Congress Debating If Putting A Fake Name On Facebook Should Be A Felony
from the how-to-turn-the-whole-world-into-felons dept
On Wednesday, George Washington Law professor and former federal prosecutor Orin Kerr authored an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, posing the question "Should faking a name on Facebook be a felony?" He was, of course, talking about the infamous Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), which Congress is preparing to update. The CFAA, as has been noted here many times, is a federal law passed in the '80s and initially designed to combat malicious computer hacking, but which has become bloated, stretched and over-applied in the years since.At the root of many of the arguably overreaching applications of the CFAA is the prohibition on conduct which "exceeds authorized access" to a computer system. According to Kerr:
The problem is that a lot of routine computer use can exceed "authorized access." Courts are still struggling to interpret this language. But the Justice Department believes that it applies incredibly broadly to include "terms of use" violations and breaches of workplace computer-use policies.And Professor Kerr should know, he was the attorney who defended Lori Drew when she was charged with a felony for making a fake MySpace profile. The Justice Department's position that a violation of a terms of service constitutes a federal crime basically makes the Federal government the enforcer of private contracts. Got an employee spending too much time on Facebook? Turn them in to the Feds. Someone posting comments you just don't like on your blog? Call the DOJ. Or threaten to. The chilling effect alone should be enough to keep your users in line.
Breaching an agreement or ignoring your boss might be bad. But should it be a federal crime just because it involves a computer? If interpreted this way, the law gives computer owners the power to criminalize any computer use they don't like.
Would you believe that some politicians are even thinking of making the bill even worse?
Professor Kerr's primary concern expressed in the op-ed was that the CFAA was going to be amended to make any violation of the CFAA a felony. Hopefully, this won't pan out. The original Administration proposal (pdf) did increase the baseline punishment for any violation of the CFAA (including exceeding authorized access) from a misdemeanor level offense (less than one year) to a felony. But, thankfully, the Judiciary Committee didn't take the Administration's suggestion. Lets hope it stays that way as this bill makes its epic journey through the Washington legislative sausage maker.
There is yet a glimmer of rational-thought hope. Senators Grassley and Franken have introduced an amendment (pdf) which would modify the definition of "exceeds authorized access" to exclude violations of a TOS, if that's the only basis for the charge of violating the CFAA, effectively improving the CFAA instead of making it worse. Fingers crossed that the amendment makes it in.
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Filed Under: cfaa, felony, hacking, orin kerr, terms of service
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Here's an answer:
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Re: Here's an answer:
i srsly cant think of one argument for this
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Re: Here's an answer:
http://urbangrounds.com/2010/08/five-monkeys-congress/
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ower Congress's approval rating to 5% from ..
Hey Congress, let's get on with something important to the voters, not the lobbyists.
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Re: Lower Congress's approval rating to 5% from ..
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Re: Re: Lower Congress's approval rating to 5% from ..
Governments are powered by hookers and blow. If you do anything to try and cut that off you're impeding the work of the sociopaths that we elect to public office. People go into politics for the same reason they want to become rockstars, namely: alcohol/drugs, fame and fortune, and banging underage groupies. If they don't have those aspirations to strive for, we're stuck with regular people in office who don't look out for the corporate bottom-line, and without those assurances the job creators will pack up and move the jobs to a more hooker and blow friendly country.
Note: I feel no need to include a sarcasm tag and meant no disrespect at all to Lobo. In fact, I live in the only state that actually allows hookers, we don't have much blow but I hear we have a lot of meth.
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Give him a minute.
Some of us caught on by the end of the first sentence. Your humor is safe with us. :)
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Re: ower Congress's approval rating to 5% from ..
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FeloniesBook
All of these felonies should carry a harsher penalty than putting a false name on FB.
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Re: FeloniesBook
That whole "Gotcha, bitch!" nature of licensing has always struck me as being...you know...fucking stupid.
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Re: Re: FeloniesBook
Its always seemed pretty unjustifiable to have terms on the inside of a product that you can't return once you've opened it. Either put them on the outside, or let the customer return it if they don't like the terms, at least SOMETHING.
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Re: FeloniesBook
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Re: Re: FeloniesBook
How about we use voice stress detection on officials and get rid of the stupid and corrupt ones so that we don't end up living perpetual lies that we have to keep hidden from the people by force feeding them bullshit (which for doing the officials get rewarded with cash, benefits, jobs, security, etc.) so the people don't go ape shit when they realize that it is the same mother fuckers that bend them over day after week after month after year and never bend over themselves all in the name of bringing "order" and "security."
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Well . . .
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Re: Well . . .
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What about there publicist/spokesperson that actually maintains there social media accounts can they go to jail for impersonation.
Who has standing to press charges an overzealous district attorney or whom?
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Uh-oh
Our government is out of control. We need to hit the reset (commence fire) button.
