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Busted For Using Library Wi-Fi Outside The Library
sevej writes "Keith Shaw, in his weekly column "Wireless Computing Devices" (Network World Fusion), reported on a recent entry in AKMA's Random Thoughts where AKMA was using a public WiFi network outside of a library. A policeman approached him and asked that he only access the Internet from within the Library and hinted that Federal Laws against "signal theft" were applicable. Oh, and btw, we're not talking about a person that looked like your stereotypical 'hacker'; AKMA is an ordained priest."
I wonder how the police officee knew the priest was using wi-fi? A wi-fi sniffer or something like this?
Enter the crackdown... :)
"True refinement seeks simplicity."
Of what... the church of Emacs?
:-)
Sorry... had to
The signal itself was not stolen, it was the receiver's bandwidth.
Now, had they secured their Airport, they would not had it vampirized.
And I am not sure the inside/outside concept applies to a radio signal...
Trolling using another account since 2005.
I would have asked the officer for his FCC badge.
Don't Vote for Norm Dicks! http://www.nodicks2008.com Another nutless dirtbag that voted for the FISA bill!
He should have replied that since it was a public access point that he was in his rights to use it in a public area (namely outside the library)
"A policeman approached him and asked that he only access the Internet from within the Library"
What if the guy wasn't using the Internet but was editing his site and was looking at the preview? (this was not the case but what if)
Have you metaroderated recently?
He didn't. He assumed and even when he knew AKMA wasn't using wifi, he still told him to leave.
Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin'.
Why would a public access point at a public library need an access key? If they had one he could have just gone inside and got it and gone back outside and wound up in the same situation.
Have you metaroderated recently?
The big thing here is that he wasn't "busted" he was simply "asked" not to. If he were actually busted we'd get a chance for this to come across a judge and have a ruling.
Don't Tread on Me
From the article: I responded, "But this is a radio signal thing -- it's not like a cable connection, it's like someone has a porch light on and I'm sitting on the bench, reading a book by their light. I'm not stealing their light."
These are nowhere analogous,you are stealing bandwidth when u use WiFi this way,but its not the same with light which anyway is gonna illuminate the bench without an added effort to the wattage.
fifteen jugglers, five believers
Oh, and btw, we're not talking about a person that looked like your stereotypical 'hacker'; AKMA is an ordained priest.
What are you advocating here exactly? That police officers are more justified to harrass some because of their look? Or that the law is less applicable to some people because of their job? With ignorant, prejudicial comments like this who needs rights eh? Let's just roundup all those who look like they may cause trouble and be done with it...
Looks, job, race, gender, etc should have nothing to do with the law and law enforcement. Laws and rights apply to everyone equally.
I held up my TiBook, pointing to the zero lines in the Airport icon, and showed the officer that my card was off.
"Why don't you just close that up, sir, or use your computer elsewhere?'
Quite apart from the signal stealing part, isn't the fact that the cop asks him to move on a bit worrying? He's demonstrably not breaking the law and is sitting on public land. Are they just going to ban using laptops with wifi cards near any wireless point?
It's a public, wireless network. It's nothing to do with being protected - what's to stop you connecting inside, then walking outside to enjoy the sunshine? The point was that you're only allowed to use the public, wireless network within a defined area - like suggesting you can't listen to an AM radio signal from another country because they haven't paid licencing fees in your area.
IIRC there have been many lawsuits upheld on the basis of if the signal enters your property it's public domain. Otherwise people could say that company was liable to pay them to access their airspace and such. That's why decoders were technically legal for so long.
Now the DMCA makes it illegal to decode those signals.
Now I dont understand why some landowner who owns huge tracts have not sued the satilite broadcasters for using their airspace as a transmission medium again and ask for royalties and why cities have not charged tarriffs since they're essentially getting a free ride over the airwaves. If it was fiber optics buried in the ground they'd pay.
Being an ordained priest does not put you above the law - as Catholics are beginning to discover...
Film at 11.
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
Actually, that's a good point. We're thinking "jerk policeman picking on innocent geek", but it might have undercurrents of "jerk policemen who hates priests picking on innocent geek who is a priest". We probably need to get over the idea that certain occupations are automatically respected (priests, doctors, COBOL programmers, etc).
In fact in this case I'm disinclined to think it was a factor; Occam's razor and all that. But it's a viewpoint to consider. Doesn't make the cop any less of a jerk, of course.
I have discovered a truly remarkable
Now that's just great, now we're slashdotting a priest....
He's still got glasses and wears all black. Sounds like probable cause to me.
I'm joking, in case you can't tell.
This message was brought to you by the death of 30 brain cells.
I don't think it was a factor either, it just bothers me that people are jumping up and down and screaming about civil liberties, and adding the fact that he was a priest to it as disclaimer; the law applies to everyone, (possible not the COBOL programmers..) and even if he was Mother bl**dy Teresa, I'd expect Police to question if an illegal activity was taking place.
Seriously...where was this at? I read his site and didn't see where he's from.
I smell something very fishy here BTW. He showed the cop the second time that he wasn't connecting to anywhere and yet the cop told him to move along. Move along? He was on a bench on public land just looking at his computer! The cop had no right to tell him to move along!
Two sides to every story I suppose, but would be interesting to call the police station and get their take on it...if only I knew where this was all taking place.
Also, where is this story reported from? The submitter of the story said "Keith Shaw, in his weekly column" yet the link just goes to an index where I can't find anything on AKMA...nor does it even show up on a search of the site!
"Music is everybody's possession. It's only publishers who think that people own it." - John Lennon.
Or watching the Olympic coverage on the internet because NBC paid millions and don't want people to watch it without ads?
503 Sig Unavailable
The Signature could not be accessed. Please try again later or contact the administrator
Take that!
erm... Reverend.
Game... blouses.
I was at a party last week and a guy is talking to my friend
guy : "... we noticed someone was sucking our bandwidth via the wifi, cut him off, looked outside and saw a red BWM with a laptop on the passenger seat drive away"
friend : "hehe that's him," points at me.
busted !
ah, the perils of wardriving.
I thought wardriving was going to be an interesting hobby, got all the kit - wifi-card, laptop, inverter, usb gps.
I drove 2 miles from my house to my friends and on the way discovered 30 access points along the main road !
Turns out urban wardriving is just too easy here in the UK.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
stars!
Here is the law .Refer (a)(2)(C)
fifteen jugglers, five believers
I'm really getting tired of these "it's like stealing..." analogies. Between the MPAA and The Airwave NAZIs, I'm beginning to wonder if people REALLY understand technology at all...
The Airwave Nazis will say something similar to the cop in blog posting listed in the article above. Something along the lines of "It's like stealing somebodies cable or walking up and plugging in your hairdryer to the electrical outlet on the outside of their home"
NO, it's NOT.
The priest in the article likened it to reading off their porchlight,which is a pretty good analogy. I prefer to say that it is more along the lines of tossing your empty bottle into someones trashcan they have set to the curb without a lid (it may not be "polite" and *some* people might not appreciate it too much....but you're not "stealing" their trash service by doing so). If someone gets so upset at the idea that someone passing by might throw their empty coke bottle into their beloved garbage can, they can simply put a lid on it (which would discourage most would be bottle-throwers) or, in the analogy, the WiFi AP owner could simply turn on WEP (which would discourage most would be bandwidth users).
Regardless of the analogy, it simply is not "stealing", no matter what some judge decided.
Theft of service, my ass.
IMHO, how the hell can it be possible to even be stopped for recieving radio signals? If I listen to my personal radio, is this illegal? What if I'm afflicted by this http://www.answers.google.com/answers/threadview?i d=367925
and end up recieving gibberish network traffick or radio signals?
Isn't the bigger issue here what the TOS of the library is for their internet use? If the TOS says that you have to use it within their facility, then that's that. Just because it's a public resource doesn't mean that it's a free for all and you can do whatever you want. Not that it has to make any sense obviously.
