In today's ever-changing world, the frequent advances in technology are staggering. The growth of the technological industry has led to an underground culture composed of

people that believe information sharing is a powerful good. These people fall into two categories: the hacker, who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems; and

the phreaker, who enjoys exploring the holes in a phone system. The underlying belief of both is that by right, technological power belongs in the hands of the individual, and

that the law should reflect this. Instead, the current rules of electronic behaviour are used not to protect public safety, but to increase profit margins. The hackers themselves

do not use their information for profit. Yet, because the law does not recognize the culture, it treats these people as criminals. The notorious Kevin Mitnick, a hacker from Los

Angeles, was imprisoned for an unjust length of time due to a writer's need for sensationalism. The founding father of the phreaking movement, Joe Engressia, was thrown in

jail even though he wanted only to be a part of the system. Corporations now take advantage of the law's stagnant position by creating copyright acts that restrict freedom of

speech, as seen in the case of the 'Motion Picture Association of America versus Eric Corley'. The law has been unjust by not adequately evolving to encompass the growing

subculture of technology that involves hackers and phreakers.

 Kevin Mitnick was unjustly persecuted due to a writer's need for sensationalism.  Mitnick was a hacker from the Los Angeles area, once a part of a gang of phreakers called

the Roscoe gang. His case is one of the most famous computer crime cases, but all information given to the public can be traced back to one source: John Markoff. A writer for

the New York Times, Markoff approached Mitnick for aid while writing his book Cyberpunk. Mitnick refused to help, and Markoff became fixated with the Mitnick saga. He

dubbed Mitnick the 'dark-side hacker' and went on the publish Cyberpunk which Mitnick said had "many, many false statements and inaccurate stories" (Goldstein 'World' 46

). Markoff went on to write in the New York Times that Mitnick was a "computer expert accused of a long crime spree that includes the theft of thousands of data files and at

least 20,000 credit card numbers from computer systems around the nation" (Times,  A1). Mitnick had, however, not done any such thing. The 'theft of thousands of date files'

implies Mitnick removing the files, when in reality he copied the files, a harmless activity. In addition, 'computer systems around the nation' were not compromised. The only

system accessed was Netcom, despite multiple warnings from the hacker community that Netcom's sensitive information was freely available. It is also worthy to note that the

credit card numbers in Mitnick's possession were never used by Mitnick, and were never used to financially benefit Mitnick or cause any damage to the owner.  In 1994,

Mitnick was placed in the front page of the New York Times and denounced as a fugitive suspected of wiretapping the FBI when, in fact, he had only been accused of

probation violation.  The charges seemed to be "nothing more than a smokescreen, designed to demonize Mitnick and make him appear to be a threat to everyone's privacy"

(Goldstein 'World' 46).  Markoff went so far as to team up with another hacker, Tsutomu Shimomura, to capture Mitnick. In the 1999 Guinness Book of World Records, it was

stated that Mitnick had "been charged with software theft, wire fraud, and the interceptions of wire communications" (Guinness 178). In fact, he was not charged with any of

these.  It was exactly these tactics, however, that led to his capture. Shimomura found Mitnick using cellular tracking and many other nefarious techniques, which he claimed

to condemn ('Important Note'). Mitnick was arrested on February 15, 1995, and the team of Markoff and Shimomura went on to sign a $750,000 book deal. Mitnick was

imprisoned for four years before his case was even heard, and was then charged with copying software. The places where he copied the software claim that the software was

worth $80,000,000 and so he was treated as if he had stole something worth the equivalent amount.  The figure, however, is completely unsubstantiated.  It was because of

misleading facts such as this that Mitnick had been painted as the 'dark-side hacker' and has gained the Guinness world record for Most Notorious Hacker Case. However,

Mitnick was not the black-hatted super-villain that he is presented to be. Mitnick did no harm, nor did he financially benefit from his exploration but was painted as a

criminal due to John Markoff's need for fame.
 
The reputation of phreakers condemns them immediately, even if they have moral intentions. Joe Engressia was negatively vieweddue to his skill, but Engressia wanted only

to work for the phone system. The principal popularizer of the largely underground phreaking movement was an article in Esquire called "The Secrets of The Little Blue Box"

by Ron Rosenbaum. The article made many phreakers famous, included the original whistling phreaker, Joe Engressia. Engressia was born blind, but with the ability to

whistle in perfect pitch. His phreaking began accidentally at eight, when he was on hold on the phone. He began to whistle, and the phone went dead. He called the operator

and he was told that AT&T was run on a direct-dial system built around multi-frequency tones - musical notes generated by dialing that instruct the local exchange to route

the call to a specific number. If a speaker hit a 2600 Mhz tone while on the phone, the line would think they had hung up and go dead, a phenomenon known as 'talk-off'.

