Confessions of a Wi-Fi Thief

Michelle Shildkret from Time wrote in to tell us about a story about "the ethics of stealing Wi-Fi. Many of us been guilty of the same crime at one point or another — according to the article, 53% of us at least. But how guilty do we really feel? As it is officially a crime to steal wi-fi (Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code, which covers anybody who 'intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access')."

Comments

Not a thief

[xtracto]

"intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access")."

Then, I have never stolen WiFi. I have never accessed without authorization; as I have never cracked a WEP or WPA password scheme.

Everytime I use an available wireless network, I instruct my computer to ask for permission to connect to the router and enter to the wireless network. And most of the time the router gives me such permit and assigns my router an IP. When it does not happen, then I assume the owner has instructed the router to give permission to specific machines (as in, machines with a specific MAC adddress) and hence I do not use such networks.

Seriously, someone must create an interface in which a person is able to send the commands manually to the router (like the AT commants in a modem) to ask for connection permission (i.e., DHCP protocol). That way, when you are in court, you could use that program along the court's wifi to show them how you are indeed asking for permission and the software is granting you the permission.

Re:Not a thief

[Rinisari]

Exactly the defense that anyone would should use. If the plaintiff says, "Well, I didn't explicitly grant you permission to use my network," then you can fire back, "You did when your router gave me explicit permission by assigning me an IP address and giving me a gateway by which I could access the Internet. Essentially, I asked if I could use the network, and, acting on your behalf since you set it up, it said I could when it gave me the information required to use the network."

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I go further. I only use access points which invite access by broadcasting a signal to all to say they are open for anybody who wants to use. If the access point is broadcasting a signal which says that it isn't open I don't use it, even if it's using an insecure system such as WEP which might reasonably be treated as an invitation to hack. Also, if there's no broadcast at all I don't attempt to scan for the access point at all.

This way I know that I'm only using access points which have been configured, either by their owner or manufacturer, for public access.

Re:Not a thief

[palegray.net]

Then, I have never stolen WiFi. I have never accessed without authorization; as I have never cracked a WEP or WPA password scheme. That's the key to the whole debate. I've had a WiFi router at my home and various offices for years. If I enable features designed to limit access (MAC address checking, WEP/WPA encryption, etc) and someone tries to spoof and/or brute force their way into my network, that's theft of service and unauthorized access. If my router is set up for wide open access, I'm granting permission for anyone to use it.

In general, laws are designed to work like this: that which is not expressly forbidden is permitted. We're talking about radio waves here; before anyone starts up with some dumb analogy to parked cars and leaving the keys in them, consider this: when you use a resource I have made freely available, you're not denying me access to it. Someone might make the argument that excessive use of my resource would degrade its usefulness to the primary (owning) party, but that's easily remedied using simple protection schemes (either block access entirely, or throttle access to unauthenticated clients). I've done exactly this in numerous cases, using various router packages.

Here's a sad, but interesting article: Man charged with wireless trespassing from July of 2005. To quote a section:

Wireless networks are becoming more prevalent with the spread of broadband Internet access, and many consumers are not aware of how to configure their networks to avoid unauthorized access. This man was charged with a felony because the owner of the connection failed to educate himself on how to use a point and click interface to secure a home wireless router. Was he up to no good? Maybe, but we don't know for sure, and it's beside the point. If someone were to use my connection for criminal activities, it becomes my problem to prove it was the third party's actions, and not my own that led to the violation of law. He's "innocent until proven guilty" the same as I am. This is why companies (at least ones that aren't interested in getting sued) track their network access and provide authentication schemes.

Re:Not a thief

[Cerberus7]

Does the law already consider an open, unencrypted network as implicitly giving permission, or is it written to say that if the person who owns that open, unencrypted network has not given permission then it's illegal?

What you say makes sense, but I don't expect the law to make sense.

Re:Not a thief

[e03179]

You did when your router gave me explicit permission by assigning me an IP address...

I am not a Wi-Fi hacker, but I'm pretty sure that humans don't get assigned IP addresses.

Re:Not a thief

[Animaether]

"as I have never cracked a WEP or WPA password scheme"
Have you ever spoofed a MAC address?
Have you ever connected to an access point that did not broadcast its SSID?
Have you ever connected to an access point that says "private", "stay out", or otherwise?

