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BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) - An international squad of computer hackers will wreak electronic mayhem on Indonesia if the country hampers voting in East Timor's independence referendum, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate warned Wednesday.

``More than 100 computer wizards, mostly teen-agers in Portugal, Spain, Ireland, Belgium, Brazil, the U.S. and Canada, ... are targeting the entire computer network of the Indonesian government, army, banking and finance institutions to create chaos,'' Jose Ramos Horta wrote in a newspaper commentary published Wednesday.

``A dozen special viruses are being designed to infect the Indonesian electronic-communications system, including aviation,'' said Horta, an East Timorese leader who was co-winner of the 1996 Nobel Peace prize.

-- Lisa (lisa@work.now), August 18, 1999

Answers

Sure Lisa!

These 100 computer wizards (mostly teen-agers in Portugal, Spain, Ireland, Belgium, Brazil, the U.S. and Canada), all got together and sent an EMail to Jose detailing their plans!

This is the kind of investigative reporting that deserves reward!

-- Hardliner (searcher@internet.com), August 18, 1999.

Don't be too surprised if the doctrine of "plausible denial" is brought heavily into play, during this mess. If a corporate CEO or a government/military official, who has said ther won't be Y2K problems, can find something else to blame it on, he/she will.

Hackers make a particularly juicy scapegoat, because "Millenium Mischeif" is just the sort of thing people would expect of them.

Same goes for domestic and international terrorists. The expectation of most people will be that domestic and foreign enemies cannot resist the drama of striking their blow (for whatever their striking it for), during the millenial year (Yes, I know it's not REALLY the millenium until 2001, but try telling that to just about ANYONE on the street).

So expect to hear things, next year (assuming anything works to hear it on) from the Pollies like, "You moron, it wasn't Y2K that blew up that refinery, it was the Iraqis", or, "It was some kid in Pougkepsie, that shut down AT&T, not non-compliant code", or "Listen you, dumb-assed Tinfoil, the reason we launched on Toronto had nothing to do with imbedded chips. Everyone with half a brain cell firing knows that the Russians cracked into our defense network!".

But then again, any of those senarios are just plausible enough, that they could be the real explanation.

The truth is out there, it's just that you or I will probably never get to see it.

-- Bokonon (bok0non@my-Deja.com), August 18, 1999.