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Now it's time for Off the Hook.
Off the Hook.
And a very good evening to everybody.
It's another edition of Off the Hook, a program about technology, hackers, high tech, Big
Brother, and the future.
And we've had a very exciting week.
We've been talking about the future of the Kevin Mitnick movie and various other things
that have been going on in the past, I guess, a couple of weeks on that front, past three
and a half years on the Kevin Mitnick front.
And the important news that we have is that, yes, our efforts have paid off and we do have
a copy of the script.
And that's what we're going to be talking about tonight on Off the Hook.
Stay tuned.
The horses are on the track.
And it has indeed been an eventful week for us here.
The script is right here, right here in our hands.
We've got Phil and Porkchop here with us this evening, evening gentlemen, perusing the takedown
script here.
Let's just go through a couple of things as far as what we have to look forward to.
You know, when I first heard about this thing, I said, you know, a film is a film.
People should be able to make whatever they want to make, but we should have some say
in it.
I don't believe this anymore.
I mean, I read this thing and it is so bad, it is so awful, it is so, I guess, what's
the best word for it, libelous, defamatory, inflammatory.
This is horrible.
This is as bad as it could possibly be.
And that's far worse than I thought it could be.
Let me tell you who's going to be portrayed in this film.
Kevin David Mitnick, of course, they use his full name, Tsutomu Shimomura.
Kevin Mitnick cast by Skeet Ulrich, Tsutomu Shimomura cast by Russell Wong.
Then we have Louis Depayne, who is a friend of Kevin's, who has also been indicted, but
he is not in prison.
That's a big difference there.
Described in the casting sheet as an early admirer of Kevin David Mitnick, cyberspace's
most wanted hacker, he holds him in reverential esteem, calling the computer crimes that landed
Mitnick in jail at 15 elegant.
Having hacked his way into Mitnick's sphere after Mitnick gets out on parole, he becomes
Mitnick's closest and only friend, not what you'd call a sentimentalist, smart, knowledgeable,
but also humble and admiring.
Then you have Julia Menapace.
Remember her?
She's the one that Tsutomu Shimomura stole from John Gilmore.
There's a whole big thing about that.
In her mid-twenties, thin, she's Shimomura's girlfriend, who also works with him at the
Computer Center at the University of California at San Diego.
Very bright, not overly demonstrative, she's quite upfront about her feelings toward Shimomura
and seeks to reassure him that her former relationship with a rival of his is over,
even though she's still living in his house.
Very knowledgeable, in fact, Shimomura's living in his house too.
That somehow is glossed over, that whole bit there.
Very knowledgeable about what Shimomura does, she becomes very concerned over Shimomura's
obsession with finding Mitnick and grows angry when he persists in the dangerous hunt.
What is so dangerous about flying to North Carolina to hunt down a hacker?
Well, actually, I can answer that based on the film.
I can answer it based on the film.
There is some physical danger involved, which has no bearing on real life.
Then we have the FBI special agent, LaVard Burns.
These are all real names too.
This FBI special agent, obviously considered a person of weight in the Bureau, is the superior
to Agents Carson and Ornelas, and is working on the Mitnick case.
Very cordial and polite to Shimomura, who, after all, has provided him with most of his
information.
He nevertheless makes it clear that this isn't about computer security anymore.
This is law enforcement, and he wants Shimomura to back off.
And that any breach of Bureau etiquette will send Mitnick flying to a high-powered lawyer.
Burns is unfailingly polite to the relentless Shimomura, but ultimately the day is his,
and he and his people are the ones to physically detain Mitnick.
Yeah, for over three and a half years.
Andrew, Shimomura's assistant at the University of California at San Diego's Computer Center.
He's in on the first investigations into the mysterious hacker, most likely FBI's most
wanted Mitnick, who's breached the high-tech security on Shimomura's computers.
Hard-working, very bright, and rather sarcastic.
They don't make him look like a dummy like Shimomura did in his book.
So I guess they talked to him, and he worked out a deal.
Carson, a female FBI agent, Carson is a very efficient woman.
Assigned to find Mitnick, she first approaches Shimomura, but doesn't get much help from
him, winding up frustrated when the elusive Mitnick always stays one step ahead of her
and her partner, Ornelius.
Ornelius or Ornelis?
Spelled two different ways.
Eventually, Carson and Ornelius retreat from FBI company policy, and following orders,
refuse to, retreat behind FBI company policy, and following orders, refuse to involve Shimomura
anymore in the trail as it winds down.
Ultimately, they're the ones who arrest Mitnick.
Then you got, now he's Ornelis again.
An FBI agent, Ornelis, is rumpled, has a lopsided grin, and is fighting a battle with
his waistline.
Yeah.
Assigned to find Mitnick, he first approaches Shimomura, but doesn't, but don't get much
help from, okay, from the, from him, I guess it's, keep in mind this has been Xeroxed about
45,000 times.
I'm not complaining, it's just kind of hard to read here.
The elusive Mitnick always stays one step ahead of him as well, and his partner Carson.
Eventually, Ornelis and Carson retreat behind FBI company policy once again, and following
orders, blah, blah, blah.
Okay.
Then we have a waitress, name of Karen.
This waitress at a university coffee shop in Seattle is knowledgeable, particularly
about Italian espresso.
That's witty.
No, that's, that's humor.
That's the kind of thing people pay money to see, that kind of humor, particularly about
Italian espresso.
Very nice.
Smart and intrigued by Mitnick, whom she waits on, they begin dating, but something's not
quite right about him for Karen, who keeps seeing him, but keeps her distance.
