Return to Main Index© 1999 CrackZ. 4th October 1999.
I've read a lot of documents recently regarding the legal position of reverse engineering. As you might expect all of these commercially orientated documents condemn reversers outright, some descriptions being less flattering than others. Like most of societies well intentioned campaigns the protectionists have yet again vilified the wrong people, I list you now some of the most commonly quoted propaganda.
"Crackers are not super-geniuses .. they are simple programmers who have learned some techniques to counteract common protection schemes".....
This is always the first defence retort, by somehow suggesting that the reverser is inferior to the programmer of the software many protectionists seek to stop those who quest for knowledge from distributing it. Amongst reversers I think you'll find some of the best programming knowledge out there.
"Software pirates, students which think it's cool to offer "Warez" and "Crackz" and other strange kinda persons especially love the free services offered by sites like GeoCities, Xoom, Tripod and others to offer their stuff".
After the belittle comes the stereotype, all reversers are either social misfits, wierd or just lazy students with too much time on their hands, in fact the vast majority of reversers are competent professional programmers and the vast majority of pirates/crack users are corporate blue/white collar employees. I personally would love to shut all of the type of sites you are referring to, I loathe them, but we all know that will never happen.
"Unlike what politicians are trying to suggest to the public, it's in most cases quite easy to track down who is posting cracks, serial numbers or even full licensed copies of your software in newsgroups like alt.cracks.* and others."
No arguments at all with this one, these mindless peddlers (some of whom make vast amounts of money) are to be despised, they have little interest in software, little intelligence to crack it themselves and would be very easy to blitz completely were there actually the will. I don't post any cracks/serials/warez to my page because it is i) a waste of space and ii) incredibly easy to find out who I am. It sometimes amazes me that the big organisations haven't set up 'sting' operations to track people, a simple piece of CGI/JavaScript would uncover 80% of them.
"You could be liable for anything that you do that contributes to the infringement of copyrighted works. This includes facilitating a download by linking to remote files."
A stupid and worthless point, I could quite easily now go to virtually any site on the web which has a link somewhere to a site containing copyright infringements, and I don't limit this to warez, if you wan't to enforce this to the letter of the law then look no further than all unofficial music sites which should instantly be closed, (strange how the likes of Sony isn't clamouring for this).
"A disclaimer cannot shift your liability to someone else. You are still contributing to copyright infringement."
Another for the unenforcable in-tray. Just how far exactly does my legal liability extend for other people?, can I somehow stop them downloading warez? or cracking software if they really want to, I think not. I also believe that my site is very anti-crack use anyhow and in no way encourages anyone to break the law unlike many other sites. At the end of the day I use a disclaimer to draw attention to my position, there is absolutely nothing I can physically do to prevent anyone from cracking a piece of software.
"Free speech refers to your right to provide opinions and original content without censure. Even so, free speech has limits. You cannot use this right to break the law. Internet sites that provide access to others' copyrighted materials - whether it's on the same site or a remote site - violate the author's right to control distribution of their works, which is against the law."
I don't violate this in anyway. Educating someone on ASM protections does not contribute to them breaking the law, there are literally millions of other sites on the web (need I mention the anarchic, porn & racist sites) that give out far more disturbing messages & dangerous information ..... I am perfectly entitled to provide information in the same way a gun store owner can provide sales information on an Uzi 9mm, at the end of it all a crime will only be committed if the individual decides to do so.
"Legal software comes with required numbers or keys to install the software. It should not be necessary to get these off the Internet. Providing them for others to use with pirated software contributes to copyright infringement and is illegal."
I quite agree, close those appalling serial lists immediately, they do more harm to software sales than ALL the reverse engineering sites on the web. Besides which anyone pathetic enough to register software to the various scene crackers ought to be shot.
"An author can seek civil damages in the amount of their actual value, or statutory damages of $100,000 per work infringed. (Note that some "programs" are actually bundles of more than one copyrighted work.) Criminal penalties include fines of up to $250,000 and jail terms up to 5 years, or both. In December 1997, President Clinton signed a law called the "No Electronic Theft" (NET) Act that allows for criminal prosecution of copyright infringement, even where there is no profit motive, closing a loophole in U.S. copyright law."
Fine, I have not a single pirated program on my HD or this website, not 1, nor do I make any profit whatsoever. Again refer to point 6, there are millions of places that detail illegal actives e.g. bomb-making, in great detail (probably your local public library), just having access to the information doesn't automatically transform everyone into a criminal.
There you have it, the debatable truth about reverse engineering legality although in some countries this may not apply (certainly in the US & UK and most of Europe it does). I am 100% confident in my belief that my site cannot be censored or embroiled in any legal action, software authors make your way to Yahoo or MetaCrawler, type in "warez" and start your war there.
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