It's not that strange that he was *asked* not to use the service outside the library, they probably wan't to keep better track of who's using it (even just for statistics).
:)
Encrypting wouldn't help much as they would have to give out the key anyway it being a public access point and I suspect possible solutions would be complicated in technical and financial terms.
I don't think that being a minister means he can do whatever he pleases as it'll always be for the "good". Actually ministers can be very dangerous persons with far worst effects than many (h|cr)ackers.
As for being an officially ordained minister, well anyone can be such a creature, just pop over to http://www.cafepress.com/subgen.8403744 and fork out $30 to the Church of the SubGenius!
Often, police are right, and where they are doing their jobs within the letter and spirit, I'll support them. But sometimes, they can just end up taking a position. The bit where he was told to "move along", I'd have asked the officer for his badge number, name and the law that I was infringing.
Come on guys, lets try to have titles that are at least close to being accurate. He wasn't busted, he was asked politely by an officer (who didn't even stay to make sure he remained offline) to only access the signal inside the library. Minor difference between the two.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
It doesn't sound to me like the policeman was being a jerk. From the description on the site, he was polite, if rather clueless about technology.
I'm also an ordained priest and the law never cut me any slack.
-a
"The library was closed at the time, or else I'd have gone ahead in to finish my surfing."
Just a thought: if the library puts up a sign (inside ofcourse) that you can use the internet. Does it mean you can keep on using it, outside the building, after that library closes?
I think the point in mentioning that he's a priest isn't to say the law doesn't apply to him but that he probably has a good moral character and isn't likely to be doing something malicious. That's not to say that he does have good morals but it's expected of him just because of the position he holds.
He really doesn't seem to be doing anything illegal. If he is then this story just points out that the law is flawed and needs to be changed.
I'd be especially worried if Mother Teresa was doing it. I'm sure there's a law about dead people operating laptops.
Please remember the percentage of bad cops is proportionate to the percentage of bad citizens- perhaps a little higher. With little pay and very little respect from the general public, the only incentive beyond pure altruism I can see for becoming a cop is the power trip.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
here is the link to the nantucket police department. http://www.nantucket-ma.gov/departments/police.htm l
Now you, yes you, can ring the Nantucket PD and spew your very own, real life, Wi-Fi related verbal flamebait at a policeman close to you. He'll be even closer once they trace your call, and bust _your_ ass for hacking into their phones by dialling them.
Don't miss out on this exciting new opportunity!
in the UK, NTL cable broadband's shipping Actiontec wireless routers to punters with new broadband installs. No security by default, either on the wifi connection or on the router setup page. This particular type of router also logs all URLs you look at: hence by just sitting in my garden I can see what a naughty boy some guy called \\MIKE who lives nearby is - point a browser at his router's IP and away you go.
You can't steal what's being given away for free.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
Stupid cop gets the law wrong, picks on priest, gets his own Slashdot story to himself. Obviously there is no law pertaining to laptop use in public, the priest was moved on anyway. The cop got it wrong, and instead of realising and apologising, he did what every authority figure does and simply insist he is right, period, and wait for the other person to back down.
It probably happens all around the world every second, its the nature of law enforcement.
Meine Schwester ist sehr, sehr reizvoll - Nietzsche
The policeman's conduct was perfect, he followed orders. The real point here is a federal law that stops you from using WiFi outside, or the fact that it's interpreted that way.
I'm sorry if I haven't offended anyone
Loitering with intent is more generally a crime, though.
I prefer to say that it is more along the lines of tossing your empty bottle into someones trashcan they have set to the curb without a lid (it may not be "polite" and *some* people might not appreciate it too much....but you're not "stealing" their trash service by doing so).
It might not be theft, but if I pay for trash service by the pound, you have now cost me more money. And isn't that the issue (or at least in this context). It is not a "victimless" crime if you are causing any lessening of service or increased charges on the person whose bandwidth you're utilizing. Plus the bigger issue is something along the lines of "if you leave your front door open and I come strolling in, don't take anything, read your magazines, sleep in your bed (but make sure it's in whatever state I found it) (and no, my name isn't goldylocks) does it make it not a crime since I haven't "stolen" anything. Obviously not, we have laws about tresspassing because we have the concept of peoples "property", or more correctly an entities "property" (where the entity can be a person, organization, etc).
So you may be technically more correct by saying that "theft" is a bad analogy. So how does tresspassing grab you then?
Who collected his juice in a bucket...
Meine Schwester ist sehr, sehr reizvoll - Nietzsche
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Politely? Bullshit. Put down the badge and the gun and try asking again. The fucking pig even lied about the "signal theft" bit.
Fuck the police. Maybe they should spend less time policing 802.11b access point issues and stop some real crime.
like shareware there can be rules for free things.
30-days trial periods for example.
and if I don't lock my bike, you COULD take it. it's right there, but still I don't want you to. unless you're one of my friends, but that changes the rules.
so perhaps you are allowed to use that wifi point for free... if you're a member of that library.
Privacy is terrorism.
Later the same day the policeman was excommunicated for praying outside his local church.
It doesn't sound to me like the policeman was being a jerk. From the description on the site, he was polite, if rather clueless about technology.
Ah, so as long as they do it nicely, it's ok for the state to violate a person's rights? If only those officers had kept their language civil, that whole Rodeny King case would never have been a problem, eh?
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
You must be new here.
8 of 13 people found this answer helpful. Did you?
"Keep the sending and receiving end looking straight. We have one friend who wears a priest's outfit to ship and receive dope. In fact, every time we see nuns or priests on the street, we assume they're outlaws just on their way to the next deal or bombing." -- Steal This Book
No disrespect meant towards (MOST) priests, just the first thing that came to mind...
Banaaaana!
Yes, Chief,
he was loitering on a bench in the park.
A Nony Mouse
Other than physical notice like signs or TOS agreements, is there a current way to advertise "this is a public WiFi network" over the network itself? Obviously if the library wanted they could post a sign outside that said the network was public access. But what if you want to run a public spot from your house? or apartment? A sign isn't going to be seen by everyone.
If there is no current convention, maybe it could be done by, say, sending a periodic broadcast packet on a specific port with a text message. "This network is public access" or something. Maybe there needs to be an RFC?
I hold it, that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing. -- Thomas Jefferson
for a modern "Bells of St. Mary's".
In the old movie, Bing was priest who was cool because he could sing pop songs. I'm thinking that a priest who uses words like "h4x0r" in his blog is a twenty-first century equivalent.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I read a story about a similar issue (just several decades ago), where someone used someone elses electric power (i.e. ran two wires from his power line). The argument back then was that nothing was stolen because all the electrons taken away were promptly returned.
As a result the law was updated so that this particular behavior became illegal (something most of us would agree with). In this case the definition of theft had to be updated. The law did not mandate that all power line are to be buried under 10 feet thick concrete (to make them secure).
Now we have many folks hooking up wLAN access points who don't know how to properly configure them, essentally leaving them open. I've read numerous stories about war driving/flying/biking/sailig/whatever here on slashdot.
So most commons (who don't know how to encrypt wLAN but want an access point) will be very happy about this new definition of theft. This may lead to some funny results (as TFA helps to point out) but most of us will understand what the point of this law is and find it agreeable.
Result: expect this law to remain and to be extended to most places. In some cases courts will have to decide whether a particular case is theft or not.
NOT Interesting !!
Busted: Caught breaking rules
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
We need to fight this BS. IF we allow these morons to slap us down now they will claim presdent later. We need the EFF to publish when its ok and when its not to connecto a public wifi basestation. If you set up an open basestation and allow anyone to connect and dont event attempt to any security (ala wep) then you have asked people to come take part in your bandwidth give away. If you dont want to allow me acess.. ignore my 2.4Ghz signal. My radio is FCC compliant (unfortunailty) so the pigs can ge stuffed. wifi is unregulated.. if your under power they dont get a vote! Its up to them to protect their network.. not you to avoid it!
