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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?
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.
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'.
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.
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?
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The Signature could not be accessed. Please try again later or contact the administrator
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.
You can't steal what's being given away for free.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
Later the same day the policeman was excommunicated for praying outside his local church.
Obviously there is no law pertaining to laptop use in public,
not yet... just wait.
the more people that sit passively and are privately disgusted at stories like this the more draconian laws we will get.
If YOU dont get publically outraged, inform others and express your concern and outrage to all your government officials then you are the cause of laws like DMCA, PATRIOT, and The Public Laptop Decency Act of 2006.
A local city councilwoman here in my town wanted to make it illegal to criticize the city council or the city it's self. except for a few people that had enough balls to go to meetings and call her "Herr Hitler" and spend their money and time informing the rest of the public that this woman wanted a law that would limit their free speech severly, it would have passed because 90% of the people that live in your town are sheep. Be the 10% that actually care and do something.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Redirect all traffic from unknown users to a local webserver, which contains a usage agreement. After the user clicks "Accept" add their MAC address to the list of known users, and maybe remove it after 24 hours or so.
Then you might have "fallen" up a flight of stairs while "resisting arrest." Don't tip off a cop that you're going to report something--figure out what you can and report it when you're safely aware, so long as it's worth harassment from his colleagues whenever you happen to again cross that jurisdiction, or continually if, heaven forbid, you live in it.
Remember, we now live in a country where failure to produce "your papers" for the police is an arrestable offense, affirmed by our corrupt Supreme Court. It doesn't pay to be excessively vocal about invoking rights that, when it comes down to it, we no longer have for all practical purposes, unless you have a martyr complex. And as we see demonstrated every day here, holding one's breath waiting for the outraged public to agitate for your release would be fatal save for the autonomous nervous system.
One CPU cycle wasted on digital restrictions management is ONE TOO MANY.
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.
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!
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.