Personal information security is becoming an ever-increasingly tangled forest, but is that helpful or harmful? Code 2600 won’t answer that question, because you can’t talk about the entire forest until you’ve gone through. What this movie does is to show the origin, history, and complexity of the situation in which we find ourselves.
The information covered in the film is different than other historical documentaries, such as The Real Mavericks. It talks about the origin of the malign hackers of technologies, including telephone phreakers, and bulletin board trolls. A variety of current experts expounded on the continuing evolution of the methods and mentalities of hackers.
Unfortunately, while the film is good, it isn’t as good as it could be. My geeky companion complained that it wasn’t made by a geek, thus it wasn’t as coherent as it could be. Instead, I would say that the director and editor knew a little too much. This impaired clarity by assuming the audience had more knowledge than it may.
I wonder who the intended audience for this film is. I am not a geek, but I have some knowledge of technology and internet security. If my geeky friend complained about the film, it isn’t aimed at his set either. This could be a great cautionary treatise for everyday users of technology, if reworked. While I consider myself reasonably tech savvy, I learned some disheartening facts about the way I use my iPhone and the web with regard to the security of the information I share or seek. Technophobes, such as some of my relatives, would have a lot more they could learn, without the scare tactics offered by many news outlets of late.