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Well at least we know how to take over the government...
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Re: Well at least we know how to take over the government...
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Brady, can you tell us when this is due to go to committee, or when we can here congress "debating" this bill?
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Just think we could fill the prison with all these real world friendless facebook users and they can engage in some real social networking behind bars. Jails would become some of the friendliest and safest places around!
Also think now the politicians facebook pages will have to be run by the politicians themselves rather than handed over to office staff.
I see this as a win-win. BTW: can I legally change my name to Anonymous Coward now?
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Awesome counter-suit
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Re: Awesome counter-suit
Wont' Sony please think of the child criminals they're making?
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DA
Please, for the sake of humanity, vote these people out at your next opportunity!
Obama, 2012 - NO!
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When everything's crime...
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False Personas
Oh... you didn't mean THOSE kinds of deliberately-false identities? Ok, carry on.
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Re: False Personas
could we get some alternative media coverage on #DARPA's #SMISC????? because the MSM is never going to touch it.
people should tune out the MSM and do their own research. logging into #Facebook = plugging into The Matrix.
i say YES, make it a felony. NO fake personas on Facebook or any social media, and that INCLUDES government alphabet agencies.
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WTF
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f/b alias's ? R Ya'll Crazy ? Oh Plz...Get Real !
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What happens when violent husbands track down their ex-wifes and kill them because of this police?
South Korea has just abandoned that approach it was not working.
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"Congress Debating If Putting A Fake Name On Facebook Should Be A Felony"
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Hmm...
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Make what a federal crime?
How about banning stupid legislation from stupid people in the Congress? Would that work?
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Congress Debating If Putting A Fake Name On Facebook Should Be A Felony
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Re: Congress Debating If Putting A Fake Name On Facebook Should Be A Felony
My account gets hit by these creeps all the time. I actually have fun toying with them then turning them into the FBI and facebook. One hit up my son and he told me about it (because parents do monitor the kid's accounts and warn them about such things right? i do) and the creep had ALL of my son's friends on its list. After "IT" trying hit up on a 12 yo IT was sent to the fbi and facebook too. Creeps are always going to be around. Don't let the government be your NANNY.
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Would you believe that some politicians are even thinking of making the bill even worse?
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Why are they bothering with this BS
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For crying out loud
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It's only a way to force us to shut up....
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BS
so how fuck off with the bull shit and do something the way it should be done.
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TOS
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The government is responsible for most of the fake profiles.
(you mean to tell me i found this out from doing my own research and all #EdwardSnowden "revealed" and "leaked" was some dumb powerpoint slides that look like they were done by a 5th-grader?)
"The Pentagon is looking to build a tool to sniff out social media propaganda campaigns and spit some counter-spin right back at it.
On Thursday, Defense Department extreme technology arm Darpa unveiled its Social Media in Strategic Communication (SMISC) program. It�s an attempt to get better at both detecting and conducting propaganda campaigns on social media. SMISC has two goals. First, the program needs to help the military better understand what�s going on in social media in real time � particularly in areas where troops are deployed. Second, Darpa wants SMISC to help the military play the social media propaganda game itself."
wow. and all the MSM reports, over and over and over again, is that Big Brother is supposedly watching our every virtual move and hoarding all our telephone activity.
this is a smidge more sinister and just...well...EVIL...wouldn't you say?
they've actually developed software that generates FB profiles complete with friends, likes, photos, etc. but it's fake. the person behind the fake screen persons is a military operative component of the gov't spin machine, put there to incite conflict, debate, & confusion while using fake numbers to manipulate and control public opinion.
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2011/07/pentagon-seeks-to-manipulate-social-media-for-pro paganda-purposes.html
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TOS
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Likely message to be suppressed
Africa for Africans, Asia for Asians, White Countries for Everybody
Annihilation by Assimilation
Every white country on earth is supposed to become multicultural and multiracial. EVERY white country is expected to end its own race and end its own culture. No one asks that of ANY non-white country.
The Netherlands is more crowded than Japan, Belgium is more crowded than Taiwan, but nobody says Japan or Taiwan will solve the RACE problem by bringing in millions of third-worlders and assimilating and intermarrying with them.
Everybody says the final solution to the RACE problem is for EVERY white country and ONLY white countries to bring in the third world and assimilate with them.
Immigration, tolerance, and especially assimilation are being used against the white race.
All this immigration and intermarriage is for EVERY white country and ONLY white countries.
Anti-white is called anti-racist, but it leads to the disappearance of one race and only one race, the white race. The real aim of anti-racism is to wipe out the white race or make it a minority anywhere it exists.
It is genocide.
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Congress Debating If Putting A Fake Name On Facebook Should Be A Felony
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Facebook should look more carefully when posting liquor ads such as beer and wine and also look into their own policy guidelines as well.
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