She brushes him off for good, however, when he tries to introduce her to scanning, listening
in on other people's phone calls, which she dismisses as kind of cool, but also kind of
creepy.
Oh, boy.
Then we get Jim Murphy, known affectionately as Murph, an operator at the high-tech Sprint
Switching Office.
He somewhat cautiously agrees to work with Shimomura and Andrew, even though they don't
have a search warrant as yet.
Very informative and knowledgeable.
Then we have Nevin Pazaski and Todd Young.
These are the Cellular One people.
These two high-tech fraud analysts based in a Seattle cell phone company work on a series
of cloned mobile phone calls netting upwards of $10,000.
Nevin Pazaski is in his early 30s, short brown hair, glasses.
His partner, Todd Young, described as a cyberspace bounty hunter, is also early 30s, humorless.
All business.
Yeah.
Then we have Pai Chin, technical consultant at The Well.
She's a young Asian-American woman who noticed some anomalies during a routine maintenance
check of the system.
Friendly and outgoing, she explains that she not only found email address to Shimomura,
which she read, but other inactive accounts loaded with information only a hacker could
have retrieved and placed.
Clearly the work of Mitnick.
John Gilmore, the big cheese at The Well.
He's about 50, and though the top is thinning, the ponytail is straight back.
Previously romantically involved with Julia, he never mentions her name when Shimomura
comes to San Francisco to track Mitnick, but he's overtly hostile and unhelpful to Shimomura.
Very much in charge.
He seems to resent the fact that, not sure if that's the right word I'm reading here,
that he will not consider any of Shimomura's suggestions, claiming his responsibilities
to his users as his reason.
In other words, he jeopardizes the whole investigation because he's got a grudge against Shimomura.
Yeah.
Okay.
Then we have Robert Hood, who works for Netcom and leads Shimomura through a maze of computer
workstations and the machine room.
He understands exactly the sort of anomalies Shimomura is looking for and eventually narrows
the field down to Raleigh-Durham.
Then we have a committee chairman of Congress.
This man heads the congressional hearing on the Electronic Communications Privacy Act
of 1994 and questions his star witness, Shimomura.
Then we have a kid who plays Kevin when he's 12 years old.
That's how the film opens, actually.
It opens with Kevin, 12 years old, playing pinball and cheating.
Yes, using foul language and cheating and holding a magnet up and getting all these
points and getting the number one score, just to sort of, you know, set you up with the
character of Mitnick.
Well, guys, you've had a chance to thumb through this.
I've got some more detailed analysis of this, but what's your first, Phil, what's your first
opinion of this kind of thing right here?
It sounds like a really bad 80s movie, like something that you'd have the Brat Pack in
or something with these types of characters.
But also, you know, it's making him out to be a supervillain, and he certainly isn't
a supervillain at all.
Most films, if you try to think back, like War Games or, you know, the movie Hackers
or whatever, has these benevolent kind people.
I mean, it'd be nice even if he was portrayed that way.
This film is going to make Hackers look like Gone with the Wind.
Yeah.
It's just unbelievable.
I don't even think Kevin Plate pinballed.
Well, I don't know about that.
I mean, that's something, they obviously did their research.
You know, here's the thing.
They didn't talk to anybody.
They didn't talk to any of these people.
How were they able to make a film with people's real names who have not been convicted of
a crime, you know, and say what the crime is?
They make up things.
I just don't understand how they can do this.
It doesn't even seem like it's based on the, you know, inaccurate takedown book as well.
I guess they took their, I guess, creative liberties and kind of...
They took the story.
They took the story from Takedown and they, I guess, elaborated on it.
They basically took the book and made a script out of it and did some, you know, some real
liberties as far as, you know, the truth goes.
Porkchop, your views?
Well, it's several times removed from reality.
You have reality, then you have the writers of the book, you have the book, and then you
have this script, and the script is too far removed from the reality to really have any
real true facts come out.
And this is what the public will believe, unfortunately, if this movie is made and made
the way it's portrayed in the script.
See, I would have no problem if the names were all different.
Then it would just be another bad film.
But the difference here is that they're using real people and making it seem as if this
is what really happened.
You know?
I mean, how would you feel if you woke up one day and you saw a film that showed you,
your name, your town, your street, and showed you doing all these horrible things?
You'd be kind of upset, wouldn't you?
And that's what we're facing here.
That's what...
Kevin Mitnick cannot defend himself in prison.
He's, you know, at a big disadvantage.
And I think they're taking advantage of that fact that he can't, you know, object to this
thing.
Although I will say, as of tomorrow, he will have a copy of this script.
And hey, if we broke the law by sending him a copy of a script about him, then come and
get us.
You know where we are.
This has gone on too far.
You push people enough, eventually something's going to snap.
And you know what?
Something snapped.
This is enough.
This is too much.
And things are going to happen now.
We're going to start some definite drives to keep this thing from moving forward.
I mean, this has got nothing to do with the creative process anymore.
This has to do with spreading lies and ruining people's lives.
And Miramax, Dimension Films, they are going to be made aware of this fact very, very clearly,
as will the rest of the media.
Let's have a couple more observations here.
We remember when the Front Page article came out July 4th, 1994.
Front Page, New York Times article about Kevin Mitnick being on the run, eluding the federal
authorities for over a year.
The kind of thing that really isn't good if you're on the run, because all of a sudden
everybody will be looking for you.
Well, they portray that article coming out in this film, they portray Kevin being upset
at it.
But not upset at the fact that the article is there and that his picture is on the Front
Page.
Upset because the article is below the fold.
Yeah, below the, you know, if you look at the New York Times, there's a top and there's
a bottom, you know, because it folds.