No one else seems to have pointed out the obvious problem here. He was briefed on this by the Secret Service. I always thought that the Secret Service has jurisdiction over Presidential protection and counterfeiting (and other currency-related crimes) ONLY. So what is the Secret Service doing given local cops advice about WiFi theft?
Apparently I was wrong. Looking at the Secret Service website, apparently a newer expansion of their mission covers "computer and electronic communications fraud." This would seem to make sense to me only insofar as it is an extension of their powers to investigate crimes relating to the banking and currency systems. It looks as though the Secret Service has extended their authority through aggressive interpretation of their mandate. Doesn't that bother anyone else?
Since he is a Wi-Fi user is his parish the Church Immaculate Reception?
Policemen are aware of lates technologies? ooh great! Even more surprising , they are up2date with tha laws governing the latest technologies.
Iam sure this kind of awareness wouldnt be present in all countries.They may hav new laws for techcrimes, but the law enforcers would hardly hav any knowledge of the latest techs.
bye
P.S:
Does any of you know if it is possible to change the font color in slashdot comments posted? i know font tags cant be used..but any cracker/hacker figured out whether possible?
OOps!iam no hacker!
Why does yahoo do this
LOL! BAndwidth utilization does not change with physical distance from the acces point. Either the packet gets there, or it doesn't. It doesn't change size as it goes.
what's to stop you connecting inside, then walking outside to enjoy the sunshine?
The rules. If the library is providing the bandwidth, and ask you nicely to only use it within the library, then you have no right to not comply with the request. Sure, you can ask, and they may even say yes - but you should ask, and respect their wishes if they say no.
you're only allowed to use the public, wireless network within a defined area
But it's not public. It's publicly owned and funded, but it is provided for library patrons only, and then only for use within the library itself. Yes, the library could expend more time, effort and money putting technological restrictions in place to force the issue, but why should they have to?
Look at it this way - if I leave my house unlocked, and someone walks in and steals stuff, it's still a crime. Sure, I'll have trouble claiming on the insurance, and sure, I'd have been an idiot, but the guy(s) would still be liable for prosecution, if caught.
Just because you *can* do something doesn't mean that you *should*. Is it really that hard to abide by the library's wishes? Hell, if you do, you may even be able to use their electricity rather than run off your battery.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Know any near wandsworth?
just kidding
Seriously these days just driving around is more than enough to surf the net.I might as well ask my isp to cancel my account.
Wanted : A Signature.
Libraries have rules on what their patrons can browse on the web, right? How can the ensure this if you roam around outside?
No, AM radio is a receive-only process. Straw argument.
So, are we saying that this person was running around in his priestly robes or his Roman collar, or some other garb that would have made him easily identified? Last time I checked, a priest in street clothes looks just like any other Joe on the street.
For that matter, I'm an ordained minister myself. Only cost me $30.
IANAL but,
A public library is paid for by the people,
if he is a tax paying citizen of the USA - he has every right to use it.
Should he not use the roads to and from the library too?
He is using highway 'bandwidth' by driving on the road...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
My question is, was this person still on library property? I don't know about this particular library, but many of the ones I visit have an outside area to sit and read the books you just checked out. So, if he was still on the library's property, isn't he still "in the library"?
And another thought (random as it may be) doesn't he, as a taxpaying citizen (yes church folk still have taxes) have a right to use a public access wiFi connection? After all, it's offered as a free service to the public, not just some of the public.
Now if he was doing something malicious (hacking their server, sending spam), perhaps the police have a point, but for general use, I don't see how simply accessing a public connection is a problem.
He told him that he wasn't allowed to use his laptop in a public place, that makes him a jerk in my opinion.
Ok, I'll admit up front I didn't read the article. I did, however, do a quick google search and found that the Keith Shaw listed on this page: http://www.nwfusion.com/events/wlan/index.html is a journalist who has WiFi knowledge. If you do a reverse lookup on the contact number for the organizers at the bottom of the page it turns our that he's probably in MARLBORO, Massachusetts.
Anybody feel like calling the cops there to find out if this is the case and what their side of the story is?How can the ensure this if you roam around outside?
Same way they do it if you're sitting with your laptop in a quiet corner with your back to the wall. They can't look over your shoulder to see what you're up to, so they'd have to use technical means.
So we have someone stopped from using WIFI outside a public library and in a related event, another public library has stopped people from using Mobiles while inside the Library. You are in a loose-loose situation here. Welcome to the 21st Century Luddites Everywhere. Perhaps there is a case for libraries & other places that provide open WIFI access points to provide a room where general access to the WIFI net is allowed as well as permitting the use of Mobiles at the same time.
I'd rather be riding my '63 Triumph T120.
If they don't want people hijacking their signal, why don't they just use some magic wallpaper on the outer walls?
My only regret... is that I have... bonitis..
she can pass any law she likes, doesnt mean its legal.
for example, she could pass a law requiring everyone in the city to personally give her 1 dollar a day. no court would ever uphold such a law as its blatantly illegal.
let her pass her stupid law, then sue her into oblivion. get a lot of press coverage, publically embarass her until she resigns and hides under a rock for the rest of her life.
wanted faster download times to himself. How else is it possible for him to get that "child photography"?
I think it is perfectly fine to put conditions on the "free" wi-fi service. The condition being that you have to be inside the library. That is perfectly acceptable. If this gentleman does not want to accept those conditions, priest or not, he is wrong. This is not some big thing to get worked up about. This would be like, putting up your own satellite dish and getting the signal for free.
I hate sigs.
Did someone say yet that this is just a matter of maybe amending a couple laws and educating law enforcement? Maybe. It's new. Who cares? As a practical matter, it has gotta end up being something along the lines of secured vs. unsecured resources, similar perhaps to another public space called hmmm... the web? Anything else will fail in the courts and become a mute anyway. Note however, that I would not want to be the test case myself :-)
Other comments:
What does airwaves have to do with it? This is a public space, where or what it is doesn't matter.
Why does it matter that this guy is a priest? Or does that have something to do with the "child photography" thing?
Cops make mistakes, just like, ummm...humans. They aren't lawyers.
It is fair for providers to insist that customers secure their wireless hubs or not use them.
My brother in law is a civil engineer. His pet peeve is that somebody will get hurt when a porch railing collapse, and the local authorities will amend the building code to require that porch railings be built stronger. Except that the problem was that the railing didn't meet code to begin with. Then carpenters will scratch their heads and ask him whether a railing they just built is strong enough.
His solution is the "butt test". Take the biggest guy you have on site. Stand next to him a couple feet away from the rail, and fall backwards so your butts land on the rail at the same time. If this doesn't make you nervous, then the railing is strong enough.
This situation is pretty much analagous to a lot of cyberlaws. They're supposed to "clarify" things but all they do is create a bunch of new restrictions everyone has to learn to steer their way around. It all gets muddled up in the average person (or cop's head) to the point where they are n't sure what is legal or not. It probably never makes sense to propose a law to "clarify" anything, at least until the courts have had a crack at the situation. Prosecutors are pretty creative at finding ways to do this, and if the courts get it wrong, then it's time for a new law. Programs can be created to educate police and prosecutors on strategies for using existing laws. But that would (a) take longer, (b) appear to be more expensive and (c) doesn't sound as good. It sounds better to say "I wrote a law to stop kiddie porn over the Internet", than "I sponsored a program to teach law enforcement how to use the law against people trafficking in kiddie porn on the Internet." Create an educational program points out the (true) fact that you can't do anything directly about kiddie porn, you're one step removed from the actual action.
I should point out reason (d), though: new laws are a chance to change the way the law works to favor one party or another.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
No, AM radio is a receive-only process. Straw argument.
