Our ATM Is Broken, Go To Jail

Actually, I do RTFA writes "This community recently discussed possible criminal prosecution for people who took advantage of faulty slot machine software. At the time, many here drew an analogy to a hypothetical ATM that dispensed too much money. Well, apparently, that too may result in criminal charges. Although they suspect that someone may have tampered with the ATM, they are considering charging anyone who got extra money from it." Here is an editorial musing on the morality of such unexpected windfalls.

Comments

Lopsided priorities

[Tablizer]

This is yet more evidence of how materialistic our society has become. It is NOT a crime to not report the observation of a beating or death. Yet it is a crime to take advantage of a faulty slot machine? Something is F'd. Big business has too damned much influence over the laws of this country. They don't care if people die as long as they get their fucking loot back.

Isn't it interesting that

[JohnnyGTO]

when that bank errors in your favor, your screwed but when the bank errors in their favor, your screwed?

Bug Abuse

[SamP2]

Didn't your local friendly MMORPG teach you the consequences of exploiting bugs?

Seriously, just because you were not the one who hacked the thing, doesn't give you the right to exploit the flow. It's like stealing stuff from a shop because the window was broken by someone else.

Accidents do happen, and it should be the burden of the prosecution to prove the defendant knew of the exploit, and not vice versa, but if you see someone withdrawing 1 grand (max daily limit) from a machine that happens to give out $20s instead of $5s (especially if person never previously withdrew such large amounts), and of course the person conveniently "forgot" to check the amount he got, then you got a pretty good circumstantial case of malicious intent, and then the defendant better have some good justification for these actions.

Re:Broken argument

[polymath69]

Taking money from an ATM that is wrongly configured is also a crime.

Since ATMs are opaque and you cannot see the contents of the money bins until you have taken money out, you have to do the "crime" before you can know that the ATM is misconfigured. Thus you are already a criminal. That doesn't make sense. Crime has to have an element of intent. If your only intent was to withdraw money owned by you from your own account, clearly no wrongdoing was intended.

But going back for seconds, after having noticed the mistake... now you're talking criminal intent.

Re:Bank error in your favor!

[fermion]

It is the lack of symmetry that bothers me. For instance, a while back a bad check was improperly credited to my bank account. As a result, i bounced many checks and had no money. If I had been worse off, i could have been in real trouble. Fortunately I was not living paycheck to paycheck, so I had time to get the matter cleared up. Clearing up this matter required a trip to the bank and signing many papers. Note that the bank had a copy of the check, and the account number the check was deposited to was not my own, so they could have fixed the error themselves, if they pleased.

So here is the issue. They can bankrupt me with no significant repercussion, and don't even have to make an effort to correct the mistake unless I beg them to do so, but I have to immediately report any mistakes they make. Now, if I could claim treble damages for any mistake the bank made, and double digit damage for any mistake that was not fixed 24 hour after a report, then perhaps I could agree to civil prosecution for taking advantage of a defective machine.

Breaking a machine, or in this case taking advantage as a broken machine is criminal activity. But unless I can prosecute the CEO of bank for criminal negligence when I have no money for week due to the firms mistake, then I don't see how the bank should charge me for criminal activity when their machines give me $400 instead of $100. At most, like they do when they screwed me over, I should asked to give the money back, and perhaps, if necessary,pay a small fine. Note, however, that the bank does not offer to pay me for my inconvenience.