And he wanted to be on the top of page one, not the bottom of page one.
That's the kind of person they're turning him into.
Someone who is, just cares about his image.
He needs, he needs his friends like Louis Dupain, you know, who's a real friend of his,
to constantly tell him that he's the best, you know, you're the best there is.
And you know, one of the lines, Dupain just shakes his head in full awe.
That's who Mitnick is supposed to be.
Kevin likens his fate to a game of Pac-Man.
There's food.
You find it.
You eat it.
You stay alive.
Then there's a couple of ghosts chasing you.
They find you.
You die.
That's it.
Oh boy.
What kind of a person is this?
Also another weird part about this, apparently Kevin never heard of Shimomura until the Fed
started to use him to capture hackers.
You know, they just, he just all of a sudden heard about this person through a newspaper
article.
Never heard of him before.
And that's, of course, contrary to the way it was in real life, Shimomura was kind of
famous in the community.
A lot of people knew about him.
Didn't he do some questionable things as well, from what I recall?
Throughout the whole film, there's this sort of mood that Shimomura did something questionable
in his past for Los Alamos National Labs.
And they throw this whole twist into the film, which was not in the book and certainly
not in real life, that Shimomura had to get to Kevin's data before Kevin released it to
the world because it was something that Shimomura had to prevent from getting out.
So you have this other sense of urgency.
And in the end, if anybody is really looking forward to seeing this film, if it's ever
made and doesn't want the ending ruined, turn away now because we're going to ruin the ending
for you.
We're going to ruin the whole damn film for you because it deserves to be ruined.
In the end, what happens is Kevin is desperately trying to upload this secret data to the world
from the apartment complex in North Carolina as the feds are closing in on him.
Not only does he do that, he messes around with medical records, just for the fun of
it.
Yeah, the feds are across the street.
They're going to come.
They're going to capture me.
I'm going to mess around with somebody's hospital records.
That's the kind of person I am.
So as he's uploading the data, unbeknownst to him, he's really connected to Shimomura.
So he thinks he's uploading to like Netcom or something, but Shimomura is using an FDDI
concentrator to fool him into thinking he was connected to another system.
And Mitnick is defeated that way, and apparently Shimomura captures the data that he was trying
to keep from getting out there.
So yes, Shimomura was involved in something in the past, something he was ashamed of,
something that he never should have gotten involved in, but it's never said just what
that is.
Also, in the beginning of the film, this is crazy, Kevin hacks a radio contest to win
a television set for him and Louis DuPain, who are living together at that point.
He's in a department store and he just, he uses a cellular phone somehow to call in a
radio show and you hear his voice over all the speakers in the store.
And what's really amazing about this is that it's done so badly that he answers the phone.
The phone rings, he answers it and gives the winning phrase for the radio station.
And then they call him the lucky caller.
How can you be the lucky caller if they called you?
You're not the caller then.
That's the way this thing is written.
Then you have Shimomura up in front of Congress being what appears to be insulted by some
racist guy who insinuates that he's going to tell the Japanese all these secrets simply
because he's a Japanese American.
And of course that gives you sympathy towards Shimomura saying this poor guy has to battle
this kind of thing.
And on top of that, Mitnick is portrayed as a racist, anti-Japanese person who's always
talking about Pearl Harbor and Harbor things like that, refers to Shimomura as Jap boy.
Things that have no basis in reality and they just keep hammering you with this so you wind
up really hating Mitnick and really feeling sorry for Shimomura even though when you look
at his actions they're pretty far from honorable.
That's the problem I have with the film overall though.
There really isn't anybody that you like that much.
I think the guy from Sprint I like but he only had about three lines.
But everybody else, no there's nothing appealing about them.
Maybe they'll fix that.
Maybe they'll make it so that somebody has more character but the facts are still totally
wrong and horrible.
Shimomura doesn't become obsessed with Mitnick until Mitnick insults his girlfriend and that's
when things go too far.
That's when he has to really get involved.
And what's also weird is that they make it seem as if Mitnick hacks Shimomura's machine
and then all of a sudden everyone's looking for Mitnick.
They don't go into any of the detail as to why Mitnick was already on the run about the
probation violation, whether or not that really happened, just how minor this whole thing
is.
And I think that's interesting that they didn't do that because obviously there's no story
there.
There's no story in what happened to start this whole thing.
He had a minor probation violation which is questionable to say the least and he was also
accused of associating with certain people.
I mean how do you make somebody who's evil out of that?
It's so minor.
It's so incredibly minor so they had to make it as if he was doing something really bad
which again doesn't even come off as being really bad because all he did was log into
a computer system and insult somebody's girlfriend but that all of a sudden makes him into this
cyber monster.
At one point Shimomura says to Julia, I didn't mean to bring you into this.
I should never have brought you into this.
Again this is overdramatization.
There's nothing that was really brought into anything, it's just someone logged into your
computer system and copied some of your files and you learned a lesson about security but
it seems to go much further than that.
You guys find any interesting bits of dialogue there?
I found an interesting section about Mitnick being chased by a Rottweiler while running
away from the...
Yeah, the Rottweiler scene.
There's the two agents...
You know you can't use the word that he uses to describe the...
Yes I do.
You can use one of the words but you can't use the other word.
Mitnick is a foul-mouthed creature according to this film.
They're in a Kinko's and the two agents receive a fax.
Mitnick sees the fax from the California Department of Motor Vehicles to Special Agent Stanley
or Analysis or however you pronounce that.
Whatever that name is, yeah.
Mitnick grabs the fax, turns around only to find Carson and Analysis on the other side
of the counter.
