CDT   Electronic Frontier 2 of 2
 
Inside This Issue:                         Moderator: Patrick A. Townson
 
    Electronic Frontier Foundation - Legal Case Summary
----------------------------------------------------------------------
 
Reply-To: eff@well.sf.ca.us
Subject: Electronic Frontier Foundation - Legal Case Summary
Date: Tue, 10 Jul 90 07:31:17 BST
From: the terminal of Geoff Goodfellow <geoff@fernwood.mpk.ca.us>
 
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is currently providing litigation
support in two cases in which it perceived there to be substantial
civil liberties concerns which are likely to prove important in the
overall legal scheme by which electronic communications will, now and
in the future, be governed, regulated, encouraged, and protected.
 
Steve Jackson Games 
 
Steve Jackson Games is a small, privately owned adventure game
manufacturer located in Austin, Texas.  Like most businesses today,
Steve Jackson Games uses computers for word processing and
bookkeeping.  In addition, like many other manufacturers, the company
operates an electronic bulletin board to advertise and to obtain
feedback on its product ideas and lines.
 
One of the company's most recent products is GURPS CYBERPUNK, a
science fiction role-playing game set in a high-tech futuristic world.
The rules of the game are set out in a game book.  Playing of the game
is not performed on computers and does not make use of computers in
any way.  This game was to be the company's most important first
quarter release, the keystone of its line.
 
On March 1, 1990, just weeks before GURPS CYBERPUNK was due to be
released, agents of the United States Secret Service raided the
premises of Steve Jackson Games.  The Secret Service:
 
% seized three of the company's computers which were used in the
drafting and designing of GURPS CYBERPUNK, including the computer used
to run the electronic bulletin board,
 
% took all of the company software in the neighborhood of the
computers taken,
 
% took with them company business records which were located on the
computers seized, and
 
% destructively ransacked the company's warehouse, leaving many items
in disarray.
 
In addition, all working drafts of the soon-to-be-published GURPS
CYBERPUNK game book -- on disk and in hard-copy manuscript form --
were confiscated by the authorities.  One of the Secret Service agents
told Steve Jackson that the GURPS CYBERPUNK science fiction fantasy
game book was a, "handbook for computer crime."
 
Steve Jackson Games was temporarily shut down.  The company was forced
to lay-off half of its employees and, ever since the raid, has
operated on relatively precarious ground.
 
Steve Jackson Games, which has not been involved in any illegal
activity insofar as the Foundation's inquiries have been able to
determine, tried in vain for over three months to find out why its
property had been seized, why the property was being retained by the
Secret Service long after it should have become apparent to the agents
that GURPS CYBERPUNK and everything else in the company's repertoire
were entirely lawful and innocuous, and when the company's vital
materials would be returned.  In late June of this year, after
attorneys for the Electronic Frontier Foundation became involved in
the case, the Secret Service finally returned most of the property,
but retained a number of documents, including the seized drafts of
GURPS CYBERPUNKS.
 
The Foundation is presently seeking to find out the basis for the
search warrant that led to the raid on Steve Jackson Games.
Unfortunately, the application for that warrant remains sealed by
order of the court.  The Foundation is making efforts to unseal those
papers in order to find out what it was that the Secret Service told a
judicial officer that prompted that officer to issue the search
warrant.
 
Under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, a search
warrant may be lawfully issued only if the information presented to
the court by the government agents demonstrates "probable cause" to
believe that evidence of criminal conduct would be found on the
premises to be searched.  Unsealing the search warrant application
should enable the Foundation's lawyers, representing Steve Jackson
Games, to determine the theory by which Secret Service Agents
concluded or hypothesized that either the GURPS CYBERPUNK game or any
of the company's computerized business records constituted criminal
activity or contained evidence of criminal activity.
 
Whatever the professed basis of the search, its scope clearly seems to
have been unreasonably broad.  The wholesale seizure of computer
software, and subsequent rummaging through its contents, is precisely
the sort of general search that the Fourth Amendment was designed to
prohibit.
 