Engressia soon found that he could manipulate the system. However, his "motivation was not to steal free telephone calls, but to find his way around the network …He loved

the system….His dream was to work for the telephone company someday" (Brief History). By the time he was 21, he had mastered the multi-frequency tones. He spent his

spare time 'phone-tripping, or visiting telephone switching stations and quizzing the engineers in order to learn more about the system he loved. He usually asked to feel the

wires and just feeling through the wires showed him how links worked.  Engressia's main ambition was not to disrupt the system but to be a part of it:
 

   I want to work for Ma Bell. I don't hate Ma Bell…I don't want to screw the system. With me, it's the pleasure of
true knowledge. There's something beautiful about the system when you know it intimately, the way I do.

 Mungo 13

 However, he was one day found whistling a free call for a friend and was disciplined by his college. His troubles began when the local telephone company publicized his

case in order to make an example. The publicity led to the creation of the phone phreak network, as phreaks from all over the nation heard of Engressia and contacted him.

However, the publicity also led Joe to realize that he was too well known in his area to continue phreaking. He gathered his belonging and moved to Tennessee, attracted

because Memphis "has a number 5 crossbar switching system and some interesting little independent phone-company districts nearby and so far they don't seem to know

who I am" (Rosenbaum). He had been banned from all central offices in Florida, but could not live a life without phones. He told Rosenbaum "if I can't phone trip and I can't

phone phreak, I can't imagine what I'd do."  He was able to phone--trip in Memphis without too much publicity. Engressia lived his life quietly, and didn't use his talents for

even free calls, saying he wanted to stay away from anything illegal. However, the perception of the public and the police was that people like hackers and phreakers should

be jailed simply for being. Engressia's line was tapped shortly after he moved, and he expressed his suspicion of this during the interview with Rosenbaum. Shortly after the

interview, agents from Bell security and local police broke into his room and confiscated all telecommunications equipment. Engressia spent the night in jail. He was later

charged with 'malicious mischief', and penalized according. Engressia wanted simple to be a part of the system, yet because he was a phreaker he was deemed criminal.

 
Large corporations are now creating their own unjust laws protecting their profit margin. With the advent of Napster and the piracy of software, the media is scrambling to

find ways to restrict illegal copying of their files. The studios of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) conglomerated to adopt new software, Content

Scrambling System (CSS) as an industry standard.  CSS was the answer to the piracy of DVD's, and they claimed it would prevent the illegal copying of their releases;

however, the industry also uses region coding, wherein the world is divided into eight regions and movies are sequentially released in each one.  This means that if someone

in Asia was to buy a DVD from the Internet, he wouldn't be able to play it on his DVD player. In addition, because a CSS DVD can only be played on a CSS player, only

certain DVD machines could be used. A DVD could not be played on, say, a Linux machine.  Frustrated at not being able to play legally purchased DVD's, computer

engineers in Norway worked on the problem until DeCSS was made by the Masters of Reverse Engineering ('Activist'). DeCSS was a decryption program that would bypass

the CSS software, thereby allowing a DVD to be played with no restriction. The movie industry began to write threatening letters to the sites posting the DeCSS code, and a

popular hacker from America decided to take a stand. Eric Corley, a.k.a. Emmanuel Goldstein, was the editor of the hacker quarterly 2600. He saw that "people were losing

their Internet access, and some people even lost their jobs…I decided we had to take a stand" (Newsday). Corley posted the DeCSS code on the web page of his magazine,

and the movie industry soon targeted him. He was taken to court under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a law  "which for the first time not only give copyright to

creative work but also to the software -- or any other technology -- that protects it" (CNN). The DMCA is a precedent setting interpretation of copyright laws, and by taking a

stand, Corley raised significant first amendment issues, regarding things such as the right to experiment and share knowledge. In a recent 6th Circuit Court of Appeals

decision, it was confirmed that code qualifies as speech, and as such is protected by the First Amendment. At a preliminary injunction Corley was banned from posting DeCSS

until the trial, despite the evidence that this was not a malicious act. Corley complied, but used his web page to link to other sources of DeCSS. The film industry took him

back to the courts to ban him from posting even the links. This effort "raised the stakes substantially, turning the case into a First Amendment issue with implications for

everyone on the web" (Newsday). This means that it iss not only illegal to have sites that contained DeCSS, but even sites linking to it.  The MPAA argued that DeCSS allowed

people to copy unencrypted DVD files and transfer them over the net. Such an activity, however, would take an enormous amount of time and bandwidth and would

ultimately prove pointless because the low cost of DVD's would make piracy a money-losing venture. This case was, however, no longer about piracy, it was about power

and the control of information. Corley was supported by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who supports civil liberties in digital areas.  John Perry Barlow, the creator of

Lotus notes and cofounder of the EFF said:

                                           This is very clearly about suppression of expression. This case is about a     bunch of moribund commercial entities desperately trying to
                                            preserve themselves against an inevitable future and doing grave harm to our     constitutional right in the process.