I think that's addressed to me.
Mitnick smiles weakly and then with an athleticism we've never seen before, bolts out the back
door.
Ornalis and Carson in close pursuit.
They run out the parking lot, blah blah blah, they go through a couple of suburban homes
and he hops over a fence, drops to the ground and freezes.
What he sees, not more than 40 feet away, staring right at him, a big mean-looking Rottweiler
growling.
Your hearts are like in your mouth at this point.
Mitnick says, O S dash dash dash.
Abruptly the Rottweiler charges, Mitnick scampers back, the dog is fast, it almost is on top
of him when snap, the dog runs out of line, yelps in pain, straining against his collar.
It's inches away from Mitnick and Mitnick says, that's right, that's right, U F dash
dash dashing Nazi.
He called the dog a Nazi.
Dog begins to bark loud, skipping a couple lines, they go through a couple more places
and later you see the Rottweiler charging, ragged, the torn leash dangling behind.
He broke the leash.
He broke the leash and continued to chase Mitnick.
Mitnick is almost over some fence, I think again, when the dog jumps high, comma, unbelievably
high.
This script is written, I don't know.
This script was written in a night, I think.
It was written by a machine or something.
I'm not quite sure how they got away with this.
It gets far worse.
I'm saving the best for last or the worst for last or whatever.
There's a section where Mitnick cards plane tickets.
Now keep in mind, this is somebody who has never been accused of stealing a penny, but
in the film he cards plane tickets for Louis Dupain to follow Shima Mora to his presentation
so that he could heckle him.
This is what hackers do.
They buy plane tickets for each other so they can go and heckle their victims.
An audience member is asking Shima Mora, what did they get from his computer system when
it was hacked?
Shima Mora says, that's confidential.
Louis Dupain pipes up, not anymore.
Of course, the audience laughs.
Shima Mora gets all upset because he realizes that there are Mitnick sympathizers in the
crowd.
Then he says to the voice, where's Mitnick right now?
Louis Dupain says, that's confidential.
Shima Mora retorts, not for long.
Now they also say, and this is great, this is just amazing, Shima Mora, in order to figure
out Mitnick's trick, sorted ones and zeros by hand.
Sorted ones and zeros by hand.
I want to see how they portray that and just what it is they're trying to...
It's like an elaborate card trick or something.
This is one devoted person here.
It must be some Japanese trick or something.
The federal agents, they're made to look so helpless and endearing.
This one agent has their lights and gas turned off and they're trying to make a cup of tea.
You feel so sorry for them because they go to the water and they pour water.
They try to turn on the tap, nothing comes out.
They go to the refrigerator and they get bottled water and they put that in the cup and then
they put it on the oven and then your heart breaks when they turn on the oven and it doesn't
go on.
And the cup of tea just never materializes.
They have to order out or something.
Mitnick is cackling in the background someplace as he just turned off their water and gas.
The phones are out, you can't order out.
He turns off the phones, everything.
So they might have to walk down somewhere and get something to eat.
Despite the fact that this never happened in the first place, there's that to consider.
More Shimomura ego boosting with this little bit of dialogue in exchange with an investigator.
And how do you come to have access to classified material, Shimomura says, I wrote it.
This is one hero that we're building up here.
Okay, and you ready for this?
Kevin Mitnick whistles touch tones to avoid depositing money in pay phones.
Whistles touch tones.
Touch tones.
Just so people are aware of where the touch tone is, listen, listen to this, all right?
Okay, there's a dial tone.
That's a touch tone.
How many people do you know who can whistle that, you know?
It's going to be kind of difficult because they're two different tones, you know?
It's sort of impossible, but this part I kind of want in the film, I want to see how they
do that.
Mitnick whistles touch tones to avoid depositing money in pay phones.
They're implying that he uses a red box, I guess, which he doesn't ever do anyway,
but regardless, they're going to do that in the film.
I'd like to see that red box confiscated.
Well, it's not a red box because he does it with his mouth.
It's a voice box.
Yeah.
In fact, the last line of the film, I can give away the last line.
In the film, Shimomura comes to visit him in prison.
First of all, he's already sentenced.
They somehow jump ahead into the future, and they have this guy, Judge Dixon, finding
Kevin guilty of felony theft of intellectual and real property in violation of section
six of the penal code, as well as violation of the terms of his previous parole.
The two sentences which aren't defined are to run consecutively, and I doubt very much
it would be anything near three years, three and a half years, whatever it will be by the
time he gets out or by the time he even goes to trial.
They try to totally change Shimomura's image at the end as somebody who's trying to be
friendly to Mitnick.
Now, if you recall, when the two met for the first time in North Carolina, Shimomura was
completely hostile to Mitnick.
Mitnick went up to him and said, I respect your skills, and I think all he got out of
Shimomura was just a casual nod or something like that, but that was it, and that's it
in real life.
In the film, in the courtroom, quote, Shimomura tries and fails to catch Mitnick's eye.
Shimomura visits Kevin in prison and says he's sorry it had to be like this, and as
for breaking into Shimomura's system, he says to Kevin, good work.
I mean, if I were Shimomura, I'd be upset at this, but I guess the check you got from
these people probably makes up for that.
So as we told you before, the FDDI concentrator was what defeated Mitnick and made him upload
the secret file to Shimomura.
Shimomura says to him, your technique, my implementation, and that's when Mitnick says,
I admire your skills.
And as Mitnick is taken away, he says to Shimomura, I'll be seeing you.
All I need is a dime and a phone.
Sometimes, if I'm lucky, I don't even need the dime.