If 'yes' to any of the above; I don't know about the U.S. law, but in The Netherlands you would still be guilty of "computerhuisvredebreuk"; meaning so much as tresspassing on a computer network

Then again, a great many people seem to think that even WEP encryption is an open invite to use the system, given the easy of cracking it.

Re:Not a thief

[Just Some Guy]

Does the law already consider an open, unencrypted network as implicitly giving permission, or is it written to say that if the person who owns that open, unencrypted network has not given permission then it's illegal?

How does the law answer the same question about websites?

Re:Not a thief

[DriedClexler]

Everytime I use an available wireless network, I instruct my computer to ask for permission to connect to the router and enter to the wireless network. And most of the time the router gives me such permit Very good point, but what complicates it is: Does that router's giving you permission, reflect the owner's desire to make it open?

If every router owner knew how to open or lock down their access point, this issue would be open-and-shut. However, speaking from the experience as someone who set up a home wi-fi network, and someone who has some bizarre lifelong gravitation to the most poorly-designed aspects of products, my wi-fi kit didn't make it easy for me. The interface doesn't have anything that clearly leads me to "keep other people from using this", and you can damn well bet it's not the default. The help feature is barebones, as is the manual. (I use a linksys WRT ...)

Only by knowning, in advance, that my wi-fi point is open (not obvious to a novice), and that the "easy-lock" button or whatever, is necessary to put a password on my router, would I know what to do.

Ultimately, I agree that even with stupid router owners (like me before pulling teeth to figure all this out!) don't have a right to complain, but at the same time, companies that make these could be a little more helpful in telling you how to use all the features.

Re:Not a thief

[Alex Belits]

This is US -- we don't have real laws that get updated with precise description of what is and isn't a crime. "The law" is whatever the last time judge decided after hearing a shouting match between two attorneys.

Re:Not a thief

[palegray.net]

I've never done any of the things you describe, because I consider them to be highly unethical. In my mind, connecting to an unadvertised resource fails the ethics test because there's no way anyone could reasonably imply that consent was given.

Those who crack networks by breaking WEP, spoofing keys, or other measures should be held legally accountable. People who merely access an open, advertised resource shouldn't be at risk of going to prison.

Re:Not a thief

[Bandman]

I'm also pretty sure laptops don't get criminal trials

Re:Not a thief

[CogDissident]

Sure they do, mr 57.85.0.6

Re:Not a thief

[Slacksoft]

That would never work. First i doubt they'd let you use any computer if you're on trial for a computer related crime, second you're assuming the court even has wifi, and that the judges have the technological comprehension to understand. I think you'd have better luck pulling out a wand, calling yourself harry potter, and flail around saying you can send magic commands through the air to get into computers. I think that'd help on the insanity plea to get out of it. Either that or sue DHCP for insider trading...

Re:Not a thief

[Bandman]

If the access point is broadcasting a signal which says that it isn't open I don't use it, even if it's using an insecure system such as WEP which might reasonably be treated as an invitation to hack.

This is apparently some definition of the term "reasonably" of which I was previously unaware.

Re:Not a thief

[Bandman]

I completely agree with your viewpoint.

I've never been one of those people who feels like an unlocked door is an invitation, but call me old fashioned.

Re:Not a thief

[morgan_greywolf]

Well, I sasked your door permission to open by turning the handle, and when it did, since it was unlocked, I entered your house while you were gone today.

Since nothing was bolted to your floor, I proceeded to help myself to your TV and associated A/V equipment, your PVR, your Playstation 3, and your Wii. Additionally, your study door similarly allowed me to enter your study, where I noticed some computer equipment that wasn't chained to the desk, so I left with that, too.

Since your doors granted me permission to enter your house, and they were acting on your behelf since they are on your house, you have no reason to complain.

Right?

Re:Not a thief

[BuhDuh]

The actual language is:

(2) intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access, and thereby obtains -
(A) information contained in a financial record of a financial institution, or of a card issuer as defined in section 1602(n) of title 15, or contained in a file of a consumer reporting agency on a consumer, as such terms are defined in the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. 1681 et seq.);
(B) information from any department or agency of the United States; or
(C) information from any protected computer if the conduct involved an interstate or foreign communication;

To me it seems as if the end result of such access needs to be very specific for it to be an offense.

