Clips April 16, 2002

[Lillie Coney <lillie.coney@xxxxxxx>]

Clips April 16, 2002

ARTILCES

Lawmaker proposes reforms at state tech agency
Federal Judge Puts Off Ruling In E-Book Case - Update
Argentine Judge Rules in Favor of Computer Hackers 
Web attacks on the rise
The great African internet robbery
Piracy in Spotlight at Annual Music Sales Event 
Digital Music Downloading 'Bigger Than Napster' - Study
Interactive TV Gets Its Own Emmy
Survey: Net users don't trust e-commerce sites
Army releases major network RFP
Denver pitches official Web site
Harris to defend Army computers
Intranet open for victim notification
Mayo picked for Navy network command
Machines Are Filling In for Troops
Israel under hack attack
Hi-tech musical youth
HIGH TECH GOES HOLLYWOOD 
FBI study: Hanssen had easy access to case files 
NMCI test results could boost seats to 149,000 
North Carolina names new CIO 
States' e-commerce laws ranked
Big Brother spending spiked in 2001 
Net thieves caught in action 



*****************
Mercury News
Lawmaker proposes reforms at state tech agency
By Noam Levey

 
San Jose Assemblyman Manny Diaz, who has come under fire for championing the
troubled agency that oversees California's multibillion-dollar technology
systems, is proposing new restrictions on the Department of Information
Technology and its embattled director.

As the state auditor prepares to release a critical review of the department's
role in a $126 million no-bid contract the state signed with Oracle last year,
Diaz is urging the Legislature to ban the department from participating in the
negotiation of future technology contracts.

And in legislation due to be considered by a Senate committee later this month,
he is proposing yet another audit of how the state manages its vast array of
technology systems.

``This goes to providing more accountability,'' Diaz said Monday. But it is
unclear whether Diaz's proposals will be enough to save the agency. Several
legislators said Diaz's proposals do not address the department's fundamental
shortcomings.

The Department of Information Technology, which was created as a temporary
department to put an end to a series of embarrassing failed technology
initiatives by state government, is scheduled to be closed this summer unless
the Legislature votes to extend it.

The state auditor found last year that the department and its director Elias
Cortez failed to adequately oversee the state's technology investments. And a
Mercury News investigation showed that the department compounded those problems
in helping to negotiate the Oracle deal that could end up saddling taxpayers
with millions of dollars of software the state won't need.

Diaz, a Democrat who in his two years in Sacramento has tried to become a
leader on technology issues, has promised since last year that he would reform
the embattled agency. But earlier this year, he tried to persuade legislators
to keep the Department of Information Technology without requiring any reforms.

The latest proposal, which promises more reforms, would reauthorize the
department through 2003, by which time Diaz said the state should complete a
third audit of the department's performance.

Department spokesman Kevin Terpstra said no one at the department was available
Monday to discuss the specifics of Diaz's bill.

The proposed bill would also keep open the state's three main data centers,
whose management of criminal justice, welfare and other records has been far
less controversial.

The proposal to extend the Department of Information Technology another year
and a half is getting a rougher reception, however.

``Even Barry Bonds only gets three strikes when he steps to the plate,'' Sen.
Debra Bowen (D-Redondo Beach) said Monday. ``We should be figuring out what we
need to do to make sure state government buys and manages computer projects in
a smart, cost-effective manner, not how we can save a seven-year-old state
agency that audit after audit has found isn't doing the job it was created to
do.''
***********************
Newsbytes
Federal Judge Puts Off Ruling In E-Book Case - Update

U.S. District Judge Ronald M. Whyte today put off a highly anticipated ruling
on whether to dismiss the government's case against a Russian software company.


Attorneys for Russian firm Elcomsoft and the U.S. government were in court
today for a scheduled status hearing in the controversial case. At today's
hearing, Whyte was expected to rule on a pair of motions to dismiss the
criminal charges against Elcomsoft. 

Instead, Whyte postponed the hearing until May 6. Although there is no
guarantee that Whyte will rule then on the motions to dismiss, Electronic
Frontier Foundation (EFF) Legal Director Cindy Cohn said she is optimistic that
there will be a ruling next month. 

"I think that there is a good chance we'll have a ruling on May 6," Cohn said.
The EFF is supporting Elcomsoft and has filed a "friend of the court" brief on
the software company's behalf. 

Elcomsoft has been charged with violating U.S. copyright law by selling
software capable of circumventing security features built into Adobe eBooks. 

In March, attorneys for Elcomsoft argued that U.S. prosecutors did not have
jurisdiction to prosecute the firm - which published the offending software
product from Russia. 

And earlier this month, the same attorneys argued that the law under which the
firm was prosecuted was itself unconstitutional. 

Elcomsoft is being prosecuted under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act
(DMCA), which establishes civil and criminal penalties for people charged with
violating copyrights online. 

Under the DMCA, individuals or entities that provide information about how to
violate copyrights and those who design tools to crack copyrights can be held
just as liable as those that actually misappropriate copyrighted material. 

Elcomsoft programmer Dmitry Sklyarov - who wrote the eBook software - was
detained by U.S. authorities last year after traveling to the United States to
speak at a security conference. 

Although Sklyarov wrote the program in Russia - which has no equivalent to the
DMCA - he was charged in America and faced a possible 25-year prison term for
violating the copyright protection language of the DMCA. 

Federal prosecutors dropped their case against Sklyarov in December, but
continue to prosecute his employer. 
*****************
Reuters
Argentine Judge Rules in Favor of Computer Hackers 
Mon Apr 15, 5:23 PM ET 

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (Reuters) - Computer hackers may be the scourge of the
digital age, hunted down by police across borders, but in Argentina they have
found an unlikely ally -- the very justice system they scorned. 

  
Warning of a "dangerous legal void" making digital crimes hard to prosecute, a
judge has ruled that hacking is legal by default in Argentina. The decision
came in the case of cyberpirates who defaced the Supreme Court's Web page. 

Arguing that the law only covered crimes on "people, things and animals" and
not digital attacks, a federal court declared several Argentines known as
"X-Team" innocent of charges they broke into the high court's Web page to
accuse judges of covering up a human rights case. 

"The judge ruled that hacking didn't harm things, people or animals and thus
was not covered in the law," Antonio Mille, a lawyer for Microsoft in
Argentina, said Monday. 

The ruling, a copy of which was given to Reuters, was first published April 11.
The sentence was not appealed, lawyers said. 

"This (ruling) allows us to warn that there is a serious legal void that these
days does not allow us to repress these (crimes)," the judge said in the
ruling. 

In Argentine courts rulings do not set legal precedents and another judge could
rule differently on the legality of hackers in a new case. 

The "X-Team" was accused of illegally entering the Supreme Court Web page in
1998 and replacing it with photos of murdered magazine journalist Jose Luis
Cabezas as well as statements blaming the judges for covering up his death. 

Cabezas was found dead and his body charred into blackened bones during a 1997
probe into Alfredo Yabran, a business tycoon with links to then-President
Carlos Menem. Yabran later committed suicide after a judge ordered his arrest. 

The dead journalist's case has been a cause celebre among groups protesting
what they said was a covering up of human rights abuses by top government
officials. 

Polls show that courts are some of the most unpopular institutions in Argentina
and Supreme Court judges have become a focus of public anger and a rallying cry
for street protests against alleged corruption in the state. 
******************
BBC
Web attacks on the rise

A government survey has found that the number of times that cyber criminals
have broken through the defences of businesses has doubled in 12 months. 

Despite the escalating threat from such web-based security problems, the survey
found that businesses are not spending or doing enough to protect themselves
from harm. 