If it is unlawful for government agents to indiscriminately seize all
of the hard-copy filing cabinets on a business premises -- which it
surely is -- that the same degree of protection should apply to
businesses that store information electronically.
 
The Steve Jackson Games situation appears to involve First Amendment
violations as well.  The First Amendment to the United States
Constitution prohibits the government from "abridging the freedom of
speech, or of the press".  The government's apparent attempt to
prevent the publication of the GURPS CYBERPUNK game book by seizing
all copies of all drafts in all media prior to publication, violated
the First Amendment.  The particular type of First Amendment violation
here is the single most serious type, since the government, by seizing
the very material sought to be published, effectuated what is known in
the law as a "prior restraint" on speech.  This means that rather than
allow the material to be published and then seek to punish it, the
government sought instead to prevent publication in the first place.
(This is not to say, of course, that anything published by Steve
Jackson Games could successfully have been punished.  Indeed, the
opposite appears to be the case, since SJG's business seems to be
entirely lawful.)  In any effort to restrain publication, the
government bears an extremely heavy burden of proof before a court is
permitted to authorize a prior restraint.
 
Indeed, in its 200-year history, the Supreme Court has never upheld a
prior restraint on the publication of material protected by the First
Amendment, warning that such efforts to restrain publication are
presumptively unconstitutional.  For example, the Department of
Justice was unsuccessful in 1971 in obtaining the permission of the
Supreme Court to enjoin The New York Times, The Washington Post, and
The Boston Globe from publishing the so-called Pentagon Papers, which
the government strenuously argued should be enjoined because of a
perceived threat to national security.  (In 1979, however, the
government sought to prevent The Progressive magazine from publishing
an article purporting to instruct the reader as to how to manufacture
an atomic bomb.  A lower federal court actually imposed an order for a
temporary prior restraint that lasted six months.  The Supreme Court
never had an opportunity to issue a full ruling on the
constitutionality of that restraint, however, because the case was
mooted when another newspaper published the article.)
 
Governmental efforts to restrain publication thus have been met by
vigorous opposition in the courts.  A major problem posed by the
government's resort to the expedient of obtaining a search warrant,
therefore, is that it allows the government to effectively prevent or
delay publication without giving the citizen a ready opportunity to
oppose that effort in court.
 
The Secret Service managed to delay, and almost to prevent, the
publication of an innocuous game book by a legitimate company -- not
by asking a court for a prior restraint order that it surely could not
have obtained, but by asking instead for a search warrant, which it
obtained all too readily.
 
The seizure of the company's computer hardware is also problematic,
for it prevented the company not only from publishing GURPS CYBERPUNK,
but also from operating its electronic bulletin board.  The
government's action in shutting down such an electronic bulletin board
is the functional equivalent of shutting down printing presses of The
New York Times or The Washington Post in order to prevent publication
of The Pentagon Papers.  Had the government sought a court order
closing down the electronic bulletin board, such an order effecting a
prior restraint almost certainly would have been refused.  Yet by
obtaining the search warrant, the government effected the same result.
 
This is a stark example of how electronic media suffer under a less
stringent standard of constitutional protection than applies to the
print media -- for no apparent reason, it would appear, other than the
fact that government agents and courts do not seem to readily equate
computers with printing presses and typewriters.  It is difficult to
understand a difference between these media that should matter for
constitutional protection purposes.  This is one of the challenges
facing the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation will continue to press for return
of the remaining property of Steve Jackson Games and will take formal
steps, if necessary, to determine the factual basis for the search.
The purpose of these efforts is to establish law applying the First
and Fourth Amendments to electronic media, so as to protect in the
future Steve Jackson Games as well as other individuals and businesses
from the devastating effects of unlawful and unconstitutional
government intrusion upon and interference with protected property and
speech rights.
 