Re:Not a thief

[bryce1012]

An excellent point, and it makes me wonder... Could that judge with all the "porn" on his "website" file criminal charges against whomever dug that stuff up? After all, I'm pretty sure he didn't explicity grant them permission.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually a simple tcpdump or wireshark session will show the DHCP packets.

Re:Not a thief

[interstellar_donkey]

That's a very nice and pleasant way to look at it which absolves you of any bad feelings on the subject. But you know very well that the only reason the AP is open is because the owners don't know how to secure it.

While technically you could argue a case such as this, it's certainly a violation of the spirit of the law.

And, to look at it from another perspective, it's like saying "I drove by this house and saw the front door open. So I went inside and watched their cable TV. An open door implies permission"

Re:Not a thief

[Jeppe Salvesen]

I believe it is a lesser crime to enter without breaking in.

Now, if you use an open network, you only use bandwidth temporarily. If you leave the network, the bandwidth will still be there. So it's more like entering an unlocked house to take a sip from the faucet. The only crime committed is that you didn't pay for bottled water.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Everytime I use an available wireless network, I instruct my computer to ask for permission to connect to the router and enter to the wireless network. And most of the time the router gives me such permit and assigns my router an IP. Yes, but if you were using a stolen WEP key, you could still say much the same thing. Your computer is still asking for permission, etc., etc.

The question should be: is the network intentionally left open? Or is it misconfigured? Unfortunately, it's usually impossible to tell.

It would be nice if the protocol designers had put in an explicit flag that could be used to advertise an intentionally open network. In the absence of such a flag, I think it's reasonable to assume that an unprotected network has been left open on purpose. But certainly I feel more comfortable about using someone's network if the SSID makes its status clear (e.g. SSID = Joes-Free-Wireless).

Re:Not a thief

[heckler95]

No personal offense intended, but if somebody is not knowledgeable enough to figure out how to properly setup the security of a wireless router to match their "desire", as you put it, then one would hope that they would be responsible enough to seek professional assistance, or at the very least, return the router for an easier-to-use model.

Many of the latest consumer routers actually disable the wireless option at the factory, requiring the user to click through a simple wizard interface and explicitly choose whether to enable or disable security before the radio is turned on.

How is this any different from setting up a web server on the internet with a published domain name containing sensitive information with no password protection or other authentication? Should anybody who attempts to gain access be imprisoned? I would hope that most reasonable judges would see this deliberate act as implicitly granting permission, even if it is an act of omission.

Re:Not a thief

[networkBoy]

I have connected to a router with an SSID of private. I didn't know I was connecting to it as I was on a friends notebook and we were at a cafe that advertised wireless. Turns out I was on someone's router living in an apartment near by.
Windows simply picked a router and connected. So am I guilty?
Point is, the SSID alone can not be held as the absolute "keep out" sign. Something as simple as WEP or a non-broadcast SSID would have kept me out as I was simply relying on Windows autoconfig.
Now that's not to say I've never broken WEP, never cloned a MAC, etc. But more often than not it's been as an example to someone as to why they need to be vigilant with their WiFi security, not to steal service.
-nB

Re:Not a thief

[phoenix.bam!]

Bad analogy. I ring your doorbell and a ticket drops from the mail slot that says "You're free to enter the house and watch some tv."

Re:Not a thief

[BoogeyOfTheMan]

The problem with your analogy is that when your pc "asks" for permission, its more like knocking on the door. If it recieves no response, it quits and goes to the next "door".

Also, the taking the objects from the house would be akin to looking around his hdd, copying whatever files you wanted and deleting them afterwards. Not exactly the same as just connecting to the router and surfing the web.

Re:Not a thief

[KeithIrwin]

Look now, if you follow that logic, next you'll tell me that you aren't using your web browser to steal Slashdot just because the server gives it to you when you request it.

Re:Not a thief

[DavidTC]

Providing a poor product that is hard to use is hardly the fault of random passerbys who see a freely available resource and use it.

If you want someone to beheld liable for that behavior, try a class action suit against the companies that sold those products without bothering to inform their customers of how they behaved. I actually think one is a long time coming.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly! And if I were to see your garden hose carelessly spraying water out into the open sky ON PUBLIC PROPERTY (like that nice strip of land right next to the road) I should be able to set out twenty or thrity 5-gallon buckets to catch that water. After all, my buckets "asked" your hose for the water and your hose obliged by spraying water near them. Obviously the hose is "acting on your behalf" since you set it up. Be careful next time.