The report puts the average cost of each serious security breach at £30,000.
The most serious incidents could cost up to £500,000 to fix and take days to
repair the damage. 

Damage assessment 

The 2002 DTI Information Security Breaches survey found that 44% of all
businesses questioned have suffered a malicious security incident or breach in
2001, almost double the 24% who reported suffering breaches in 2000.

When only large businesses are counted, 78% of these report falling victim to
some kind of electronic attack, be it a virus infection, hacking attempt,
denial of service attack, website defacement or fraud. 

"Businesses with a website connection or an internet gateway are almost
perpetually under attack," said Chris Potter, partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers
which helped analyse the survey results. 

Unlike many other surveys the DTI report only counts an incident as such if it
succeeds in causing damage. 

The survey also found that, despite the growing number and sophistication of
attacks, many businesses are not spending nearly enough cash to protect
themselves. 

Security investment 

Only 27% of those questioned are spending more than 1% of their total
technology budget on security. 

Experts estimate that businesses should be spending 3-5% as a minimum and
perhaps as much as 10% in high-risk areas such as financial services. 

Mr Potter said many businesses saw security as an overhead rather than an
investment. Even worse, he said, very few companies measured whether the money
they spent on improving security had the desired effect. 

"There's a lot of fire-fighting expenditure," he said, "so when there is an
incident they fork out protecting themselves so it doesn't happen again rather
than think about the level of spending they should be making." 

Mr Potter said that one of the big changes since the 2000 survey was the
neglect of staff training. 

"Where people are spending money on security it seems to be around technology,"
he said. "They take a fairly narrow information technology view of security
rather than as a part of a strategy to embed a security culture within an
organisation." 

Fewer organisations are now telling employees about responsible use of e-mail,
the web and passwords. 

Even fewer were educating support staff to spot and deal with malicious hackers
that try to trick them into revealing key information about a company's
computer systems. 

But Mr Potter said the news from the survey was not all bad. 

The number of incidents over the 12 months covered by the survey had made many
organisations realise how important it was to protect themselves against
attack, he said. 

The full report will be published at the Infosecurity show being held at
London's Olympia from 23-25 April.
****************
BBC
The great African internet robbery

Africa is being ripped off - to the tune of some $500m a year - simply for
hooking up to the World Wide Web, say Kenyan internet company chiefs.

And this extra cost is partly to blame for slowing the spread of the internet
in Africa and helping sustain the digital divide, they contend. 

According to Kenya's Internet Service Providers (ISP) Association, the
continent is being forced by Western companies to pay the full cost of
connecting to worldwide networks. 

Chairman Richard Bell says this has led to the unfair exploitation of the
continent's young internet industry. 

He says the problem is that International Telecommunications Union regulations
- which ensures the costs of telephone calls between Africa and the West are
split 50:50 - are not being enforced with regard to the internet. 

"British Telecom doesn't spend one single penny... America Online doesn't spend
one single cent in sending emails to Africa." 

The total cost of any email sent or received by an African internet user is
borne entirely by African ISPs, Mr Bell said on the BBC African service
programme Talkabout Africa. 

Despite the relatively high cost of using the internet in Africa, growth has
been rapid in recent years. 

All 54 countries are now hooked up to the internet, and there an estimated four
million subscribers across the continent . 

In Kenya alone, there are more than 100,000 subscribers and some 250 cyber
cafes across the country. 


Bandwidth 

Mr Bell said that their association had calculated that the current and latent
demand for bandwidth in Africa cost about $1bn per year. 

And he said that if data network operators in the West were forced to adhere to
the same regulations as voice operators then they would have to pay half the
cost. 

"The only reason this doesn't happen at the moment is that European and North
American operators are not prepared to pay their share of the costs." 

"This is exploitation... These networks are raping Africa of half a billion
dollars a year." 

He said that the G8 group of leading nations were responsible for this
inequitable trade and at some point had to act to halt it, if they were serious
about trying to bridge the digital divide. 

And he said that they as an association now planned to push for this change. 

Action 

They are also calling on African countries to take action by getting together
to reduce their costs. 

A proposal called the Halfway Proposition urges fellow African countries to
create national exchanges and then interconnected regional ones - as has
occured in other parts of the developing world. 

This would at least mean that the communications costs for intra-African emails
stay within Africa - rather than the West benefiting from the cost of an email.


Mike Jenson, who runs the Africa Interconnectivity web site and is surveying
the current utilisation of broadband on the continent, agrees that this could
make a difference. 

"No one really knows how much intra-African traffic there is, but it's sure to
grow and become significant if it isn't already," he told BBC News Online. 

"If only 5% is intra-regional, it would add up to a sizeable amount," he said.
*****************
Reuters
Piracy in Spotlight at Annual Music Sales Event 
Mon Apr 15,12:23 PM ET 
By Bernhard Warner, European Internet Correspondent 

LONDON (Reuters) - Record executives on Tuesday will gather at a plush London
hotel to release annual global music sales figures, but this year music pirates
are expected to steal the spot light from the chart-toppers. 

  
The event, hosted by International Federation of the Phonographic Industry
(IFPI), had been the measuring stick to determine who's hot and who's not in
the fickle recording industry. 

Lately though, the gathering has taken on a more somber tone as executives
decry the amount of business they're losing to rampant CD-copying, or
"burning," and Internet file-swapping services such as Kazaa and Morpheus Music
City. 

The IFPI recently put a value of $4.2 billion on pirated music activities in
2001. 

In 2000, the industry was hit by the worst year on record when world sales of
recorded music fell five percent to $37 billion. 

The misery likely worsened last year and some analysts estimate sales tumbled
10 percent, aggravated by poor sales in the two largest markets, the United
States and Japan. But the potential future damage may lie beyond the numbers,
industry observers say. 

PIRATE GENERATION 

With millions of Internet users downloading all manners of music, from Abba to
Eminem (news - web sites), on free rogue services, observers warn that
teenagers and twenty-somethings are growing accustomed to seeking pirated
versions before venturing into record shops. 

"You have an entire generation of people thinking content should be available
for free, and that's just not a sustainable long-term business model for the
labels," said Hank Forsyth, media analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein. 

Major record labels -- Sony Music, Warner Music, EMI Group Plc (news - web
sites)., Universal Music and Bertelsmann's BMG -- late last year went on the
offensive launching subscription download services of their own. 

It is widely held that it will take at least five years for the majors'
services MusicNet and Pressplay to make a noticeable sales contribution and,
more importantly, derail free rivals. 

A second technological defense has stirred up considerably more controversy:
copy-proof CDs. Universal and Sony Music are among the first to try out the new
technology with the releases, respectively, of "More Fast & Furious --
Soundtrack," and Celine Dion (news - web sites)'s "A New Day Has Come." 

The new technologies, however, have irked some music fans who complain the
security measures prevent them from playing the CDs on PCs, portable devices
and even car stereo systems. 

TOUGHER ON PIRATES 

With sales growth hitting all-time lows, the labels are expected to get tougher
on pirates. Over the past year, IFPI has had success shutting down warehouses
in eastern Europe and Asia that mass-produce supplies of pirated CDs, often
resold on the streets. 

And, earlier this month, trade group Recording Industry Association of America
(news - web sites) (RIAA) collected a $1 million fine from an Arizona company
that it said permitted employees to use the corporate computer network to trade
thousands of music files. 

Analysts forecast that the RIAA and IFPI will next turn their attention to
shutting down individual consumers that use the Net to distribute pirated
music. 

But they had better be careful, warned Jupiter MMXI analyst Mark Mulligan. "The
labels are at an absolute low with the new generation of music listeners," he
said. 

