The Times: Tech column - 911 scams/Filesharing wars
By David Rowan
A Hampshire businessman was £100,000 poorer last week, the latest victim of the e-mail scam that promises riches in exchange for help in transferring cash. You probably know the format: typically the money is tucked away in Nigeria, and the e-mailer needs a gullible British partner to arrange a bank transfer which invariably ends in the victim's account being emptied.
But have you ever wondered who writes these things? Now, thanks to a Nigerian whistleblower named Taiwo, we have a clearer idea. This is a sophisticated family business, Taiwo tells Wired News, that has provided a living for dozens of relatives since 1986. "We have the letter writers and the people who create the official documentation, the people who talk to our clients on the phone, the people who arrange travel and meetings and tours of government offices in Africa, Canada, Japan and the US," he explains from New York, where he is a student. Taiwo's role is to write the e-mails, using language that evokes someone "educated, upper-class, out of touch with the common people".
It is when people e-mail back, normally sceptically, that the game begins. "Once they realise there is a real person on the other end of the e-mail, they sometimes get interested," Taiwo says. And if they can be lured to Nigeria, about one in three will pay upfront to have the "money" laundered - which, of course, never materialises. Taiwo has found religion, but he says it is not his fault that foreigners are greedy. Be warned.
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Some day there may be a great movie in Hollywood's war against file-swapping technology - just don't try to watch it on your PC. Frustrated that litigation against individual companies has so far failed to stem the spread of peer-to peer software, the studios have had another idea. If their lawyers cannot kill innovation itself, they have decided, then they want something better - the power to hack into your computer.
Last week, Howard Berman, a US Congressman from California, introduced a Bill in Washington that would give the film and music studios just such a power. If Berman has his way - and he is backed by powerful lobbyists, from Disney to the Recording Industry Association of America - then any copyright holder with a "reasonable basis" to believe that piracy is taking place can tamper with your PC without fear of liability.
It is unclear what this tampering might involve - Berman talks of "technological tools" that can attack file-sharing networks - but the proposal has huge potential implications, even in Britain.
The Bill, which even allows copyright holders to cause your hardware $50 of damage for each copyright breach, represents a dangerous extension to the industry's demands. Already Washington is debating a law to ban music or film players that play unencrypted content, and another proposal would force recording devices to block certain digital broadcasts, but Representative Berman's Bill takes intrusion to a worrying new level. The law will probably not be passed, but its very introduction will lower our resistance to such a strategy - something that we must resist.
(The Times, July 31 2002)
A Hampshire businessman was £100,000 poorer last week, the latest victim of the e-mail scam that promises riches in exchange for help in transferring cash. You probably know the format: typically the money is tucked away in Nigeria, and the e-mailer needs a gullible British partner to arrange a bank transfer which invariably ends in the victim's account being emptied.
But have you ever wondered who writes these things? Now, thanks to a Nigerian whistleblower named Taiwo, we have a clearer idea. This is a sophisticated family business, Taiwo tells Wired News, that has provided a living for dozens of relatives since 1986. "We have the letter writers and the people who create the official documentation, the people who talk to our clients on the phone, the people who arrange travel and meetings and tours of government offices in Africa, Canada, Japan and the US," he explains from New York, where he is a student. Taiwo's role is to write the e-mails, using language that evokes someone "educated, upper-class, out of touch with the common people".
It is when people e-mail back, normally sceptically, that the game begins. "Once they realise there is a real person on the other end of the e-mail, they sometimes get interested," Taiwo says. And if they can be lured to Nigeria, about one in three will pay upfront to have the "money" laundered - which, of course, never materialises. Taiwo has found religion, but he says it is not his fault that foreigners are greedy. Be warned.
++++
Some day there may be a great movie in Hollywood's war against file-swapping technology - just don't try to watch it on your PC. Frustrated that litigation against individual companies has so far failed to stem the spread of peer-to peer software, the studios have had another idea. If their lawyers cannot kill innovation itself, they have decided, then they want something better - the power to hack into your computer.
Last week, Howard Berman, a US Congressman from California, introduced a Bill in Washington that would give the film and music studios just such a power. If Berman has his way - and he is backed by powerful lobbyists, from Disney to the Recording Industry Association of America - then any copyright holder with a "reasonable basis" to believe that piracy is taking place can tamper with your PC without fear of liability.
It is unclear what this tampering might involve - Berman talks of "technological tools" that can attack file-sharing networks - but the proposal has huge potential implications, even in Britain.
The Bill, which even allows copyright holders to cause your hardware $50 of damage for each copyright breach, represents a dangerous extension to the industry's demands. Already Washington is debating a law to ban music or film players that play unencrypted content, and another proposal would force recording devices to block certain digital broadcasts, but Representative Berman's Bill takes intrusion to a worrying new level. The law will probably not be passed, but its very introduction will lower our resistance to such a strategy - something that we must resist.
(The Times, July 31 2002)
posted by David Rowan at Wednesday, July 31, 2002
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