I'm going out on a limb here and suggesting that A) you don't own your own home and B) a lot of the services you receive are paid for by someone else. Am I right? Sure I am.

A clue here, sonny: inanimate objects cannot function on anyone's behalf. The owner must grant you permission. This ain't science fiction.

Re:Not a thief

[countach]

I just accessed the slashdot server without written authorization. Sue me.

Re:Not a thief

[DJProtoss]

Not quite the same since there is an active response from the system granting authorisation (not that I entirely like their metaphor, but hey) - for your analogy to match I suppose the wifi stealer would have had set up a static ip and route which happened to match that which was in use, except that still isn't quite right ( arp for a start)
I suppose a closer one might be if the door has a lock of some kind, but any key fits it (or a more accurate one a fingerprint reader rigged up to accept all prints).
Now I suppose it could be a defence if you could argue that you had reason to believe that the system had been setup so that some people should be let in and others kept out. In which case the fact it let you in could be construed as authorisation. maybe.

Re:Not a thief

[MobyDisk]

Firstly, nothing was stolen.
Secondly, the WiFi situation was more like a bright neon flashin sign that says "open internet access available here"

Re:Not a thief

[gurps_npc]

1. The door does not act in your example, the router DOES act. A more accurate analogy would be: I asked your door to open for me AND IT DID OPEN. Not impossible, as many businnssess have doors that automatically open. 2. You had people STEAL things instead of simply enter the house and watch TV. We are describing someone enter the wifi connection and use it to connect to the internet, NOT take other things. Stop trying to ADD real crimes that we are NOT discussing. God, is it THAT hard to pay attention to our points or do you just ignore people that disagree with you and make up vile lies?

Re:Not a thief

[magarity]

we don't have real laws that get updated with precise description of what is and isn't a crime. "The law"
 
You've described civil cases which are common law. Criminal law is real laws made up by the legislature. These wifi theft cases seem to be the criminal sort.

Re:Not a thief

[KeithIrwin]

Amongst the problems with this analogy is that the door didn't actually tell you to come in. If you turned the handle on a door and a sign popped up which said "Please come in", then, yes, you would be fully within your rights to come in. Although that wouldn't entitle you to steal stuff, but it would be perfectly reasonable for you to use the person's stuff while you were there.

Re:Not a thief

[BoogeyOfTheMan]

I think of the router like say a home security system. If I request permission for a connection and it gives me one, it would be kind of the same as if I knocked on someones door and the security system opens the door and lets me in, whether the owner wanted it that way or not, thats how it was set up.

Re:Not a thief

[liam193]

No actually there is a difference here. Your door does not send out a beacon saying, "Hey I'm here, I'm unlocked, and I'm asking for people to come inside."

Re:Not a thief

[tubapro12]

Leaving one's WLAN open and broadcasting is more like leaving your front door wide open and putting a neon sign that says OPEN. Maybe what is needed is regulation of who is allowed to run an open network such as a "wireless cafe permit" or something to that extent.

Re:Not a thief

[DeadTOm]

Exactly. If I walk up to a random house and the butler lets me in even though the owner of the house didn't explicitly grant me permission to enter, am I entering unlawfully?

Re:Not a thief

[SirGarlon]

"The law" is whatever the last time judge decided after hearing a shouting match between two attorneys.

And that's why our society can still function in spite of the legislature's penchant for passing laws whose terms they never bothered to define, whose consequences they never bother consider, and whose Constitutionality they never bothered to verify.

Judicial independence. Where would we be without it?

Re:Not a thief

[Just Some Guy]

Bad analogy. I ring your doorbell and a ticket drops from the mail slot that says "You're free to enter the house and watch some tv."

That was even worse. More accurate analogy: you have a loudspeaker shouting "HI! COME IN!" to all passersby. I ring your doorbell, and a key to the house and a nametag pops out of the mail slot.

Don't want me in your house? Don't advertise free admission then give me a key and a nametag.

Re:Not a thief

[91degrees]

Well, it seems to me that there are likely to be a lot of people who don't know how to secure their wireless router. I'm also aware that those who want people to connect to their networks will typically put something along the lines of "free" or "open" in their network ID to make it clear that that's what they want.