Actually, no its not. The airwaves actually belong to the people to begin with. I believe there are rulings indicating that if something is broadcast, you have the right to receive it, which is why radar detectors are legal in alot of states. The spectrum that wifi acts in is also unlicensed, so you can broadcast without a license as well.
If this is true, then why did a POLICE OFFICER show up on the scene to ask the person to follow library guidelines? If it is a matter of a general rule, not even a local law, then the police have no jurisdiction. It could be MUCH easier to just have a sign outside saying "Library rules require that wireless access to our LAN must be done solely from within the library" or something to that affect, or else have a library personell request it (if they have this kind of an incident, a security guard for the library would be within his bounds to do what this officer did). But to have the police come to enforce a rule like this is not only ludacris, but it is borderline harassment.
If you can't say something nice, make sure you have something heavy to throw.
USA amateur radio has a frequency allocation from 2390 MHz to 2450 MHz FCC Part 97.301a pdf
802.11 2.4GHz frequencies are:
Channel Frequency
1 2401-2423
2 2404-2428
3 2411-2433
4 2416-2438
5 2421-2443
6 2426-2448
7 2431-2453
8 2436-2458
9 2441-2463
10 2446-2468
11 2451-2473
So any 802.11b channel other than channel 11 overlaps licensed spectrum. The implications are:
1. any 802.11 user who causes interference to a licensed amateur radio operator must stop causing interference even if it means turning off the device
2. Licensed amateur radio operators could build some high power wireless networks for amateur radio use as long as they only use channels 1 thru 6 and follow the FCC regulations governing amateur radio.
. there used to be a sig here.....
Cellphones work on the assumption that the radio frequencies used are to have the same operative security from snooping as wireline communications. This is one of the reasons that radio scanners have the cellphone frequencies blocked out. Computer networking relies on wireline transport. Wi-Fi transport is relatively new. Even though the signal passes through the walls and outside, if the operational policy of the library (run by the city or county), who runs and maintains the AP, states that you have to be within the physical building to use the services, they are within their right to ask the local gendarme to ask the errant user to quit. Since they would have the ability to control who plugs in a ethernet cable into a public router, the same idea here should apply here to the wireless side. AFAIK, the FCC has not transported the cellular telephone privacy idea to Wi-Fi. It would be interesting to see if some deep-pockets spread some dead-president lubricant on the FCC to enact the philosophy or worse yet, having Wi-Fi ports be licensed with the usual outrageous wallet tapping. If those thieves do that, then I drop my Part 15 operation and switch over to Part 97 operation using VPN.
Ah, but the key thing to remember here is that it was not an agent of the library. It was not even in response to an agent of the library.
A uniformed policeman who had been told by the secret service that "theft of signal" was a new form of crime. Said officer informed this individual that he was committing a crime and needed to move on.
The article doesn't even say if the library thinks their open wi-fi should be accessible to people sitting on that particular park bench.
This is not a case of violating the rules of the access point. This is a case of someone deciding that the entire category of hooking up to a wi-fi point is a crime and informing the person they were in violation. To the point that using a computer in a vicinity of a wi-fi without actually using the wi-fi is cause to be moved along.
Any arguments about the library being able to enforce their own rules are mostly irrelevant since we have no idea what the libraries rules/stance on this actually are. [OK, in some of the follow up posts they posted rules about when they'd have the access point open ].
Cheers
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I'm pretty confident that beating people is considered impolite in most places.
I am not a Lawyer, but I am a US Citizen with the inherent responsibilities that entails. (I posted a comment to the following effect in reply to Akma's thread)
Akma passed up a slow ball thrown by God in the game of Good vs. Evil on this one. As my good friend Henry Davis Thereau would have been quick to point out, a bit of Civil Disobedience was called for and quite appropriate here. This is exactly the kind of situation that could have resulted in a nationally publicised arrest that resuts in exposure of the Law's absurdity and education of the masses that might
I have noticed a large number of people arguing about Akma's analogy regarding the porch light and claiming that a person standing in the light doesn't take up any bandwidth. Really? Perhaps these people have never noticed a shadow? Even in the case of a light directly overhead, if one looks within themselves for the answer so to speak, they will realize that they are eating up light bandwidth in the geophysical location they occupy. Bits and people move at different rates to be sure, but wherever the [person as bit] goes, there they are, eating up light bandwidth!
If noone else needs to stand where I am when I'm there, does it effect anyone that I am eating up that bandwidth. Things get complicated and philisophical from here, but it should be reasonaby clear that his analogy holds quite well to those who couldn't see it before at this point.
Of course, being a preist accused of possibly downloading child porn, perhaps he had good reason to throw his civil rights out the window and bow and pray to the powers that be (just a rhetorical comment to make my point Akma, and I realize that you are not Catholic.) The point is this
This would have made such a great case on so many levels, I can only hope he has what it takes to go back there, throw open his laptop, and wait for a cop to try it again so that he can tell the him or her to go fsck himself
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
if this was in the USA, actually thanks to HBO in 1981 it is NOT illegal the officer was completely wrong. the law is very clear on this. It is not illegal to take any signal out of the air. it is however illegal to decrypt a signal. That is why HBO ended up having to scramble their signals. They were sueing provate satellite dish owners and manufacturers for copyright infringement. The US supreme court held that if it was not encrypted, it was indeed public domain.
Secondly, the FCC has detemined certain channels to be public use. the 2.4 gig range used by WI/Fi is among those.
New and improved Guilt. Now its alcohol soluble!
So from the article I assertain that:
a) our friend the priest was accessing a PUBLIC WIFI AP
b) it was from a Library offering PUBLIC NET access
c) it is illegal (according to Boss Hog) to access a PUBLIC ACCESS spot (even though the range allows you to) from outside that building.
You know it makes me wonder, how many of these laws are real. The articles author could have hopped into the library to look it up. It would not at all surprise me to see that no law exists concerning Public WIFI AP's.
Ok true people have dl'd kiddie pr0n on other peoples bandwidth but still. The ones doing that aren't going to stop because now it's a Federal Law.
I would have searched for that law. Printed it out and had I found nothing even remotely close. I would have told Boss Hog he was harrasing me and to shuffle his way down to Dunkin Donuts.
I am not one who hates Police and thinks they are all "The Man".
They are there for our protection, and I applaud them for the job they do.Yet I also wonder how many of them, create these imaginary laws and tell people well it's a such and such law you cant do this. People may argue, but like the blog stated "you can explain it to the Cheif if ya like", so he has threatened to arrest this Priest on possibly an imaginary charge. My bet would be that if the Priest did not cease and he went before the Magistrate it would have been something completely different than accessing a public wifi spot outside a library.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
I gotta go with the cop on this one. Ya, the wi-fi leeching is probably not illegal, but it is using a free public service in a way that was not intended.
But the idea of a priest hanging around a parking lot with all those kids coming and going...
Seriously though, he wasn't "busted". He has not been whisked away by a black van filled with ski-masked villians to a classified prison. He wasn't even arrested. Hell, he didn't get a freaking parking ticket. A lone cop allegedly asked him to stop doing something which may or may not have been illegal, perhaps as an excuse just to engage him in conversation and make sure he was on the up-and-up.
Someone re-file this under "Whining About Trivial Annoyances", and leave YRO for the occasional legitimate problem.
Apple don't own the "AirPort" trademark in Japan; it's owned by another company, IO-DATA. Apple's wireless hardware is therefore marketed as the "AirMac" range.
In fact, the very laptop on which I am typing this is an iBook with a Japanese-issue Air(Mac|Port) card. The US model gets 11 channels, the EU 13, and the Japanese version can utilise all 14. Not too bad!
If your comment title says 'Re: Foo', I'm not likely to read it.
This is just the beginning. See our "rights", held up so highly in plain view by the present pundits and politicians, be slowly destroyed by terrorist rhetoric.
Please be sure to speak out BEFORE they slap the cuffs on you, or you'll never be heard.
