permaculture

[Thilo Pfennig <tp@alternativ.net>]

On Thu, 2002-03-28 at 17:05, Toby Hemenway wrote:


> sounded too personal, as it's more an issue I have with a part of the
> computer community. I think the heart of my unhappiness lies with

It's ok.

 
> > I put this thing online to show everybody in the list, that this is
> > possible.
> 
> There's a view that is held by some in the computer world that any system
> that is not secure should be breached, and that this is somehow doing the
> owner--or somebody--a favor. But we long ago outlawed this view in the
> physical world, ...

I am not somebody who proposes hacking. But I think sometimes it is
good. Several times hackers were able to detect credit count information
that was available with a bit hacking on commercial websites. And they
made these break ins public saying:

1) This shop is not secure
2) Ecommerce is still not secure

I think this is better if people continue to use such shops, without
knowing any risks and loosing money. 


I also have tested tools which very easy for everybody allow you to scan
harddisk with windows shares open to the internet. I was really shocked
- and I think it would be good if more people know how easy this is. If
people are too lazy to protect there computer you could delete there
whole homepage while they are online - or worse - grabbing personal or
business information and using or selling it. 

In telling people how easy this is - is this immoral or is this a duty?
If I just write THAT it's possible (without hacking!) many will say: How
good that i do not know why and continue my wrong attitude. I will not
tell it here, because this is offtopic and I see that this can be
sensible - but think about what people with criminal energy could do to
harm us! 

Hackers call proprietary ir secret but simple security technics
"Security by Obscurity" - meaning that this is not really secure if you
find out, how it works. This is the password protection of PDF files
from Adobe. If you really want security use open standards with open
source, so that security wholes can be find by everyone and be closed.


I think there are thousands of stupid security holes, that are not
closed by software corporations and constantly used by criminals,
because no good hacker has found the hole - only bad guys.

-- 
Thilo Pfennig
http://www.alternativ.net/edv/