It's both; I pretty sure those in charge do not want to encourage and they do not want any legal issues to come up (and don't get into a dispute with me about this), but it's not our decision to make or question.

not on this forum it's not our decision, but there is nothing illegal about talking about the subject or spreading knowledge in any way about it. the only thing that's illegal are the actions made. if it were there would be countless gigantic sites shut down.

it may not be a question of legality at all. I myself was not involved in this, but I think a large part of the decision was a matter of ethics. TWL, as a member of the internet community, has a responsibility to keep the internet a safe place. Teaching people to hack does not do this. Especially on a forum environment, where only little bits of info are availble here and there, this would simply tell people who don't really know what they are doing how to do some damage. This is how "script-kiddies" are probably created. I myself don't want TWL giving information out on how to setup a DDoS attack or anything like that. It doesn't promote safety and it isn't educational. The reason its not a freedom of speech argument is because we are not the government and the 1st amendment really only applies to the government (read it sometime).

note: this is not official TWL policy, but just my individual viewpoint on where those who made this policy might be coming from and why they might be justified

oh.. then what is official TWL policy?

For some reason you seem like the only person to dispute the fact that "hack-talk" in forums is an ok thing. If you honestly want to give pointers and aid to a hacker on a forum 1.) You could be endangering the very forum you're informer the hacker on 2.) You're only contributing to the danger 3.) What's the point? Educational or not, hacking is hacking. And when it's put to use, bad things can arise. Ok, there's good hacking and all, but being that there is more notorious hacking vs. beneficial hacking, hacking in general is a know to the common public as being a bad choice, and I believe that it shouldn't be discussed with in forums if it is known as being more notorious rather than beneficially legal. If the admins what no more Hack Talk, let's give it to them and be courteous of what they have to say. After all, they do run the site . . .

Situations:
A: some kid is curious and asks about hacking, someone shuns him away, he gets pissed, finds that info somewhere else (this is the internet..) and wipes out the site that wouldn't help him
B: same kid comes and asks, someone that has been there done that says some things, everyone is happy..

besides, of course it's "bad" and it's illegal, so if you do it, you go to jail.. that should be deterence enough, but shouldn't limit the innocent oerson's opportunity to learn

you don't know what you're talking about. you didn't even comprehend my comment and you're assuming i'm saying something i'm not.

i wasn't arguing at all that it should be allowed here, in fact i pointed out the contrary. your reply astounds me. i feel like the conversation just went 20 feet under.

True. A person's opportunity to learn shoudln't be limited. I agree with you in whole on that one Jason. But also take into consideration the percent chance of that person coming back and actually attacking our site. We know no one here would shun him off in a manner to make him mad. We'd handle it properly and notify him of our proposition on informing members on how to hack is wrong, and hopefully he'd abide to that in a mature manner. The percent chance of the guy getting mad at us turning him down and hacking us as retality would probably be the same chance as us giving him some pointers as mentioned in your B situation, and him coming back at us, (of course with us not knowing he had already wanted to hack us from the start)...

This is all just my take on the whole situation...we all are entitled to our own opinions, and I shouldn't of singled out Merc in that case. It was wrong and childish.

that's not the case either, i'm just pointing out that i wasn't saying what you think i was.

Alright then.