Stop the present administration ANY WAY YOU CAN, and preserve that which it means most to be American, namely our FREEDOMS.
IF YOU DON'T VOTE,YOU ARE VOTING FOR SUPPRESSION AND IMPERIALISM.
Library = Public Building Library WiFi = Public WiFi Priest = Public Ok so just tell the officer you are paing for it.
Well, these posts certainly show that people can come up with enough bad or improper analogies to "prove" how wireless access compares to tangible property.
It's easy to come up with pointless analogies. For example, I was in an art museum with pamphlets that describe the work in each gallery. Some of the bins were marked "Free - take one", some were marked "Please donate 50 cents", and many were not marked at all. Most times, in our society, pamphlets are free - but not always. Should one presume that the unmarked ones are free, not free, or do you always have to ask first?
The fact is, most computer-based resources (wifi, windows file sharing) offer somewhat weak but clearly available access control mechanisms (passwords, WEP encryption, MAC based filtering, splash page with terms and conditions, etc). In these cases, I would argue that choosing not to use an access control mechanism is tantamount to making access public BECAUSE unsecured access was designed to allow public access.
Another unclear analogy would be, do you always look for a sign saying "This store is open and you are welcome to enter" before shopping? Chances are, if it's the middle of the day, you just go in. You wouldn't try to pick the lock, but if the door is open and the lights are on, you would presume you are welcome to enter.
Take a look, for example, at Windows File sharing in XP. I have no sympathy for people who distribute viruses and worms to break into computers and steal data. But I also have no sympathy for someone who says "hey, I didn't know all my files were out in the open" when they had to click through four or five windows saying "This will allow other people to see your files!" to do that - particularly since public file shares are such a useful feature that people will often intentionally want to use. Same for wifi - it's now a mature technology. There's no excuse to not set it up properly for what you intend to do with it.
More often than not, the Dutch language reveals its bastard origins as a mere dialect derived from German and English:
"Kijk en luistergeld"
Kijk -> Guck(German) (colloq. for Schauen)
en -> und(German), and(English)
Luister -> Listen(English)
Geld -> Geld(German)
which means "kijk en luistergeld" is a "Guck und Hoergeld" which would, properly germanized, boil down to "Schau- und Horchgeld", which translates to "Watch and Listen Fee". Nowadays no anglosaxon would actually describe a concept like that with words like these, but when I switch to German thinking mode, I kind of like the sound and I can feel my how my right arm becomes lighter and lighter and starts automatically to rise up to a perfect 45 degree angle: It sounds so 3rd Reich.
Except for the pronounciation, Dutch really is such a trivial language if you speak both German and English. Dutch should be done away with altogether and coming generations inhabitating this flat land region on the coast of the Northern sea should be taught either proper German or English.
I've been following your uninformed drivel throughout this discussion, and I think it's time you admit you have no idea what you're talking about, you are obviously not a technical person by any means, and you are probably making your posts using AOL Broadband because the real internet is too scary for you to use. Do us a favor and get off of slashdot so we don't have to read your uninformed bullshit anymore.
If you read further on his site, on August 25th, he posted;
The Atheneum has just now posted a policy stating that the wifi connection is available only between a half-hour after they open to a half-hour before they close, on days that they're open. The stated reasonn is "for better maintenance and operation."
Case closed.
FWIW I think the cop was in the wrong, and AKMA did the right thing by not causing a fuss.
Thou Shalt Not Steal Bandwidth
It's happened. People have gone to court over such petty things.
So why did they place a convenient bench just outside the library? Would it be OK to read a library book while sitting on that bench?
Yes, it would be okay to read a book there... if you had check it out first. Oh, I get it - you can assume that the bench's whole purpose was to let people sit down and use the access point. Hell, do anything you want there - it's public property.
But he did "take" it to be technical. He took access, he took bandwidth. My point wasn't to say that the man was wrong or even that the police officer was right. I'm just saying that any open Wi-Fi point isn't open to just anyone. Regardless of what many here may think it is morally wrong to use something that isn't there for you to use. It is for people inside the library... that simple. How can you say that being in close proximity of the library is being a patron?
From their rules:
There isn't anything in the rules about Wi-Fi anyways... the rules are moot. Sure, you can read a book inside the library without checking it out and that goes beyond the discussion (because you are still following protocol).
But this AP wasn't encrypted. It was an open, public hotspot. Besides, even after he stopped using it, the cop still rousted him from the bench where he was sitting. In a public area. By your analogies, he could be accused of stealing the bench unless he carried it inside the library before sitting on it.
Who cares if it was encrypted? Does an unencrypted hotspot make it public? A simple "No Unauthorized Access" will make a legal case in court if I don't secure my website but people click right past the warning. Yes, the cop was a dick. Anyone who has dealt with the police knows that is usually the case. But your argument about stealing the bench is ridiculous. Even still, the land the library sits on isn't "public" property, it's "city/county" property and carries other legal implications.
What if the store puts out a box of apples and the sign "Unsellable old apples, minor cosmetic flaws, please help yourself".
What? How can you even say that has anything to do with it? Your analogy puts "please help yourself" right in as a qualifier. I'm sure that the library doesn't have a sign saying: "please connect to the Internet, other people inside aren't doing the same"
Simply, go inside and use the facilities. And quiet literally... could I urinate in your yard because you don't have a fence? Your street? It's public property.
It just doesn't make moral sense... the hotspot isn't secure so anyone can use it. I'm sure companies who don't lock down their hotspots appreciate that. Even though it's their flaw, it isn't your right to take advantage of it. Ah, well, this cop isn't driving this car... and it does belong to the city, I might as well take it.
This guy left his front door open, let's grab that television.... These mp3's are copyright, but they are just sitting here on this server. Where does it stop?
At least he should have
Get your Unix fortune now!
Unlicensed spectrum? Umm, IIRC, they have to live with ANY interference from you, and you from them. ( extreme paraphrase of FCC rules part 15 ).
So, you can transmit on the freq. all you damn well want, if your xmiter is fcc approved for that freq, and they are SOL. Just like if you get a wifi and your neighbors cordless phone hoses your wifi signal, or their wifi and yours are fscking each other.
While THEFT of network bandwidth MIGHT be enforcable, (maybe), the possession, operation and use of the transceiver is 100% within the law, because it is covered by part 15 of the FCC rules, who has 100% jurisdiction over the airwaves in the USA, under Federal Pre-emption.
Just like the FAA has 100% pre-emtion over the use of airspace. ( Fiefdom of Boulder Co. tried to make a freind of mine stop towing banners over the CU games, ( well before 9 11 01 ) and threatend to arrest him... even did... he had to take it through state courts, all the way to US court before FAA _could_ get involved, and then they told Boulder that they could NOT regulate the airspace above the city in any form or fashion. Boulder tried to claim that his "advertising" broke thier advertising and licensing laws, and he claimed that the FAA had jurisdiction over the airspace ( which they did )
and therefore their advertising laws only applied to that which they had jurisdiction over. ( the ground ). They tried to claim safety issues... Again, aircraft safety is under FAA... etc. etc.
In the end, Boulder LOST. But it cost him a buttload of money to defend himself and his business. He recovered it in another lawsuit wherein he nailed them for giving him so much shit they had no business in. (Boulder was _aware_ that they ha no jurisdiction because the FAA TOLD THEM SO. but they pressed the issue in the lower courts, trying to force him to stop by bleeding him dry money wise. )
SOmething similar will maybe oneday happen with wifi. It is a conflict of the method of access which is unlicensed and the laws goverening the unauthorized use of someones networks.
Its going to get interesting...
Nobody ever became a cop because they wanted a life of peaceful noninterference. Plenty of cops would be muggers or serial killers if they hadn't found a socially acceptable way to satisfy their inner need to beat and shoot people.
Of course, "the tree of liberty must be watered from time to time with the blood of patriots... and of tyrants" so you go right ahead and antagonize the cops, I fully support your decision and applaud your ethical stance.