Computer-assisted piracy is not entirely to blame. A sagging global economy and
the popularity of entertainment alternatives, notably video games, has eaten
into music sales too. 

Recorded music sales surged in the early to mid-90s as consumers purchased
compact discs to replace scratchy vinyl and cassette collections. The question
remains: what new innovation will lift the industry now? 

Forsyth, for one, believes the best way for the majors to combat the piracy
problem is to find the next big act. 

"A lot of success in the industry still comes down to putting out quality
music," he said. 
******************
Washington Post
Digital Music Downloading 'Bigger Than Napster' - Study

Despite the absence of the legally challenged Napster, the seminal file-sharing
service that helped change the way people listen to music, digital downloads
and file-swapping continue at a hefty pace.

According to a study released today by market research firm Odyssey, 31 percent
of online users over the age of 16 - which translates to over 40 million U.S.
consumers - have downloaded or transferred music online in the past six months.

Odyssey said respondents reported an average of 11 downloads or file transfers
per week.

The swapping of music does not show any signs of slowing down. The study said
sharing digital music files "appears to have become a mainstream activity."

Fifty-three percent of online users under 30 said they have transferred or
downloaded music in the past six months. However, because 20 percent of online
users over 30 and 14 percent of those over 45 said they also have swapped music
in the past six months, Odyssey said such behavior, "is not something that this
large base of young consumers is likely to outgrow over time."

Another factor that indicates digital music swapping will continue to grow is
the increasing availability of recordable CD-ROM droves. 

Odyssey said 23 percent of U.S. households have the ability to copy songs to a
blank CD, up from 16 percent in January 2001.

Odyssey said it expects a recording industry trade group to release sales
figures later this week that will show a 10 percent drop in music unit sales
from year to year - the worst such drop in history. In addition, the Recording
Industry Association of America (RIAA) recently reported music unit shipments
in the U.S. were down 10 percent from 2000 to 2001.

The study concluded the availability of digital music "appears to be playing a
major role" in the drop in sales of recorded music.

Odyssey said the recording industry should offer services that allow consumers
to create their own "play lists" of songs, and transfer ("burn") the music to
their preferred format. The firm said 60 percent of U.S. households have some
interest in subscribing to such a service.

"The industry has taken so long to respond that an entirely new set of
expectations has been created," Nick Donatiello, president and CEO of Odyssey
said in a written statement. "Now record labels will have to climb walls that
they are allowing to be built."

The study said the music services offered by the record companies, such as
MusicNet and Pressplay, do not meet the needs of consumers. Odyssey dismissed
those services as something that solves the industry's problems, but does not
meet consumers' needs.

What people want, the firm said, is to own, control and customize their music.

"Changes in music behaviors are not solely relegated to the online medium,"
Odyssey managing director Sean Baenen said in a written statement. "Just as
cassette tape offered the ability to reproduce and separate tracks, digital
technology is giving consumers more choice and more control of their music
consumption across the board."

"We're seeing a sea change, and from the consumer perspective it looks as if
the industry is still out shopping for boats," Baenen added.

Odyssey conducts a U.S. study known as "Breadbox" every six months. The firm
said Breadbox measures consumer attitudes and behaviors on offline and online
forms of commerce, online banking, and online product research.

The firm said its survey of 3,000 consumers is a representative sample of the
U.S. population 16 years and older.

Odyssey is at http://www.odysseylp.com.

Reported by Newsbytes.com, http://www.newsbytes.com.
*****************
Interactive TV Gets Its Own Emmy
By JON HEALEY
TIMES STAFF WRITER

April 16 2002

The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences on Monday announced a new Emmy for
interactive TV programming, signaling that the long-hyped but little-seen
marriage of technology and TV has finally won a foothold in the industry.

Chances are good, however, that the winning enhancements won't have been seen
by most TV viewers. That's because relatively few sets, cable converter boxes
or satellite receivers in the U.S. are delivering that kind of interactivity
today.

With that in mind, the academy decided not to reserve an Emmy statuette for
interactive programmers. Instead, the winners--if there are any--will receive
an Emmy plaque. The award will recognize original interactive enhancements that
are "integrally related" to a program. For example, it might be an overlay on
the TV screen that offers background information on the characters, or a Web
site that offers supplemental text, graphics and video.

John Leverence, the academy's vice president of awards, said interactive TV is
still a work in progress. The award, he said, should be viewed as "a first step
in the direction of full Emmy recognition, even as the technology is still in
its infancy, still unfulfilled in terms of its promise."

Advocates of the new Emmy, which will be awarded Aug. 21 during the engineering
awards presentation, said they wanted not only to recognize the creative work
being done in interactive TV but also to encourage more of it.

"The mission of the television academy [includes] recognizing leadership in the
advancement of television arts and sciences," said Brian Seth Hurst, a
consultant active in the campaign for the award. "The point is to continue to
forward the medium."

Interactive TV has been around in one form or another since the 1950s, when a
CBS show, "Winky Dink and You," invited kids to help solve a cartoon
character's problems by drawing on their TV screens. It has come and gone
several times since then, with new technologies being abandoned in the face of
high costs and low interest.

Over the last few years, cable and satellite operators have installed millions
of set-top boxes capable of delivering interactive TV--if they have the right
software.

The TV industry has yet to settle on which software to use, however, chopping
the potential audience into smaller pieces.

Josh Bernoff, a principal analyst with Forrester Research, said the leading
interactive TV services today are interactive ads, news and weather updates,
video on demand and personal video recording, not program-related enhancements.

Although public TV stations and education-oriented cable networks have been
particularly active experimenters, no one has found a business model yet to
support the kind of interactivity the academy wants to recognize.

Consumers "are interested in that extra information. They've taken advantage of
it, but from the broadcasters' side, how do we make a dime off of this?" said
analyst Mike Paxton of Cahners In-Stat MDR, a technology research firm.

Nevertheless, Shawn Hardin, a governor of the academy's Interactive Media Peer
Group, said interactive programs are "being distributed pretty much by every
major broadcaster."

For example, CBS offers a stylish version of "CSI" with interactive
explanations of the high-tech forensic tools used on the show, and ABC's Web
site for "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" lets viewers play along with the
on-air contestants.

"Every major outlet that we can look at has one- or two-screen experiences that
qualify for this award and in some cases are extremely compelling," Hardin
said.

A one-screen program lets viewers display the interactive features on their TV
sets, typically by shrinking the video to make room for extra text and
graphics. A two-screen program delivers the interactive features through the
Web, so viewers can display them on computers near their TVs.

Analysts estimate that 30 million to 40 million people watch TV and surf the
Web simultaneously, and close to 10 million homes have satellite and cable TV
set-top boxes that can deliver basic interactive programming.

As many as 1 million have more advanced set-tops with two-way connections to
the Internet, enabling more sophisticated interactivity. 
If you want other stories on this topic, search the Archives at
latimes.com/archives. For information about reprinting this article, go to
www.lats.com/rights. 
**********************
USA Today
Survey: Net users don't trust e-commerce sites

NEW YORK (AP)  Internet users are fairly skeptical of Web sites that sell goods
or give buying advice, according to a survey out Monday from Consumers Union.

Only 26% trusted e-commerce sites most of the time, and 29% trusted advice
sites that way.

By comparison, trust in small businesses was at 59%, newspapers and television
news at 48%, charities at 46% and financial companies at 45%. Only large
corporations rated as low as Web sites, at 29%.

Fifty-nine percent of users considered it very important that sites clearly
distinguish advertising from news and information.