United States v. Craig Neidorf 
 
Craig Neidorf is a 20-year-old student at the University of Missouri
who has been indicted by the United States on several counts of
interstate wire fraud and interstate transportation of stolen property
in connection with his activities as editor and publisher of the
electronic magazine, Phrack.
 
The indictment charges Neidorf with: (1) wire fraud and interstate
transportation of stolen property for the republication in Phrack of
information which was allegedly illegally obtained through the
accessing of a computer system without authorization, though it was
obtained not by Neidorf but by a third party; and (2) wire fraud for
the publication of an announcement of a computer conference and for
the publication of articles which allegedly provide some suggestions
on how to bypass security in some computer systems.
 
The information obtained without authorization is a file relating to
the provision of 911 emergency telephone services that was allegedly
removed from the BellSouth computer system without authorization.  It
is important to note that neither the indictment, nor any briefs filed
in this case by the government, contain any factual allegation or
contention that Neidorf was involved in or participated in the removal
of the 911 file.
 
These indictments raise substantial constitutional issues which have
significant impact on the uses of new computer communications
technologies.  The prosecution of an editor or publisher, under
generalized statutes like wire fraud and interstate transportation of
stolen property, for the publication of information received lawfully,
which later turns out to be have been "stolen," presents an
unprecedented threat to the freedom of the press.  The person who
should be prosecuted is the thief, and not a publisher who
subsequently receives and publishes information of public interest.
To draw an analogy to the print media, this would be the equivalent of
prosecuting The New York Times and The Washington Post for publishing
the Pentagon Papers when those papers were dropped off at the
doorsteps of those newspapers.
 
Similarly, the prosecution of a publisher for wire fraud arising out
of the publication of articles that allegedly suggested methods of
unlawful activity is also unprecedented.  Even assuming that the
articles here did advocate unlawful activity, advocacy of unlawful
activity cannot constitutionally be the basis for a criminal
prosecution, except where such advocacy is directed at producing
imminent lawless action, and is likely to incite such action.  The
articles here simply do not fit within this limited category.  The
Supreme Court has often reiterated that in order for advocacy to be
criminalized, the speech must be such that the words trigger an
immediate action.  Criminal prosecutions such as this pose an extreme
hazard for First Amendment rights in all media of communication, as it
has a chilling effect on writers and publishers who wish to discuss
the ramifications of illegal activity, such as information describing
illegal activity or describing how a crime might be committed.
 
In addition, since the statutes under which Neidorf is charged clearly
do not envision computer communications, applying them to situations
such as that found in the Neidorf case raises fundamental questions of
fair notice -- that is to say, the publisher or computer user has no
way of knowing that his actions may in fact be a violation of criminal
law.  The judge in the case has already conceded that "no court has
ever held that the electronic transfer of confidential, proprietary
business information from one computer to another across state lines
constitutes a violation of [the wire fraud statute]."  The Due Process
Clause prohibits the criminal prosecution of one who has not had fair
notice of the illegality of his action.  Strict adherence to the
requirements of the Due Process Clause also minimizes the risk of
selective or arbitrary enforcement, where prosecutors decide what
conduct they do not like and then seek some statute that can be
stretched by some theory to cover that conduct.
 
Government seizure and liability of bulletin board systems 
 
During the recent government crackdown on computer crime, the
government has on many occasions seized the computers which operate
bulletin board systems ("BBSs"), even though the operator of the
bulletin board is not suspected of any complicity in any alleged
criminal activity.  The government seizures go far beyond a "prior
restraint" on the publication of any specific article, as the seizure
of the computer equipment of a BBS prevents the BBS from publishing at
all on any subject.  This akin to seizing the word processing and
computerized typesetting equipment of The New York Times for
publishing the Pentagon Papers, simply because the government contends
that there may be information relating to the commission of a crime on
the system.  Thus, the government does not simply restrain the
publication of the "offending" document, but it seizes the means of
production of the First Amendment activity so that no more stories of
any type can be published.
 