... because he was reading Slashdot? :P
While it is true that *IF* the Library had in there TOS you must use your computer inside than you must use it inside, in this particular case the TOS of the library does NOT say that you MUST use it inside, hence this amounts to nothing more than the usual harrassment we get from the local authorities.
I think he should get a busted laptop from eBay, take out any remaining innards and stow a book and some sandwiches under the keyboard. Then sit outside the library reading and pretending to make notes on the laptop. He should be able to get the cop to work up a pretty good head of steam by refusing to shut it down. Be even better if he could place a video camera near enough to capture audio as well as video during the conversation...
....did you ever think that perhaps the WiFi "theft" is merely misdirection? Since the cop asked him to move away from the lib even after turning the radio off, it makes me think that it is a cover for a deeper issue. Perhaps AKMA is a creep and the pretty librarian asked the cop to brush him away. I think all the "My Rights" talk is wasted energy when the real deal may be that the cop was talking smack to move creepy stalker AKMA away from the kiddies.
Or wait, maybe I am remembering a very special episode of Magmum P.I.
Yep, sure could - any time the library was open. Which it wasn't, or I imagine the priest would have invited the cop to discuss the issue with the librarian...
Out of curiousity and not being an avid user of wireless laptops.
Is it possible that you would pay to access one wireless network but accidently get connected to different one and through this you could potentially end up being charged for accidential theft?
Actually, it sounds like he was embarrassed when the guy he was confronting turned out to have a fairly good clue about the legality of his actions. The cop's response was to whip out a fear-inspiring "higher authority" rather than back down or risk having to arrest the guy.
wtf? are u serious? THIS is news? the amount of energy spent on this thread is laughable. Just read it over, see how many people have posted and argued about it and ask you self does it really matter?
big fucking deal a guy at a library was asked not to use the connection. am I the only one who is laughing at the fact that this is on slashdot!?
In other news I checked my e-mail and was asked to finish up some code before lunch. *waves hand* discuss! wait, CNN is calling Lary wants the "exclusive"...
*shakes head*
just maybe....the officer is a lil' annoyed that donut prices (krispy kreme) has been going up. Or maybe it's the low-carb donut craze?
ah, so that's what the F in RTFA stands for...
If the library has one of those air filters that "cleans" the air and this guy was standing outside the door breathing the library's filtered air that was being released would the policeman be able to ask him to stop breathing?
when he lectured him about the jurisprudence on public use of wifi spots directly from www.lexisnexis.com ...
NEOCA - Custom LED Flashlights
After reading a slew of bad theft/usage analogies I have a few thoughts.
Firstly i agree with the general consensus that since the library also had a secure network, they obviously wanted people to be able to use the open one.
Second if you read on in the blog the priest found out that the library does say that access should only be in their operating hours (more or less) HOWEVER this raises two interesting points. The library did nothing to inform people nor enforce that policy. I know that even with open wireless networks browsers can be forwarded to a TOS page before any access is allowed (some kind of script adds your MAC to an access list i would think). I have seen this done at cafes and other similar places. Since they seem to be somewhat competent with wireless technology this might be a good idea. But there is a more obvious solution: if you don't want people using your AP outside of business hours then shut it off when you close. Not that hard
Third, even though the library did have this policy the cop didn't know that. I guess he just thought he was doing his job. It seems like its a lot easier to prove something is restricted than to prove it is open for public use, but it seems like law enforcement usually likes to assume people are starting trouble. I agree with people that there aren't many good ways to let people know your network is open, but i would say if you don't want it to be simple WEP encryption is the way to go. Some have said that this is a hassle and that may be true, but the library can always post signs or simply give people the key when asked. That way they could make sure people see their TOS before they start using with only a slight hassle for patrons. I wouldnt complain about having to read a WEP key off a piece of paper in exchange for free internet though
Comment removed based on user account deletion
it's not like they, oh I don't know, molest children or something...
If this article confuses you, don't worry. It was posted yesterday in a much clearer fashion.
Most of those who are arguing that the AP is in the public domain are ignoring the fact that this is not broadcast technology we're talking about. WiFi involves packets going in both directions, not just from the AP to your computer. In accessing the WiFi you are asking the library to transmit packets from your system to a 3rd party server, or in other words use their facilities. Now I'm not gonna argue the rights/obligations of a public library, I just wanted to point out that comparisons to radio/TV broadcasts or porch lights are specious.
Maybe that had something to do with it if you know what I mean...
You never know what a priest could be doing on an unsecured wifi network. Not these days.
Intolerance for ambiguity is the mark of the authoritarian personality.
I think people missed the point entirely. He was an ordained priest. He most certainly was surfing child pornography of little boys.
This is a public library. Anyone can go into a public library and look at a book. Public access. It is very difficult for public libraries to limit any of the public to the holdings/information that is availble even to minors.
Why should he be held to rules that apply only _inside_ the library?
Remember. He was outside the library.
Why should the AUP only apply inside the library? I agree that this whole story is ridiculous, but I'd say the rules for an access point are the rules for an access point. Unless you want your tax dollars paying for libraries to install EM shielding in all their walls, I'd recommend you think about this one for a second.
Just because I leave my door open doesn't mean you can walk into my house whenever you want. Yes, it may be stupid on my part, and yes, it changes it from break and enter to trespass, but it's still not acceptable. Similarily, just because my WiFi connection is open, doesn't mean you're allowed to do whatever you want with it.
I'd imagine he was probably obeying the terms of the AUP regardless, but if he'd never gone in and read it, that's kind of weak on his part. If someone's offering a free service, at least be respectful of their terms, so you don't ruin it for everyone.
It's important (if someone already hasn't) to distinguish that this guy isn't a priest in the classic sense (i.e. a Catholic priest). He appears to be Episcopalian.
It is called 'potential'. Bandwidth to most means the capacity of a circuit, not the size of a packet sent. And yes most wireless access points do rate scaling. 11Mbit, 5.5Mbit, 2Mbit, 1Mbit. Not that most libraries or networks in general are going to have an Internet connection faster than the LAN speed.
This guy's an Episcopalian or something of that variety. He's definitely not a Catholic priest.
If someone sets up a access point with no restrictions at all, I would use it too.
If you have configured it in a way so that all you have to do is to boot your windows XP to get access, I find it hard to take that as anything other than a invitation to use it.
Now I would be careful which information I choose to transmit over that connection, but that is another topic.
However if people have disabled DHCP or enabled even the most weak encryption, it would be different.
FUCK the police and I said it with authority
Fuck Ashcroft and his war against the Constitution
Fuck Bush and his war against the world
And fuck any goon, cop, security guard, etc, who thinks that they because their boss is the president that everyone who disagrees with them is a criminal
Fuck them fuck them fuck them
A lot of universities allow specialized access to certain sites, like ACM, etc, where a fee would normally apply for access.
Back in college, some friends and I for a senior paper at my smaller university drove down to a major Big 12 school to their computing and engineering library on a Saturday morning with our laptops, hoping to get some references for out papers. We got there around 9:00 am, and they didn't open until 1:00 pm. We sat down on the steps in the hallway outside of the library and could access their wireless network, along with some of those special sites. In probably 45-60 minutes, we had more than enough sources to write our papers!
Don't ping my cheese with your bandwidth!
Assuming one has a library card (or maybe not): 1. was he still on library grounds - our main library, 250,000+ city is surrounded by several landscaped acres (ditto my university alma mater 3000 miles away). If so chill out copper, you're disrupting my library experience. Good libraries seek to disseminate and diffuse information anytime, anywhere within copyright or license. 2. A passerby (cop) presumes that he was surfing the internet, not the library's space. I surf in my library's site and databases from my home/overseas, for hours. Really aggressive librarians seeking to expand their reach (librarians can get pretty messianic about this), might well decide to expand their local user access and define their intranet bubble by the precise power of their transmission under some particular FCC class including over town. If the library gets stressed about bandwidth (or Patriot Act Stalinism er shrubbery) over their budget/desire, the adjusted server rules can regulate internet access accordingly, encryption if necessary. If this ass accosted me, I would drag his sorry ass inside and ask Bob (a plesant senior librarian, in 5-10 minutes someone with a short attention span is going to be verrryy sorry).
