A Bittersweet Victory
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By now, many of you have probably heard the news about the Phrack case we
talked about in the last issue.  In case you haven't, the charges were 
officially dropped when it became clear that Bell South had provided false 
information to the prosecution.  The document they claimed to be worth nearly 
$80,000 turned out to be obtainable from them for a mere $13.  In an 
unprecedented move, the superiors of the prosecutor involved demanded that he 
drop the case immediately.  Good news, right?

Well, sort of.  It's great that one of the publishers of Phrack won't be going 
to jail for putting out a newsletter.  But we won't soon be seeing another 
issue of Phrack.  As Craig Neidorf told us, the risks of running Phrack at this
stage are far too great. Plus he's got a lot of recovering to do.  Legal fees of
over $100,000 plus the emotional stress of facing many years in prison for 
being a publisher....  It's a bit much for anyone. So the government managed to
shut down Phrack and give the publisher a hefty penalty.  Not bad, considering 
they lost the case.

Add to this the fact that there are many other cases pending, cases that are 
disturbing even to those who know nothing about hacking.  Raids are commonplace,
as is the misguided zeal of federal prosecutors who seek to imprison teenagers,
hold them at gunpoint, confiscate all kinds of equipment, and put their 
families through a living hell.

We have alot of education ahead of us.  Much of it will involve getting through
to non-hackers to point out the serious dangers of a legal system gone mad.  A 
good part of this issue is devoted to those matters and, as a result many 
articles we were planning on running were bumped to the autumn issue. It would 
be nice if there was substantially less of this to report for our next issue.