The government is allowed to seize "instrumentalities of crime," and a
bulletin board and its associated computer system could arguably be
called an instrumentality of crime if individuals used its private
e-mail system to send messages in furtherance of criminal activity.
However, even if the government has a compelling interest in
interfering with First Amendment protected speech, it can only do so
by the least restrictive means.  Clearly, the wholesale seizure and
retention of a publication's means of production, i.e., its computer
system, is not the least restrictive alternative.  The government
obviously could seize the equipment long enough to make a copy of the
information stored on the hard disk and to copy any other disks and
documents, and then promptly return the computer system to the
operator.
 
Another unconstitutional aspect of the government seizures of the
computers of bulletin board systems is the government infringement on
the privacy of the electronic mail in the systems.  It appears that
the government, in seeking warrants for the seizures, has not
forthrightly informed the court that private mail of third parties is
on the computers, and has also read some of this private mail after
the systems have been seized.
 
The Neidorf case also raises issues of great significance to bulletin
board systems.  As Neidorf was a publisher of information he received,
BBSs could be considered publishers of information that its users post
on the boards.  BBS operators have a great deal of concern as to the
liability they might face for the dissemination of information on
their boards which may turn out to have been obtained originally
without authorization, or which discuss activity which may be
considered illegal.  This uncertainty as to the law has already caused
a decrease in the free flow of information, as some BBS operators have
removed information solely because of the fear of liability.
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation stands firmly against the
unauthorized access of computer systems, computer trespass and
computer theft, and strongly supports the security and sanctity of
private computer systems and networks. One of the goals of the
Foundation, however, is to ensure that, as the legal framework is
established to protect the security of these computer systems, the
unfettered communication and exchange of ideas is not hindered.  The
Foundation is concerned that the Government has cast its net too
broadly, ensnaring the innocent and chilling or indeed supressing the
free flow of information.  The Foundation fears not only that
protected speech will be curtailed, but also that the citizen's
reasonable expectation in the privacy and sanctity of electronic
communications systems will be thwarted, and people will be hesitant
to communicate via these networks.  Such a lack of confidence in
electronic communication modes will substantially set back the kind of
experimentation by and communication among fertile minds that are
essential to our nation's development.  The Foundation has therefore
applied for amicus curiae (friend of the court) status in the Neidorf
case and has filed legal briefs in support of the First Amendment
issues there, and is prepared to assist in protecting the free flow of
information over bulletin board systems and other computer
technologies.
 
For further information regarding Steve Jackson Games please contact: 
 
Harvey Silverglate or Sharon Beckman
Silverglate & Good
89 Broad Street, 14th Floor
Boston, MA  02110
617/542-6663
 
For further information regarding Craig Neidorf please contact:
 
Terry Gross or Eric Lieberman
Rabinowitz, Boudin, Standard, Krinsky and Lieberman
740 Broadway, 5th Floor
New York, NY 10003
212/254-1111
 
------------------------------
 
End of TELECOM Digest Special: Electronic Frontier  2 of 2
******************************

	I have modifyed the title of this note to indicate the new name of this
Organization Originally, it was conceived as the "Computer Liberty Foundation".


Mike

	I have found out that the EFF will meet the 501(c)3 tax deduction.

	So if you are a DEC employee and donate to this foundation, PLEASE
	get DEC to match your gift; it is especially meaningful that this
	organization gets contributions from computer companies like DEC!!!

Your tax deductable contribution can be sent to:

The Electronic Frontier Foundation
One Cambridge Center, Suite 300
Cambridge, MA       02142
617/577-1385
617/225-2347 fax
eff@well.sf.ca.us

Re: < Note 1139.21 by SPICE::PECKAR "She said: yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah" >

>	So if you are a DEC employee and donate to this foundation, PLEASE
>	get DEC to match your gift; it is especially meaningful that this
>	organization gets contributions from computer companies like DEC!!!