And that's how the film ends, that kind of weirdness right there.
In Kevin Mitnick's apartment, the modem sound is deafening.
Well, of course, we all, all of us who use modems know that there's a constant shriek
of modem noise that we can't ever seem to turn off that follows around everywhere.
For those of you interested in getting involved in computers, don't, because you'll lose your
hearing because of all that modem noise that always is there.
Yeah.
If someone out there, by the way, can figure out how to turn off the modem, you know, the
modem noise, all of us in the hacker world would just love to know how to do that.
I can't get that ATN S3, I think it is, out of my edit stream.
What else do we have here?
People listening to the sound of touch tone dialing over the cellular scanner, which of
course, if you ever listen to a cellular phone call on a scanner, you don't hear the touch
tone dialing.
That doesn't make any sense, but that's just the kind of stuff you'd expect to see in a
film.
Also, hokey dialogue, like, you know, people in airplanes talking to each other or having
relationship problems, you know, and the phone starts to cut out, I'm losing you, we're breaking
up.
Things like that that really will bring tears to your eyes, but not for the reasons they
wanted.
No detail is given on how Shimomura stole Julia away from John Gilmore, but John Gilmore
is portrayed as bitter, potentially dangerous, and he jeopardizes the investigation to settle
the score, refusing to help out and track down the hacker.
The people at the well, the well management, are portrayed as idiotic deadheads who protect
unauthorized users.
At one point they say, we can't erase the sensitive data that the intruder uploaded
because that would be a violation of our agreement with the users, where we protect their words.
I doubt any such conversation ever happened, because obviously an intruder is not a user
and they can do whatever they need to do to get rid of what he put up there.
So that's just insanity.
I think the people at the well would be very upset at that, too.
I think deadheads would be upset at that, and I think Electronic Frontier Foundation,
they'd be upset, too, even though they haven't really said anything about this.
Electronic Frontier Foundation, actually they call it Electronic Freedom Foundation, I don't
know what that means, but people in that organization were helping to capture Mitnick, according
to this film, and that's really not the kind of image I think they'd want to have.
Meanwhile the feds are constantly worried about Kevin Mitnick outmaneuvering them in
court.
They are seen as the victims, not only having their power and water and gas turned off,
but basically Kevin will outmaneuver them in court.
They say at one point, he won't be on trial, we will.
Thing is, he's not on trial, he's never been on trial, and they're trying to keep him from
being on trial for as long as possible, and I think it's about time that they indeed were
put on trial for this.
Let's see, it just goes on forever, I mean there's all this idiocy in here, and it really
makes you mad reading the script.
At one point Shimomura says that, you know, we have to move faster, he could be going
into medical records, he could be killing people, and we're just standing here.
Okay, and I said I'd save the best part for last, so that's what I'm going to do, here's
the best part, and our phone number is 212-209-2900 in case people have some points they want
to raise, questions they want to ask, because we have the whole thing right here in front
of us.
This is the sound of garbage hitting the table, it's right here, so if you have any questions
about it, we'll be happy to answer it, and we have to talk about what we're going to
do about this too, and how we're going to stop this thing.
Here's the best part, Kevin Mitnick, now keep in mind that in real life Mitnick and Shimomura
have met once in a courtroom, and Mitnick said one line to Shimomura and Shimomura
nodded to him.
That is it, that's all that has happened.
In the film, Mitnick clubs Shimomura on the head with the top of a metal garbage can in
Seattle.
Here's a quote, Shimomura, dazed, blood flowing freely from a gash above his ear, raises himself
to his elbows and watches Mitnick disappear into the night, unquote.
Shimomura winds up having to get nine stitches and a neck brace.
What kind of image do you think that might give of Kevin Mitnick and of Shimomura?
Totally, totally fictitious, a lie, a real miscarriage of truth and justice, and I don't
know guys, what do you think we should do about this?
Well that's one of the good things is people can do something about this, and after listening
to all this I'm sure there's a lot of people at home who are very upset, and some of the
things they can do are all contained on Kevin Mitnick's site, www.kevinmitnick.com, and
they can go there and read the history, the true history, or we like to think the true
history, based on a non-biased point of view.
A lot of court documents, which certainly that's about as real as you can get.
Yeah, those exact transcripts.
His defense fund they can contribute to, they can write to their senator, they can write
to their congressman, they can contact news agencies, and they can get on the mailing
list, which has a lot of activity right now, and see and hear the latest on what's going
on with Kevin.
We've had a fundraising effort from 2600 with the free Kevin bumper stickers, and I'm happy
to say that since that came out about three weeks ago we've raised $750 for them, and
that also means that we've given out $750 bumper stickers to those people that pledged
for that.
They've been turning up all over.
Yeah, they have been, and you know, it's really amazing.
I was driving yesterday out on the island, and somebody beeped at me, and they asked
me, you know, is that sticker on the back, is that Kevin Mitnick?
They knew who it was, and of course they wanted a sticker, and they're popping up everywhere.
There was an incident at SummerCon a couple weeks ago in Atlanta where somebody, it wasn't
me because I found out about this only last week, but somebody who was at SummerCon had
stuck a sticker up near the CNN Center, and they stuck it there, and what they wanted
to do is they wanted to walk around the block or walk around the mall and come back and
take a picture of it sort of nonchalantly like they had nothing to do with it, and in
the time it took them to walk around with the camera this little kid with his mother
was there, and the little kid was trying to peel the sticker off, and the guy was like,
what are you doing?
Don't peel that off.
I want to take a picture of it.
He's like, well, I want, you know, the sticker because I know who Kevin Mitnick is.
