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---[ Phrack Magazine Volume 8, Issue 52 January 26, 1998, article 09 of 20
-------------------------[ On the Morality of Phreaking
--------[ Phrack Staff
The issue of phone phreaking is an interesting topic for
discussion concerning morality. For those not familiar with this
topic, I will give a brief outline of the subject. Following the
outline of phreaking, I will analyze the issue of whether
phreaking as defined in the outline is a morally right act, from
the perspective of John Stuart Mill and Immanuel Kant. Finally,
I will address the fallacies of each of the arguments they might
present concerning the topic and provide a determination of which
stands as the superior argument for this subject.
The meaning of phone phreaking has changed over the years;
its initial growth can be traced in a large part to a magazine
named TAP (Technical Assistance Program) started by Abbie Hoffman
in 1971 as part of his Youth International Party (YIPL) (Meinel,
5). The intent at this point in time was to utilize technology
in order to subvert government and big business institutions. As
time progressed, phreaking became less politically motivated and
instead was led more by technology enthusiasts interested in
learning about the phone systems and how they worked. In 1984,
2600 magazine was formed by Eric Corley in order to further this
spread of knowledge (Corley).
The definition of phone phreaking I will use for the
purposes of this paper is that which the prominent members of the
hacking/phreaking "scene" would use. In discussing the
motivations of a phone phreaker, I speak from both personal
experience and from numerous conversations with individual
phreakers over a period of years. Phreaking is the pursuit of
knowledge concerning how phone systems operate. The skills that
a phreaker learns in this pursuit of knowledge has the effect
that they can often gain control of a phone switch in order to
make add additional phone lines, modify billing information, and
other such activities, but these are generally considered
unrelated to that which an actual phreaker is interested in, and
I will focus only on the activities of those true phreakers that
are motivated by the desire for knowledge and not for other
gains. Generally however, phreaking does involve utilizing the
resources of a phone company switch without the permission of the
company owning it, in order to both explore its capabilities and
to communicate with other phreakers in order to share knowledge.
John Mill, given his views of morality as found in
Utilitarianism, would find that phone phreaking is a morally
right act. In order to find that an act is morally right, it
should have a net benefit in terms of the happiness it adds to
the world versus the opposite of happiness it causes (Mill, 7).
To show that phreaking is morally right, first it must be shown
that it does have a positive effect on the general happiness in
the world, and then proceed to show that any negative effects
that phreaking may have are sufficiently minor so as to be
outweighed by the positive effects. If the positive effects are
greater than the negative effects, then clearly the act is
morally right.
First, the actual benefit that phreaking has for the
individuals involved in it is not directly the pursuit of
happiness, but rather the pursuit of knowledge. Since morality
is determined by happiness, not knowledge, how knowledge relates
to happiness needs to be resolved. The reason this pursuit still
relates to morality is that individuals that are pursuing
knowledge for no motivation other than itself are doing so
because the gain of knowledge has become a part of those
individuals' happiness. It is in the same way that Mill argues
the pursuit of virtue can be reconciled with the pursuit of
happiness that knowledge can also be reconciled (Mill, 35-37).
Phreaking does have a benefit to the individuals that are
involved in its practice. This benefit is in the form of a gain
of knowledge concerning the phone systems. This knowledge is
gained in generally one of two ways, both of which are common
methods of learning and the reader will recognize. The first is
through experimentation and exploration. By accessing the phone
switch, phreakers are able to experiment with its capabilities
and teach themselves how to operate it. In the second case, the
phone switches that phreakers have learned to use are utilized as
a method of communication with other phreakers. The free
communication that comes about as a result of the phone system
knowledge that has been gained allows phreakers to exchange new
information and teach each other, either as peers or through a
teacher-pupil relationship, even more about the phone system. In
both cases, knowledge is gained, and as knowledge is a part of a
phreaker's happiness, the general happiness of the world is
increased.
