Forwarded From: Nicholas Charles Brawn <ncb05@uow.edu.au>
25Nov98 NEW ZEALAND: HACKING LAWS UP TO THE JOB DESPITE CRITICS -
WILLIAMSON.
By DEAN BEDFORD, Business staff
The Government is defending its laws on computer hacking despite criticism
from industry experts.
Information Technology Minister Maurice Williamson is due to release a
policy paper on electronic commerce tomorrow or on Friday but the issue of
computer hacking will be barely touched.
New Zealand's two biggest Internet providers, Telecom subsidiary Xtra and
privately owned Ihug, have both had hackers breach their security in the
past two weeks. In Ihug's case a hacker deleted thousands of websites,
while another hacker gained access to hundreds of Xtra customer passwords.
Ihug is considering seeking the extradition to the United States of its
hacker because of the inadequacy of New Zealand laws, while Xtra is still
seeking advice on whether a prosecution would be feasible.
New Zealand does not have specific laws on electronic vandalism, but Mr
Williamson believes current laws are adequate.
A spokesman for Mr Williamson said prosecutions could, for example, be
possible for wilful damage. He said it was difficult to have "black and
white" rules in an area that was changing rapidly.
However, hacking was an area for officials to look at in future, he said.
Phillips Fox technology law specialist Brian Bray said the law was fuzzy,
but prosecutions could be possible depending on the circumstances. While
hacking was thought to be illegal, it was not specified in the Crimes Act.
A civil action could be brought against a hacker but the company would
have to show a specific economic loss, which could be difficult to prove.
He said he believed the law should be made clearer as security became more
important with the growth of electronic commerce. "The real problem is
when you start using the Internet for money transactions," Mr Bray said.
"(The concern is) the hacker could go in and pinch the money as well."
Victoria University Professor of Communications Howard Frederick said he
favoured light regulation of the Internet as a general rule, but hacking
was an area that definitely required law changes.
A Wellington company, 128i sells encryption software that protects against
hacking into personal information. Spokesman David Young said there was
growing interest from businesses in protecting financial transactions and
confidential information through the use of encryption.
But there is concern Telecom's new program to beat hackers may fail
against the fraudulent Internet access.
Telecom's Internet provider, Xtra, believes some of its 140,000 Internet
customers may be inadvertently leaking their access passwords to hackers
via a Trojan-horse virus known as "Back Orifice."
But the hacker who provided The Herald with samples of some 200 stolen
passwords from Xtra, Clear and other Internet service providers claims he
is not using this method.
He was using "sniffer" software that monitored users as they logged on to
their Internet service provider, and then other software to "poke" their
computers for password information. The passwords give him free Internet
access at other customers' expense.
THE EVENING POST (NEW ZEALAND) 25/11/1998 P3
-o-
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Received on Tue Dec 8 08:58:50 1998