He's a little kid, and it could have been more than like eight or nine, and somehow
he knows who Kevin Mitnick is, and he knows that Free Kevin is all about that, so yeah,
it's working.
It's getting out there, and people are being affected by this, and if you want to help,
the best way to help is to spread the word.
Get some of the stickers.
If you're on the web, grab the image from the KevinMitnick.com site, which also has
the link to that site, and put it on your web page, convince your friends, convince
your coworkers or whoever to put the sticker up on their page as well, and by all means
get the real ones too.
Help Kevin out with his defense fund.
As far as the film, okay, we've got a lot of work ahead of us this summer.
This thing is set to begin filming in about a month in Raleigh, North Carolina.
I'm sure it'll be filming in California as well and who knows where else.
We're going to need all kinds of people to help out as far as getting the word out to
people at Miramax.
It's being made by Dimension Films and Miramax, and they need to be made aware that this film
is a travesty, and it will hurt a lot of people in very bad ways if it's made because they
are defaming all these individuals for no apparent reason.
I really never, I mean, even like John Gotti films, you know, they didn't seem to portray
them in that bad a light compared to this, and those are people who have already been
convicted and are infamous.
This is relatively minor compared to that kind of a thing, yet they're being completely,
their character is being completely destroyed.
How can anybody honestly say that Kevin Mitnick will get a fair trial after this film comes
out?
It's impossible.
It won't happen, and even if he does get a fair trial, people are not going to remember
who Kevin Mitnick is.
They're not going to remember who the guy in this film is, and they're going to assume
that's who the same person is.
So we have a lot of work to do.
We have to get down to North Carolina.
We have to get out to California.
We have to contact the people involved in making this film, including the actors, and
I think that's a very important thing to do.
If I was an actor and I was portraying somebody, I'd want to know that the portrayal of the
person I'm playing is completely wrong and completely harmful to justice and to truth.
That's the kind of thing that I think some actors at least care about, and directors
should want to make a film that's accurate.
I mean, these are real names.
We're not talking about fiction here.
We're talking about something that is based on reality.
It's a simple concept.
If you're making a film based on reality, then it should be based on reality, not just
the names, not just who wound up in prison and who wound up with a book contract, but
you want to get the characterization right, and also there has to be some mention, some
showing of what the consequences of all this were.
The fact that somebody has been in prison now for three and a half years, the fact that
this person is not allowed a bail hearing, not allowed visitors, a lot of people don't
know this.
If he's in the Metropolitan Detention Center, which is a pre-trial place to be held, he's
not allowed visitors.
It doesn't matter that he's been in pre-trial conditions for three and a half years.
He's in a place where you're not supposed to be held more than a year, and he's been
there for three and a half.
These are all things that need to be brought up in a big way.
Also, he can't even take a look at the evidence against him.
What, 9.75 gigs?
Yeah.
I'm trying to figure it out on paper later, or maybe even a computer or whatever.
If he were to try to read 9.75 gigs worth of information from now until a set trial
date, he'd have to read thousands of pages per second, or whatever it is.
The trial date has now been set for January of 1999, so we're talking about four years
in prison before he even goes to trial.
It's sick.
It really is.
You have to draw a line someplace, and we've already drawn the line with the whole trial
nonsense and being held in prison, but this film is just…we're drawing a lot more lines
now.
It's insane.
How much can you take?
While I'm happy we were able to get a copy of this script to Kevin, I'm afraid of what
he's going to do when he sees this, because this is like your worst nightmare coming true.
It really is.
But it might be enough to wake people up and get a lot of us motivated to actually do something
similar to what happened with Bernie S. when he got the crap beaten out of him in prison.
That got people mad.
Maybe this will get people mad, too.
Maybe we can show that we can do something constructive here and affect this project
in a positive way.
All right.
Let's take some phone calls.
You're listening to Off the Hook.
Emmanuel Goldstein here with webmaster Phil and Real Audio Czar Porkchop.
I assume we're going on Real Audio tonight.
Yes, we are.
Even though you're here, not monitoring the situation.
There are several servers still active, and we should have capacity for a couple hundred
people.
Okay.
And it's especially important in these days as the events we're talking about take on
bigger and bigger dimensions.
This is going to really be a breathtaking summer, I think.
We'll be moving really fast, doing a lot of different things.
Every week is going to be something major until this whole thing happens one way or
another.
All right.
Let's take some phone calls.
Good evening.
You're on Off the Hook.
Hi.
Gee, I'm surprised I didn't hear that guy who always calls, who's always the first caller.
Yeah.
Well, sometimes there is a God, you know?
Yeah.
That film.
Do you know who the actors are or anything?
You pretty much have the script.
Two actors have been cast so far.
Skeet Ulrich is going to be playing Kevin Mitnick, and Russell Wong is going to be playing
Satomo Shimomura.
Who are these people?
Well, Skeet Ulrich was in, what film was he in?
He was in As Good As It Gets, I believe.
Okay.
And Russell Wong was in The Joy Luck Club.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
I mean, they're not major, major actors.
Yeah.
I don't know who else.
Probably Penn Jillette's going to be in this thing, too.
He always winds up in everything.
Oh, my goodness.
Well, if he's in it, then that should be an ally right there, shouldn't it?
I don't know.
I don't know.
It's hard to say.
When money is involved, when Hollywood is involved, people do weird things.
This is true.
So we might have to approach this from a different angle.
Well, thank you for sharing about it.
Thanks for being interested.
What part of the country are you in?
I'm in New York.
New York, of course.
Brooklyn.
That's a good part to be in.
