Man Charged With Felony For Accessing Public WiFi

[Atrocities]

So the operative point of view should be, if your getting it for free, your stealing it. In that case they take the risk and if caught, pay the fine and do the time.

[Edi]

More or less.

If they're getting ot for free without asking for permission or checking that it really is meant to be used by all and sundry without conditions, then yes. If they check that it's okay or fulfill the conditions (e.g. buying that cup of coffee anbd thus becoming a paying customer), then no foul.

WLANs are a fairly new phenomenon, which is why there is so much ignorance about them and the laws governing them, but existing laws pretty much have it covered in most places if you just apply the same principles. Due to this fact, I'd have been inclined to let this guy off with a warning, had I been that prosecutor and had leeway. He was obviously harmless, and it isn't exactly the most ethical thing to make an example of him this way when the consequences of having a felony conviction can be as severe as they are in the US (somewhat depending on location, of course).

On the other hand, it is becoming more and more common for e.g. pedophiles leaving their WLANs unsecured, so if their activities are uncovered, they can try to weasel out of trouble by claiming that they had no idea someone else was using their WLAN to surf for child porn, for example. There have actually been at least two court cases like this in the US that I know of and fortunately in both of them the perverts got themselves a judge's gavel square on the forehead. Of course, in both cases there was other physical evidence besides the ISP access logs that indicated the WLANs in question being the source of suspicious activity. I could probably come up with more creative excuses to get off the hook for various other sorts of things regarding WLANs if I were of a mind to put effort into it, so being too lenient is not a realistic option.

Telecommunications security and confidentiality are thorny topics, as is their relation to civil rights and how far in what directions you can go. It's a fine line to walk and sometimes the outcomes are less than optimal, like in this case. But given the maximum possible penalty, the man can count himself lucky to have been let off lightly. Had he actually been guilty of more than a stupid, thoughtless mistake, the outcome would have been VERY different, if my grasp of the practical side of the American system is anywhere near accurate.

I hope that helps you understand why I took the tack I took. Having studied the field as a major subject, having a vocational degree in IT and telecom stuff and working at an ISP, I've had occasion to keep an interest in the subject and to actually know about it, because if I screw up and step on the wrong side of that divide at work, I'll get a bootprint on my backside. That's a fairly strong motivation.

[Serenity]

Yeah its really hard to draw the line, I agree with Edi on that.

However if you play music on street, and people listen to the music, they are not obligated to pay you; it is knowingly made available to others through lack of any restrictive measures such as having the music contained in private apartment or a festival area, and thus can be considered your own neglicence.

Only thing separating these 2 examples is the fact that a internet access is limited and everything others download/upload is in theory taken off of your current capacity to dl/upload, but which I imagine is practically unnoticeable considering the place is full of people using internet which is shared.

[Edi]

If you play music in the street as you're walking along, or in your front yard while doing something else, you're not doing it for money and you are not doing it to advance any kind of business venture (such as playing music in stores to put customers in a better mood to buy something), so there is no conceivable valid argument for charging you for anything. Rather impossible when no violation or even potential violation has occurred with those parameters.

If you're talking about street performers, that's covered by other sorts of rules. So it's a bad analogy all around.

[CUnknown]

Wow, this is some serious BS. I think a polite, "Please do not do this anymore" would be sufficient. Charging him with a felony is ludicrous. He was checking his f'ing e-mail. Is he not going to be able to vote anymore? If he applies for a job, will he have to check "yes" when he's asked if he was ever charged with a felony?

Let the punishment fit the crime, my god. Is there a law making this a felony? I suppose there is. But -should- doing this be a felony? Hell no, that's insane.

[Edi]

CUnknown, yes, it's harsh, and the reason it ended in such a clusterfornication is basically outlined in the a-j in my post above. The followup of it is either the prosecutor being an arsehole or the laws not giving him any leeway.

In recent years there has been a very disturbing tendency in American legislation to eliminate any and all power of consideration and leeway from various laws, regulations and statutes, which can then lead to cases like this, so it is a very real possibility.