A similar percentage did not know that some search engines accept payment in
exchange for prominent listings, while 80% of users felt that search engines
should reveal such deals.

Veteran Internet users tend to be more trusting of the e-commerce sites.

Consumer WebWatch, the Consumers Union project that commissioned the study,
recommended that sites clearly:

? Disclose their physical location and include a mailing address, phone number
or e-mail address.

? Label advertising and for-pay search placements.

? Disclose all fees, including service and shipping costs.

The study was based on random telephone surveys Dec. 20-Jan. 7 with 1,500 adult
Internet users. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage
points.
*****************
Federal Computer Week
Army releases major network RFP

The Army last week released its request for proposals for the Warfighter
Information Network-Tactical (WIN-T) program, a tactical intranet that will use
commercial technologies for wired and wireless voice, data and video
communications.

WIN-T is a potential multibillion-dollar, 15-year systems integration program
to develop the Army's tactical communications network for offensive combat and
joint operations for the Objective Force, which will transform the Army's
armored forces to make them better able to survive an all-out fight.

WIN-T will be mobile, secure and survivable and will integrate ground-,
airborne- and satellite-based capabilities into a network infrastructure and
will support the Army's Future Combat Systems (FCS). 

FCS is envisioned to create an integrated battlespace, where networked
information and communications systems provide a competitive edge to soldiers
in the field and commanders in the control room. Last month, the Army selected
Boeing Co.'s Space and Communications group and Science Applications
International Corp. for the $154 million FCS lead systems integrator contract. 

The WIN-T contract has two phases and is a competitive award that will be given
to up to two contractors to help maintain competition throughout development
and provide the "best value," according to a March 20 presentation by Col.
Thomas Cole, Army program manager for WIN-T, at a pre-solicitation conference
for vendors. 

Phase 1 is designed to accomplish certain activities leading up to a milestone
in one year, including: 

* Conducting technology readiness assessment to assist in program scheduling.

* Preparing documentation to support the milestone decision.

* Producing a technical baseline requirements document that will serve as the
contractor baseline for Phase 2.

* Developing an "initial architecture."

* Initiating risk management and cost reporting processes to be used throughout
the life of the program.

* Establishing a dialogue among the WIN-T contractor, the FCS lead systems
integrator and other Objective Force contractors.

Phase 2 is scheduled to last 23 months and will include the system design and
development phase, according to Cole's presentation. WIN-T's near-term proposed
funding calls for $3 million for fiscal 2002, $20 million for fiscal 2003 
which includes completion of Phase 1 and initiation of Phase 2  $31 million for
fiscal 2004 and $21 million for fiscal 2005.

"This will be a complex systems integration challenge," said David Kelley, vice
president of information operations and program executive for WIN-T for
Lockheed Martin Mission Systems, one of the many companies vying for the
contract. "WIN-T will provide the framework to horizontally integrate the joint
battlespace, and it will give our 21st-century soldiers an overwhelming
advantage of having the right information at the right time to decisively
defeat the enemy."

Kelley said WIN-T also would provide mobile battle command capabilities that
will enable commanders to "plug in" to the network from any location in the
battlespace. 

Lockheed Martin's WIN-T team includes Harris Corp., Cisco Systems Inc., ACS
Defense, Integrated Solutions, SRI International and Innovative Logistics
Techniques Inc.

The deadline for proposals is May 9, and the contract is scheduled to be
awarded in mid-August, according to Army officials.
******************
Federal Computer Week
Denver pitches official Web site

In an aggressive campaign beginning May 1, Denver will advertise its government
Web site through community newspapers, radio spots and a city-owned cable
channel. It's an unusual move within a sector unaccustomed to such marketing
efforts.

"I see the need being precipitated by the competition out there," said Steve
Hansen, marketing director for the city's Television and Internet Services
Department.

Scores of "imposter" sites  such as news, travel or "underground" sites  bill
themselves as "the official Denver Web site," he said, and then provide links
to the city's site (www.denvergov.org), which was launched in 1999. 

"We felt like we had to do a full-blown branding to the public," Hansen said,
adding that the initial marketing push will last through November.

Hansen and Byron West, director of the 22-person Television and Internet
Services Department, presented their strategy to several other municipal
officials at the Public Technology Inc. conference last week in Scottsdale,
Ariz. They showed print advertising campaigns that promote the government site
as the primary source of information for constituents and said the city-owned
Channel 8 also would air ads.

Marketing is a difficult concept for governments to embrace, said Hansen, who
added that it gets a "bad rap." West said officials have a mindset that they
don't need to publicize services and offerings because people will come to
them.

"Government sets itself up that other people have to come to it because they
have to," she said. "[But] we're in the best position to present this
information." West said the campaign could not have happened without high-level
support from the city government. The city budgeted $90,000 last year for the
effort, and $84,000 this year, they said. This enabled the department to hire a
professional marketing firm.

West said she's seen "pockets" of marketing done by other municipalities, but
only where a specific service was promoted. "As a general principleÖyou don't
see it adopted," she said.
******************
Federal Computer Week
Harris to defend Army computers

The Army announced April 15 that it has awarded a multimillion-dollar contract
to Harris Corp. to help protect its worldwide computer networks from
cyberthreats.

The award calls for deploying Harris' Security Threat Avoidance Technology
(STAT) Scanner on more than 1.5 million Army workstations worldwide. The work
to install the vulnerability assessment tool is already under way, according to
a company spokesman.

STAT Scanner provides network administrators with an analysis of all
vulnerabilities, details about the risk level of each vulnerability and
remediation of detected weaknesses. The product features enterprise reporting
to enable officers to monitor the vulnerability analysis results of systems
under their command, according to the Melbourne, Fla.-based company.

Under terms of the contract, which was awarded last month, STAT Scanner will be
used to detect vulnerabilities in active-duty and reserve Army computer
networks. Myriad systems are scheduled to be covered including:

* Strategic networks  post, camp and station computers.

* Tactical networks. 

* Mobile Subscriber Equipment networks (microwave radio system).

* The Army's Tactical Internet, including direct applicability to the
Warfighter Information Network-Tactical. 

STAT Scanner searches for vulnerabilities in Microsoft Corp. Windows NT,
Windows 2000/XP, Linux and Unix operating platforms, assessing more than 1,400
network security vulnerabilities and automatically repairing many of them.

The Army contract also requires Harris to provide maintenance services for
three years.

In addition to Scanner, the STAT product suite includes: Neutralizer, a
behavior-based intrusion-prevention tool that stops security threats, and
Analyzer, a network security risk assessment tool that automates and
streamlines the network security assessment process.
*********************
Federal Computer Week
Intranet open for victim notification

The Justice Department now has a Web-based system to notify victims of federal
crimes about changes in the status of their cases, AT&T announced April 15.

The national Victim Notification System is a collaborative effort among the
FBI, the U.S. Attorneys' offices and the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Victims of
crime can register with the system to receive notification about such things as
court proceedings and information about the release of a defendant.

Justice awarded the contract to GRC International Inc., an AT&T subsidiary, in
August 2000. An automated call center that is part of the project opened last
year.

The new Web-based system includes a secure intranet site for the federal
victims and witness coordinators to enter information. It also has a
centralized system to provide automated notification to the victims by letter,
e-mail, fax or pager. 

Automating these functions will provide more time for the coordinators to work
with victims and other agencies, according to AT&T.
**********************
Federal Computer Week
Mayo picked for Navy network command

Navy Vice Adm. Richard Mayo has been nominated to head the new Navy command
responsible for all of the service's information technology networks,
information operations and space requirements.

Mayo has been the director of space and electronic warfare for the Chief of
Naval Operations in the Pentagon since August 1999.