Do you really think it more likely that the person wants you to use their wifi or that they simply don't understand technology? Do you really believe that the software has been granted explicit authority by the network owner to decide who should and shouldn't access the network, rather than just left in its default state?

I'm not even sure what the point of this justification is. If it's to satisfy yourself, then it sounds like you're weaseling ut of responsibility. It most likely wouldn't stand up in a court of law, where you have another person (called the prosecution) making the case that it would be pretty obvious to anyone that the owner of the wireless network didn't intentionally leave the network open.

Re:Not a thief

[morgan_greywolf]

God, is it THAT hard to pay attention to our points or do you just ignore people that disagree with you and make up vile lies?

I confess to playing "Devil's Advocate" here. My point is that it is not so clear cut, especially for Joe Sixpack. Unfortunately, we don't have IT experts presiding as judges in our courtrooms, so it has to be clear-cut enough for Joe Sixpack.

Since everything that DHCP does is behind the scenes, Joe Sixpack doesn't know that an exchange between his router and your laptop took place. All he knows is that you access his router. If it gave permission, it was because he didn't know how to 'lock' it.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I liken using somebody's unsecured wireless network to listening to a neighbor's music that they play loud enough for me to hear. I didn't ask my neighbor to send wifi signals into my home.

Re:Not a thief

[mweather]

Well, I sasked your door permission to open by turning the handle, and when it did, since it was unlocked, I entered your house while you were gone today. If I didn't want you in there I wouldn't be publicly broadcasting the fact that my door is unlocked to the entire neighborhood. "Since nothing was bolted to your floor, I proceeded to help myself to your TV and associated A/V equipment, your PVR, your Playstation 3, and your Wii." Copy whatever you want, just leave a copy for me. If I didn't want you to have it I would have locked that stuff up some place that isn't accessible to the public which I explicitly gave permission to be there.

Re:Not a thief

[clint999]

Am I the only one that is completely confused?

Re:Not a thief

[DJKenChedda]

So if I knock on your house door or checked a window and it's not locked then did your entry point give me explicit permission to use your premises? If your computer has an unpatched vulnerability and I request access to your workstation through this vulnerability, then can I say your computer give me explicit permission to access it and use it's resources? Just because most home users are naive and uneducated doesn't mean that they deserve to be taken advantage of. It's no different than exploiting a mentally handicapped individual even though you believe they may have given you permission to do so. The world is not a free playground, respect other individual's privacy like you would wish upon your own.

Re:Not a thief

[bryce4president]

Exactly. Especially since in today's society there are tons of businesses that offer free wifi. Some of them aren't so clearly labeled, so while you would think you are connecting to a local free wifi point, you could actually be connecting to some dope across the street that has their home wifi completely open and broadcasting to the world.

If you know enough about technology to claim someone is stealing your wifi when it is completely open then you know enough how to make it NOT completely open and its your fault.
Society has been trained technologically that if the wifi is free and open then that must be what the owner intended, if they didn't then they would have taken steps to otherwise say so.

Re:Not a thief

[Bombula]

Presumably there is some cyber-analogy to the brick-and-mortar public vs private property issue. If a door to a public building is open, you CAN enter (during stated operating hours). But on private property, that is not so. Similarly, on an unsecured public network the parent argument might hold, but on a private unsecured network then your analogy would seem to stand up quite well.

Anyone know how the law distinguishes unsecured public and private network access?

Re:Not a thief

[Alex Belits]

Same with criminal cases, too, except you have to add willingness or unwillingness of DA to prosecute them in the first place. No one actually updates laws to clarify them with any kind of authority that can be relied upon, lawyers constantly have to argue about applicability of definitions that were unreasonably vague centuries ago when they were made, and are ridiculously anachronistic now.

Re:Not a thief

[DriedClexler]

Okay, let's make sure we know where we disagree. I thought I was very clear that I *agree* that a wi-fi AP owner should be morally and legally responsible for the accessibility of his AP, even and especially if the instructions for it suck. Point conceded.

Second, I *agree* that someone who doesn't know how to setup the security should take all possible steps to *find out* how to set up the security. Again, point very much conceded. Buy why the hell is this information not abundantly clear in the instructions for the product? I had to pull teeth to figure out how to configure the security settings (not literally of course). Yes, I can go on the internet and piece together what I'm supposed to do. No, that doesn't mean my router had acceptable product design. The help feature and manual should say SOMETHING about how to put password protection on my routher.

