Re: Borrow a neighbor's WiFi connection and go to jail?

[coderman <coderman () gmail com>]

On 3/8/06, Gary Funck <gary () intrepid com> wrote:
> ...
> If we have a user who is too clueless to
> implement encryption or other safeguards, then how was
> that individual cluefull enough to detect the interloper?

this doesn't matter; in most places totally open == no expectation of
privacy or access restriction.


> Or, what if the broadband owner implemented encryption,
> and the war driver broke the code? Is that a higher level
> of intrusion?

absolutely, this crosses the line into digital "breaking and
entering".  just because it is trivial to break WEP/WPA-PSK does not
mean you are free to do so without consequence. :)


> And, unless there are some other extenuating
> circumstances (such as identity theft, or intentional
> destruction of property), it is difficult to see how
> grabbing a piece of someone's open wireless connection is
> more than a misdemeanor.

grabbing open wireless == fine.
breaking into private wireless == crime.
breaking into private wireless and gathering info for secondary
offenses == many crimes.

unfortunately there isn't enough detail in these articles to determine
what exactly was committed, as you mentioned earlier.

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