Hackers Demand Benefits

[InfoSec News <isn () c4i org>]

http://www.bbspot.com/News/2003/01/hackers.html

By Brian Sizemore 
January 23m 2003

Washington DC - A group of hackers, crackers and malicious code
writers filed suit today against several prominent businesses and
organizations, insisting that they should receive health care and
retirement benefits for their work at the companies' web sites.  
Amongst the companies and organizations listed in the lawsuit were the
Department of Defense (DoD), Amazon, Microsoft, and of course the
RIAA.

"I read about how eBay is providing health benefits to its sellers,
and I thought, if they can get it, why not me?" stated William
Kenowitz, aka Phr1d4y. "I mean, damn, I spend as much time on-line as
some power seller, and if I come down with the flu, that can take me
away from checking out CNN's perimeter defenses for a week, maybe
longer."

Fellow claimant Ganesh Rudhi agreed. "I was working some huge hours
putting the final touches on my fourth DDOS attack against the RIAA
website when, bang, I pulled a back muscle while hunched over my
laptop. It cost me a bloody fortune at the emergency room, and by the
time I could get back online, they had changed their firewall
configuration. Wasted weeks of effort for nothing."

The hacking community is predominately composed of high school and
college students due to the availability of health coverage by
hackers' parents or schools. Oftentimes as soon as that coverage ends,
however, so does a hacker's career in favor of one that will provide
needed benefits.

Attorney Sam Tonning made an official statement after filing the
lawsuit in court. "These people are hard working Americans, and they
deserve the same fundamental protection as the rest of the working
community. Their actions force Microsoft into actually fixing their
software, and keep thousands of people employed at companies like
Symantec, ZoneLabs and SANS. It is simply unethical for society to
allow them to fall through the cracks without simple health care or
retirement plans."

A self-styled hacker only known as "bUbBlEs" added, "We only want
what's fair. That Mitnick guy got free room and board from the
government for five years. We're not going that far. Me, I'd be happy
with a 401k account matched by the DoD." When notified that the
military does not use 401k accounts, bUbBlEs exclaimed, "You gotta be
kidding - that's even worse than us. All right, I'll take shares of
Microsoft instead." Microsoft stock lost 1.26 on the news.



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