Third, my routher most certainly *did* make me go through a wizard, and it either didn't make me choose security, or I chose not to put up the security, naively thinking that information about that would be the easiest thing in the world to find if I wanted to do it later. But that would pre-suppose actual product testing on linksys's part. Not a good assumption, it turns out!

So I by and large agree with you, but we seem to be takling past each other.

Re:Not a thief

[DRAGONWEEZEL]

The main difference is that the router is easy to set up to allow only the Homeowner access, Also the Router broadcasts an ssid that says: "HEY! I am an available Network! You can use me!" Your house doesn't say anything, except what kind of neighborhood you live in, and your level of affluence.

Also, "stealing" open Wifi is more akin to taking a drink from the owners hose(like the kind used to water a garden) that rests in their front yard. It's not even clsoe to the same level as breaking in and stealing everything the guy owns. Petty theft at the least, with the greatest value being what? $60?

Re:Not a thief

[DoctorDeath]

but a router is not a computer, it is an access device to the ISP

Re:Not a thief

[palegray.net]

If the default behavior of the operating system is to connect to unadvertised access points, you're not at fault. In this case, it was a friend's machine; the ethical fault would lie with him if he configured the machine to act in this manner.

No, the SSID should be the sole indicator of whether access is permitted. However, common courtesy keeps me from walking through the unlocked front doors of strangers uninvited, laws against such behavior notwithstanding.

Re:Not a thief

[profplump]

Entering an unlocked, unposted house is not a crime, at least not in my jurisdiction. If you enter a locked house, you're breaking and entering. If you enter a house posted with no trespassing signs, or enter a house and refuse to leave after being instructed to do so by a legal resident or their agent, you are trespassing. If you simply enter a house, stand around inside, and leave when asked without breaking anything, you have committed no crime.

Re:Not a thief

[rgviza]

IANAL, but by that same logic, it's ok to walk into a stranger's house, who accidentally left the door unlocked, help yourself to a glass of water, and watch TV. By turning the knob you ask the door's permission right? Whether or not it's locked, if you don't own or lease the property, and don't ask the tenant for permission, you are trespassing. You don't ask an inanimate piece of gear for permission, you ask the owner of it, much like you'd ask the owner of a house if it's ok to come in whether or not the door is locked. I don't believe you can "steal" WiFi. You can, however, trespass on a WiFi network. -Viz

Re:Not a thief

[McDutchie]

So it's more like entering an unlocked house to take a sip from the faucet. The only crime committed is that you didn't pay for bottled water.

Except that you didn't enter any house. Your neighbour is transmitting their open-access signal into your own house for you to use. Your analogy is therefore broken.

Re:Not a thief

[eebra82]

I hate the house analogy when used in these debates. What if someone sets up a WiFi zone that covers dozens of apartments? Are you basically saying that there is a house - that you may or may not enter - in my apartment? This is where that analogy fails, because a house is still property. My apartment is, however, my property and what's in it is rightfully mine.

The WiFi, if not secured, is simply private space because there is no sign that prohibits trespassing. Why the hell should I be a criminal if someone penetrates my apartment with WiFi signals that are not secured by password?

By breaking through the encryption, you're obviously doing something criminal. But that's something entirely different, too..

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you ever spoofed a MAC address?
Have you ever connected to an access point that did not broadcast its SSID?
Have you ever connected to an access point that says "private", "stay out", or otherwise?

I must say no to all of these... there are so many open access points around that there is no need... too much hassle in fact to do this just to get internet when you can connect to another access point by just selecting it. I can see why this would be considered unauthorized access if there were any of those obstacles in place.

Re:Not a thief

[protolith]

Interesting analogy but that's not really the same.

A closer analogy would involve fruit growing on a tree. If you defeat a locked gate and enter past a no trespassing sign to pick a piece of fruit from a tree in the garden, that's B&E and theft of property, even if the fruit was not going to be used by the owner.

Most unauthorized use of Wifi is more like picking a piece of fruit from the branches of a tree hanging over the property line, like over a public sidewalk. Unless a security measure has been emplaced (like a big net) to prevent me access to the fruit, I really don't see how its stealing something that is being allowed by its owner into public.

