Computer and Internet Security Law a Year in Review

Architecture and Background

Computer and Internet Security Law - A Year in Review 2008 - 2009 Robert Clark Attorney This presentation reviews the important prosecutions, precedents and legal opinions of the last year that affect internet and computer security. We will discuss the differences between legal decisions from criminal cases and civil lawsuits and what that means to the security professional.

Vulnerability Analysis

This presentation is strongly audience driven and it quickly becomes an open forum for questions and debate. This year the past key precedents have involved: the Fifth Amendment and passphrases to an encrypted hard drive (UPDATE- the case is in and Government wins appeal.

Exploitation and Demonstrations

The Defendant MUST produce an unencrypted hard drive to the grand jury!!!); Fourth Amendment searches; Pirate Bay prosecution in Sweden; use of CFAA in civil cases against departing employees and trade secrets; forensics and use of metadata; FTC injunction against CyberSpy software and its RemoteSpy; reverse engineering; Facebook and privacy rights; and, a case of forensics to support a default judgment (no actual trial) against a party that used several file deletion programs to hide and delete evidence. Robert Clark is a cyber lawyer and is the previous counsel for the Army Computer Emergency Response Team, Navy CIO and some other CERT operations.

Remediation and Defensive Strategies

In these positions he has advised on all aspect of computer operations and security. He consults regularly with DoJ Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section and National Security Division; DoD, NSA, and other agencies involved in cybersecurity. He is a past lecturer at Defcon and lectures at Black Hat, the Army's Intelligence Law Conference and at the DoD's Cybercrimes Conference. For copies of the slides and additional materials please see the DEF CON 17 Archive here: