Access to "hacker's" computer legal?

Well if it helps your thought process, consider that (UK example), some thieves have successfully been awarded damages by hurting themselves or getting hurt in the course of their illegal action by what they have claimed to be dangerous property or being shot by the property owner for example.

In my view, as soon as you commit a crime with intent, you lose all rights against the person to whom your crime was aimed but then i'm neither a laywer or judge, just a reasonable person with commonsense.

David.

Actually if you FIRST try using "reasonable" means to keep them out and then they come back, they have opened themselves up to your wiles. BUT you must FIRST try and stop them from coming in...someone walks in your front door and leaves when you tell them to, you lock it and they break it down, you have the right to stop them because they are then "breaking" in and you would have the expectation that they could then escalate that to involve you or others in your home. If however they do NOT advance towards you, you are stuck and cannot do anything to them. Same thing with the computer hacker, if he comes back after you have put up some security and just stays there, then you have the right to exclude but not harm them. If HOWEVER they try to damage your info/computer/etc. then you have the right to protect yourself from that same damage. That could then involve damaging their computer.

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With today's low-life lawyers you would be guilty of causing mental distress to the person breaking into your system and have to support him the rest of his life.

I agree. Its no different to any othe crime - just because tealeaf X nicks your wallet, doen't mean you're ok to pinch his telly.

Actually, the "hacker" use is wrong - you are referring to crackers and skript kiddiez. Or haven't you every "hacked" something together with duct tape - because that's all you have handy at the moment?

In some legal jurisdictions, yes. Other jurisdictions may have different definitions, or none at all.

Do you normally solicit medical advice from the clerk at the grocery check out line? Then why are you soliciting legal advice from Usenet? Consult your lawyer.

Probably - but consult your lawyer

Do you have kids? Haven't you heard the argument "(s)he started it first" when you tell them to stop {fighting|screaming|what-ever} often enough? Does that "reason" make any difference? Why do you think it might make a difference in the legal system? The black-hat accessing your LAN/computer is not a threat of gross bodily harm - so that exception is irrelevant.

What jurisdiction? You are posting from a Verizon address to a Usenet newsgroup that is read around the world. Personally, I rather doubt it, but the only way you'll know for sure is to ask a lawyer who is licensed by your state.

Old guy

I get this disgusted feeling every time I read one of these "is it legal?" type of questions. What bothers me is that it's almost always the wrong question. What you should be asking is "is it right?". Are your proposed actions morally and ethically correct? Is anyone going to be hurt by your actions? Is there damage being done? You should be able to answer these within the framework of your own common sense, good judgement, and assorted teachings from skool, church, temple, guru, messiah, or parents. Once you have made that determination, then you can ask "is it legal". You will then discover that the fine print of legality only matters to lawyers and criminals who want to get away with something by squeezing through loop holes and oversights in the law. If you cannot make such a common sense judgement, then I suggest you consult someone you respect that can deliver a proper lecture on ethics, and forget about consulting an attorney. For example, put yourself in the "hackers" shoes and predict how you would respond. If it feels wrong, don't do it.

Laws are written because people do not know how to act. If you have no knowledge of ethics or common sense, no amount of laws is going to teach you right from wrong. If it's ethically or morally wrong, you need no lawyer or law to remind you that it's wrong.

Hear hear.

It appears that Moe Trin shook an Etch A Sketch before scribbling:

I wasn't actually looking for legal advice, I was looking for what people

*thought* about this. As you said, jurisdiction controls what, if any, penalty is handed out. I was wondering what people's opinions were. From your response, it would appear your opinion is "ask someone else" which is exacly what I was doing.

It appears that Jeff Liebermann shook an Etch A Sketch before scribbling:

See my above response. I was soliciting opinons rather than a strict legal definition. I realize that certain laws have loopholes while others are a catch-22. In this vein, I was wondering how people intepreted the "illegal access" laws that, when badly written, can actually make it possible to penalize someone trying to determine the identity of a legal or illegal network user.

And again, thank you for your opinion. It demonstrates how many different ways a question can be answered.

I purposely quoted your original post above.

or whether it's even a crime in the first place. In several states in the USA, it's a felony - the recent post relating to the guy charged in St. Petersburg, Florida was arrested for such. The Federal Communications Commission regulations could be interpreted in the same way, but I haven't heard of any such instance. The one case I am aware of, the perp was nailed under federal espionage charges - even if he could have been charged for breaking into a computer. It's been a while, but I vaguely recall that when arrested, he was _charged_ with everything down to illegal parking, and breathing on a Wednesday, but a lot of the charges were dropped before the trial.

My _personal_ opinion is that it is wrong, and _probably_ illegal, but my opinion isn't going to carry any weight what-so-ever with any court except where I might be on a jury - and I'd really try to avoid tainting any debate in the jury room based on that opinion, preferring to try to reach a decision based on the evidence produced in the court room during the trial.

Opinions are great - everyone should have one. But in legal matters, the only opinion that is meaningful is the one from those who are legally certified in those legal matters.

Old guy

Well, that's about all you're going to get in a newsgroup that has no users with legal expertise.

Oh that's easy enough. Commiting a crime in order to "identify" a criminal is itself a crime. You can't use one crime to justify another. If you think someone is hacking your system, and you are able to hack into their system, they are within their rights to press charges. In most cases, the judge will only give passing consideration to your good intentions.

The most visible example was when Randall Schwartz, author of Perl, was working for Intel in Oregon doing programming. He decided to help determine if the company's network was secure. Instead of Intel thanking him for uncovering security flaws, they pressed charges:

not a perfect example of what happens to good guys that hack, it's close enough to your thinking to merit consideration.

Well, the original question was rather general. If you want specifics, you should narrow the scope of the question.

As I said before, you're asking the wrong question. If you had asked if it is *RIGHT* to hack into someones system for whatever purposes, the answer would have been much simpler and easier. Whatever the law thinks or says is secondary.

At 20:47:39 on 22/07/2005, f/fgeorge delighted alt.internet.wireless by announcing:

That's incorrect. You can use reasonable force to remove them if they refuse to leave, whether or not the door was locked or wide open.

That is a FACT, especially here in Florida.