Well, actually, I was thinking, everyone else in the country must be listening to this show,
because I can't access a thing online.
I can't get on the net at all.
Oh, really?
Well, it's not our fault, is it?
It could be.
Are you trying to connect, and you're not able to connect?
No, I can't get any websites or anything.
Okay.
So hopefully it's just you and not us.
Bye.
We'll keep our fingers crossed.
Thanks for calling.
Let's take some more phone calls.
212-209-2900.
Good evening.
You're on off the hook.
Hi, Manuel.
Hi.
How are you doing?
Make it quick.
All right.
Well, I just wanted to mention, you know, you're talking about the film companies.
I make a lot of deliveries to film companies, like Miramax and all of them.
Well, Miramax is the film company we're talking about.
So, okay.
I wonder if I can maybe, you know, get to the person who's, you know, involved in this,
and maybe I can help out.
I don't know.
Well, if you showed up at their office door, I think that would definitely carry a message.
I'm not quite sure what the message would be, but you might actually be serving a very useful purpose here.
You have to think about this.
How can they make a film?
They didn't ask Kevin, like you said, they didn't ask Kevin Mendix permission.
Right.
And how could they make a film using the real names and everything?
Isn't that like copyright infringement?
Well, what I imagine they're going to fall back on is that it's been in the news,
and these names are a public domain and they can be used because stories have been written about them.
But, you know, the whole thing is so self-serving because you have John Markoff,
New York Times reporter, who wrote the front page article in the Times
and then sold the rights to the book and made all this money at it,
and now the film is being made based on the book,
which is able to be made because there was a newspaper story written about it in the first place.
And, you know, interestingly enough, John Markoff's name is mentioned, I think, once in the whole film.
They don't mention the fact that he was there at the time of Kevin's arrest,
that he helped track him down, this being a reporter who's supposed to, you know,
not help law enforcement people out, you know, tracking down wanted fugitives.
And they leave out the fact that he made all this money doing this
and that Kevin has not made a dime and never will.
So, yeah, that's just one other element to this.
I notice at the end of movies there's a thing that says,
the characters portrayed in this motion picture are fictitious or something like that.
I guess that is, I mean, I don't know what that means.
I think they're going to say in this case that it's based on reality, you know,
but some events were made up for the sake of drama.
But this is not acceptable because this is a case that is still going on.
And to portray somebody as violent, who has never been violent in his life, you know,
it's just so wrong, you know.
I can't say it any other way. I'm at a loss for words.
Well, I'm back from California.
Okay, well, that just caps my week.
I also wanted to mention there's lots of New York City CoCOT phones.
Okay, well, you're going to have to talk about the CoCOTs next time
because we have to talk about this film this time.
Let's go to another phone call. Good evening, you're on the air.
Thank you. I've been trying to get this thing through for a couple of weeks.
I think the last thing you want to do is stop the film.
Well, you know, I would agree with you a week ago, but having read the script...
I hear you.
Having read the script, this film cannot be made in this state
because if it's made in this state, it's just so defamatory, so insulting,
so harmful to everybody that's involved.
I mean, yeah, make the film like this with fictitious characters if you want.
It'll just be a bad film.
No, but I know what you're saying also about the public domain,
but I think what has to be done very quickly is that you copyright a treatment,
like a one-paragraph treatment, that you copyright it,
and then you have to be prepared to proceed from there.
The names are public domain, too, but I don't...
I mean, I'm fascinated enough with it to try to find you the right person to work with
because I know... I mean, don't you just have this sense that this cannot be done legally
without his permission?
But I think it's important to do something that is your best vehicle for getting the story out.
But if you could speak with Miramax on the grounds that he won't...
Kevin won't sue you if you allow him to have the final say or director's cut,
something to the effect of that.
I'd have to explore the terminology more,
but the idea would be that he'd like to work with you
and that he won't sue or press charges for personal libel or slander or whatever.
Well, I'm sure he'd like to work with him,
but he's been given terms, offers by the federal government
that he can look at the evidence as long as he never talks about his case,
and that, I think, would be a violation of this.
He's kind of in a very bad place right now
where he's not in a position to really help anybody with their projects.
He'll have to just give power of attorney to someone who knows the scope of it the best.
But I'd like to somehow investigate a little bit more on this myself
because I'm just convinced that it can't go like it is, of course,
but that I think it's your best vehicle for getting this out worldwide.
I agree with that because there will be a lot of publicity,
and if we are there demonstrating against this kind of thing
and getting the same amount of publicity for the Free Kevin campaign,
then we have accomplished something.
But it has to be lasting.
It can't be something that's just there when they're shooting the film
and then the film comes out and everybody believes it.
It has to be something that lasts.
What we want is to have the truth represented in the film.
What has happened to Kevin and what is happening right now
and people trying to get him released and how long this nightmare has been going on,
he's not this happy-go-lucky guy going around whistling touchtones in prison
making free phone calls.
That's not true.
No, of course not.
He's suffering in there every day.
He's been suffering for over three and a half years,
actually almost three and a half years.
And the two lead actors, I think the best way to approach it
is to get their reps, their agents,
and make sure they understand what's really going on with this person that's in prison.
The lead actors might have no clue about the whole thing.
Probably they don't.
And I really believe that because there's a couple of guys from the Rat Pack
when I was doing scenic art in Los Angeles,
Andrew McCarthy and Rob Lowe Jr.,
those guys, they're just so into their Beverly Hills and their acting careers
that they don't really keep up with the current events,
but I found them to be real people.
Once you could speak with them about the real portrayal of less than zero,
less than zero was the film I was talking about,
they changed their whole attitude and decided to show
they did not want to promote drug use in the film.
