Posted on 02/12/2003 12:23:33 PM PST by RCW2001
LOS ANGELES Feb. 12 —
A federal grand jury has indicted 17 people who authorities say hacked into satellite television transmissions, causing millions of dollars in losses to DirecTV and Dish Network, the U.S. Attorney's office said.
Six of the defendants were charged with violating the anti-encryption provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The other charges involved conspiracy or manufacturing a device for the purpose of stealing satellite signals. All three counts carry a maximum prison sentence of five years.
The indictments were returned last month and unsealed Tuesday.
Ten defendants already have agreed to plead guilty, authorities said, including a 43-year-old West Los Angeles man who has acknowledged causing $14.8 million in losses to satellite TV companies.
The investigation was aimed at people who develop software and hardware devices that crack the scrambled signals designed to limit satellite TV services to paying customers. DirecTV, for instances, uses "smart cards" as part of their set-top boxes that descramble satellite signals.
The defendants named Tuesday are charged with thwarting that security, often meeting in secret online chat rooms to exchange data and techniques and using such nicknames as "FreeTV," authorities said.
The defendants range in age from 19 to 52. Most live in California, although some are from Kentucky, North Carolina, Texas, Indiana, Florida and Ohio.
"This case demonstrates our commitment to identifying and prosecuting sophisticated computer hackers who steal the intellectual property of others for their own economic benefit," U.S. Attorney Debra Yang said.
"Stealing" Satellite Signals? Can some please explain to me me how you can "steal" a signal? Stealing implies that the original owner of the product was denied his property. What did these guys do, build an SSSS [Super Satellite Signal Sucker] which absorbed the Signals eminating from the Satellite?
Hey, I know I violate a number of laws, probably every day. I even cut the "do not remove" tags off my pillows. In paractice, most copyright laws are enforced against people who sell content without authorization.
DSS leases smart cards. Periodically they reprogram or replace them. To the best of my knowledge they have never criminally prosecuted anyone who was not selling counterfeit cards.
You make a big deal about the quality of encryption. This is a bogus argument. If your door is locked, the law does not require you to have a state-of-the-art lock. Any old lock provides you with the benefit of law.
There is an interesting side note to all this discussion. Your TV also broadcasts. This fact has been used by cable companies to locate people using unauthorized cable services. In fact, every electrical appliance you use broadcasts a signal that could be detected. Particularly computers. It is probably possible to pick up your unencrypted computer video being broadcast by your monitor.
At some point, society draws the line and says this is private. Infrared cameras can see through clothing (hey, you are broadcasting infrared, so why can't I film you or your children and email the photos to a few thousand of my friends?)
The answer to all this is that civilized people do not steal and do not peep. OK, they do, but it isn't moral or ethical, and when caught, there are consequences.
so if your six-year-old daughter walks past my house and broadcasts infrared radiation onto my property, it's OK for me to film her naked, with a camera that can see through her clothing, and put the images on my web site?
At some point, civilized people have to agree to abstain from doing everything that is possible. Not because it's illegal, but because it is wrong.
Thank you ...
It isn't about the quality of the lock.
It is about thoughtcrime. Suppose you put a lock with a design flaw on your house. Using the design flaw to burglarize your house is clearly a crime. But suppose I posted the information about the defect on the Internet? Crime? Or thoughtcrime?
This isn't just theoretical. I can defeat many locks people think are secure. The information of how to do this is publicly available. I don't carry anything that could be considered a burglarious tool because I can quickly make a lockpick from a streetsweeper bristle - very easy to find if you know what you are looking for. Any NT machine without encrypted file systems or physical security is not secure, period. You don't need drills and explosives any more. All you need you can carry in your head.
By the way, an AT&T Labs researcher just published a fundamental sploit common to almost all key-operated locks. With knowledge of that sploit, you can make a master key without examining a lock cylinder. Should that publication have been suppressed or criminalized?
Yours is a really bad analogy. It isn't even remotely similar. Using books as an analogy and the logic of current law, I would be prohibited from reading books that fall from the sky and land in my yard.
An interesting question to which I don't have a firm answer. I am drawn to the "fire in a crowded theater" argument, although it isn't a perfect analogy.
Perhaps a thought experiment might help. If you discovered a non-classified way to disable all American military weapons (perhaps some new technology that you personally invented) would it be lawful to post it on the internet? Would it be moral and ethical? Would it be the right thing to do?
I think that correctness of behavior is determined by its forseeable consequenses. The law is a shabby subset of morality.
Bottomline ... you made a blanket statement that the signal would NOT pass thru glass ... you did NOT mention ANY qualifiers in your original post ... so that implies under ANY circumstances ... so I called you on it.
I guess I don't need that refund.
Enough of this banter. From both a legal and, more importantly, moral perspective, if one cannot see that compromising security and software in order to receive commercial programming without paying for it is theft, then there is nothing I can say beyond what I have posted on this thread to help that person achieve understanding of their malfeasance.
BTW, you conveniently forget that I've called you on numerous errors on this thread... Please refer to post #52, #77, #83, etc.
You said if you decode the signal you in effect agree to the agreement.
I said I don't believe so ... show where in the agreement it says that if you DECODE the signal you enter into the agreement.
I personlly would NOT have to have a smart card to decode their signal. It is easier but not absolutely necessary.
I don't like seatbelt laws either
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