The new command, called the Naval Network Warfare Command, was created by Navy
Secretary Gordon England last month. Headquartered at Naval Amphibious Base
Little Creek in Norfolk, Va., it is scheduled to begin operations by June.

Navy officials have said that the new command is a realization of how critical
networks are to the service.

Mayo, a native of Falls Church, Va., previously was the Navy's deputy director
and fleet liaison for space, information warfare, command and control.

The creation of the Naval Network Warfare Command is seen as an effort to align
the staffs needed to support the concept of one naval network and to support
that network's end-to-end operational management, Navy officials said.

Mayo's nomination must be approved by the Senate.
*************************
New York Times
Machines Are Filling In for Troops

WASHINGTON  From Homer to Hemingway, Sun Tzu to Churchill, humans have been
fascinated by the violence and plotting, the heroism and sacrifice, the epic
theater of what Dryden called "the trade of kings"  war.

But the Pentagon, energized by successes in Afghanistan, is moving ever closer
to draining the human drama from the battlefield and replacing it with a ballet
of machines.

Rapid advances in technology have brought an array of sensors, vehicles and
weapons that can be operated by remote control or are totally autonomous.
Within a decade, those machines will be able to perform many of the most
dangerous, strenuous or boring tasks now assigned to people, military planners
say, paving the way for a fundamental change in warfare.

Already, autonomous sentinels on the ground, in the air and in orbit are
probing the battlefield with heat detectors, radar, cameras, microphones and
other devices. Some can reveal decoys and pierce camouflage, darkness and bad
weather.

In years to come, once targets are found, chances are good that they will be
destroyed by weapons from pilotless vehicles that can distinguish friends from
foes without consulting humans.

The rapid shift away from people  what the Pentagon calls manned units  to
automation has several goals.

Many new devices will be much smaller and lighter, making them cheaper, more
fuel efficient and easier to move, advocates contend. And because of their
unlimited attention spans, machines should do better at tedious, time-consuming
tasks that human warriors loathe, like standing guard or monitoring mountain
passes.

But most important, many officials say, remote technology can shield and aid
the the flesh-and-blood soldier.

"We seem as a society, thank God, very averse to taking casualties," said Dr.
Gervasio Prado, the president of SenTech, a Massachusetts company refining
book-size robotic sentinels that can be sprinkled on battlefields to listen for
enemy vehicles.

"We'll continue putting as much effort as possible into keeping the humans in a
safe location and do this dirty job remotely," he said.

In the short run, soldiers, pilots and sailors will still be essential
components of any battle, military planners say. This will be particularly true
in urban settings, where buildings, tunnels and people create confusing
obstacles that no machine will be able to skirt for years to come.

But over time, experts largely agree, remote-sensing and piloting technologies
will produce the biggest change in warfare in generations.

By 2020 or earlier, if the Pentagon and its many supporters in Congress and the
White House have their way, pilotless planes and driverless buggies will direct
remote-controlled bombers toward targets; pilotless helicopters will coordinate
driverless convoys, and unmanned submarines will clear mines and launch cruise
missiles.

"The promise is enormous," said Dr. M. Franklin Rose, an electrical engineer
who is leading a study of driverless ground vehicles being done for the Army by
the Board on Army Science and Technology of the National Academy of Sciences.
"Robotics can do three things for the future army: keep soldiers out of harm's
way, do the laborious and boring tasks and keep going long after a soldier is
exhausted. And they have no fear, at least in current embodiments."

Some simple devices, like infrared and night-vision scopes, are available to
enemies as well. But no country or terrorist group will have the ability any
time soon to deploy these systems so widely and deeply in its forces, many
military analysts say.

It is a dream long in the making that has been stunningly accelerated by the
war in Afghanistan. There, several pilotless surveillance aircraft turned in
unexpectedly strong performances, including the Air Force's Predator and its
missile-toting cousin from the Central Intelligence Agency. They piped
streaming video of Taliban and Qaeda movements to command posts in Saudi Arabia
and the Pentagon, where commanders could then call almost immediate air
strikes.

As a result, the Pentagon has requested $1.1 billion, an increase of nearly
$150 million, in the 2003 budget to accelerate development of the Predator,
Global Hawk and other pilotless planes.

"Why send a marine into harm's way when you can send an $8,000 vehicle
instead?" said Brig. Gen. Douglas V. O'Dell, commander of the Fourth Marine
Expeditionary Brigade, referring to the Marines' new pilotless aircraft, the
Dragon Fly.

Today's advances in military technology are the result of an effort to
extending forces' ability to see over the foxhole rim, the next ridge or across
a national border and to speed the application of deadly force.

In Vietnam, troops dropped battery-powered listening devices, designed to track
submarines, into the forest along the Ho Chi Minh Trail and broadcast the
sounds of activity below to crews in planes circling above. The Pentagon also
used remotely piloted surveillance drones, including ones armed with Maverick
missiles, in Vietnam. But crude technology and limited range discouraged
further development.

But the 1990's saw leaps in computer and sensor technology that reignited
interest in remote controlled weapons. In Bosnia, the military tried an Army
drone called the Hunter; in Kosovo, it first deployed the Predator. By the time
American warplanes began attacking Afghanistan, the Air Force had learned out
how link the Predator's cameras to video screens on AC-130 gunships, aircraft
carriers in the Arabian Sea and the Combined Air Operation Command Center in
Saudi Arabia.

A few years ago, listening devices, called unattended ground sensors, weighed
30 pounds and were lugged into enemy territory by troops. Now they weigh three
pounds. One model is designed to be dropped from aircraft. The sturdy sensors
detect vibrations and sounds. Using a computerized library of the distinctive
noises produced by a host of enemy engines, tank treads and the like, they
recognize passers-by.

The next step will be to integrate data from the unattended sensors with
information flowing from high-flying drones or satellites, said Dr. Prado,
whose company builds the listening devices.

By using different sensors to scour the same landscape and comparing the
information, it will be easier to unmask decoys or camouflaged weapons,
officials say. As recently as the Kosovo bombing campaign, decoys regularly
fooled American bombers.

Leading the Pentagon's remote-control warfare effort is the Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency, which operates out of Northern Virginia. The agency
is working with Boeing to developed the X-45 unmanned combat air vehicle. The
30-foot-long windowless planes look like flying "W's" and will carry up to 12
250-pound bombs. In their initial deployments, as early as 2007, they will be
used to attack radar and antiaircraft installations. 

The Pentagon estimates that pilotless aircraft will cost less than half as much
as piloted fighter jets like the F-15 or F-18, largely because they lack
humans.

At first, the aircraft will be programmed to ask human controllers for
permission to bomb targets. By 2010, the Pentagon envisions that the X-45 will
independently attack targets in designated "kill boxes." Then, "If the aircraft
sees a target that matches its memory, it hits it and tells the humans about it
later," said Col. Michael Leahy of the Air Force, the program director.

The research agency and the Army are also working on the Future Combat System,
a network of pilotless and piloted aircraft, transport vehicles and artillery
pieces linked by high-speed communications.

The goal is to make the Army lighter and more nimble. Pilotless vehicles are
expected to play a central role. Small hovering drones would peek over
ridgetops, while unoccupied helicopters would watch troop movements. Closest to
deployment is an all-terrain vehicle programmed to follow a soldier, hauling
weapons and other gear.

The Pentagon already has the Hornet, essentially a land mine with a 100-yard
reach. When it hears an approaching vehicle, it launches a device into the air
that uses a heat sensor to direct a potent projectile down at the target.

