Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncr-sd!hp-sdd!hplabs!ucbvax!SCFVM.BITNET!ZMLEB
From: ZMLEB@SCFVM.BITNET (Lee Brotzman)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Computer (in)security
Message-ID: <8811171507.AA08404@jade.berkeley.edu>
Date: 17 Nov 88 14:58:47 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 52


   This message was recently downloaded from GEnie, the General Electric
Network Information Exchange:


Message 2         Thu Nov 03, 1988
D.RUFFER                     at 21:22 EST

This is more in the random rumor category, since I only have this
second hand, but I'll put it up here to see if anyone else can
substantiate it.

Was anyone watching either the Today Show on NBC or Good Morning
America in ABC between 7:30 and 8:30 earlier this week (probably
Monday)?  Let me explain why.  My parents caught someone on those talk
segments that was talking about the Computerized Voting Booths.
Aparently, he was saying that because they were written in Forth they
could be tampered with, because Forth is an unsecure language.

WOW, do we need to make a rebuttal to that, and I hear one is being
worked on right now.  I know must of us programmer types rarely see
that time of the morning, much less turn on the TV to watch one of
those talk segments, but did anyone else hear about the show?

Inquiring modems want to know.   DaR

------------------------

   On the surface, this is just another example of poor journalism about
computers and programming (newspaper articles about the recent Internet
virus have shown just how little your average reporter knows about the
area of computers, networking, and programming).

   I'm posting this is to try to raise another topic of discussion.
Is there such a thing as a "secure" programming language, or can only
programs themselves be thought of as secure?  What techniques can be used
to write secure programs in any language, especially Forth?

   In regards to the voting booth example given above, I find it difficult
to believe that a single voter fiddling around in the booth could rig an
election.  The greater threat is bribery or some other human  frailty in
the central data processing facility that tabulates the votes.  Then again
there have been several examples cited of people "outsmarting" bank automated
teller machines.  The principles might be the same.

   The reasons I ask is because this is a topic that interests me.  I'm
studying network communications in the Masters program at Johns Hopkins
University, and security is a subject of heightened interest at the moment.

-- Lee Brotzman (FIGI-L Moderator)
-- BITNET:  ZMLEB@SCFVM   Internet: zmleb@scfvm.gsfc.nasa.gov
-- If my employer knew what I was doing, I'd be fired on the spot, so Shhhh!