    Please help me to understand why it is meaningful for this
    organization to receive contributions 'from computer companies like
    DEC'?
    
    Lee

RE:  < Note 1139.22 by SMOOT::ROTH "Grits: Not just for banquets anymore!" >

>    Please help me to understand why it is meaningful for this
>    organization to receive contributions 'from computer companies like
>    DEC'?
    
Because as producers of the hardware and software whose usage this organization
is chartered to protect, computer companies stand to loose the most from the
continuance of unconstitutional actions taken against computer users.

If computer companies and their employees don't stand up for their rights to 
speak freely through computers,  then who will?

Digital possesses the largest private network in the world, and already, the
Government (Secret Service) has acted to shut down a network because a single 
file which passed across that network was a "stolen" document. Nobody has
questioned those actions until this organization came around, so it is
meaningful for this organization to receive funds from large computer companies
in that only with the support of an entire industry can protections from 
unconstitutional actions be established in the electronic domain.


I believe that there are a lot of people who have misconstrued the charter of
this organization. They are not out to protect people who break into computers;
they are attempting to protect computer owners; our customers, and guarantee
that they can safely use their equipment and their software within the
established guidelines of the constitution. 


Mike

The EFF is now publishing a newsletter, available electronically.  Send a 
request to be put on their E-mailing list to:

		DECWRL::"eff-news-request@well.sf.ca..us"

The first two can also be copied from:

		MPGS::USER3:[PECKAR]EFFMAIL.1 and 
		MPGS::USER3:[PECKAR]EFFMAIL.2

The first is 58 blocks and the second is 65 blocks, which is why I have not
posted them here.

Also available is Barlow's article "Crime and Puzzlement" (165 blocks):

		MPGS::USER3:[PECKAR]BARLOW.TXT
Mike

From:	DECWRL::MAILER-DAEMON "Mail Delivery Subsystem" 23-JUL-1990 17:23:50.27
To:	mast::derosa 
CC:	
Subj:	Returned mail: Host unknown 

   ----- Transcript of session follows -----
550 well.sf.ca..us (tcp)... 550 Host unknown
554 <eff-news-request@well.sf.ca..us>... 550 Host unknown (Non recoverable name server error)
 
   ----- Recipients of this delivery -----
<eff-news-request@well.sf.ca..us> (bounced)
 
   ----- Unsent message follows -----
Received: by decpa.pa.dec.com; id AA08317; Mon, 23 Jul 90 14:22:48 -0700
Message-Id: <9007232122.AA08317@decpa.pa.dec.com>
Received: from mast.enet; by decwrl.enet; Mon, 23 Jul 90 14:22:50 PDT
Date: Mon, 23 Jul 90 14:22:50 PDT
From: "I := notnumber  23-Jul-1990 1722" <derosa@mast.enet.dec.com>
To: eff-news-request@well.sf.ca..us
Subject: Electronic Frontier Foundation newsletter
 
    .
    .
    .
    

Try ``eff-news-request@well.sf.ca.us'' - note there are no consecutive dots in
a domain-style addres.
				/AHM

My mistake, sorry.  Yes, only one dot in between the letters.

Mike

Must be a BLISS programmer.

			GURPS CYBERPUNK INTRODUCTION

			      by Steve Jackson

		(Reprinted without permission from the actual
		GURPS CYBERPUNK High-Tech Low-Life Roleplaying
		Sourcebook by Loyd Blankenship.  Copyright 1990)

    "Meanwhile, Back in the Real World...

	The staff at Steve Jackson Games would like to offer our somewhat
    bemused thanks to the United States Secret Service for their diligent
    "reality checking" of GURPS Cyberpunk.  It happened like this...

