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Technocrimes: the computerization of crime and terrorism
Book reviews
national business organizations too. I am also much less certain that the world will move towards narrowing the gap between rich and poor internationally; as at home, the poor have become notionally poorer, at least in Africa and Latin America, and that poses acute threats to the global environment and to global But the abiding weakness of peace. current Western capitalism is its shorttermism, the insistent emphasis on ‘the
Computer
457
bottom line’ next week, next month, next year, which in turn is the consequence of reliance on the financial markets. One of Japan’s great strengths is its ability to take the long view, to invest in human resources, in research and development, in the domination of markets yet unborn. If Professor Halal’s vision is never realized, the Western obsession with shortterm, and often illusory, financial success will be the main reason.
crimes-efficient
illegality
Robert Hay
Technocrimes: the Computerization of Crime and Terrorism August Bequai 208 pages, $12.95 paperback (Lexington, MA, USA, Lexington Books, 1986 When I was asked to review this immensely readable book I felt that a little independent research on the author’s pedigree might prove interesting, as the literary style of the book was more that of a professional writer than of the run-ofthe-mill lawyer. From my research I found that August Bequai is described in The Computer Law and Security Report, a UK publication, as ‘One of the foremost experts on industrial security law in the US’. It further describes him as a domestic and international consultant in industrial security, author of six books and over 100 articles. He is President of Bequai Associates Inc, Washington, DC, and a legal practitioner. All of this confirms the description on the fly leaf of the book. Technocrimes is by no means the only book that has been published on the subject of computer crime but, in my opinion, it is certainly one whose breadth and depth has not been matched. The
Robert Hay is at the Federation Against Software Theft, 8 Southampton Place, London WCIA 2EF. UK.
FUTURES August 1988
wealth of detail and statistical information which, in the past, I have found to be an excellent soporific, is described in such a manner that it lends enormous credence and style to the narrative. There is a tendency to regard computer crimes as illegal acts carried out by yuppie-type whiz-kids or criminal masterminds, the stuff of melodrama. Bequai, however, takes us into a far more interesting world where ‘The Mafia’, ‘The Syndicate’, or ‘Organised crime’ have already computerized their illegal numbers rackets, drugs operations, and prostitution rings and have brought the same efficiency to such areas that legitimate computerization has brought to the stock market, the finance house and the legitimate workplace.
Compulsory
reading
I was particularly interested to find that the problems of investigating and prosecuting cases of computer crime are much the same in the USA as in the UK. The chapter on ‘How the cops can’t cope’ should be compulsory reading at the UK Police Staff College at Bramshill, at the UK Detective Training School at Hendon, and for that matter for each member of the Criminal Law Review Committee. At a time when research and development within the high-tech industries of the West runs into many billions of
458
Book reviews
pounds, dollars, marks and francs, the book describes how, by the simple expedient of buying western goods, smuggling them back behind the Iron Curtain, often with the help of unscrupulous companies in Europe, and using the latest reverse engineering methods, the Warsaw Pact countries have saved just as many billions of roubles, kopeks and lei. It is for this very reason that the USA has introduced such stringent clauses in agreements with the UK and other countries with whom it has shared its technological know-how, in
A mid-spring’s
order to prevent such materials being made too easily available to competitors. I hadn’t really considered such activities as computer crimes before but on reflection I believe that their inclusion in the book is entirely justified on a number of levels. In conclusion, I thoroughly recommend this book not only to computer buffs, but as a book which can be easily read and understood by all. It is a serious work but not in the least stuffy, condescending or pompous and, as you’ve guessed, one which I enjoyed.
night dream
Dennis Livingston
Rumors of Spring Richard Grant 458 pages, $4.50 (New York, Bantam Books, 1988)
Richard Grant’s second novel is a total delight, filled with beautiful writing, offbeat characters, and provocative scientific speculation. Although billed as a fantasy, the story does not quite fit into any stereotyped marketing category. For instance, mythical elements mingle with scientific extrapolations that seem to explain them (but don’t quite), and the main story line takes place five centuries from now, yet is suffused with an air of Victorian whimsy. A review blurb quoted in the book compares Rumors to the works of John Crowley. The reference is apt, and to Grant’s credit. Here, as in Crowley’s Little, Big and Aegypt, a subtext runs throughout the whole novel. The world is not as it seems; the diverse legends and fairy-tales we tell about ourselves are all part of one grand story; beyond the equations of reductionist science lie transcendent realities that give shape to the apparently aimless forms of everyday life. If you love
Dennis Livingston can be contacted at Strategic Forecasting and Issues Management, 14 Elm Street,
Brookline,
MA 02146, USA.
this approach to fiction, Grant should be high on your reading list. At some point in what seems to be the next century, environmental stresses have wiped out all forests in the world except one-the Carbon Bank Forest. The local government has placed a scientific station in this unspecified location to monitor ongoing changes in plant life and chemical balances affecting the disrupted ecosystem. In time, only Amy Hyata and her eight-year-old son Robin inhabit the station. Hyata has some interesting ideas, whose full implications emerge gradually in the course of the book. In brief, growth fields pervade all living things. Anyone following certain techniques of deep meditation can tap such fields and nudge them in ways that encourage genetic transpositions and other genome alterations in the organism in question. Evolution can thus be quickjumped in ways Darwin never anticipated. Moreover, Hyata theorizes that the complex interconnectivity of ecosystems qualifies them to be thought of as adaptive, quasi-cognitive life forms, each of which is guided by morphogenetic organizing principles. Metaphorically speaking, a forest has a personality. Can the Carbon Bank Forest be altered in such a way as to protect itself from man and his pollutants? Hyata, half-scientist and half-
FUTURES August 1988
national business organizations too. I am also much less certain that the world will move towards narrowing the gap between rich and poor internationally; as at home, the poor have become notionally poorer, at least in Africa and Latin America, and that poses acute threats to the global environment and to global But the abiding weakness of peace. current Western capitalism is its shorttermism, the insistent emphasis on ‘the
Computer
457
bottom line’ next week, next month, next year, which in turn is the consequence of reliance on the financial markets. One of Japan’s great strengths is its ability to take the long view, to invest in human resources, in research and development, in the domination of markets yet unborn. If Professor Halal’s vision is never realized, the Western obsession with shortterm, and often illusory, financial success will be the main reason.