At risk of sounding like 'me too ', I agree totally.
The public library is funded with tax dollars, and therefore open to use by the public. Key word there is PUBLIC...
Secondly, since the wifi wasnt encrypted or anything to cause restriction, its the same as being IN the library, so the cop has no legal leg to stand on..
I'm not so sure there is any legal ground to stand on if you access ANY unencrypted wifi point. You have to assume it was intended for public use if its not restricted in some way.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
When does the library deal with secret national defense issues?
The library's charter is put in place to disseminate information to the public..
Norad's charter isn't...
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Of course, if the cop had *his* wireless porkchop, he could have looked up the exact regulation and nailed him then and there.
Doesn't this state it is basically the job of the network to provide the security?
If you don't want me intercepting your signals, keep them off me.
look, im not logged in, and this is gonna get modded as troll. But the cop probably though the preist might have been d/l'ing pr0n, because the library was CLOSED and he was sitting outside. Im sure he wasn't, but we all know how police can be sometimes. Normally no one would care, it would be just a misunderstanding, but with all these darn bloggers it's a big deal or something.
If your signal escapes your hours and invades my space, and isn't reasonably protected, then yes i have a right to do what i please... Its your loss
Much as i can receive any commercial broadcast signal that hits my yard...
True i cant decrypt any signals as that is illegal due to the DMCA, however that falls into 'reasonable protection'.. Which is your responsibility, not mine.
Or how about if you stuck your hose toward my house and turned on the faucet, i could collect whatever water i get on my side of the fence and use for my garden or pool..
We arent taking about me going on your property to see if your door is unlocked, its YOUR signal that is on MY property....
If you are going to use analogies, at least try to compare apples to apples...
---- Booth was a patriot ----
"You might want to go back into the Athenaeum and ask a librarian about this. I smell a cop-library feud somewhere."
I've got $20 on the librarians. I need to make a "Hug a Librarian!" t-shirt, maybe with some allusion to the fact that librarians seem to be just about the only people left in this country with the stones to actually tell law enforcement to stick it.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
1) he was accessing a public hotspot not a private one as such the rules are different in that he is a member of said library and as such has rights to use its facilities.
2) At the time that he was using it no rules were in place against the use of wireless connections outside the library. If you read his coverage, the library stated their opposition to using wireless signals outside the library only after this incident.
I used to get busted for plugging into an external electrical outlet outside of a public library. Back then the internet was called "books". It was weird, man. It made sense to me at the time that what I was doing was wrong. Whoever was making decisions about how to offer "Public Services" from the Library had decided that providing a very cheap bit of electrical service to me outside the Library was not what was intended. Ergo, I was misusing a few Public tax dollars. While it seems a reasonable cost for society to up and provide "free" public Internet access to everyone out of our tax dollars, until that happens, it seems reasonable that society should enforce against "theft" of wireless access both Private and Public.
And I bet Sony just loves it too - they have the exclusive rights to use the most common name for the portable cassette player on their products. As an IP lawyer pointed out in another post, they send cease and desist letters to everyone that 'misuses' walkman as evidence they protect their trademark but I bet they don't really care unless it is a competing company that uses it.
Underloved Movies and Pub Quiz: donotquestionme.org
Because the WiFi users on the street is a Majority.
I was going to post that signal theft in the wireless context normally refers to frequency ranges used for wireless phones and cell phones and the like. But then I noticed the officer stated it was a 'new' law.
The individuals at the nearby phrat house uses our corporate wlan, I have known it for a while. I would hate to be aiding criminal activity by not turning them in or locking them out...
Does anyone have a link to something official regarding this new law?
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
Man, if that was Oakland, either his laptop would have been stolen or the cops would have clubbed him like a baby seal and *then* arrested him.
This guy was just told to leave the area.
Besides, in this day & age, hanging out in front of pretty much any state/county/city facility during off-hours will get you the same treatment. Try it. Go sit around City Hall with your laptop. Same thing might happen to you.
I do know how wifi works, but if there is no effort taken to restrict access, then it can be considered public access and should be treated as such..
Plus its in my yard, so i didnt break any trespass laws..
Oh, and the 14th does not count.. it wasnt part of the original 10..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
As the I.T. director for a public library, let me give my $.02
We use a timed based ACL to restrict connections while we're closed, but I couldn't care less what you do while we're open. We force a page on the first HTTP request, which gives you the ACU and notes that you're agreeing to it by proceeding. Included in that ACU is adhearing to the law (fed. , state, and local). That ACU doesn't mention where you can use the signal, but if it's a nice day...
People surf for porn all the time inside the building. Heck, I'd prefer if they'd take it outside. Granted, we've never had to deal with illegal child porn, but if we did, we'd at least have a MAC address and hostname to watch for if they returned.
I'm recently retired as an IT director for a public library. Two years ago I put WiFi in place at nine branches and INTENTIONALLY placed hubs near windows facing parking lots to allow WiFi access outside the buildings and outside normal open hours. We don't guarantee outide (or inside) 100% coverage. (Dooesn't work? Move to another chair!), but the idea is to provide free public access.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
I think it would be a very good thing if this officer's entire chain of command (up to the mayor of the town in question) were to receive a couple of hundred polite inquiries as to WTF this officer thought he was doing?
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
But in what religion? And he's ANti-Bush. So it's a conspiracy.
I just tried to call the police station at: 508-228-1212, but only got transferred to people that weren't there and put on hold for long periods of time. I even talked to the acting chief of police, but he put me on hold too. So I sent email to towngov@nantucket.net to get an explanation. There is another email address: police@town.nantucket.net that one might try too. I don't think it is unreasonable to ask exactly what law is being violated whenever an authority confronts you.
Dude, check the law before giving legal advice...
If a term falls into public use as a generic, even without the participation of another company, then the trademark is no longer valid, *THEN* another company can use it.
Note that the public invalidation happens *before* the other companies use is permitted.
Were it as you believe, then a company could "disenfranchise" ( generic public usage => effective lapse of trademark => GROSS WEAKENING OF BRAND IDENTITY IN THE MINDS OF THE PUBLIC => use by competetor => (lost) legal fracas declaring word common => common word.
This is why the "windows" vs "lindows" thing was so important. MS "stole" the common word into their trademark registration (lots of programs had windows in the generic sense, before MS invented, let alone registered the word), and then at the first challenge, they had enough money to "back down" the "Lindows" people. In point of fact "Lindows" was a stronger trademark but the word-thief windows people had better lawyer budgets.
Trademark Word Thievery is the act of trying to climb back up the decay chart.
So mod parent down as crap... 8-)
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
They used to be used to protect the president, and escort prostitutes. Why would the secret service be in charge of eductating local police? They are becoming more an more like their initials would indi cate...
S.S.
Enforcing federal law... in secret...
We need to take a more common sense approach to the issue of connecting to an unsecured network. I do this all the time and I do not see it as trespass. I feel that it is not like walking into someone's house after they left the door open, but rather like sitting on a bench that the homeowner has placed near the sidewalk. Even this analogy is not all that accurate, because when you use an open network you may not be on this person's property. If you don't want people using your bandwidth, then turn down your transmission power, turn on wep, turn off your ssid broadcast, or any of the other measures that have been made available to you for just this reason. If you don't know how to do these things then HIRE someone to do it. An honest computer professional will only charge you an hour of labor for this service, more if you have several wirelessly connected computers.
Why are the library patrons INSIDE the walls more important than the library patrons OUTSIDE the walls?