Miniaturization is a keystone. Another goal is a "microair vehicle" less than
nine inches long that can be carried in a backpack and, when launched, will
send images from tiny heat sensors and cameras.

There are many technological and strategic hurdles. First, drones like the
Predator require humans to do almost all their thinking. Having unoccupied
vehicles accomplish the sophisticated maneuvers envisioned by Pentagon planners
will require much greater autonomy, and more powerful artificial intelligence.

"Flying a Global Hawk from California to Australia, impressive as that is, is
not as hard as driving an unmanned ground vehicle from here to the Capitol,"
said Dr. E. Allen Adler, director of the tactical technology office at the
advanced projects agency, whose office is about five miles from Capitol Hill.

Second, the armed services have not begun adjusting their strategies to
incorporate robotic vehicles. That will take years of study and training,
experts and commanders say.

"The real challenge is to mix man and machines," said Colonel Leahy, program
director for the pilotless fighter. "It will be a loose ballet at first. But
eventually, the systems will be linked to each other, sharing information and
deciding among them who has the best shot."

Third, Afghanistan did little to educate the Pentagon on how a more capable
military rival might adjust to unmanned systems. The Taliban never learned how
to shoot down a Predator, but Saddam Hussein's troops may have bagged at least
two last year over southern Iraq. A sophisticated foe might disarm, destroy or
confuse pilotless aircraft, rendering them useless or even turning them against
American forces.

Finally, debate persists over just how much the military should rely on
machines. Most military experts still say the human brain remains the most
effective weapon.

"The onboard logic of unmanned combat aerial vehicles will not begin to
approach the computational capacity of human brains, making them highly
vulnerable to attacks by manned aircraft," Loren B. Thompson, chief operating
officer for the Lexington Institute, which studies military issues, testified
before the Senate last week.

In the end, said Dr. Rose, the electrical engineer assessing ground vehicles,
the biggest challenge will be to design the technology so that to the fighter
it becomes an invisible, almost subconscious, extension of the eyes, ears or
trigger finger. That will take another generation, he said.

"Already, so many of these young soldiers grew up on video games and
computers," he said. "They grew up trusting machines."

Eventually, he said, the new weapons and sensors will slide into the ethos of
war just like the autopilot, which was once disparaged by aviators as "Iron
Mike" but is now a standard part of airplane cockpits.

"But it'll still be 20 or 25 years up the road before we get to the point where
you regard `Iron Mike' as a member of your squad as opposed to a nuisance," Dr.
Rose said.
*****************
BBC
Israel under hack attack

According to security firm mi2g, the Israeli domain .il has been the biggest
victim of web defacements over the past three years, suffering 548 of the 1,295
attacks in the Middle East. 

As violence escalates in the region, cyber attacks on Israel are also on the
rise. 

In the past 14 days, Israel has suffered about two-thirds of the significant
web defacements in the Middle East. 

Online threats 

The most active anti-Israeli hacker group claims to be Egyptian and started its
activities just weeks after 11 September. 

Cyber warfare can be used as a barometer for political tensions around the
world, said mi2g Chief Executive, DK Matai. 

"The tense situation in the Middle East is reflected in both covert and overt
hack attacks," he said. 

Israel is vulnerable not just because of its action against the Palestinian
Authority, but also because it has the largest number of internet connections
in the Middle East. 

Israel has 2.4 million net connections, more than any of the 22 Arab countries.


Attacks on infrastructure? 

So far hacktivism has been limited to web defacements and denial of service
attacks. This is where a web server is bombarded with messages causing it to
fall over. 

It is possible for the political hackers to intensify their campaign, said
Peter Sommer, senior fellow at the Computer Security Research Centre at the
London School of Economics. 

"It is entirely feasible to mount an attack on critical national
infrastructure," he said. 

"From a pro-Arab point of view it would be far more effective than sending in a
suicide bomber." 

Cyber-politics 

Hacktivism is a growing problem on the internet as activists utilise the web to
get across their political messages. 

One of the most prolific hacktivists is a group of Pakistani hackers calling
themselves GForce Pakistan. 

Soon after the 11 September, the group defaced a server belonging to the US
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency. 

It also threatened to target US and British military sites unless the US
withdrew from Saudi Arabia and ended its bombing campaign in Afghanistan. 

Similar attacks were seen during the Serbian conflict, the US-China spy plane
incident in April 2001 and the China-Taiwan standoff in August 1999.
*****************
BBC
Hi-tech musical youth

Imagine if you were 10 years old and you could play a musical instrument,
without spending years in music lessons. 
This was the aim of Toy Symphony, a three-year project by scientists at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab. 

Composer Tod Machover and his team turned to technology to design special
musical toys that eliminate years of scales and struggles with fingering. 

"Toy Symphony proposes another model of how children can start with music,"
said the professor of Music and Media. "We have invented a whole set of new
instruments and tools to listen and perform, create and compose." 

The youngsters from the Ark Children's Centre in Dublin who tried the musical
toys were enthusiastic about them. 

"It's neat that anyone at all can play them," said one. 

"One lessons shows you the basics. It's easy to learn but fun at the same
time," said another. 

Music inaccessible 

Professor Machover came up with the idea as a way of introducing children to
music and allowing them to express themselves without any of the traditional
obstacles.

"Children are some of the most capable musicians in the world and have
everything it takes to make music - energy, imagination and body movement," he
told the BBC programme Go Digital. 

"But in many ways, music has been inaccessible to children because instruments
are hard and there is so much to learn." 

To sweep children up and place them in the heart of the musical experience,
Professor Machover and his team developed special musical toys. 

Tap and squeeze

They came up with Beatbugs and Shapers. 

The Beatbugs are percussion instruments that you hold in one hand and tap with
the other to create rhythmic patterns. 

The Beatbugs have two antennae that can be bent to transform the pitch and
timbre of the rhythm. 

They are connected to each other so that the rhythm can travel from one to
another. 

The Shapers are colourful balls that produce notes when they are squeezed. 

Painting music 

Children can go one step further by using Hyperscore, a sophisticated piece of
software that allows a child to create music by drawing onscreen. 

"Unlike with telling stories or painting, children are never given the
opportunity to compose," explained Professor Machover. 

"Hyperscore is an attempt to use a computer interface that lets you draw and
paint, and to turn the drawing and painting into sound." 

A child draws lines and paints colours that the software coordinates together
to create a musical composition. 

Toy Symphony, written by Professor Machover, received its world premiere in
Dublin last week and is coming to Glasgow on 2 June. 

A tour of the US and Japan is also planned.
****************
San Francisco Chronicle
HIGH TECH GOES HOLLYWOOD 
Electronic gadgets are playing a bigger role in movie product placements

When Ben Affleck disrupts a terrorist bomb plot as a young incarnation of CIA
agent Jack Ryan in the summer flick "Sum of All Fears," employees at RSA
Security in San Mateo won't be watching for explosions or chase scenes. 

Instead, they'll be waiting for the shot in which Affleck wears their product,
a key-size identification device, on a cord around his neck. They're hoping
that scene won't end up on the cutting room floor. 

Once, high-tech devices in movies and on television were laughably unrealistic
-- picture the shoe phone on "Get Smart." But now that high-tech firms are
getting hip to product placement, more and more real-life gadgets -- many of
them not well known -- are getting cameos in films, making onscreen technology
look more realistic than ever. 

RSA, whose security technology has already played a role in the John Travolta
hacker thriller "Swordfish" and "Antitrust" starring Ryan Phillippe, isn't the
only one in on the act. 

