UK Parliament to ban DoS Attacks

Ian Hill writes "It seems that the UK government is not as technologically withdrawn as you may think. This bill is an amendment to the Computer Misuse Act 1990 which bans Denial of Service attacks by name. It states that a person is guilty of an offence if they cause, or intend to cause, 'degradation, failure or other impairment of function of a computerised system.'"

Comments

Re:Blast it all

[Martin Spamer]

If they changed the wording just a little bit it would make Spammers face charges.

Unsolicited Bulk Email is almost certainly illegal (though untested) under the Section 1 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990 if sending or receipt of UCE is against your AUP/TOS. Any unauthorised access to a computer is illegal under the Computer Misuse Act Section 1.

The problem is enforcement, the Police seem to have neither the inclination nor ability to enforce it.

---
1.--(1) A person is guilty of an offence if--
(a) he causes a computer to perform any function with intent to secure access to any program or data held in any computer;
(b) the access he intends to secure is unauthorised; and
(c) he knows at the time when he causes the computer to perform the function that is the case.
(2) The intent a person has to have to commit an offence under this section need not be directed at--
(a) any particular program or data;
(b) a program or data of any particular kind; or
(c) a program or data held in any particular computer.
(3) A person guilty of an offence under this section shall be liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale or to both.
---

http://www.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts1990/Ukpga_19900 01 8_en_1.htm

Criminal Law not Civil Law

[Martin Spamer]

The Computer Misuse act is criminal law not civil law anybody breaking goes to Prison.

Re:English Law

[nicklott]

In case anyone cares: it's here

Not the UK Government

[RvonG]

The Earl of Northesk who has introduced this Bill is a Conservative peer, and so this is not a Government Bill.
For better or worse it is therefore most unlikely to become law, especially so close to the end of the Parliamentary year. Though if the UK Government notice that there is support for it, they could decide to introduce their own Bill next session, I suppose.

Eh ... no

[00_NOP]

This is not a Government Bill - so has no real chance of getting passed - especially as it has been introduced so late in the session. I don't think it's even had a 2nd Reading debate.

Nice try, guys. But you need to update yourselves on the UK constitution.

Re:Eh ... no

[plaidfishes]

What UK constitution? They don't have one.

Re:UK vs US?

[csmiller]

Except you can only get extradited if the crime you commited *is* a crime in the country you are being extradited from, and you will not be punished more severly in the extraditing country. (Or at least extradition can not be refused in these cases, given reasonable evidence)
For example, most of the EU refuses to extradite suspected murders to the US, unless the US says it will not seek the death sentance. (It is a condition of EU membership to renounce the death penalty)
Simce crashing a P2P server is not a crime in the US, then the US authorites can (and probably will) refuse the extradition.