[iwar] News


From: Fred Cohen
From: fc@all.net
To: iwar@egroups.com

Mon, 1 May 2000 06:54:51 -0700 (PDT)


fc  Mon May  1 06:55:13 2000
Received: from 207.222.214.225
	by localhost with POP3 (fetchmail-5.1.0)
	for fc@localhost (single-drop); Mon, 01 May 2000 06:55:13 -0700 (PDT)
Received: by multi33.netcomi.com for fc
 (with Netcom Interactive pop3d (v1.21.1 1998/05/07) Mon May  1 13:55:08 2000)
X-From_: sentto-279987-319-fc=all.net@returns.onelist.com  Mon May  1 08:54:59 2000
Received: from mr.egroups.com (mr.egroups.com [207.138.41.139]) by multi33.netcomi.com (8.8.5/8.7.4) with SMTP id IAA26114 for ; Mon, 1 May 2000 08:54:59 -0500
X-eGroups-Return: sentto-279987-319-fc=all.net@returns.onelist.com
Received: from [10.1.10.35] by mr.egroups.com with NNFMP; 01 May 2000 13:54:58 -0000
Received: (qmail 5568 invoked from network); 1 May 2000 13:54:51 -0000
Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by m1.onelist.org with QMQP; 1 May 2000 13:54:51 -0000
Received: from unknown (HELO all.net) (24.1.84.100) by mta1 with SMTP; 1 May 2000 13:54:51 -0000
Received: (from fc@localhost) by all.net (8.9.3/8.7.3) id GAA28566 for iwar@onelist.com; Mon, 1 May 2000 06:54:51 -0700
Message-Id: <200005011354.GAA28566@all.net>
To: iwar@egroups.com
Organization: I'm not allowed to say
X-Mailer: don't even ask
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL1]
From: Fred Cohen 
MIME-Version: 1.0
Mailing-List: list iwar@egroups.com; contact iwar-owner@egroups.com
Delivered-To: mailing list iwar@egroups.com
Precedence: bulk
List-Unsubscribe: 
Date: Mon, 1 May 2000 06:54:51 -0700 (PDT)
Reply-To: iwar@egroups.com
Subject: [iwar] News
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

   Date: Mon, 01 May 2000 07:46:48 -0400
   From: cybercrimes@theMezz.com
Subject: The Epidemic of Cyberstalking .........

The Epidemic of Cyberstalking 
by Katie Dean 
3:00 a.m. May. 1, 2000 PDT 


Deborah has been stalked in a chat room for over six months, during
which time detailed personal information and a doctored pornographic
photograph with her likeness has been posted on a website.  The
cyberstalker has threatened to rape and kill her. 

"He told people that I was on drugs, that I was looking for sex," said
Deborah, not her real name.  "He enlisted (his) Internet friends to
harass me."

Frightening scenarios like this are increasingly common as more people
use the Internet and blindly trust those they meet online. 

And too often, untrained police officers do not address the situation as
they should.  Advocacy groups say that when victims report their
situation to authorities, a frequent response is "turn off your
computer."

"They are scared out of their mind and no one takes them seriously,"
said Parry Aftab, executive director of the Internet safety group
Cyberangels.  "The victim is victimized twice."

The first cyberstalking law went into effect just over a year ago in
California, and Congress is considering a federal law.  The Stalking
Prevention and Victim Protection Act of 2000 passed in the House, and
currently is pending in the Senate. 

Cyberstalking is defined as repeated threats or harassing behavior over
email, the Internet, or other electronic communications. 

As with offline stalking, most perpetrators are men and most victims are
women who have met them before.  But cyberstalking can be carried out in
places as close as the same room as the victim, or as far away as
another state. 

The technology, moreover, makes it easier for stalkers to harass their
victims because they do not need to physically confront them. 

There are no clear statistics on the number of cyberstalking victims,
but an August 1999 report from the Department of Justice estimates that
there could be hundreds of thousands affected, and the numbers are
growing. 

"The rate of cyberstalking has escalated enormously in the past few
years with the spread of the Internet," said Linda Fairstein, chief of
the sex crimes prosecution unit for the Manhattan district attorney.  It
"provides a new method of committing the same kind of crime."

The anonymity of the Internet -- with free email and anonymous remailers
readily available -- also enables cyberstalkers to easily conceal their
identities.  "The Internet is both anonymous and public," said San
Francisco Police Lt.  Lon Ramlan.  "(People) need to take the common
sense that they use in the physical world and use those sensibilities in
cyberspace."

But because not all law enforcement officers are familiar with
technology, not all departments are trained to effectively deal with the
problem. 

"It's really a new area for police," Fairstein said. 

An "unevenness of response" exists based on how technologically
sophisticated and well-funded law enforcement is, she said.  Large
cities are more likely to have a computer crimes unit, whereas smaller
departments often are unable to specialize. 

"They're not equipped to handle it right now," agreed Morgan Wright, a
former Kansas state trooper and police detective who heads up the
advanced training unit of the International Association of Computer
Investigative Specialists in Virginia.  "It's not that they don't want
to, it's just that they haven't been trained."

"The fact that Congress is considering making it a federal crime and a
felony is an indication of how serious the problem is and that we need a
national solution to it," said Nancy Savitt, chief legal officer for
Cyberangels. 

Savitt points out that fewer than half of the states currently have
cyberstalking laws, and most offenders, if caught, face only a
misdemeanor. 

Victim advocacy groups are hoping that the bill in Congress will bring
attention to an issue they deal with daily. 

"We need to get the information out there.  It's potentially going to be
a very big problem if people don't learn about it, don't understand it,
and don't know how to protect themselves," said Jayne Hitchcock,
president of Women Halting Online Abuse. 

Aftab estimates that Cyberangels receives 500 complaints of
cyberstalking per day, 65 to 100 of which are legitimate cases. 

In addition to providing support and guidance to victims, Cyberangels
and WHOA regularly contact ISPs to alert them about harassers.  This
will often halt the abuse, but there are cases like Deborah's that are
more serious and require police involvement.  These advocacy groups also
talk to the police for the victims to alert them to the seriousness of
the crime. 

Deborah's case still is being investigated, but she is skeptical that
anything is getting done. 

"I feel like I'm being placated and not taken very seriously because it
is happening on the Internet," she said.  "I feel like a sitting duck in
a shooting house."

http://www.wired.com/news/0,1713,2558,00.html

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Why buy CDs? Now you can swap for them. At Switchouse.com, you can 
choose from over 300,000 titles of every kind of music. Top 20 hits, 
R&B, hardcore, whatever. Get the music. Forget the money. Sound good?
http://click.egroups.com/1/3717/7/_/595019/_/957189295/
------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------
http://all.net/