-Caveat Lector-
Culture Activists Defend Cyber Disobedience
Dressed in black and armed with an audio-video
presentation reminiscent of the cyberpunk film "Blade Runner,"
two "hacktivists" from the Electronic Disturbance Theater
cut an unusual swath at a gathering this week of information
warfare professionals heavily populated by men in military
uniforms.
Stefan Wray and Ricardo Dominguez — two
self-styled electronic artists and political activists from EDT
— kicked off their presentation of "The Politics of Infowar"
by comparing themselves to Daniel appearing in the lion's den.
Denying that their actions constituted "hacking" or were
in any way illegal, the duo nevertheless mounted a defense
of "cyber civil disobedience." They recounted some of their
previous actions, including a denial-of-service program
called FloodNet, which they launched against Mexican government
computer servers as a means of expressing support for the
Zapatistas.
"We don't consider ourselves hackers," said Dominguez,
who said he defined the term as an attempt to infiltrate a
Web site, rearrange, or deliberately crash a computer.
"As politics becomes technologized, and technology
becomes more politicized, we can expect more hacktivism,"
said Wray.
They sees themselves as "digital Zapatistas" who are happy
to use the notoriety they have gained from electronic disturbances
to spread propaganda against the Mexican government to
a "military-entertainment" complex that would not otherwise
hear this point of view.
EDT's most notorious action, a FloodNet attack against
a Pentagon Web site on September 9, 1998, was thwarted
when the Department of Defense retaliated with a Java
applet called "hostileapplet," which caused the digital protesters'
computers to crash.
Dominguez and Wray said they had talked with
lawyers at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet
and Society about the possibility of suing the government
for violating the 1878 Posse Comitatus law that bans the use of
the military in domestic law enforcement.
"In the same way that the Pentagon is not allowed
to use B-52s against New York City, they may also
not be allowed to use offensive information war
tactics against civilians," said Dominguez.
But judging by the stream of attendees who deserted
the presentation midstream, the duo's thoughts weren't
too well received.
"I need some toilet paper to clean out my ears
after listening to that propaganda," said Michel Kabay,
director of research and development for the ICSA labs
— and who is not known for his kind words for hackers —
to Winn Schwartau, director of consulting firm Interpact
and a conference organizer. Schwartau said he found
Dominguez and Wray's willingness to publicly take
responsibility for their actions provided an important
perspective on information warfare.
- by Drew Clark
Senior Writer
National Journal's Technology Daily
http://www.cloakroom.com/pubs/techdaily
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