Excellent - I look forward to the newest US War on Terror acronym - the 'Department of Defense Distributed Denial of Service' or DoDDDoS for short :-)

"You need a network to defeat a network."

Am I the only one to think immediately "Doctor Strangelove" by Kubrick, when reading that ? Even the Kubrick dialogs were more elaborated than that, by the way ...

To me, it seems to bear the sad sign of cluelessness, and, as stated in the article, the forecast that something extremely stupid might happen.

At least, during WWII, all parties understood the radio signal couldn't be shutdown, at least not easily. Thus, they took this opportunity to gain intelligence.

I also read the article from http://www.washingtontechnology.com/online/1_1/29734-1.html. Geez, he speaks of “the long war".

I really hope it doesn't become "the infinite war", like in Supreme Commander, waiting for this bloke to understand the Net, to end.

He should in my opinion retire, and play video games.

Oh, by the way, most of them are also played on this "network needing a network". LOL.

A couple of bombers had an e-mail address.

Its like saying Osma Bin Laden has a safe haven at the Post Office because he once sent a postcard!

But I suppose we should expect this from anyone dumb enough to accept the poisoned chalice from his Bushness.

...a new front!

In an unprecidented assault in the war on terror, the US Department of Defense authorized the use of it's computer network to pass along emails of Islamic women stripping. Emails with the subject "Peek under my Burka" were sent out to billions of suspected users world wide. Any one caught NOT opening the email will have their IP addresses logged and the Dept of Homland (in)Security notified. It's believed that this is a way of "tagging" all fundimental Islamic extremist as it is a sin to see women this way and true followers of Mohammed will just toss the email. Because of this ethically bad use of computer hardware all the DoD servers have been blacklisted. Due to this blacklisting now everyone will be tagged.

Welcome to the new world order.

Is of course Battlefront. Will send him a link for the demo forthwith.

With his time taken up safely playing Battlefront 2, hopefully he won't accidentally invade any more countries that have nothing to do with terrorism (or at least didn't until they were invaded and then left to fall into anarchy).

Interestingly the President's mission in Iraq has changed from Finding WMDs, to Deposing a Dictator, to Spreading Democracy, to Not Being Able To Leave Until We Clean Up The Total Shitstorm We Created, to We Need To See If We Can Keep The Shit To Shoe Level..

Not bad - and I'm sure he'll be pleased to know that rather than being remembered as the only dipshit capable of bankrupting an oil company to the only President that lost a war to 12 yr old Iraqis.

I for one am not happy about the anarchy of the internet. When someone post a video of a kidnapped contract worker being beheaded, we should be able to locate the origin of that post and get the people who did it.

Don Mitchell:

> I for one am not happy about the anarchy of the internet. When someone post a video of a kidnapped contract worker being beheaded, we should be able to locate the origin of that post and get the people who did it.

Absolutely, after all, we should surrender all of *our* basic rights and freedom of expression etc as long as there's a vague hope that somehow, at some time, repressing all those liberties might save a single life...

I agree with Don, and I believe we *can* track those videos at least to a degree. The issue is, will they be tracked?

Intangible, adj.

1. Incapable of being perceived by the senses.

2. Incapable of being realized or defined.

Yeh, that sounds about right. Well at least he's honest, they don't go after Bin Laden, but they do go after his MySpace webpage.

The "anarchy of the internet" reflects anarchy in the real world. The internet is not causing it. Remove the internet and the real problems are still there, just that fewer people become aware of them.

I for one would rather be aware of public issues than have them covered up in secrecy (China). It is very important in a democracy for people to be knowlegable.

What's he talking about? US DDOS attacks on Al Jazzera? Censorship? monkeying around with the root DNS servers? wtf is an internet safehaven?

"I for one am not happy about the anarchy of the internet."

Fair enough. I'm not happy about the anarchy wrought in Iraq following the invasion; and I'm equally unhappy about the anarchy of deranged scum flying planes into towers or blowing-up underground trains. But, hey, your unhappiness is as valid as everyone else's so let's just shut down the internet.

"When someone post a video of a kidnapped contract worker being beheaded, we should be able to locate the origin of that post and get the people who did it."

Wow! You've cracked it! It's THAT simple! Extraordinary that the Pentangon/CIA/MI6/Downing Street have overlooked such an elementary weapon in the War on Terriers.

As to the term 'war czar', it strikes me as a fitting epitaph for the departing Blair.

Yes you can track the source of contributions on the internet. If the IP address is in the west, you can track it to a single house, office, hotel or internet cafe. The latter three could help narrow your search to hundreds perhaps tens of people.

If the source was a house, then you know that someone used a computer at that house for the dastardly deed - ie one of the residents, one of their friends, relatives or neighbours. Unless of course they have a wireless network, in which case you have to add in any passing hacker, or, if it's an unencrypted wireless network (as many people are baffled by implementing such things), you have to add in any passer by with a laptop.

So yes, we can track such things already, but unless you believe the spin from the police or the RIAA, we can't pinpoint the guilty party. Not possible.

"If the IP address is in the west":

Assuming:

IP address is logged especially if it is DHCP - if this is released to authorities, and even if the ISP actually holds onto the data for very long (xs4all is good!)

If the Internet Cafe keeps records of who uses computers (I've been in several in london and handed over no more than my money to sit down).

Here is a good one:

Someone robs a bank and uses a legal hand gun - leaves it at the scene. What are the chances that the hand gun was actually theirs? Oh thats right - criminals - that is the people we are trying to catch here - hide their tracks.

IP address are pointless. Bot networks, bouncers, free dial up internet (0845)... it easy to make yourself anonymous if you are trying to.

Bit like those pesky ID cards - watch out for the Criminal robbing the bank with his ID card incase he gets stop..... oh yeah right.