Posted on 07/08/2008 9:36:37 AM PDT by Clint Williams
"The access to MySpace was unauthorized because using a fake name violated the terms of service. The information from a "protected computer" was the profiles of other MySpace users. If this is found to be a valid interpretation of the law, it's really quite frightening. If you violate the Terms of Service of a website, you can be charged with hacking. That's an astounding concept. Does this mean that everyone who uses Bugmenot could be prosecuted? Also, this isn't a minor crime, it's a felony punishable by up to 5 years imprisonment per count. In Drew's case she was charged with three counts for accessing MySpace on three different occasions."
The criminal justice system has nothing serious to do, I guess.
Where are the Terms of Service for FR posted?
She must have been using it to trick somebody, ala Megan Meier, and they have to act like they're actively doing something to stop it.
It's fun to be a sacrificial lamb.
Other than to turn lots of folk into criminals? There's a quote there, something about control, but I don't remember it.
Stop the beating! I confess!
My real name is Glenn.
Glenn is just an alias on here.
I better ‘fess up to all of you right now. Joe 6-pack is’nt my real name.
Hmmmm......maybe I outta stop registering with the online name of “Nunya_Business”.
BTW, does anybody ever really read those user agreements anyway?
I have had someone create an account on a different forum in my name, then used that false account to attack me.
“There’s no way to rule innocent men. The only power government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren’t enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws”
Seems like a lot of information is missing about this story.
I started to read one from MicroSoft once and got to the part where they said “We will control the horizontal; we will control the vertical” and gave up.
Lori Drew is the woman who allegedly used Myspace to provoke a teenage girl to commit suicide.
This has to do with that girl that committed suicide because a friends Mom posed as someone else. If this is applied to all websites we will be required to share our personal information with the world, to be sold for pennies, name, address, phone, etc , to access websites that may just be spam/virus sites.
The connection with Megan Meier’s suicide is entirely missing...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megan_Meier
That's it! Thanks!!
... The problem is that there is no generally accepted definition of what unauthorized means in this context. Law makers either didn't define the term or if they did, used such sweeping language that the definition is plainly overbroad. One Kansas statue defined access as "to approach, instruct, communicate with, store data in, retrieve data from, or otherwise make use of any resources of a computer." A judge rejected that definition, saying that if it was used, then "any unauthorized physical proximity to a computer could constitute a crime" and instead used the definition of access from Webster's dictionary.Such overarching language is also common in the terms of service used by ISPs and websites to define what is allowed to happen on their website or service. These documents are written by lawyers trying to shield their employers / clients from harm, not set up a set of usable rules of conduct. As such they are routinely ignored by both service providers and visitors. Commonly they contain clauses that no reasonable person could expect to abide by. One example is a TOS that expects users to not "violate any local, state, federal, or non-U.S. law, order, or regulation." In conjunction with the CFAA, wouldn't this make violating any law from any country a violation of US law? Another clause which is commonly found in a TOS, is to not include any content which is "threatening, abusive, defamatory, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, vulgar, obscene, profane or otherwise objectionable." This type of clause seems to be intended to prohibit being mean on the Internet. ...
"A Los Angeles federal grand jury has indicted a woman for her alleged role in a MySpace online hoax played on a 13-year-old girl who later committed suicide.
Lori Drew of St Louis, Missouri was indicted on Thursday on one count of conspiracy and three counts of accessing protected computers without authorisation to obtain information to inflict emotional distress.
Each of the four counts carries a maximum possible penalty of five years in prison.
Drew allegedly helped create a fake MySpace account to contact neighbour Megan Meier who thought she was chatting with a 16-year-old boy named Josh Evans."
The prosecutor is just trying to tag as much as possible on this b!tch.
My real name is ‘Tater Salad.
This IS the woman who tricked Megan Mier....The /dotards left that part of the story out.
See background at link: Click here
Be funnier if you said “My name is Glen” (1 n)
The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.
Ah..................the rest of the story!
Well, that would explain it.
I run the content for a heavily traveled web site and the Terms & Conditions pages sometimes have zero hits for weeks on end.
They just want her really bad. Do a search and see what she did. She impersonated a teenage boy, and pushed a 13-year-old neighbor over the edge and she suicided.
An adult did that because of a Girl Feud.
