[iwar] [fc:Law.means.Linux.security.patches.secret]

From: Fred Cohen (fc@all.net)
Date: 2001-10-31 22:12:34


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Date: Wed, 31 Oct 2001 22:12:34 -0800 (PST)
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Subject: [iwar] [fc:Law.means.Linux.security.patches.secret]
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Law means Linux security patches secret 
By James Middleton, vnunet.com, 10/31/2001 http://www.vnunet.com/News/1126547

The controversial Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) is spreading
such fear among the open source community that a Linux kernel update
will go out lacking information on security fixes. An update to the
widely used version 2.2 of the Linux kernel was released on Monday
without detailed information on a number of security patches. According
to Alan Cox, Linus Torvald's right hand man, the censorship was
necessary to prevent the coders running into trouble with the DMCA. The
Act was designed to prevent the publication of code that is capable of
circumventing security and copy protection schemes. The law became
infamous with the geek community after the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov,
who cracked the protection on Adobe's eBook Reader software. Previous to
this it had attracted attention in the DeCSS DVD decryption software
case. In a posting to the Linux kernel developer newsgroup Cox said
that, until the authorities realised the flaws in the DMCA, "US citizens
will have to guess about security issues". Cox seems to be saying that,
because some security systems in Linux could be used to manage rights on
copyrighted work, security information would have to be posted on a
website that blocks access from US visitors. However, other posters to
the mailing list have said that Cox may be overreacting to the impact of
the DMCA, and some have suggested that he may be using the open source
community as a vehicle to protest at the Act. In related news, Sony last
week invoked the DMCA to force the closure of a site that details how to
modify and enhance the software in the Aibo robotic dog. In a letter to
the webmaster of Aibohack.com, the electronics giant claimed that the
contents of the site "contained Sony copyrighted software which you are
copying and distributing in violation of Sony's rights". "Your site
provides the means to circumvent the copy protection protocol of Sony's
Aibo Memory Stick to allow access to Sony Aibo-ware software which
appears to have been created by copying and decrypting Sony's software,"
the company added. The site has since been closed down and all files
capable of modifying Aibo have been removed.

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