Re: Banning utility software

[Anja Hofmann <anja.hofmann () ub uni-tuebingen de>]

Hi!
Thank you very much for bringing this topic up.
In Germany, a similar law has been passed in August 2007
http://www.securityfocus.com/brief/567
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9759051-7.html
http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/security/soa/German-anti-hacking-law-hijacking-security-/0,130061744,339281161,00.htm
Since then, I'm thinking hard about how to bulletproof our web sites 
(apache/tomcat or linux/apache/php/mysql)
without making use of software that might be considered illegal.
In this context, I wonder whether some security tools could be rewritten 
in terms of software testing/reverse engineering (which is legal under 
certain circumstances here).
For example, I might store snippets of test code in a database, instead 
of loading them as executable scripts,
or design my scripts so that they have to be triggered from the machine 
that is to be tested.
What are your thoughts about this?
Yours sincerely,
Anja Hofmann