	On March 1, the SJ Games offices, and the home of the GURPS
    Cyberpunk writer, were raided by the U.S. Secret Service as part of a
    nationwide investigation of data piracy.  A large amount of equipment
    was siezed, including three computers, two laser printers, and a great
    deal of assorted hardware.  The only computers taken were those with
    the GURPS Cyberpunk files; other systems were left in place.  In their
    diligent search for evidence, the agents also cut off locks, forced open
    footlockers, tore up dozens of boxes in the warehouse, and bent two of
    our letter openers in an attempt to pick the lock on a file cabinet.

	The next day, accompanied by an attorney, I personally visited the
    Austin offices of the Secret Service.  We had been promised that we
    could make copies of our files.  As it turned out, we were only allowed
    to copy a few files, and only from one of the three systems.  Still
    missing were all the current text files and hard copy for this book,
    as well as the extensive playtest comments from the bulletin board.

	In the course of that visit, it became clear that the investigating
    agents considered GURPS Cyberpunk to be "a handbook for computer crime."
    They seemed to make no distinction between a disscussion of futuristic
    credit fraud, using equipment that doesn't exist, and modern real-life
    credit card abuse.  A repeated comment by the agents was "This is real."
    Now, I'll freely admit that this book is the most realistic cyberpunk
    game yet released.  It has a lot of background information.  But it
    won't make you into a console cowboy in one easy lesson, any more than
    GURPS Fantasy will teach you swordplay.  Sadly, the distinction appeared
    lost on the investigators.

	Over the next few weeks, the Secret Service repeatedly assured our
    attorney that complete copies of our files would be returned "tommorow."
    On March 26, almost four weeks after the raid, some (but not all) of the
    files were returned.  As of now, we have no idea when, or if, we will get
    the rest of our files, our BBS software, and our computers and printers.

	Why were we raided?  We're still not sure.  My best guess is that
    the author of this book wound up on a federal List of Dangerous Hoodlums.
    While reality-checking the book, he corresponded with a variety of people,
    from computer security experts to self-confessed hackers.  He knew a lot
    about computers and the "computer underground."  Now it seems that anybody
    with any computer knowledge at all is suspect...especially if they own
    a modem.  And sharing that information makes you doubly dangerous,
    regardless of the First Amendment.

	Maybe the cyberpunk future is closer, and darker, than we think.

							-Steve Jackson"

 Hackers - 'Hacking' crackdown is dealt a setback in trial in Chicago
	{The Wall Street Journal, 30-Jul-90, p. B8}
	{Contributed by: Wes Plouff}
   In a setback for the federal crackdown on computer "hackers," prosecutors
 dropped felony charges against a computer whiz accused of conspiring to steal
 a sensitive document from a BellSouth Corp. subsidiary. The closely watched
 trial, which began here last week, had been seen by some as a test of First
 Amendment rights of operators of electronic "bulletin boards," computers that
 store and forward text over phone lines. But the case was dropped after
 testimony showed the document wasn't the  potentially dangerous and
 proprietary information that the government had said it was, said Sheldon
 Zenner, attorney for the defendant, 20-year-old Craig Neidorf, of
 Chesterfield, Mo. Mr. Neidorf was charged with conspiring with three Georgia
 men who admitted breaking into Southern Bell Telephone Co.'s computer systems.
 The three pleaded guilty to computer fraud last month and are scheduled to be
 sentenced in September. Mr. Neidorf's case differed from the Georgia cases in
 that he wasn't accused of "hacking," or illegally entering the Southern Bell
 computers. Prosecutors instead focused on his role as an operator of the
 electronic bulletin board on which the document had appeared. The focus of the
 case was a Southern Bell document describing the administration of its
 emergency 911 telephone system. The government alleged that electronic
 publication of the document by Mr. Neidorf could have led to a disruption of
 the system. But the defense showed that the document contained information
 commonly available and could not have been used to endanger the 911 system. A
 spokeswoman for the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Attorney William Cook, said,
 "We received information during the course of the trial that changed our case
 drastically, and we no longer felt that felony charges were appropriate." She
 said the defendant agreed to submit to pre-trial diversion, a form of court
 supervision similar to probation. "If he keeps his nose clean for a period of
 time, he won't have a criminal record," the spokeswoman said. She added that
 "the trial never got to the First Amendment issues."