What does the library gain by having me inside rather than outside? It's not a commercial entity. Being inside doesn't force me to watch advertisements that generate revenue for the library.
Either way, they are providing a taxpayer service to taxpaying citizens who have come to the library for a specific purpose.
+++ATH0
My point with the "free country" statement is that it should NOT be automatically illegal for a computer user to think of a new way to use his computer and/or software. It's like the HIAA (Hammer Industry Association of America) suing people who use hammers to whack at things besides nails or pry up things other than nails because they "are operating outside the legal bounds of the license agreement" or some such BS.
This guy found some bandwidth--outside the box, so to speak--and believed, correctly, that it was provided for him to use, so he used it. But because he was doing it in an unconventional way (and probably because it involved the internet) this cop decided it must be illegal and made him stop. That's what pisses me off about it.
It's not a lie. It's the truth with lossy compression.
I think you mean Henry David Thoreau .
Prolific writer of his time who needs to be read a lot more especially given the times we live in.
So when you use the less-than sign in a "Plain Old Text" posting instead of using the ampersand-l-e-semicolon thing, slashdot will eat some of your text.
If it's plain old text, then the system should not do an "html remove" or whatever, it should turn the plain text into the decorated text.
Someone needs to fix this text entry dialog box.
The system ate nearly a paragraph because it was trying to do _something_ _inexplicable_ about a less-than sign followed dozens of words later by a greater-than.
It's not that hard to turn an literal less-than into the actual ampersand-le thing, and having done that, the "cross-host-scripting" is prevented becase the long-form thing isn't a less-than any more...
Very Vexing...
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
Why are the police worrying about some priest using the library wifi?
Do we not have AIDS, Cancer other other such problems which plague man kind?
Lets start worrying about that stuff.
COME ON...
My life is an open book ... up to a point.
I've always been under the impression that emacs is a cult... ;-)
Good moral character huh? What about this guy
Okay, so now they have a law that prevents me from using someone elses bandwidth via an open WAP.
Are they going to create laws that prevent me from using streetlamps to run my solar-powered devices as well?
Probably not, but what's the difference? These resources are being paid for by me (at least in the case of public library WAPs and street lamps). Is it security? What is preventing me from using the energy from a streetlamp to...whatever.
Ugh.
I'm guessing you're white. Well, I'm not. I also drive a Jaguar (when it's not being repaired) which seems to attract more cops than a Dunkin' Donuts. I've been pulled over coming home from work over ten times this year. I never receive a traffic summons. They just check my license and registration, finally letting me go after standard "few questions". I've had the car tossed [by the police] a few time too. It seems they suspect trouble when they see a Mexican-American driving a nice (completely stock) "white man's" car. It's called DWM (Driving While Mexican). Maybe if I got a Hyundai or a Kia they'd leave me alone.
I can't speak for the grandparent poster but there's a lot of people that agree with him. Cops create as much trouble as they stop.
I thought I remembered an old ruling by the FCC which basically said, "if radio signals are passing through you, you're free to do with them whatever you like." This has been applied to things such as intercepting satelite TV transmissions and using radar detectors. (Yes, radar detectors are illegal in some states but that's only because no one has bothered to pay the money to take it to court yet.) I don't see why one part of the radio spectrum is any different from others. Maybe my understanding of the FCC ruling is incorrect?
Let me roll this off:
1. The 2.4GHz and 5GHz spetrums are unlicensed public frequencies, you CANNOT be charged with signal theft and any FCC lawyer can tell you that; it's the same as listening and transmitting on a Citizens Band (CB) radio
2. If it was a PUBLIC library, any citizen is allowed access to the resources there-in, including any Internet connection that is offered inside, outside, or otherwise; restrictions may apply and login information may be required for access, but unless you are charged and found guilty of wrongdoing with said connection, you are as welcome to use it as little Suzie in the third grade doing her report on dinosaurs
3. Arguing with a cop, as long as you do not become beligerent or otherwise disorderly is the same as arguing with anyone else and if the cop is an ignorant buffoon (which he/she was in this case), you are guaranteed the right to call him/her one to his/her face by the constitution and the 1st Ammendment which guarantees freedom of speech; I have had many lengthy discussions with uppety cops that think they can intimidate private citizens. One made the mistake of calling me 'son' and I proceeded to inform him that I was not his 'son' and that addressing citizens in such a manner would generate a formal complaint to his commanding officer. It's surprising how knowing your local police stations phone number and having a cell phone handy changes the demeanor.
4. Finally, if the cop did arrest you, the charges would most likely be dismissed and you could then turn around and sue him/her and the department for wrongful prosecution; another nice civil right we have in the United States; remember folks, in the US judicial system, it's not what you know (or what you think you know) it's what you can prove (beyond a reasonable doubt)
Maybe it's just me, but I don't see mention of this anywhere in the most recent "Wireless Computing Devices" newsletter posted on THE NWFusion website...
"They've canceled the show but we're still here. What does that make us?" "Big Damn Junkies, Sir!" "Ain't we just"
For my two cents, and IANAL.
It's a wireless hotspot, aka, using non-directional radio broadcast.
It's from a public institution that provides this as a public service.
It was in no way "locked up or restricted".
By the very circumstances it is obviously there to be used by the public.
The priest didn't do anything wrong, there was no signal theft, the cop is a stupid powerhungry prick.
If I legally broadcast my home radio show over an obtainable frequency without any encryption or other security, it is totally legal for anyone who can tune in and listen, to do so.
Besides that, anyone who wants a private network but doesn't activate any security is utterly incompetent, or paid off by someone. And the last time I checked, the computer people at libraries don't do a lot of drooling on their shoes...
For decades now, television and radio networks have been spamming my home, invasively, with high-frequency energy weapons (commonly known as radio and television). These weapons have unknown physical effects on the human body, but the advertisements and pathetic mind-numbing drivel that they call "programs" should be considered a form of psychological warfare when decoded using a standard television or radio receiver.
.... or when the people running things get a Clue (TM) and either use encryption (digital library cards anyone?) or go back to lead-based paint to stop signal leakage.
NOW, we finally have the means to fight back and use the airwaves for our own purposes (via a broad network of low power high-frequency transcievers, commonly called Wi-Fi)... and they want to make it illegal!
I'll stop using public access points when they stop irradiating my home with network commercialism.
... get a Faraday cage to "close" the open signals...
Karma: Good, or bust!
You guess I'm white? Oh, now you're psychic? Got all the stereotypes memorized?
Heh. How does it feel to be a racist? Not that you'd ever admit it, of course.
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
Big deal, it's not like he was arrested or anything. The police man informed him that he was violating a law and asked him to stop. What's the big deal? If I had some unknown security hole in the wireless access point at my house and somebody was using it for illegal activities, I'd want some kind of protection, too.
My lame blog.
A reading of their Internet Policy states The mission of the Salt Lake City Public Library is to provide free access to information, materials and services to all members of the community to stimulate ideas, advance knowledge and enhance the quality of life. To support this mission, the Library provides gateway access to the Internet and other electronic resources.The Library considers electronic technology to be a powerful tool and an effective means to extend open access to information and ideas for patrons. But there's nothing about a patron having to be physically inside. The only written prohibition is Use of library equipment or network access for illegal purposes is expressly prohibited. Access to obscene materials by minors is restricted in order to comply with Rule 223-2.. Please take a copy of this document the next time you sit near the library...
Not quite the same scenario though. Connecting to an open WiFi is a bidirectional transfer. You're not just listening, but transmitting and requesting information as well. This might be more akin to flipping the channels on your radio through an open window than just listening to it... not quite the same though since using open WiFi is somewhat less disruption (and for the record, I think the cop was being an idiot anyhow).
What if the cop was a new officer on the beat and just made a dumb mistake? They learned their lesson and he'll move on...isn't this the simplest explanation?
Jonathan B.