From: stewarts@ix.netcom.com (Bill Stewart)
Date: Thu, 13 Jul 95 23:33:00 PDT
To: Ray Arachelian <cypherpunks@toad.com>
Subject: Re: Anti-Electronic Racketeering Act of 1995 (fwd)
Message-ID: <199507140629.XAA21600@ix3.ix.netcom.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 04:53 PM 7/13/95 -0400, Ray Arachelian wrote:
>> Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I rise this evening to introduce the
>> Anti-electronic Racketeering Act of 1995. This bill makes important changes
>> to RICO and criminalizes deliberately using computer technology to engage in
>> criminal activity. I believe this bill is a reasonable, measured and strong
>> response to a growing problem. According to the computer emergency and
>> response team at Carnegie-Mellon University, during 1994, about 40,000
>> computer users were attacked. Virus hacker, the FBI's national computer
>> crime squad has investigated over 200 cases since 1991. So, computer crime is
>> clearly on the rise.
>
>Eh, what do "virus hackers" have to do with encryption, why is it these 
>morons justify the destruction of encryption by mentioning hackers and 
>viruses?

You're parsing the title wrong.  It's an act to support racketeering
through opposition to electronic communications.  What viruses have to
do with encryption is that encryption makes it easier to prevent viruses,
and Senator Grassley wants to stop that.  And the term "strong" was used in its
correct engineering meaning, as in "It's a vessel of fertilizer which is
very strong and promotes growth".


>> Mr. President, I suppose that some of this is just natural. Whenever man
>> develops a new technology, that technology will be abused by some. And that
>> is why I have introduced this bill. 

Yup.  Quite so.

>> Computer fraud accounts for the loss of millions of dollars per year. And
>> often times, there is little that can be done about this because the computer
>> used to commit the crimes is located overseas. So, under my bill, overseas
>> computer users who employ their computers to commit fraud in the United
>> States would be fully subject to the Federal criminal laws. 

Hey, Julf, we've got your number!  And we're making sure nobody's got any
encryption to prevent fraud with.

>> Mr. President, this brave new world of electronic communications and global
>> computer networks holds much promise. But like almost anything, there is the
>> potential for abuse and harm. That is why I urge my colleagues to support
>> this bill and that is why I urge industry to support this bill.

As above.

#                                Thanks;  Bill
# Bill Stewart, Freelance Information Architect, stewarts@ix.netcom.com