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These people have hurt feelings. I've insulted both them and their big brother.
   technofile
Al Fasoldt's reviews and commentaries, continuously available online since 1983

Hate mail? I love it, especially when it comes from trolls


Jan. 16, 2000

By Al Fasoldt
Copyright ©2000, Al Fasoldt
Copyright ©2000, The Syracuse Newspapers

   "When you step on the toes of the giant," a proverb says, "you annoy the elves."
   I annoyed a lot of elves last week. I wrote about the lack of security and privacy in networks run by Windows NT, the industrial-strength version of Windows. I got more hate mail in one day than I've received in years.
   Most of the mail came from software engineers who make their living setting up and taking care of Windows NT networks. These are called network administrators. I must have threatened their livelihoods. People who are in control of themselves do not write hate mail to strangers. Hate mail is generated by fear. I must have made these people afraid.
   I get hate mail now and then, and usually I just dismiss it. But sometimes I learn from it.
   What I realized from the latest batch was intriguing. These people who send me ugly letters have hurt feelings. I've insulted both them and their big brother.
   People who are insecure often attach themselves emotionally to a protector -- to the big guy in class when they are kids in school or to the big guy in the marketplace when they are out in the business world. Criticizing the big guy is worse than criticizing these legions of followers. By pointing out the flaws in that central power figure, you are threatening all those who hang on the big guy's every word. They do not want their secure little world changed.
   "Have a nice low-level meaningless life filled with other hippies like yourself, rebelling against mainstream society," one of them wrote. "May you always be bitter and jealous while the rest of us go with the flow and prosper."
   Such an odd comment from a stranger! My article, which you can read here, is simply a report on a flaw in Microsoft's networking. I called it by the wrong name, as it turned out, and got a helpful letter that straightened out my error -- it's at the end of my original article -- but the most of the trolls who wrote to me found me beyond hope.
   Listen to this: "Reporting just senseless paranoia without a method of repair is a disservice to the public and only scares people off from using their computers."
   I was warning the public of a security flaw. That sounds simple and straightforward to me.
   "You may however wish to withdraw the article to save yourself further embarrassment."
   No thanks.
   "I don't know how you ever were allowed to post information to the public but I'm not impressed."
   It's called freedom.
   "You and the rest of the Microsoft bashers out there ... are nothing more than a small minority whose big mouths only make it seem like you are bigger. Do us all a favor and next time know what you are speaking about before you write another annoying little article."
   What can I say?
   It's easy to moralize over something like this. It's also pointless. As long as people like this are running networks, we'll have to guard our privacy and watch our backs. I've already pointed out that anyone can waltz right into some of these networks and view whatever is stored on the computers attached to them, so I don't need to make a big moral issue about network administrators who blame me for reporting this instead of railing against Microsoft for creating such a monster in the first place.
   Besides, the real problem isn't how well or how poorly our network adminstrators are trained or how much they care about privacy. The real problem isn't Microsoft's immense arrogance. The basic issue is whether we care about our privacy and security.
   My article explained that anyone sitting at a PC can enter various Windows NT networks on the Internet just by running a program that connects one computer to another. (The program I ran was a Linux program, but this entire procedure could be done on any kind of computer. Linux isn't necessary.)
   Once you get into the network, browsing around the various computers that are on the network is absurdly easy. I pointed that out, too. I also told how my journey into a Windows NT network (at an American university) turned up love letters stashed in what was supposed to be a private place -- the "My Documents" folder of one of the student PCs.
   One of the letter writers told me that students who leave their love letters on unsecured computers are foolish. Another said students should know better.
   Blaming a student for leaving private letters in what should be a personal storage place is a double indignity.
   First, the network administrator is the one responsible for how the network is used and set up. The people who are required to use it are not responsible for it. (Students have no choice, just as you have no choice if your office has a network.)
   Second, this kind of evasive amoralism is just plain -- how should I say it? -- disgusting. Networks need to be tended by people who care about privacy and take their own responsibilities very seriously.
   We're suffering from the flu in this country, but it's not the flu your kids bring home from school. It's the flu that makes the elves among us sneeze when the company that makes Windows coughs. If Windows networking systems are not private, warning the public about them is not a criticism of anybody. It's a public service.