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Hackers Walk Fine Line Between Criticizing Copyright Law and Breaking the Law
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posted by justfred
on Tuesday August 06, @10:26AM
from the not-deaf-to-the-law-at-Defcon dept.
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Participants of the Defcon X security conference attempted to show their qualms with modern copyright law, while also remaining alert to the legality of their actions. Attendees were concerned that openly sharing information could result in arrest, citing strict U.S. laws recently passed which define hacking as an act of terrorism.
For example, Adam Bresson realized he was risking arrest for violating U.S. copyright law when showing an audience how to make copies of copyright-protected videos, Reuters reports. Thus, Bresson's family and girlfriend sat in the audience, videotaping his talk in case prosecutors accused him of violating the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 (DMCA). Many conference participants were attentive to the DCMA, given the arrest of Dmitry Sklyarov for demonstrating how to break the code of e-books at last year's Defcon.
"There's a fine line between creating technologies that bypass copyright protections and demonstrating them," Bresson said on Monday. "I decided to do it because I think the message is important."
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Even so, hacktivity pervaded the event, as attendees participated in contests whereby they would get points for hacking into computers, while the conference discussion board was also hacked.
Wired reports on Defcon and the Black Hat Conference, which occurred one week earlier. Defcon and Black Hat will make available transcripts and video of all the conference presentations during the next few weeks.
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