Trojans Putting Child Pornography On Computers
from the that-can't-be-good dept
With the recent acquittal of a UK man accused of having child pornography on his computer after it was determined that the images were a result of a Trojan horse virus on his computer, the NY Times is looking at a number of legal questions this brings up. First of all, there's the issue of whether or not this will become the "standard" defense of anyone caught with child pornography. However, even scarier, is the idea that child porn could just end up showing up on your hard drive without your knowledge, if you did happen to get infected with a Trojan horse. The article quotes Mark Rasch saying: "The scary thing is not that the defense might work, [but] that the defense might be right." Yet another example where authorities are going to have to get caught up on technology if they're going to accurately find the criminals, and not end up throwing innocent people in jail.
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Can't imagine what would happen today.
The parallels are obvious.
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In this american theocracy, I'd be afraid today of having my figurative hand chopped off by the snarling 'protective' lawyers.
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Deliberate Infections
The same could happen with MP3s also - a virus that acts as a Kazaa client would provide cover for all kinds of illegal trading.
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