COMPUTER SABOTAGE

Against the myth of computer technology and the inviolability of its security systerns, a few examples of the possibilitics that exist to attack it.

The computer is an intrinsic part of post-industrial capitalism. Hospitals, schools, banks, public works, the stock exchange. the police, production, the ariny - everything funetions on tbc basis of operations carried out in real time that depend on a computer network and data banks with complicated programmes the access to which depends on codes and passwords. An indispensable component of all this is the mythology that accompanies the instrument: that of efficieney, of tbc advance of technology and scienee, presented to us as liberator of knowledge and therefore of humanity.
The efforts made by the power structure to render this apparatus a source of wonder and reverence are due to the fact the the latter's functioning depends more and more on the complicita of those operatine it. They must believe more in tbc divine properties of the instrument than recognise themselves in the old work ethic of the nineteenth century.
Today a bank employee, a laboratory technician, someone employed in the mutlinational companies, works in re-stocking, etc, have great autonomy of movement in the field of their work. Their input into the cornputer/processer is not completely controllable, and if the operator were to acquire a saboteur's consciousness, would be able to cause incalculable damage not only in their place of work, but in Tokyo, New York, Canton, and anywhere else be or she couid reach following an adequate research in the field. This is why today there is a great preventive selection on the part of State bodies, corporations, banks, etc, before engaging personnel. It is now available to anyone who participates in the funetioning of the networks of postindustrial capital to cause und.reamed of damage, even those who operate peripheral terminals.
The need to protect the company's image (especially in the case 'of banks), and not to damage the myth of the computer, means that nearly all the sabotage carried out until now has been carefully covered up by the companies who have fallen vietim lo it. There are varjous Computer Crime Clubs which pool resources of banks and corporations to combat tbc acts of expropriation and sabotage that are now commonly carried out. In Italy alone 71 1 cases of "computer technology crimes" were recorded by the Ipaeri Computer Crime Club which 120 banks belong to.
In the light of this situation we find ourselves faced with the necd to go into and reconsider the whole concept of individual sabotage and expropriation that takes place at the Place of work. This coneept, due to the inheritance of a now obsolete ghunionist consciousness", has always oeen cast aside, or more often openly condemned even by anarchist comrades. Wc shall speak of this in a future moment. For the time being we shall content ourselves with reporting a few facts.
The most common form for rcappropriating goods (in this case inoney) by bank employees is that of developing a programmi that moves minute quantities of money from al] current accounts. No bank usually controls decimal parts of pounds, dollars, lire, etc., and clients do so even less. Another method is tbc Troian horse that allows entry into and the modification of programmes to withdraw amounts in current accounts in such a way as to avoid raising suspicion.
The accounts preferred by these expropriators are those where there are fewest movements and which are therefore least subject to control. Money is progressively moved to another account, or is simply "borrowed" in order to earn the interest or to carry out some financial operation, then it is replaced,
Alarge bank in northern Italy was forced last year to replace all its credil cards because one of its employees had got hold of the matrix that gave out the secret codes of the bancomat users, and used the information to draw money using false cards. On other occasione cards have been duplicated inside the banks themselves.
Another weak point of banks, especially those that communicate using public telephone lines, are the link n . etworks between the various ageneles. Millions have been withdrawn with the method of intercepting telephone lines and guaranteeing che-

ques for huge sums which were then cashed.
Remains the virus, a potent threat against any institute that works through computers. A few hundred thousand pounds is a small price for a bank to pay in exchange for avoiding contamination by such an eleetronic beast.
In Italy even in national pension scheme Inps, which has one of the most advanced computer set ups available, has paid out millions in pensions altered or falsified by simple modifications inserted into programmes by employees.
Many of the above examples are so easy to accomplish at technical level that it is only the false consciousness, the work ethie and royalty to the firm (or simply hab@) that prevents operators from taking up such a road, even if an incomplete one, to their own liberation.