Any negative impact phreaking has is minimal, and indirect.
The resources that are being used are possessed by phone
companies, corporations. A corporation of itself is not a moral
being, but a corporation has an effect on three different types
of people: stock holders, employees, and consumers.
A stock holder's interest in a corporation is purely on the
profits that it produces. Stockholders could be negatively
effected by phreakers if a phreaker causes a loss of revenue, or
an increase in costs. A loss in revenue for a phone company can
only occur if the phreaker uses some resource that if not in use
would otherwise be used by a paying customer, or if the phreaker
herself would have paid for the resource utilization if it had
not been attainable for free. In the first case, phone systems
use a technique called multiplexing to handle simultaneous phone
calls between switches. If a phone system is below capacity,
there are empty time slices or frequencies (depending on type of
trunk) in the data that is transmitted between switches. Adding
a new connection between switches involves only filling one of
these idle slots, with no degradation of quality for existing
phone calls, and no marginal cost associated with the additional
call. It is only in the case where a phone system is filled to
capacity that a phreaker using a slot would prevent an existing
customer from using the phone system, resulting in a loss of
revenue. In fact, phreakers being more cognizant of this fact
that the general public will purposely explore the phone system
when it is at its lowest capacity times (late at night and on
weekends) just to avoid this situation.
The second part of the stock holders interests is that a
phreaker would potentially pay for the phone calls she is making
for free. An attraction of phreaking is that it does not cost
money to involve ones self in, and most phreakers first start in
their youth when they do not have access to being able to pay for
phone calls to other phreakers, or even more to the point there
is no price they could pay to gain access to a switch. If the
phone company were to make this available at a price to
phreakers, almost universally they would not be able to afford
the price, and would have to stop their gains in knowledge in
that subject. This would not result in any additional revenue
for the phone company, only a loss of knowledge that the phreaker
could have otherwise gained.
Employees are only impacted if they are either aware of
something occurring, or have to perform some activity as a result
of a phreaker's activities. However, a phreaker only interacts
with the phone company's equipment in an under utilized state,
and not with employees. Further, phreakers do not cause damage
or interfere with the operation of the phone company's equipment,
and so require no employee intervention. In this manner, no
employees are affected by phreakers.
Finally, consumers are also not negatively impacted by
phreakers. A phreaker's interactions with switches does not
cause any disruptions in service or prevent consumers from using
the same switches simultaneously. Further, there is no
interaction that takes place with consumers as a result of a
phreaker's activities, and so they are never impacted in any
manner.
It is possible there can be a negative impact as a result of
the perception of phreakers and based on people with different
moral viewpoints than the utilitarian view. Some people are
scared by a phreaker's knowledge, and some people are intent on
protecting their resources even from those with moral pursuits.
These people may become agitated as a result of a phreaker's
activities, and although they have no utilitarian reason to be,
their agitation should still be considered. However, weighing
the moral righteousness of the knowledge being gained, an
agitation seems to be greatly outweighed. Based on these
criteria, it is clear from the utilitarian viewpoint phreaking is
overall beneficial and is morally right.
In contrast to the views of Mill, Immanuel Kant would not
find phreaking to be a moral act. In order to find an act moral
from a Kantian perspective, it must be in accord with duty (Kant,
9), universalized (Kant, 14), and then tested for a contradiction
in thought (Kant, 32) or a contradiction in will (Kant, 32). If
an action does not succeed in passing these tests, it can not be
a moral act.
The goal of phreaking, the pursuit of knowledge, is in
accordance with duty. An individual has an inclination towards
improving himself, gaining knowledge being one way of doing so,
so this would be an imperfect duty to self (Kant, 31).