So one wonders if the little girl were some Freeper's daughter, if perhaps this prosecution is relatively merciful..Without even speculating if it were my little girl.
see my 23
Where you sign up and click "agree". You should read that first on any site you sign up to. You should read that before you download and use any "free" software as well. You may inadvertently install spyware on your PC.
I may agree with the broader point that the law is dubious in this case, but Lori Drew is kind of low on my long list of people to weep for. I hope justice (if not the law) is served for this heartless, mean spirited, self absorbed fourty something adolescent.
Yes there is...
That woman is a vile, evil human being who will have to answer for what she did someday.
'My Space' hoax ends with suicide of Dardenne Prairie teen
She told the Meiers that Josh Evans was created by adults, a family on their block. These adults, she told the Meiers, were the parents of Megan's former girlfriend, the one with whom she had a falling out.
LOL! I thought the exact same thing!
I remember a quote here on freerepublic:
“I used to know an Assistant US Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He told me that on his first day on the job, the US Attorney called him into his office and told him to look out the window. Below was a park and dozens of people were walking around. The US Attorney told my friend, ‘You see everyone in that park? They have all committed a federal crime. Your job is to decide who to prosecute.’”
“She impersonated a teenage boy, and pushed a 13-year-old neighbor over the edge and she suicided.”
She didn’t push anyone over any edge and there was no internet bullying. There are laws on the books for both those offenses. The fact that she really did nothing illegal is why these prosecutors are pushing this crap. Oh, it was immoral as hell, but it was no felony.
What people are having a tough time coming to terms with is that a messed up 13-year-old girl could kill herself over a two-week casual but fraudulent internet relationship. Well, she did. The girl was seriously messed up.
Now we have people supporting outlandish legal propositions so they can “get the bitch” who posed as the boy, ramifications be damned.
“Seems like a lot of information is missing about this story.”
Yup. And I bet the devil is in the details...
That would be like complaining that John Hinkley Jr. spent 26 years in a mental hospital because of his love for Jodie Foster.
According to my criminal law proffessor, everyone is guilty of something, everyone should serve a little time. In Texas, the Incarceration State, “Lock Up” is big business!
I can assure you if she were my daughter I would do no such thing as supporting outlandish legal propositions.
..Though she was the injuring agency and was in charge, as the supposed adult.
But none of that would matter.
I would also note that some people on FR are “public persons” and it would destroy their ability to speak or carry out their privates lives if their identity must be made public with their comments.
It also shows that people who value their privacy must become familiar with offshore proxies [1] which have their own pitfalls, or they must use their computer from anonymous wifi service such as found in coffee shops and public places.
[1] http://dir.yahoo.com/Computers_and_Internet/Software/Internet/World_Wide_Web/Servers/Proxies/
Yes, but it still sets a bad precedent.
“My real name is John Trout,
ask me again and I’ll knock your ass out!”
What people are having a tough time coming to terms with is that a messed up 13-year-old girl could kill herself over a two-week casual but fraudulent internet relationship.
But you just called it "Fraud".
That said I agree that new Law does not have to be invented. There are plenty of other hunting licenses available to the prosecutors as it is.
well, I didn’t even know what myspace was. then one day I was randomly searching the internet; my name, most commonly used username, my (ex)wife’s name/username.
then this link came up... my (ex)wife’s username@whatever_in_the_hell_myspace is. So I clicked on it. She looked so pretty with her boyfriend.
To read her blogs about all the time they spent in the hotel together, I had to create a myspace account. No, I didn’t use my real info, no this isn’t satire, and yes I “won” the divorce. But, if I hadn’t been able to do that (ghostSpace)... maybe we’d still be married.... and maybe I would have contracted the VD she picked up.
There’s a tshirt on Tshirthell.com (don’t know if its still available) it says “I’m the teenage girl you had sex with on the internet last night” (or something along those lines) the “model” wearing it is a big fat guy
That kind of delusional thinking used to be called paranoia.
I don’t think it was delusional. And I think you are stretching the meaning of the word paranoia. I don’t think the guy was afraid of them. I think he was making a point.
There is an equally serious and equally real corollary to that statement.
Is this what you mean: Ever since I was in high school (I graduated in 1972) I have believed that one was almost certainly violating some law even if innocently just walking down the street or watching tv in their home. And if I ever became “important enough” “they” would successfully throw me in prison.
I firmly believe that.
Is that what you mean?
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