Re:Not a thief

[xSauronx]

a family friend of ours stole satellite tv by the same logic: the radio waves are out there, and as far as hes concerned, any such thing is fair game.

Re:Not a thief

[Richard_at_work]

So if I guess your ssh password, I'm good to go, since your sshd said 'yes'? How about your SMTP server accepting my spam? Is that also fair game? What about exploits giving me access to your system?

Re:Not a thief

[salemnic]

Oh c'mon - That _is_ a bad analogy. It would be more like your house was unlocked so I can in and made some local calls, or watched some TV.

The taking of the stuff is where the analogy breaks down.

Re:Not a thief

[Saint Gerbil]

All in good time. I recon about 5 years we will all have an IPv7 Number.

Re:Not a thief

[d3ac0n]

And, to look at it from another perspective, it's like saying "I drove by this house and saw the front door open. So I went inside and watched their cable TV. An open door implies permission"

Your analogy is incomplete and incorrect.

A proper analogy would be something more like;

"I was driving by their house and a Circus Barker was outside, saying 'Hurry, hurry, hurry! Free Internet inside! Come and see the amazing Internet! Hurry, hurry, hurry!' (SSID broadcast set to on). So I walked up, asked the Barker if I could enter (DHCP), he gave me a ticket (IP address). I entered, and the Internet was there. They gave me permission."

See the difference?

Re:Not a thief

[LordOfTheNoobs]

Your argument is dumb. They're not taking your things when they "steal wifi". They are sending you messages you've happily configured your equipment to forward along. It's more like I handed you snail-mail, each envelope containing another envelope and a request to forward it off. If you waste time sending along my letters, I'm not doing anything criminal. This is how public wifi operates.

Either properly configure your radio signal or keep it the hell off of my lawn.

Re:Not a thief

[xtracto]

If you leave the network, the bandwidth will still be there.

That could presumably be false if whoever is paying for the service pays for a limit GB/month allowance

Re:Not a thief

[Lostlander]

I agree that Joe Sixpack isn't likely to know how to secure a router however with modern routers most come with very straightforward tools that auto configure the router turning the wpa authorization into a password style setup.

Using the top level parent analogy it would be a lot like buying a new door with a complex lock and claiming that someone broke in even though you didn't lock the door because you didn't know how. In most states as I understand it, it's the difference between breaking and entering and trespassing. Although given the range of most wireless devices it's kinda like putting your door on your neighbors property and saying he has no right to use it.

Re:Not a thief

[palegray.net]

If you know enough about technology to claim someone is stealing your wifi when it is completely open then you know enough how to make it NOT completely open and its your fault. That's the most awesome point I've seen in this entire discussion. Unfortunately, there have been cases where police officers have witnessed someone outside a business using a WiFi connection, and arrested the person for unlawful access, even though the connection's owner had no problem whatsoever with the act. This is why broad scope laws against such behavior are extremely dangerous; the prosecutor decides whether to pursue charges, and prosecutors are politicians.

"I was only protecting the citizens on this county from themselves!" I can see it now.

Re:Not a thief

[Sockatume]

One of my neighbours did that. I switched on MAC filtering, but not before I wrote down his computer's name. Which was his own name.

Clearly I was dealing with a hacker genius.

Re:Not a thief

[es330td]

This isn't quite right as the homeowner, landlord, somebody, pays for incremental water usage. A better analogy would be entering an unairconditioned house and breathing the air. In no way is the owner worse off for you having been there.

Re:Not a thief

[Kankraka]

I'm sorry, but in this day and age the 'I don't know how to lock it' cop out just won't fly any more. Every joe six pack runs that stupid cd that comes with the router, and it guides them through, step by step, VERY CLEARLY, how to configure, AND SECURE their router. Most of the technology illiterate in my condo complexes have their routers on WPA, a few on WEP, some even realized that not broadcasting the SSID helps out as well. The one network out of ten in range of my house that is sitting at factory defaults is a cheap-o network everywhere, it likes to eat DHCP assignments randomly, and stop all connections for an hour here and there. I'm sure the router is a piece of garbage, and that's why the owners don't bother. Even my router is left open for that reason, I have to set the damn thing to factory defaults about once a month, even then, I cannot actually turn on any encryption because the firmware sucks (and is fully updated). Also, I don't really care if someone jumps on my network to check email, or download crap, hell, there's a random xbox 360 that connects from time to time, I just wish I could find out when they're playing halo so I can start up a random lan game and hope they connect.

