Information and Disinformation in Technology

Fahrenheit 452

April 26, 2004

Recently I had written a page about the "Brainwasher Machine," otherwise known as television. I thought the third world war had already begun—the war over information and disinformation.

In fact, speaking for myself, the period 2002–2003–2004 was a kind of turning point. I first realized that justice was not justice, but rather an institution that could serve liars and help them have their own victims condemned. This was confirmed in other cases discussed on my website. I believe it's pointless to say that the political class, across all parties, has become completely discredited. The socialists were in power when the genocide in Rwanda took place, and we are only now learning, eight years later, that the Mitterrand government was deeply involved.

We no longer entertain illusions—neither about the "left," nor the "right," nor the "center." I recall a joke from my old friend Vladimir Golubev, a pioneer of MHD, at a time when we were still in the middle of the Cold War:

In your country, it's man exploiting man. Well, in ours, it's the opposite.

Another awakening came with the fantastic Arte program "Thema," broadcast on April 13, 2004, featuring the dossier "September 11 Never Happened": our trust in the media is dead—completely and irreversibly. For me, it died that day. Readers sent me a copy of this film. I would need someone who knows how to digitize this document, so we could cut it into short segments. We could then produce a special edition equivalent to an "extra" episode of the show "Arrêt sur Image," where a journalist is supposed to critically analyze television. But now we know that this "alibi" program is just as fake as the rest. Proof? Don’t expect its journalist to dissect that Arte broadcast—after all, you can’t saw off the branch you’re sitting on.

In the previous dossier, we had asked ourselves whether, in the near future, we might have to manage information in a "wild" way, bypassing journalists altogether, since they have become incapable of doing their job. All of them are sitting on ejectable seats, leashed by their editors, who in turn are controlled by other political or financial powers. Some (for example on Arte) are allowed to pretend to deliver "hot news" to give us the illusion that the press is free. But we’ve seen that this is merely a way to better conceal other topics. So how can information ever circulate freely? Not through the Internet. See the dossier discussing the first wiretaps on ADSL lines carried out in Belgium in April 2004. That was the day I decided to gather all the "Big Brother" topics into a single dossier.

I thought the CD-ROM could be an effective communication tool, given its storage capacity (700 megabytes). With a computer, a burner, and a few software tools, it would be possible to distribute information endlessly. But reader Hervé Desrue reminded me of reality. The situation is actually far worse than we can imagine. For this, readers may consult the following documents, which I will provide:

http://www.lebars.org/sec/tcpa-faq.fr.html

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/can-you-trust.fr.html

Please go and study these documents. You will return stunned. Here, I will try to summarize the key ideas briefly.

All the technologies already exist that could enable the establishment of a vast digital-repressive arsenal. Take hacking, for example. A few years ago, a company imagined the following: if software or a file were hacked, the document or medium in question would contain the ability to... erase your hard drive. There was a lawsuit. This measure was banned because "it was considered that individuals or societies should not take justice into their own hands." That said, hacking has since grown to fantastic proportions following the emergence of burners. Targets: software, music, anything...

How, in today's world, can laws be enforced when everyone breaks them? The only thing that has been done so far is to crack down, as an example, on those who trade in piracy. But the truly effective method is the "Fritz" chip. This is a "surveillance and alert component" soldered onto the motherboard, which the giants of computing would like to embed in future PCs. Fritz activates when your machine starts up. It checks the state of your operating system and runs it. Then Fritz verifies that your computer doesn’t have pirated software, that your serial numbers are valid, and that your subscriptions are up to date. If not, an order to erase those programs is issued. This is... legal. You are a... lawbreaker.

Fritz is part of a project developed by Intel called TCPA: "Trusted Computing Platform Alliance." The document translates this as "Alliance for Trusted Computing." I believe this translation is inaccurate. Readers more fluent in English may suggest better alternatives. Personally, I would translate it as:

A system designed to verify that the way you use your computer complies with existing laws and rules.

This fits within the framework of digital rights management—"digital rights management." But who, in this world, is not in violation? Palladium is the version developed by Bill Gates, CEO of Microsoft, who "dreams of charging the Chinese." Indeed, if everyone were to actually pay for what they use, software providers would be fabulously wealthy. They dream of even greater profits. And yet, they are already feasting.

These TCPA, Palladium, and Fritz chip systems have unlimited power. The only thing restraining them are current laws. But those laws could easily be changed under pretexts such as fighting pedophilia, terrorism, or piracy. If we open that door even slightly, Big Brother enters your home. He has multiple entry points. One of them is the structure of the Windows operating system. Have you noticed how, from time to time, Windows announces:

It is downloading updates.

A seemingly harmless message. The same goes for Norton messages about downloading new viruses. For now, your computers remain relatively free. But Windows is threatened by "free software" like Linux. Files in .doc format can be read by pirated versions of word processors, but also by free, open-source word processors. Technically, Microsoft has the means to lock its customers into a galaxy from which nothing can enter or exit. For example, documents created using Microsoft’s word processor would no longer be readable by any "free" word processor. The situation goes even further. Please check the documents cited. Everything is conceivable. Documents in the form of text...