While good in principle, this legislation is hopelessly
unenforceable and is almost certainly just election year politics.
Somebody knows this and is probably the 1 vote against it. Think
about it:
Say that this was a law and someone does what you say and changes
your homepage or something similar with some spyware. Here are
somethings that any prosecutor or civil attorney would have to
consider before pressing charges:
1) How can you prove what the setting was before? It's one thing
for you to know what it was, but another to prove it in a court of
law. Otherwise it's your word versus theirs.
2) How can you find out who exactly was the person or company that
took this action? You're talking about a massive time undertaking
to trace the packet data through every router between you and the
accused.
3) Was their machine used by some hacker? This, unfortunately (or
fortunately, depending on how you see it), has been used in court
and proved to be a successful defense.
4) What was the motive for changing your computer specifically?
5) What type of crime is appropriate? Is it theft? trespassing?
moving your plant from your front yard to your back yard?
6) What is an appropriate sentence? The five minutes you lost
changing it back paid at your current salary? A fine? jail time?
I am not a lawyer, but only a little common sense about the law is
needed here. Some of these issues apply not only to this law, but
all forms of cyber-related law. Few organizations have successfully
prosecuted under any form of cyber law. The most notable so far has
been the RIAA, whose cases were never tested in court, but used to
torque people into paying fines rather than facing legal bills that
would bankrupt them.
If we keep passing unenforceable legislation, all we'll end up with
is a tomb of law with hundreds of thousands of lawyers looking
through it and an internet that's just as lawless as it is right
now. On second thought, keep passing those laws. <<searching for
LSAT book>>
--Bankim
On 06 Oct, 2004, at 19:09, RandallM wrote:
<|>On Wed, 6 Oct 2004 05:03:45 -0700, Gregory Gilliss
<|><ggilliss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
<|>> Great, Not that I'm any fan of spyware, but this is just
<|>another law
<|>> against hacking. Think - what's the difference between this and
<|>> someone using XSS to "take control" of a computer? If you
<|>r00t a box
<|>> and deface the home page, then you've broken this law.
<|>>
<|>> <sigh> Instead of fixing the problem (poor software
<|>security) we pass
<|>> laws to punish the people who do the things that
<|>illustrate the problem.
<|>> Basic philosophical differences, blah blah blah ...
<|>>
<|>> Worst of all, do you really think that the spyware rackets
<|>will slow
<|>> down or cease because of this? Nope - they'll just migrate
<|>out of the jurisdiction.
<|>>
<|>> -- Greg
<|>End of Full-Disclosure Digest
<|>
I guess one has to decide if browser hijacking is not the taking of
personal
property. I for one do not fine it amusing to open my browser and it
has
been redirected to a hijacked page as my new Homepage!
If this law would allow me...the user to bring down hell upon these
people
then I'm all for it.
_______________________________________________
Full-Disclosure - We believe in it.
Charter: http://lists.netsys.com/full-disclosure-charter.html
_______________________________________________
Full-Disclosure - We believe in it.
Charter: http://lists.netsys.com/full-disclosure-charter.html