| Punishing the Innocent |
23 June 2003
|
Senator Hatch's Computer Folly
During hearings on computer software piracy, Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) suggested that intellectual property rights should be protected by software that destroys computers belonging to those who download unlicensed data. Mr. Hatch's idea is brilliant, and one hopes that he will get appropriate legislation approved right away to deal with the problem -- such as the unlicensed Java code on the website belonging to Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah.
Glennreynolds.com, Laurence Simon and Wired News have all reported on their websites that Milonic Solutions of the UK has some copyright-protected software that appears on Mr. Hatch's website. The innocence of the senator and his staff are not in question here as the non-profit or personal use is free; business users must pay a $900 fee for a site-wide license.
However, Milonic's license agreement says that such use still requires registration and a link in the source code to Milonic must be provided. Mr. Hatch's site had not done this prior to his remarks about destroying other people's computers. Since no money is involved, it isn't really that big a deal. It's a bureaucratic, paper-shuffling issue that is doing no one any real harm. Except if Mr. Hatch gets his way.
If he gets his way, the computer with the offending code would be wrecked by a program subroutine that examined it, found it in violation of the agreement, and attacked it. And not only would the computer the website was created on suffer, the host would be at risk, and any machines to which data was innocently downloaded. Imagine the joy a parent would feel on discovering a destroyed computer because Junior had downloaded parts of the senator's website in preparation for a school project on American Liberties in the 21st Century.
Such programs are currently illegal under federal anti-hacking laws, and they should stay that way.