There are several possible manners in which the act of
phreaking could be universalized. One could say "all people
should use the phone system without paying in order to pursue
knowledge." This is not a contradiction in thought, a phone
system that allowed anyone pursuing knowledge to use it free of
charge could exist and persist. However, there would be two
major results of having this sort of system. First, the loss in
revenue from large numbers of people no longer paying would
result in those communicating when not pursuing knowledge
subsidizing those that were. Second, a free phone system would
have an enormous increase in usage, causing it to reach its
capacity quickly and preventing it from being available to those
who needed to use it. Nobody wants to have to spend hours
attempting to make a phone call in order to get through, and so a
system of this type is a contradiction in will for most people,
and would thus not be moral.
A preferred universalization of phreaking would be "all
people interested in gaining knowledge should be able to freely
use unutilized corporate resources in order to do so." The goal
of a corporation is to maximize profits. If a corporation has
under utilized resources with a value, it is in the company's
interest to produce additional revenue based on those resources.
If a company does not have under utilized resources, it does not
apply to this universalization. The final case is if a company
has under utilized resources, but the resources have no value.
If they have no value, of what use would the resource be to a
person interested in gaining knowledge (i.e. if it was useful to
someone, it would have value). So it is a contradiction of
thought for a company to have an under utilized resource of value
for an extended period of time; if those seeking knowledge are
able to recognize an under utilized resource with value, then the
company would quickly realize that resource does have value, and
utilize its value for profit or else sell the resource off.
Because there is no manner in which phreaking can be
universalized so as to preserve its intent and not provide a
contradiction of thought or will, it can not be a moral act in
accordance with the views of Kant.
In analyzing which of Mill or Kant has a more solid
argument, it becomes clear that neither philosophy is ideal for
all situations. Both the utilitarian and Kantian viewpoints have
disadvantages that are addressed below, however as a whole the
Mill utilitarian view of phreaking provides a more rational view
that is applicable to those who are phreakers.
First, the utilitarian viewpoints of Mill only considers the
individual act in the context of the current state of the world
in deciding if it is moral That is, a single act may in all
cases contribute to the general happiness of the world, but it
may also leave the world changed in some other respect that does
not add to or take away from the general happiness. However, the
change that has taken place may very will have an impact on how
that same act or a completely unrelated act would impact the
world so as to make what was once moral now immoral. Although
the potential for alternative moral acts remain in that world,
and so you have not reduced its potential for happiness, what it
has done is impacted the available choices of others in how they
can go about acting in a moral manner. This is not a concern of
Mill, but of those interested in freedom, as an end to itself,
actions promoting the general happiness may adversely affect the
freedom of others to act in a moral manner.
The view Kant gives of morality provides that if an act can
not be universally applied, it can not be morally right. In the
case of phreaking, is it possible that it is at some point for
some people a morally right act to phreak, but not for all people
at all times? The basis for this argument is that there are some
people who are both honestly extremely interested in the phone
systems and do not have the resources to explore their interest
in any reasonable fashion for some period of time. The typical
case is with a phreaker is a young adolescent that has become
intrigued with phones. I would contend that for one that is
truly interested in learning and has no alternative means, that
it is morally right for that person to phreak.
However, as that person grows older and gains access to
resources, alternative means become available for him to continue
to learn about the phone systems (money buys resources, a job at
the phone company provides an immense opportunity to learn). At
the point where alternative means are available, it is no longer
moral for that person to phreak. Where exactly that point occurs
is a blurred line, but it is certainly not a universal law as
Kant would imply.
In summary, the subject of phreaking is certainly a
controversial subject and would be viewed by many as an out of
hand immoral activity. But, at closer examination it is actually
something that is done for very moral reasons and although the
morality of a phreaker may not necessarily correspond to the
morality of all others in society, it is certainly in the mind of
the true phreaker a moral activity in which they are engaging,
with intelligent rational premises backing up their moral views.
Although Kant may not agree with the moral views that are held by
the phreaker, the individual circumstances confronted by the
individual are not considered and if morality can be decided on
an individual basis, as Mill allows, then it may just be that the
Kantian view may be too restricting to account for contemporary
issues faced in today's technological society.
----[ EOF