 >supervision similar to probation. "If he keeps his nose clean for a period of
 >time, he won't have a criminal record," the spokeswoman said. She added that
 
Wait a minute. The charges were dropped.  How could he have a criminal record
even if he didn't "keep his nose clean"?

Bob

Apparently he agreed to pre-trial diversion in order to get the charges
dropped.

/john

>Wait a minute. The charges were dropped.  How could he have a criminal record
>even if he didn't "keep his nose clean"?

That's a  cheap  shot  by an inexperienced prosecutor who realized that she did
not do her homework - and lost an opportunity.  

From:	DECWRL::"eff-news-request@well.sf.ca.us" "MAIL-11 Daemon" 20-AUG-1990 01:24:21.92
To:	eff-news@apple.com 
CC:	
Subj:	EFF mailing #3: About the Electronic Frontier Foundation 

[Our story so far:  If you're getting this message, you either asked to
be added to the EFF mailing list, or asked for general information about
the EFF.  We have sent out two mailings before this one; if you missed
them and want copies, send a request to eff-news-request@well.sf.ca.us.
We now have two Usenet newsgroups set up, in the "inet" distribution.
The moderated newsgroup, comp.org.eff.news, will carry everything we send
to this mailing list, plus other things of interest.  If your site gets
the newsgroup and you want to read this stuff there instead of through
the mailing list, send a request to eff-news-request@well.sf.ca.us and
I'll be happy to take you off the list.  And now...]
 
 
************************************************************ 
About the EFF
General Information
Revised August 1990
************************************************************
 
The EFF (formally the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Inc.) has
been established to help civilize the electronic frontier; to make
it truly useful and beneficial not just to a technical elite, but
to everyone; and to do this in a way which is in keeping with our
society's highest traditions of the free and open flow of information
and communication.
 
The EFF now has legal status as a corporation in the state of
Massachusetts.  We are in the process of applying to the IRS for
status as a non-profit, 501c3 organization. Once that status is
granted contributions to the EFF will be tax-deductible.
 
************************************************************
Mission of the EFF
************************************************************
 
1.      to engage in and support educational activities which
increase popular understanding of the opportunities and challenges
posed by developments in computing and telecommunications.
 
2.      to develop among policy-makers a better understanding of
the issues underlying free and open telecommunications, and support
the creation of legal and structural approaches which will ease
the assimilation of these new technologies by society.
 
3.      to raise public awareness about civil liberties issues
arising from the rapid advancement in the area of new computer-based
communications media and, where necessary, support litigation in
the public interest to preserve, protect, and extend First Amendment
rights within the realm of computing and telecommunications
technology.
 
4.      to encourage and support the development of new tools which
will endow non-technical users with full and easy access to
computer-based telecommunications.
 
************************************************************ 
Current EFF Activities
************************************************************
 
>  We are helping educate policy makers and the general public.
 
To this end we have funded a significant two-year project on
computing and civil liberties to be managed by the Computer
Professionals for Social Responsibility. With it, we aim to acquaint
policy makers and law enforcement officials of the civil liberties
issues which may lie hidden in the brambles of telecommunications
policy.
 
Members of the EFF are speaking at computer and government conferences
and meetings throughout the country to raise awareness about the
important civil liberties issues.
 
We are in the process of forming alliances with other other public
interest organizations concerned with the development of a digital
national information infrastructure.
 
The EFF is in the early stages of software design and development
of programs for personal computers which provide simplified and
enhanced access to network services such as mail and netnews.
 
Because our resources are already fully committed to these projects,
we are not at this time considering additional grant proposals.
 
>  We are helping defend the innocent.
 