Vancouver's Sierra Wireless has a laptop modem that appeared in "Swordfish" as
well as the 1995 movie "The Net." And Nexian, based in La Jolla, has an add- on
device for personal digital assistants called HandyGPS that has been used on
the popular Fox TV show "24." 

Purveyors of well-known consumer products, from Gordon's Dry Gin ("The African
Queen," 1951) to Reese's Pieces ("ET," 1982), have long used placements in
movies and TV as a means of advertising. It makes sense: Humphrey Bogart drinks
Gordon's, so why shouldn't you? 

But firms selling new technology often don't have such recognized brand names,
or, like RSA, don't even sell their goods to the public. They see product
placement simply as a way to introduce their brand to the world or to tell
people that a new technology exists. 

"Our kind of technology has yet to hit the mainstream, and any exposure we can
get makes the 'I didn't know you could do that' statement," said Sierra
Wireless co-founder Andrew Harries. 

In fact, technological improvements -- which have translated into smaller
devices -- have made Sierra's brand name less and less evident on film. In "The
Net," the bad guy hunting down Sandra Bullock's character used a small modem
with a flashing light that attached to his laptop. But in "Swordfish," all
viewers saw of Sierra's product was a small antenna protruding from a laptop --
with no brand name visible. 

Harries does the placements simply to spread the word that wireless Internet
access from laptops works. 

"Since there's a technology phobia, putting (gadgets) in a movie and showing
people how they're used might be valuable," said Mike Kamins, professor of
marketing at the University of Southern California's Marshall School of
Business. 

The biggest force pushing high-tech firms into product placement now is
economics, said Eric Dahlquist Sr., president of the Entertainment Resources
and Marketing Association, a product placement industry group. 

"The high-tech industries are suddenly finding themselves without the resources
they once had, because their stock has gone down, so they're looking for other
ways to gain image and market their products. Product placement is a very
attractively priced way to do that," Dahlquist said. 

RSA didn't get into product placement under financial duress -- although its
share price has fallen recently due to several quarters of disappointing
earnings. The firm was doing well when it started doing placements 2 1/2 years
ago. But RSA does get its movie roles for small fees or for no fee at all, said
Marina Donovan, RSA vice president of marketing. Major consumer brands can pay
millions for prime screen real estate, but tech firms pay mostly in free
products and technical consulting. 

"With 'Swordfish,' I spent hours with them," Donovan said. "They wanted to know
how you could break code, what it would take." 

Donovan would not disclose how much RSA spends on product placement fees. 

RSA also offers cross promotion in lieu of payment. The firm devised an
encryption breaking contest that ran on the "Swordfish" Web site, and arranged
screenings for employees and corporate customers. 

In "Swordfish," John Travolta plays a spy who persuades a hacker played by Hugh
Jackman to steal millions of dollars through government computers. But RSA's
security is not breached in the film -- the logo appears on a computer screen
reading "ACCESS DENIED." 

It's very important to RSA that its software doesn't play the role of a
defeated security system. In fact, RSA turned down a role in "The Farm," a
movie about CIA recruiting scheduled for release this fall, for just that
reason. 

"The script changed and it was going to look as if we were being breached, so
we didn't do it," said Layne Sipole, RSA's agent. 

Sierra Wireless doesn't have much influence over how its products are used,
Harries said, but so far it hasn't been a problem. 

"We'd be a bit miffed if somebody in the movie took the (modem) card out of the
laptop, threw it on the ground and said, 'Damn thing doesn't work!' " he said. 

No one seems to complain, though, when technology is shown performing far
beyond its real capabilities. Remember the scene in "Independence Day" where
Jeff Goldblum uses an ordinary Apple PowerBook to upload a virus to an alien
spaceship, thereby saving the planet? 

Apple declined to comment on whether the scene exaggerated the PowerBook's
prowess. 



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----

TIVO DEVICE SHOWING UP UNSOLICTED ON TV SHOWS
Some companies get their tech gadgets demonstrated onscreen without even having
to promote them. 
TiVo, the digital TV recorder company based in San Jose, never pushed for
product placement because the company figured that viewers probably wouldn't
know what that box sitting next to the television was, according to Rebecca
Baer, corporate communications director. 

Yet TiVo has been popping up on all kinds of shows this year, both as a prop
and in dialogue. It has been seen on "Sex and the City," "Dawson's Creek" and
"Friends." 

"It appeals to a lot of people in the entertainment industry. TiVo's just part
of their vernacular, and that has resulted in a lot of mentions and visibility
in TV programming," Baer said. 

The product was incorporated in one episode of "Friends" this season, in a
fashion few companies would have paid for. 

In the episode, Rachel (Jennifer Aniston) plans to tell her father that she's
pregnant. She brings along her pal Phoebe (Lisa Kudrow) for moral support. 

When the dad asks what's new, Rachel tells him that she recently got TiVo. 

"What's TiVo?" he asks. 

"It's a slang word for pregnant!" Phoebe blurts out. 

TiVo would never have paid for that placement, and in fact hasn't paid for any
placements so far, Baer said. 

Baer described her co-workers' reaction to the mention: "Everyone watching
said, 'Did she just say that?' " 

Of course, for those who couldn't believe their ears, TiVo fortunately has an
instant replay function. -- Carrie Kirby 
*****************
Government Computer News
FBI study: Hanssen had easy access to case files 
By William Jackson 

The FBI?s failure to secure its case files made it possible for Robert Hanssen
tofreely and without detectiongain access to data for his espionage activities,
a new report concludes. 

What?s more, according to the independent commission that conducted the review,
the FBI still fails to adequately control its case files. 

Hanssen?s espionage ?demonstrated in a public and convincing way that the
bureau?s information systems security controls are inadequate,? noted the
report from the commission headed by former FBI and CIA director William H.
Webster. The unclassified portion is available on the Web at
www.usdoj.gov/05publications/websterreport.pdf. 

But the commission also found that after the Sept. 11 terrorist attackseight
months after Hanssen?s arrestsenior FBI officials lifted many access
restrictions to the bureau?s Automated Case Support system, a primary source of
Hanssen?s stolen information. The restrictions apparently slowed investigation
of the World Trade Center and Pentagon bombings. 

?The decision to loosen ACS restrictions was made essentially without the
involvement of the Security Countermeasures Branch,? the report said. 

Attorney general John Ashcroft ordered the study in March of 2001, after
Hanssen?s arrest on charges of selling information to Russia. 

The FBI did not respond to specific findings of the report. In a statement, FBI
director Robert S. Mueller called it ?instructive on the importance and urgency
with which the FBI must treat its security. I agree we have much more to do,
but I am confident we are on track to accomplish what this report envisions.? 

Hanssen, using only his ordinary ACS rights, accessed thousands of files in
which he had no legitimate interest. 

?It does not appear that Hanssen possessed system administrator access or that
he hacked into any files,? the report said.
********************
Government Computer News
NMCI test results could boost seats to 149,000 
By Dawn S. Onley 

Navy-Marine Corps Intranet director Charles Munns met with senior Defense
Department officials Friday to update them on the progress of contractor
testing and evaluation. 

Munns gave a verbal report to senior Defense officials. A written report will
soon follow, according to his office. 

When the Navy gets the green light from DOD, it can add 100,000 more seats to
the NMCI portal environment. That decision is expected to come May 3, Navy
officials said. Electronic Data Systems Corp., contractor for the $6.9 billion
outsourcing deal, already has assumed responsibility for 49,000 seats. 

NMCI will consolidate 200 networks into an intranet linking more than 400,000
sailors to the EDS-run intranet at sea and ashore.
**********************
Government Computer News
North Carolina names new CIO 
By Trudy Walsh 

North Carolina Gov. Mike Easley has appointed George J. Bakolia the state?s new
CIO, effective May 1. Bakolia replaces Ronald Hawley, who is retiring from
state government to take a job with Search, a nonprofit criminal justice
research organization in Sacramento, Calif. 

