OT - Re: [Mimedefang] Phishing Question

[Kevin A. McGrail]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mark Johnson" <defang at astroshapes.com>
> Kevin A. McGrail wrote:
>> Great idea but unfeasible.  In Virginia, this would be considered 
>> malicious
>> programming and probably computer trespass as well :-(
>>
>>
> I used to live in Virginia and I don't miss that place.  I cringe even 
> when I have to drive through it :)
>
> Only place I know that you could hinder the efforts of a criminal 
> organization and spend 10x more time in jail than they do.......

I used to have a similar view that it was too conservative in Virginia as 
well but I've grown older and seen more reasons that the conservative stance 
just "works".  I also haven't heard of many cases where people were 
convicted and given unreasonable sentences despite the laws that were on the 
books for technology.

For example, people used to have firewalls that when attacked would launch a 
counterattack automatically.  Sounded like a great idea until the majority 
of attacks began occurring from owned machines or people would forge attacks 
to create a DoS.

Same thing happened with viruses.  Great idea to notify people that they 
have sent you a virus until you realize that you are actually sometimes part 
of a DoS because the headers are all forged.

And, I also remember when programmers would add malicious code to their own 
programs so that if people pirated it, the software would do nasty things to 
the computer's hard drive or the files.  All well and good until technology 
changed or parallel port timing went wonky a few times and innocent people's 
hard drives were wiped and 3D studio meshes were corrupted.

Anyway, the philosophy of two wrongs don't make a right is a sane solution 
that has lasted through more than a decade of changes in the technology 
field which is pretty good when you think about it.

Regards,
KAM