Enough is Enough (Spring, 1997) ------------------------------- The question we're asked most often is whether or not we're making any progress in the fight against ignorance and fear. And it's the question that we can never answer the same way twice. There are days when we really seem to be getting somewhere and then there are times when we wonder if we're actually moving backwards. Looking at the Kevin Mitnick case makes the question really hard to answer. We've managed to reach a whole lot of people and we know that our concerns are shared all over the world. But, as in the early days of the Bernie S. nightmare, mere concern doesn't really amount to much. In the end, only true outrage gets results and, even for us, that can take a while. It's now been over two years since Mitnick was caught in North Carolina. At the time we asked for a summation of his "crimes" so we would know just what this was really all about. A lot has happened since those early days. At least four books have been written about the Mitnick chase and capture and all of their authors have cashed their checks and moved on to other projects. But our initial question has yet to be answered since Mitnick still hasn't gone to trial. How can this be allowed to happen? The sad truth is that once you're a prisoner, anything can happen to you and not many in the American public will care. The media will latch onto whatever they're fed and more often than not will simply take the word of authority figures without question. Examples? In March the government began its appeal to the Supreme Court of last year's striking down of the Communications Decency Act. Most of us know that the CDA is blatantly unconstitutional and would stifle free speech on the Net. But the media, who should value the concept of free speech, defines this battle as "the fight against pornography on the Net." Ratings over content once again. And we all suffer because of it. The same blindness to the facts and unwillingness to do some real investigative work led to the more recent belief that Dutch hackers had gotten into military computer systems during the Gulf War and had offered secret information to Saddam Hussein, information that could have won the war for Iraq. There was no evidence. There were no facts. Just a crackpot with an authoritative air and the media's desire to get another sensationalist story. Done enough times, this kind of garbage eventually turns into reality and the inevitable reaction against the "crisis" is accepted as necessary. We all know this yet somehow it continues time and again. If ever there has been a human victim of this constant disregard for the truth, that victim is Kevin Mitnick. While we've been reading the books about him and getting on with our lives, Mitnick's life has been frozen since February, 1995 much longer if you consider the time he spent living the life of a fugitive trying to avoid his current fate. It seems clear that Mitnick knew how the authorities would treat him, which is why he went on the run. After all, these are the same authorities who put him in solitary confinement for eight months in 1989! That torture came from the authorities' fear of Mitnick's phone abilities. After this kind of abuse, anyone who would simply turn themselves in after being declared a fugitive would have to be crazy. As for what he did to make them want to imprison him for so long, all we know is that it didn't involve theft, personal profit, or damage to any computer system. Everyone seems to agree on this. Whatever it is they finally do come up with, we doubt it can justify locking someone away for as long as they already have, let alone for as long as they seem to want to. Recently Mitnick was again thrown into solitary confinement for reasons that are still somewhat unclear. Wired Magazine said it was because he had too many cans of tuna in his cell and proceeded to make light of the whole thing, choosing to ignore the permanent trauma of Mitnick's 1989 experience in solitary. This absurdity was most definitely not the reason. Mitnick was considered a "threat" to the institution because prison authorities somehow reached the conclusion that he was going to modify a walkman, turn it into an FM transmitter, and then proceed to bug the prison offices. (Nobody can explain how Mitnick was supposed to gain access to these offices being a prisoner and all.) These facts come from the administrative detention order, prison guards, and legal people who were privy to the facts of the case. We realize pursuing these facts was too difficult a task for the media people whose real concerns are ratings points and newsstand sales. Many of Mitnick's legal papers were taken from his cell during his time in solitary and never returned. Issues of 2600 and Phrack as well as mail forwarded to Mitnick from his Internet mail account simply disappeared. Much of this material had information pertaining to other cases that Mitnick was hoping to use in his defense. Other returned items appear to have been read. Prosecutor David Schindler has taken it upon himself to keep Mitnick in prison for as long as possible. Schindler wants Mitnick to sign a plea agreement that would keep him imprisoned for 32 months before he s even charged with anything in California. Not exactly a good deal in our opinion. Schindler has said that if Mitnick refuses to go along with this, he will drag him across the country to face charges in other jurisdictions. That's the beauty of being charged with crimes over the Internet and the phone system; you can be indicted in places you ve never even been to! In doing this, Schindler and the government basically get to keep rolling the dice until they find a judge someplace who will sentence Mitnick for however long they want. This kind of tactic is often used on the most dangerous of criminals to ensure that they wind up in prison somehow. To see it used here is frightening and a dangerous affront to the intent of our justice system. When this story first broke two years ago, there were some people who thought Mitnick was a criminal of some sort and that he should be punished for whatever it was he did even though nobody really knew what that was for sure. Now, even those people seem to think that this has gone on long enough. Even if Mitnick had committed some very real and recognizable crimes, the time he's spent suffering in prison is more than sufficient punishment. But Mitnick has never even been charged with any recognizable crime and we doubt that he ever will be. If and when this case ever gets to court, we re sure Schindler and his cronies will try to make it seem as if Mitnick stole millions of dollars by copying files and making a few phone calls. And the media, by not probing and asking questions, will swallow the whole thing once more and the American public will somehow believe that justice was served. It doesn't have to be this way. Those of us who understand the technology involved in this case are able to see when the truth is not being told or when people are being misled. We can't let this go unanswered any longer. Education is the key to stopping this injustice and many of us have the ability to make a real difference. But do we have the guts to turn that ability into action? We're working on many different approaches. We've started a mailing list that exists for the sole purpose of discussing the Mitnick case and what we can do to help. At the Beyond Hope conference in August (by which time we really hope Mitnick is free) we will be having panels on this case and how to use the power we have to make changes. We welcome skeptics as always. In the meantime, we ask that you not forget about Mitnick and the many others who are imprisoned unjustly for actions that are hard to consider crimes. We wish we had the staff and resources to adequately pursue all of them. By focusing on this case, we hope to be able to spread whatever change we make to these and future cases.