Bakolia has worked in the IT arena for more than 24 years. ?George will be
leading the drive to ensure that North Carolina?s information network serves
the citizens of this state efficiently and effectively,? Easley said. 

Since 1990, Bakolia has worked for the state?s Justice Department, starting as
data processing manager. Before joining state government, he worked for Unisys
Corp. and Sperry Corp. He received a bachelor?s degree in computer science from
Queens College of the City University of New York.
****************
San Jose Mercury News
States' e-commerce laws ranked
GROUP CONTENDS CALIFORNIA LAGS IN FRIENDLINESS TO CONSUMERS
Scripps-McClatchy Western Service

If you want to buy wine online, California is the place to be. But if you want
to shop online for contact lenses or insurance, you would be better off packing
up your computer and moving across the border to Oregon.

So says the Progressive Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C., think tank, in
its recent report, ``The Best States for E-Commerce.''

The report places Oregon No. 1 in a ranking of the states and Washington, D.C.,
with the most consumer-friendly Internet laws, followed by No. 2 Utah and No. 3
Indiana.

California ranked 48th.

``It was a surprise to us,'' said Robert Atkinson, the report's primary author.

But the report is more a measure of how a state's regulatory policies help or
hinder consumers' Internet use rather than a reflection of a state's standing
in the technology economy, said Atkinson, a vice president of the institute and
director of its Technology & New Economy Project.

California, for example, gets a low score in the buying-contact-lenses-online
category because of regulations that limit consumer's online choices, the
report says. California also fares poorly in the online mortgage category. The
state gets zero points because California is one of 17 states that require
brokerages to have a physical office in their states in order to broker
mortgages to residents.

Anything that limits consumer choice is a bad thing, the authors contend.

The PPI, an offshoot of the Democratic Leadership Council, describes itself as
an advocate of a ``third way'' in American politics that looks beyond ``the
liberal impulse to defend the bureaucratic status quo and the conservative bid
to simply dismantle government.''

The evaluations are, the authors admit, ``complex and inherently subjective.''

Explanations aside, Gov. Gray Davis' office takes issue with the report's
assessment of California government's Internet attitude.

``By any industry-recognized measure, California is way ahead of the pack,''
said Hilary McLean, spokeswoman for the governor.
******************
MSNBC
Big Brother spending spiked in 2001 
GAO report shows $50 million spent on biometrics before 9/11 
By Bob Sullivan
MSNBC 
 
April 15  Even before Sept. 11, government spending on surveillance
technologies had risen sharply in recent years, according to a report released
Monday by Congress? General Accounting Office. Over $50 million was spent prior
to July 31 of last year researching technologies like biometric identification,
including facial recognition software. Twelve different government agencies
have researched the technology, with the State Department and Justice
Department topping the list.

       WHILE THE GAO report paints a picture of government agencies actively
researching the use of surveillance technologies, only one agency indicated it
has actually deployed them, the report says.
       House Majority Leader Rep. Dick Armey, R-Texas, ordered the report last
July  well before the terrorist attacks that have brought surveillance
technologies to the forefront. Results of the survey were delayed by the
attacks, but the information returned by the agencies reflects ?pre-Sept. 11?
data.
       In a case of unusual political bedfellows, The American Civil Liberties
Union and Armey?s office made a joint statement last July calling for the data,
in the wake of controversial deployments of face recognition cameras at the
2001 Super Bowl and other high-profile events. At the time, Armey?s office said
in a press release that the technologies have ?an alarming potential for
misuse.?
       The study didn?t allay those concerns.
      ?There?s a lot of money involved in these technologies,? said Armey
spokesperson Richard Diamond. ?One thing that seems certain is there should be
more public debate about whether this is the right approach before these
technologies are ever used in public. And that?s something we just haven?t
had.?
The report was not complete: the CIA and Department of Commerce both didn?t
answer the GAO?s questions.
       The report makes clear that biometrics initiatives which have gotten
great attention since Sept. 11 were already under way. Most of the money spent
by July 31  $47 million of the $50 million reported  had been spent developing
facial recognition software, the report indicates. Among the potential uses:
fraudulent Visa detection by the State Department. The report also indicates
more general motives, such as ?national defense, combating of terrorism, and
national security.?
      Diamond said there might be situations where biometrics could be
particularly useful, particularly outside U.S. borders, as a means to protect
U.S. embassies.
       ?You don?t want to dismiss out of hand any technology that could help
save lives,? he said. ?Which is why you need to ask: ?Is this particular
technology going to work?? ?
*********************
MSNBC
Net thieves caught in action 
Fraud investigator sets sting, watches thieves swap fake info 
By Bob Sullivan
April 15  Just how long does it take for stolen credit cards to find their way
around the Internet, and the world? About 15 minutes. That?s what fraud
investigator Dan Clements found this weekend when he posted a Web page full of
faked credit card data to track how quickly the information would make its way
around the ?carder culture.? He then planted links to the Web site in a few
Internet chat rooms. Within 15 minutes, 74 carders from 31 different countries
arrived to peek at the data.

       BY THE END of the weekend, 1,600 potential thieves had visited the page,
hailing from some 75 countries, with Indonesia, the United States, and Romania
topping the list.
       ?It?s frightening how vulnerable we are, and how quickly this
information gets around,? said Avivah Litan, fraud analyst with Gartner Inc.
       Clements, who operates antifraud site CardCops.com, plans to locate as
many individual IP addresses as he can. He will then inform Internet service
providers that their customers are likely participating in illegal activity. 
       He also plans to share his data with the FBI and U.S. Secret Service.
       ?We caught a lot of people in this net. Word is going [around] that ID
process will take place. Just identifying half of them will be a deterrent,? he
said. ?We want the carders to know we?re coming.?
       The Web page Clements produced included fake data that mimicked the kind
often left accidentally on the Internet by e-commerce merchants. He then had
people he trusted call attention to the Web sites in chat rooms that are known
havens for credit card thieves. Then he sat back and watched, logging the IP
address of every computer which visited the Web site.
       Tracking the physical location of IP addresses can be tricky business,
but Clements used a company named Nami Media Inc. to trace back addresses to
originating countries, and in some cases, cities. In this case, Nami Media acts
as a reseller of tracking information provided by Digital Envoy.
       Nami Media?s CEO, Gary Mittman, said technological advancements and
plain old hard work has refined such IP tracking to the point where it?s
reliable.
      ?It?s a mix of a variety of things, including crawling back up the line
with spiders. There?s relationships with ISPs. And there?s 10 guys whose full
time job it is to update systems with global database information. They keep it
as accurate as they can,? Mittman said.
       Clements? results are certainly consistent with the anecdotal
impressions merchants have about credit card fraud hot spots, Litan says.
       ?I know they have strong crime rings in Indonesia and Romania,? Litan
said. ?These two countries keep coming up when people talk about fraud.?
       About 600 surfers from Asia hit Clements? site, almost 400 from
Indonesia. Another 500 hits came from Europe, with 133 from Romania, nearly 80
from Turkey and about 40 from Bulgaria. In North America, some 400 hits
originated in the United States and 80 in Canada.
       ?What this shows is that these guys work at light speed, and if you?re
going to war with them, you can?t move in weeks or months,? Clements said.
*****************

Lillie Coney
Public Policy Coordinator
U.S. Association for Computing Machinery
Suite 507
1100 Seventeenth Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20036-4632
202-659-9711