We gave substantial legal support in the criminal defense of Craig
Neidorf, the publisher of Phrack, an on-line magazine devoted to
telecommunications, computer security and hacking. Neidorf was
indicted on felony charges of wire fraud and interstate transportation
of stolen property for the electronic publication of a document
which someone else had removed, without Neidorf's participation,
from a Bell South computer.  The government contended that the
republication of proprietary business information, even if the
information is of public significance, is illegal.  The EFF submitted
two friend of the court briefs arguing that the publication of the
disputed document was constitutionally protected speech.  We also
were instrumental in locating an expert witness who located documents
which were publicly available from Bell South which contained all
the information in the disputed document.  This information was
critical in discrediting the government's expert witness.  The
government dropped its prosecution in the middle of the trial, when
it became aware that its case was untenable.
 
EFF attorneys are also representing Steve Jackson Games in its
efforts to secure the complete return and restoration of all computer
equipment seized in the Secret Service raid on its offices and to
understand what might have been the legal basis for the raid.
 
We are not involved in these legal matters as a "cracker's defense
fund," despite press reports you may have read, but rather to ensure
that the Constitution will continue to apply to digital media.  We
intend to demonstrate legally that speech is speech whether it
finds form in ink or in ASCII.
 
************************************************************
What can you do?
************************************************************
 
For starters, you can spread the word about EFF as widely as
possible, both on and off the Net. Feel free, for example, to
distribute any of the materials included in this or other EFF
mailings.
 
You can turn some of the immense processing horsepower of your
distributed Mind to the task of finding useful new metaphors for
community, expression, property, privacy and other realities of
the physical world which seem up for grabs in these less tangible
regions.
 
And you can try to communicate to technically unsophisticated
friends the extent to which their future freedoms and well-being
may depend on understanding the broad forms of digital communication,
if not necessarily the technical details.
 
Finally, you can keep in touch with us at any of the addresses
listed below.  Please pass on your thoughts, concerns, insights,
contacts, suggestions, and news. And we will return the favor.
 
************************************************************
Staying in Touch 
************************************************************
 
Send requests to be added to or dropped from the EFF mailing list
or other general correspondence to eff-request@well.sf.ca.us.  We
will periodically mail updates on EFF-related activities to this
list.
 
If you receive any USENET newsgroups, your site may carry two new
newsgroups in the INET distribution called comp.org.eff.news  and
comp.org.eff.talk.  The former is a moderated newsgroup of
announcements, responses to announcements, and selected discussion
drawn from the unmoderated "talk"  group and the mailing list.
 
Everything that goes out over the EFF mailing list will also be
posted in comp.org.eff.news, so if you read the newsgroup you don't
need to subscribe to the mailing list.
 
Postings submitted to the moderated newsgroup may be reprinted by
the EFF.  To submit a posting, you may send mail to eff@well.sf.ca.us.
 
There is an active EFF conference on the Well, as well as many
other related conferences of interest to EFF supporters.  As of
August 1990, access to the Well is $8/month plus $3/hour.  Outside
the S.F. Bay area, telecom access for $5/hr. is available through
CPN.  Register online at (415) 332-6106.
 
A document library containing all of the EFF news releases, John
Barlow's "Crime and Puzzlement" and others is available on the
Well.  We are working toward providing FTP availability into the
document library through an EFF host system to be set up in Cambridge,
Mass.  Details will be forthcoming.
 
Our Address:
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, Inc.
One Cambridge Center, Suite 300
Cambridge, MA 02142
 
(617) 577-1385
(617) 225-2347 (fax)
 
After August 25, 1990:
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation, Inc.
155 Second Street
Cambridge, MA 02142  
 
We will distribute the new telephone number once we have it.
************************************************************
 
Mitchell Kapor (mkapor@well.sf.ca.us)
John Perry Barlow (barlow@well.sf.ca.us)
 
Postings and email for the moderated newsgroup should be sent
to "comp-org-eff-news@well.sf.ca.us".
 
************************************************************
 
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	... on the BellSouth hacker, Frank Durden.

							Trace