One of the tactics the entertainment industry could use to fight its copyright war against free file trading services is to arrest users who download these applications. A look at the David McOwen case demonstrates how this could be done.
In December 1999, David McOwen, a system administrator at DeKalb Tech, part of the Georgia State University System, installed a screensaver from Distributed.net on computers at DeKalb. Distributed.net client software is part of a distributed computing system that harnesses a network of computers to solve large computing problems for researchers and scientists. It employs the unused cycle time of computers which companies, such as Parabon Computation, sell as a commercial resource.
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The Distributed.net system was used several years ago, for example, to crack the Digital Encryption Standard (DES) which was used to encrypt sensitive government and business data. By linking the computing power of idle PCs round the world, the DES researchers proved that this form of encryption was no longer safe to use.
Several weeks after McOwen downloaded the Distributed.net software, he was asked to resign from his job by prosecutors who claimed that the application cost the state of Georgia $415,951.49 in bandwidth charges. The state claimed that they were paying an outrageous 59 cents per second for bandwidth or $1,529,280 per month. They are seeking to recover this sum from McOwen even though the application used computers that were not in use during a slow period in December. They didn't give him the opportunity to simply shut off the application.
McOwen's attorneys say the state attorney general's office will be prosecuting under a computer hacking statute alleging that he engaged in computer trespass. The state is seeking felony convictions, which carry a maximum up to 30-year prison sentence and $50,000 fine for each felony count, plus $ 415,000 in restitution and damages.
This action could set a precedent for everyone who downloads not just distributed computing applications, but also any peer-to-peer program. McOwen got another job at Cingular Wireless, but was fired when a news story about the charges mentioned the company, which was fearful of bad publicity.
McOwen' attorneys were expecting a grand jury hearing to take place at the end of July or early August, and for McOwen to be arrested once the grand jury issues its indictment. So far, they have not heard back from the state Attorney General. Let's hope that Georgia State prosecutors have better things to do than persue some systems administrator for installing a distributed computing application.
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Ann Harrison is a technology reporter in San Francisco. She can be reached at ah@well.com.
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