crimes-efficient
illegality
Robert Hay
Technocrimes: the Computerization of Crime and Terrorism August Bequai 208 pages, $12.95 paperback (Lexington, MA, USA, Lexington Books, 1986 When I was asked to review this immensely readable book I felt that a little independent research on the author’s pedigree might prove interesting, as the literary style of the book was more that of a professional writer than of the run-ofthe-mill lawyer. From my research I found that August Bequai is described in The Computer Law and Security Report, a UK publication, as ‘One of the foremost experts on industrial security law in the US’. It further describes him as a domestic and international consultant in industrial security, author of six books and over 100 articles. He is President of Bequai Associates Inc, Washington, DC, and a legal practitioner. All of this confirms the description on the fly leaf of the book. Technocrimes is by no means the only book that has been published on the subject of computer crime but, in my opinion, it is certainly one whose breadth and depth has not been matched. The
Robert Hay is at the Federation Against Software Theft, 8 Southampton Place, London WCIA 2EF. UK.
FUTURES August 1988
wealth of detail and statistical information which, in the past, I have found to be an excellent soporific, is described in such a manner that it lends enormous credence and style to the narrative. There is a tendency to regard computer crimes as illegal acts carried out by yuppie-type whiz-kids or criminal masterminds, the stuff of melodrama. Bequai, however, takes us into a far more interesting world where ‘The Mafia’, ‘The Syndicate’, or ‘Organised crime’ have already computerized their illegal numbers rackets, drugs operations, and prostitution rings and have brought the same efficiency to such areas that legitimate computerization has brought to the stock market, the finance house and the legitimate workplace.
Compulsory
reading
I was particularly interested to find that the problems of investigating and prosecuting cases of computer crime are much the same in the USA as in the UK. The chapter on ‘How the cops can’t cope’ should be compulsory reading at the UK Police Staff College at Bramshill, at the UK Detective Training School at Hendon, and for that matter for each member of the Criminal Law Review Committee. At a time when research and development within the high-tech industries of the West runs into many billions of
458
Book reviews
pounds, dollars, marks and francs, the book describes how, by the simple expedient of buying western goods, smuggling them back behind the Iron Curtain, often with the help of unscrupulous companies in Europe, and using the latest reverse engineering methods, the Warsaw Pact countries have saved just as many billions of roubles, kopeks and lei. It is for this very reason that the USA has introduced such stringent clauses in agreements with the UK and other countries with whom it has shared its technological know-how, in
A mid-spring’s
order to prevent such materials being made too easily available to competitors. I hadn’t really considered such activities as computer crimes before but on reflection I believe that their inclusion in the book is entirely justified on a number of levels. In conclusion, I thoroughly recommend this book not only to computer buffs, but as a book which can be easily read and understood by all. It is a serious work but not in the least stuffy, condescending or pompous and, as you’ve guessed, one which I enjoyed.
night dream
Dennis Livingston
Rumors of Spring Richard Grant 458 pages, $4.50 (New York, Bantam Books, 1988)
Richard Grant’s second novel is a total delight, filled with beautiful writing, offbeat characters, and provocative scientific speculation. Although billed as a fantasy, the story does not quite fit into any stereotyped marketing category. For instance, mythical elements mingle with scientific extrapolations that seem to explain them (but don’t quite), and the main story line takes place five centuries from now, yet is suffused with an air of Victorian whimsy. A review blurb quoted in the book compares Rumors to the works of John Crowley. The reference is apt, and to Grant’s credit. Here, as in Crowley’s Little, Big and Aegypt, a subtext runs throughout the whole novel. The world is not as it seems; the diverse legends and fairy-tales we tell about ourselves are all part of one grand story; beyond the equations of reductionist science lie transcendent realities that give shape to the apparently aimless forms of everyday life. If you love
Dennis Livingston can be contacted at Strategic Forecasting and Issues Management, 14 Elm Street,
Brookline,
MA 02146, USA.
this approach to fiction, Grant should be high on your reading list. At some point in what seems to be the next century, environmental stresses have wiped out all forests in the world except one-the Carbon Bank Forest. The local government has placed a scientific station in this unspecified location to monitor ongoing changes in plant life and chemical balances affecting the disrupted ecosystem. In time, only Amy Hyata and her eight-year-old son Robin inhabit the station. Hyata has some interesting ideas, whose full implications emerge gradually in the course of the book. In brief, growth fields pervade all living things. Anyone following certain techniques of deep meditation can tap such fields and nudge them in ways that encourage genetic transpositions and other genome alterations in the organism in question. Evolution can thus be quickjumped in ways Darwin never anticipated. Moreover, Hyata theorizes that the complex interconnectivity of ecosystems qualifies them to be thought of as adaptive, quasi-cognitive life forms, each of which is guided by morphogenetic organizing principles. Metaphorically speaking, a forest has a personality. Can the Carbon Bank Forest be altered in such a way as to protect itself from man and his pollutants? Hyata, half-scientist and half-
FUTURES August 1988