The decryption of this program was inevitable, but instead of learning from the community that could aid them, the MPAA decided to wield their power. 2600 "feels that any

such suppression of information is a dangerous precedent…that is why we feel it is necessary to preserve this information" (2600 'DVD encryption'). They went on to say that

"we do feel sympathy for the DVD industry now that their encryption has been cracked…we hope they apply that knowledge in a constructive way" (2600 'DVD industry').

Barbara Simons, a leading computer scientists filed a declaration supporting Corley, saying that the anti-circumvention clause of the DMCA would severely restrict the

common practice of engineers. Matthew Pavlovich, president of Media Driver, stated that the DeCSS code was critical in developing a Linux-based DVD player. However, the

court was sympathetic to the case of the MPAA and this was borne out in the decision against 2600 and Corley. Corley was forced to remove not only the code, but also any

link to the code. The DMCA has also bee further detailed. Only half of the law had been in effect until then, the other half suspended until hearings were heard. Despite the

protests of the public, the DMCA states that is now possible to be imprisoned simply for writing a program such as DeCSS. DeCSS was not written for the purpose of piracy,

but instead so that people could play legally bought DVD's on their own computer systems including those (such as Linux) for which no legal player had been developed.

However, the issue of free speech was put aside by the prospect of money. After all, if the DMCA or region coding helped the movie industry sell more movies, then who

cares about consumers? The public made their feelings known by reacting to the CSS case more than any other subject in the DMCA rule-making did. Their arguments fell on

deaf ears, for although the public understood the technical issues and the value of freedom of speech, the court systems failed to.

 By not evolving to include hackers and phreakers, the law is unjust towards a growing subculture of technology.  The Motion Picture Association of America is completely

disregarding the right of free speech by suing Corley.  Engressia was wrongfully harassed for his curiosity by the system he simply wanted to join.  Mitnick was dubbed "the

dark-side hacker" and chased across America by a nefarious writer who simply wanted a good story, and exploited the facts to get that story. The law is meant to serve the

people, but a vast number of people are losing their rights of free speech because the law will not adapt to include them. The hackers and phreakers could aid technology

with their knowledge, but are instead brushed aside in an effort to globalize. The government should serve the people's needs, and it should know that it does not decide

who the people are or what they believe in.
 
 
 

Works Cited

Barlow, John Perry. "DeCSS." The Electronic Frontier Foundation. 19 Nov. 2000
      <http:// www.EFF.org/>

BucWheat. "A Brief history of Phreaking." Phreaking. 21 Oct. 2000
      <http://www.19f.org/archive/phrkhist>

Ciolli, Rita. "The Digital Divide." Newsday.com.  22 Oct. 2000
      <http://www.newday.com/news/daily/ncovsun.htm>

Durham-Vichr, Deborah. "Focus on the DeCSS Trial." CNN.com.  27 July 2000. 18 Oct. 2000.
      < http://www.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/ 07/27/decss.trial.p1.idg/>

"An Important Note to all Readers of the 1999 Guiness Book of Records." 2600 parody site
      <http://www.guinessrecords.com>

Goldstein, Emmanuel, ed. "DMCA Now a Whole Lot Worse." 2600 15 Oct. 2000
      <http://www.2600.com/news/2000/1031.html>

Goldstein, Emmanuel, ed. "DVD Encryption." 2600 15 Oct. 2000
      <http://www.2600.com/news/1999/1112.html>

Goldstein, Emmanuel, ed. "DVD Industry Takes 2600 to Court." 2600. 15 Oct. 2000
      <http://www.2600.com/news/1999/1227.html>

Goldstein, Emmanuel, ed. "The World vs. Kevin Mitnick." 2600: The Hacker Quarterly.
      Spring 1995. 4, 46.

Harrison, Ann. "Activist Defends DVD Hack." Computerworld. Nov. 5 1999. 25 Oct. 2000
      <http:// windows.idg.net/crd_internet_90679.html>

Markoff, John. "Kevin Mitnick." The New York Times. 16 Feb 1995, sec A: 1.

Rosenbaum, Ron. "The Secrets of the Little Blue Box." Esquire. 22 Oct. 2000
      < http://mbay.net/~mpoirier/lbb.html>

Young, Mark. "Most Notorious Hacker Case." The Guinness Book of Records. New York: Mass
      Market Paperback, 1999.