Kevin Mitnick

This week we are watching 2600's video Freedom Downtime about Kevin Mitnick

Legal Documents:
U.S. vs. Mitnick and DePayne
US v. Mitnick [appeal]

There are also interviews with him for more of the story:

From 60 minutes:



From the end if Freedom Downtime:

Interview

Kevin Mitnick now runs a security company:

Kevin Mitnick's Security Company

Here are some links for Tsutomu Shimomura:

Wikipedia
Takedown website

Second Life

There was an article not too long ago about online investigations:

Cops learning how to extend beats online [USA today]

I just thought it was interesting that Second Life is mentioned as a
valuable resource, though it makes some sense.

BTW, there was a CSI NY episode (slightly more glamorous) about this recently called ``Down the Rabbit Hole''. We watched this in class last Thursday before the break. You can watch it on cbs.com.

Also apropos Second Life, there was an article not too long ago regarding a Virtual Mugging that was accomplished by exploiting a flaw in Quicktime.

Wireshark

We talked about wireshark before the break. You can download it from here: Wireshark.org.

I will post a homework project related to this later.

Creative Commons

In class we talked about Lawrence Lessig, the creator of the Creative Commons. The Creative Commons is a non-profit organization that allows copyright holders to grant some rights to their work while retaining some rights.

You can find the video here:

• Fast connection
• Slow connection

There are several points that he makes in this talk. The most striking one is: excessive copyright laws are resulting in a loss of culture. He describes a society of ``rip, mix, burn'' and how it is not necessarily a bad thing. He also mentions that the mere holding of copyrights gives the owner such power, such that s/he can prevent any opposition to his/her work.

There are several copyright terms mentioned such as:

• RIAA: Recording Industry Association of America
• DMCA: Digital Millennium Copyright Act
• DRM: Digital Rights Management

The last two terms are interesting in light of computers. The DMCA makes it criminal to circumvent copyright protections in software. This is even if the ``hack'' would make the product better! [Lessig mentions this when he discusses the AIBOs.] Since it is too easy to create copies of software, just because you bought it doesn't mean that you can do anything you want with it. That is: it's not the same as purchasing a tangible item, like furniture, that you can modify to your content. If the software sucks, your just stuck.... at least legally...