When the FBI got wind of two Russian hackers breaking into US computers, back
in November 2000, stealing credit card information and trying to extort money
from US citizens and companies, it swung into action.
Initiating a typical FBI 'sting operation', they invited the two hackers to
come to an interview at a non-existent Seattle-based company, to demonstrate
their hacking skills with prospective employment as bait.
Like many wanted criminals and bail-jumpers, who can't resist the temptation to
pick-up their free forty-foot yacht, free tickets for the Super Bowl, or
meet with Michael Jackson, Vasily Gorshkov and and Alexei Ivanov, no doubt
dreaming of the lucrative incomes they could make State-side, were reeled
in, hook, line and sinker.
It's a fine line between entrapment and playing on people's gullibility and
weaknesses, but it sure beats storming into another country to seize those
whom the US wants to press criminal charges against. Although friendly western
countries have turned a blind eye to such activities, whitewashing the events
as being in the best interests of everyone, there was little chance that this
could be done on Russian soil.
Gorshkov's and Ivanov's greed, and stupidity in falling for the con, has
earned them little sympathy, as they walked into a trap they should have seen
a mile away.
Having arrived in Seattle, they probably imagined their interview was going
well as the FBI acted out their role as potential employers, hardly imagining
they were looking at long jail sentences, and not the flashy company cars
they were hoping for.
When the FBI got Gorshkov and Ivanov to login to their computers back in their
Russian homeland, they taped the connection, and gained access to both their
passwords.
Subsequently, they used the stolen passwords to login to their computers and
downloaded files they would be using in evidence against the hackers.
And this is when the political problems started.
It is quite clear that the American Government, so worried about computer
hacking that it has classified it as a terrorist offence ( carrying a maximum
sentence of life imprisonment ) doesn't bat an eyelid when it wants to break
into someone else's computer.
The Russians, on the other hand, see it somewhat differently, and have charged
the FBI agent involved with hacking.
The FBI dismiss the charge as nonsense, and their opinion has been confirmed by
the Judge presiding over Gorshkov's trial.
The court rejected the argument that the password to the hacker's machines were
illegally obtained, because the two should have had, "No expectation of
privacy", once they had entered their password through an external computer
system and there were no requirements for a warrant to have been obtained before
downloading the files, as they were held outside the US and exempt from any
protection that US law may provide for them.
This is an incredulous ruling on two counts. Firstly, it creates the argument
that no one should expect any protection from anyone intercepting your passwords
as that information moves through a computer network, and secondly, it confirms
that the US operates one law for itself, and another for others.
It's all well and good the Americans saying that, what was done was perfectly
okay, because it didn't infringe any US law, but what about the laws of other
countries, and their rights to have their laws upheld ?
Accepting the way the court has interpreted the situation, means that we must
accept that the American Government, or any American citizen come to that, has
the right to intercept our passwords
through any ISP we dial up to, or any system not our own through which we
access our mail, files and other information, and the Government can then
seize all our files with impunity and under the protection of US law.
In the Gorshkov case, the Judge decided that the documents hadn't actually
been 'seized', because they were only copies of files which were left
on the hacker's PC's. A rather strange decision, considering that the copying
of documents from other computers has usually been treated as theft by the
US Courts, and punished accordingly.
When the FBI downloads files, it is copying them, but when you or I, or any
non-sanctioned individual does so, it is theft, and these days, likely to be
terrorism under US law. Hardly the most balanced interpretation of an
offence.
The Judge rejected arguments from Gorshkov's Defence Lawyer that the FBI's
actions were unreasonable or illegal, because it was deemed that Russian Law
did not apply to FBI hacking, and that the FBI had complied with the relevant
Russian Law anyway.
That's not quite how the Russian Federal Security Service sees it, as their
charge against the FBI agent shows.
The activities of the FBI agents involved lead to them being given the FBI's
Director's Award for Excellence, but while FBI, self-congratulatory
back-slapping seems to be the order of the day, those outside the US do not see
their activities as being legally justified in any way, and that Russia does
present a legitimate charge which needs to be prosecuted.
It may be acceptable to allow the American people to be walked over by their
Government as it pursues its agenda of law enforcement. If that is what the
people in the States are prepared to accept, so be it; it's their country, and
they have the right to accept or reject anything their Government decides.
What is not acceptable, is for the US Government to discard another nation's
sovereignty, its laws, and the rights of those living in those countries to
be protected by the laws they create for themselves. Doing so makes the USA
look hypocritical, and unwilling to accept that they do not have the right to
act illegally against other citizens and peoples of the world.
This is not the first time that America has been charged with being a law
unto itself, and acting as being above the law, and it is unlikely to be
the last, as it imposes its will and sanctions over others around the globe.
If the American Government isn't bombing or invading your country, it could
well be stealing documents from your computers, and doing so, with impunity
and with the backing of their law, to congratulatory applause from within itself
as it does so.
If you hack their computers; it's terrorism. If they hack yours; well, they're
allowed to.
