return
to the course schedulereturn
to the course schedule
This is a problem focused web page that is intended to give you an overview of the procedures involved in content analysis.
| Unlike the
efforts of the Chicago Computer Fraud and Abuse Task Force, "Operation
Sundevil" was not intended to combat "hacking" in the sense of computer
intrusion or sophisticated raids on telco switching stations. Nor did it
have anything to do with hacker misdeeds with AT&T's software, or with
Southern Bell's proprietary documents.
Instead, "Operation Sundevil" was a crackdown on those traditional scourges of the digital underground: credit card theft and telephone code abuse. The ambitious activities out of Chicago, and the somewhat lesser known but vigorous anti hacker actions of the New York State Police in 1990, were never a part of "Operation Sundevil" per se, which was based in Arizona. Nevertheless, after the spectacular May 8 raids, the public, misled by police secrecy, hacker panic, and a puzzled national press corps, conflated all aspects of the nationwide crackdown in 1990 under the blanket term "Operation Sundevil." "Sundevil" is still the best known synonym for the crackdown of 1990. But the Arizona organizers of "Sundevil" did not really deserve this reputation -- any more, for instance, than all hackers deserve a reputation as "hackers." There was some justice in this confused perception, though. For one thing, the confusion was abetted by the Washington office of the Secret Service, who responded to Freedom of Information Act requests on "Operation Sundevil" by referring investigators to the publicly known cases of Knight Lightning and the Atlanta Three. And "Sundevil" was certainly the largest aspect of the Crackdown, the most deliberate and the best organized. As a crackdown on electronic fraud, "Sundevil" lacked the frantic pace of the war on the Legion of Doom; on the contrary, Sundevil's targets were picked out with cool deliberation over an elaborate investigation lasting two full years. And once again the targets were bulletin board systems. Boards can be powerful aids to organized fraud. Underground boards carry lively, extensive, detailed, and often quite flagrant "discussions" of lawbreaking techniques and lawbreaking activities. "Discussing" crime in the abstract, or "discussing" the particulars of criminal cases, is not illegal -- but there are stern state and federal laws against cold-bloodedly conspiring in groups in order to commit crimes. In the eyes of police, people who actively conspire to break the law are not regarded as "clubs," "debating salons," "users' groups," or "free speech advocates." Rather, such people tend to find themselves formally indicted by prosecutors as "gangs," "racketeers," "corrupt organizations" and "organized crime figures." |
Note that
I have highlighted several words in violet. My marginal impression
is one that picks up impressions of exaggeration or exaggerated law enforcement
efforts. But as I work systematically I will also identify other
impressionistic patterns. The words that correspond to additional
patterns will be highlighted in different colors.
This is not
the only emergent pattern that I am aware of. There are at least
eight others. Perhaps more. After I go through the passage
and highlight text that seems to match exaggerated law enforcement efforts,
I will go through as many more times as there may be patterns or categories,
highlighting each set of words or terms in a different color.
In this paragraph I am also beginning to pick up a pattern of that I would describe as invisible organization. What units of text probably led me to this inference? |