And the way that it had been written earlier,
they didn't really care so much,
and it really changed because they got interested.
You can change the message of a film.
I mean, Hasidic community in Brooklyn did that to a film that was being made there
that portrayed their community in what they saw as inaccurate and insulting light.
They got it to change,
but I don't see why we should be any different when something like this is coming out,
why we shouldn't move forward and get it to change.
Right. I agree.
Thanks very much for calling.
I'll see if I can help somehow.
Okay, take care.
Yes, everybody will be able to help.
We'll give out a couple of e-mail addresses and phone numbers and things like that,
and we can start organizing and getting together
and figuring out just what we're going to do next.
We'll do that in about a minute or so, a couple of minutes.
Good evening. You're on Off the Hook.
Hey, can I have some of what that last caller was smoking?
I don't know. What would that be?
I don't know, but it seemed like it was pretty potent stuff.
If she thought that movie in its present state
or anywhere near its present state would be anywhere close to be good.
Yeah. Well, what would you recommend doing?
Well, first of all, how can they keep, what's the guy, Jackoff, the reporter?
What's his name?
You know, it's funny you should call him that,
because that is what he's referred to in the film by Markoff.
Not by Markoff, by Mitnick.
Oh.
Yeah, that's the one mention he gets, actually.
But he was a major player in the whole story.
A very major player.
He wrote the story, and he played out the story,
and he helped capture Kevin,
and none of that is focused on at all.
And for a very good reason, too,
because if you focused on that, people would say,
hey, wait a minute, why is this film being made
when the whole thing has been contrived by people who profited from it?
Yeah, he was almost like a puppeteer.
Yeah, very much so.
Yeah, very much so.
I mean, you know, a writer for the New York Times
really should not be doing things like that.
And then making this whole profit off the book.
Uh-huh.
Seems to be a trend.
And the screenplay, and God knows what else,
the action figures that are going to come out of this film.
Wait, so he's in on the screenplay, too?
Well, I mean, he wrote the book with Shimomura,
and obviously sold the rights to the screenplay,
so they made a tidy sum from that, I'm sure.
Who wrote the screenplay?
Who wrote the screenplay, what's his name?
Howard Rodman.
Howard Rodman.
Any dirt on him?
Well, not yet, but we just got this thing.
His last name's a little suspicious, if you ask me.
Well, we'll have to look into it.
We'll have to look into it,
and this is one person that will be contacted,
and we will attempt to talk reason.
All right, keep up the good work, guys.
Thanks very much for calling,
and we'll be in touch with everybody who's interested in helping out.
Let's see if we can squeeze in one more phone call.
Good evening, you're on the air.
Oh, great, I'm the last phone call.
Quick question on another subject.
Make it quick.
They had a picture of you in the New York Times?
That may very well be.
You didn't see it?
I think I might have.
It was a scary-looking one, right?
Yeah, that's what I was going to say.
It was so unflattering,
and you had a t-shirt on that said Satan or something like that?
Well, yeah, you know, people wear shirts that say different things on them,
and fortunately this is one of the ones that could be photographed.
Oh, my goodness.
I don't think it was that bad-looking, though.
Well, no, it wasn't that you were bad-looking,
but it was just that the whole context made you look kind of demonish.
Well, they wanted me to be demonish.
They wanted me to scare people.
Oh, well, why didn't you not wear that shirt?
Well, I wanted to make them happy.
I wanted to make them happy and scare people.
You know, it sells papers.
The same paper, by the way, the New York Times.
Maybe I shouldn't have listened.
I don't know.
Yeah, okay.
Well, I just needed to verify that.
Okay, but don't worry.
We won't hurt anybody.
Okay.
All right.
Yes, what a nice note to end on.
Okay, well, now, if people want to get involved with the Mitnick campaign,
they can email us here at OffTheHook, oth at 2600.com.
You can also join the Kevin Mitnick mailing list,
which is where we're discussing what we're going to be doing next.
Obviously, you need Internet access for these things,
but if you don't have it, we'll give you other ways to get involved.
To join the Mitnick mailing list, first of all,
you can just go to the www.2600.com site,
look in the Mitnick section there,
which is about to be linked over to the KevinMitnick.com site,
and you can get it all there as well.
But if you just want to subscribe now,
send email to Majordomo, M-A-J-O-R-D-O-M-O, at 2600.com,
and on the first line of the message, simply type,
Subscribe Mitnick, M-I-T-N-I-C-K,
and put that in, not in the title, in the first line of the message,
and that will subscribe you to the mailing list,
and instructions on how to post will follow.
If you simply want to call us and get involved that way,
516-751-2600, extension 0,
is the best way to leave us a message
with whatever it is you feel you can do to help.
And if you don't have a phone, don't have a computer,
and just want to write to us,
write to us at 2600-PO-BOX-752,
Middle Island, New York, 11953.
We're at the beginning of a very interesting campaign,
and it's going to take us to some very weird places.
So the best way to keep abreast of the situation
is to stay tuned to this radio show,
Off the Hook, every Tuesday night at 8 p.m.
Phil Porkchop, thanks so much for coming in,
and I guess we'll be hearing from you in weeks to come.
Yes, indeed.
All right, and we'll keep you updated
as to the progress or regression of this film.
Until then, this is Emanuel Goldstein for Off the Hook.
Have a good night.
The telephone keeps ringing
So I ripped it off the wall
I cut myself while shaving
Now I can't make a call
It couldn't get much worse
But if they could, they would
For Billy Bond, for the best, expect the worst
I hope that's understood
For Billy Bond