DoJ’s efforts to impose a Draconian interpretation of the CFAA on the American public.

[midnight]

"According to a leaked statement that Richard Downing, the DoJ’s deputy computer crime chief, will reportedly deliver to Congress on Tuesday, the DoJ will argue that the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) — an amendment to the Counterfeit Access Device and Abuse Act generally used to prosecute hacking and other serious cyber-crimes, and which went into effect way back in 1986 — must give prosecutors the ability to charge people “based upon a violation of terms of service or similar contractual agreement with an employer or provider.”

According to Downing, the expansion of this law is necessary for law enforcement to prosecute individuals for identity theft, privacy invasion or the misuse of government databases, among other infractions. Limiting “prosecutions based upon a violation of terms of service… would make it difficult or impossible to deter and address serious insider threats through prosecution,” Downing is expected to say.

Just to reiterate, in case you didn’t catch that sly turn of legalese, the DoJ is saying that not allowing them to prosecute people for violating websites’ terms of service would make it “more difficult or impossible” to scare people with the threat of prosecution. Yay, America!

Of course, if the DoJ is permitted to act upon the CFAA in the way they want, a vast number of Internet users would be in violation of federal law, especially because almost nobody even reads terms of service, let alone follows them to the letter. Fortunately, some very smart and authoritative people will be present to argue this very fact."http://www.digitaltrends.com/social-media/lying-on-the-internet-could-soon-be-a-federal-crime/


Professor of George Washington Law School will argue against the interpretation. I wish the DOJ would come after the computer source code purposefully written to lie about our selection of a candidate...

[bemildred]

1. Fools. nt

[pscot]

2. Simple and elegant

Criminalize normal, everyday behavior and you can arrest anyone, any time, at your whim or convenience. Conversely, legitimize criminal behavior and no banker, businessman or government official will ever have to face a jury. It's a monstrous perversion of the rule of law. If this country were a dog, it would be time to put it down.

[formercia]

3. K&R

I guess they have nothing better to do.