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From: jlg@lanl.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.followup
Subject: Re: Hackers and others take note
Message-ID: <17488@lanl.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 6-Dec-84 13:43:46 EST
Article-I.D.: lanl.17488
Posted: Thu Dec  6 13:43:46 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 8-Dec-84 06:53:48 EST
References: <2612@dartvax.UUCP>
Sender: newsreader@lanl.ARPA
Distribution: net
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Lines: 40

> 
>    "  Computer hackers across the USA have ganged
>    up on a NEWSWEEK reporter, who says his life has
>    become an electronic-era nightmare since he wrote
>    about them a month ago.
>       Correspondent Richard Sandza wrote about hackers
>    in the Nov. 12 issue, in which some hackers were
>    called a "new generation of vandals."
>       In the December 10 issue of NEWSWEEK, the story
>    is "hackers' revenge" --  on Sandza, who says:
>       He's received death threats and hundreds of
>    harassing phone calls.
>       He's been told his credit card numbers, home
>    address and social security number have been
>    stolen from the computerized files of TRW, the
>    nation's largest credit information operation
>    -- a federal crime -- and "posted" electronically
>    nationwide along with requests to "nail this guy."
>       He's still on "teletrial," where hackers debate
>    his "case" on an electronic bulletin board called
>    "Dragonfire" in Gainsville Tecas.
>       Sandza's first article showed how teen-age computer
>    whizzes -- who outwit bank, store and government
>    computer security systems (Who?  Us? :-) --have created
>    their own subculture.
>       Experts say hackers continue to pierce confidential
>    data banks at will, and anyone in the files is a potential
>    victim.
>    "We've created a generation of criminals and given
>    them a new way to become vandals," said Sandza, Monday.  "
>
Too bad black lists are illegal.  I think that anyone that has made 
unauthorized access to computing equipment should be barred from 
employment in any computer related field.  The period of this employment
sanction should be long enough to discourage even the youngest potential
criminal.  I began programming when I was 13 (in the late sixties) and
even then the term 'hacker' was derogatory - as it still should be.

                                  J. L. Giles
                                  jlg@lanl