🚀 go-pugleaf

> Date:    Thu, 25 Jan 90 12:08:35 -0500
> From:    woodb!scsmo1!don@cs.UMD.EDU
>
> Should it be illegal to own or transmit virus source (for non-security
> personnel)??
> <etc etc>

A storm in a teacup I'm afraid. What possible technique could you use
to make it 'illegal to own or transmit virus source'? I mean, if in
the U.S.  you can buy books on homemade weapons from machine guns
right up to nerve gas and atomic bombs, I can't see the U.S.
Government being able to successfully crack down on people swapping
virus source code.

It seems to be a common practice on this newsgroup/mailing list to
assume guilt until shown otherwise. E.g. 'Morris is guilty writing the
Internet Worm', before a verdict has been handed down. Statements such
as 'Anyone who has virus source code must be a criminal' are of a
similar ilk.

XPUM01@prime-a.central-services.umist.ac.uk (Dr. A. Wood) writes:

> If James Huang is Taiwanese, then his first and most familiar language
> is likely not English but Chinese, and likely he committed no computer
> ethical error but merely a language blunder, namely the common capital
> offence of 'unclear use of a pronoun'!  <WOODB!SCSMO1!DON@CS.UMD.EDU>,
> in the course of emptying his  flamethrower down the  computer link at
> the  unfortunate Huang, seems to   imply that Huang   meant "I want to
> spread VAX virus".  But Huang could also have intended to say  "I want
> to spread news about how to notice and combat VAX virus"
>
> - - which is what Virus-L is for!!

I couldn't agree more. Get off the poor guys back!

- --
Todd Hooper                                                Computing Centre
                                            Curtin University of Technology
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