Re:Not a thief

[wild_quinine]

This kind of misses the point, actually. The purpose of a door, other than to keep heat in, is to DENY access. If you don't need to deny access, you don't need a door. Having a door at all is analagous to enabling WPA or WEP.

By contrast, the purpose of a router is to ALLOW access. Only the encryption routines and MAC filtering are there to filter that access.

Re:Not a thief

[xtracto]

No, I have never done anything like that. But I have been attempted to print several (say 200) containing nothing but Hidely-ho, neighborino! using their shared lasetjet printer :D

Re:Not a thief

[TheSpatulaOfLove]

I'm also pretty sure laptops don't get criminal trials Laptops may not, but printers are subject to civil lawsuits - Right, RIAA?

Re:Not a thief

[XenoPhage]

You know.. if the neighbor is playing loud music, you can complain to the authorities about that... I wonder if the same is true for wifi signals? I realize that the loud music is generally an ordinance thing, but still..

I wonder if there's a case there for high population areas where there are lots of wifi signals... There are only 14 channels, 3 of which don't overlap... Can you sue for interference? (not that I'm sue happy, just curious..)

Re:Not a thief

[Jarik_Tentsu]

I'm sure according to the law, that'd be like seeing someone with their front door open, walking inside and taking their stuff.

Now of course, tech peopel know better, but most people (Ie, lawyers, judges and jury) would probably see it like that. Even if it *was* open, you still intentionally logged on knowing that it was not your wireless network.

In that case, it would be best playing dumb and not mentioning "IP address" or "gateway" at all and pretending "I thought computers came with internet! I just opened Internet Explorer and it worked!"

~Jarik

Re:Not a thief

[Just Some Guy]

There is a door, in that if you don't have an IP on that WAP for whatever reason, then it's not going to pass traffic with you. Once you associate with it and get a DHCP lease, that door's wide open.

Re:Not a thief

[192939495969798999]

Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.

Re:Not a thief

[Venik]

I think a more appropriate analogy would be that you saw a sign "Free stuff!" over my house, you rang the bell and the doorman let you in. He said the owner told him to invite everybody in and let them take whatever they want.

If you set your router to broadcast and authorize all incoming connections, then obviously that was your intention. You put up a big sign over your house: "Free network for all!" Why would you get upset if someone takes you up on your offer?

To be entirely accurate, it would be you who is breaking the law (in some states at least) by openly sharing your wireless connection. In addition to that, you are also violating the terms of the contract with your ISP.

Re:Not a thief

[DriedClexler]

*sigh*

Three things are certain in life:

1. Death
2. Taxes
3. Increasingly complicated analogy wars in discussions of wi-fi freeriding

Re:Not a thief

[Red Alastor]

And the router owner pays extra for downloading a certain amount of GBs per month. The analogy holds. No wait, this is Slashdot... Does anyone have a car analogy?

Re:Not a thief

[ProfessionalCookie]

I've never gone into a house to use WiFi, just sit in your car usually the radio signal is good enough out there.

Re:Not a thief

[oledoody]

total bs. if I start my laptop and my neighbor doesn't happen to have security on and my computer automatically connect through their wireless network what difference does it make? I don't even check what I'm going through but I have noticed that sometimes my mac does seem to prefer my neighbor's "linksys" wireless. It happens all the time. I guess I'm a thief? Right?

Re:Not a thief

[hairyfeet]

Which is how come I don't see how they can make Wifi access illegal. About a year ago I moved into my apartment. Just sitting in my bed with my laptop on my knee I can get at least 4 open access Wifi nodes,and depending on the weather that can go up by as many as a half dozen. Hell I have gone to fix neighbors WAPs and gotten so good a signal from those WAPs around it that it hooked to someone else's WAP before it would hook up to the one in the room with me.

Personally I think stupid laws like this are just an excuse. The giant telecos and cell providers can't stand the thought of a nationwide free WAP made up of all of us sharing our resources. With things like Skype and many phones coming out with Wifi functionality it could cut into those huge profits they are making. So they try to scare folks into not sharing with crap like this and "If someone looks at child pr0n on your WAP we'll bust YOU!". And sadly,at least for me it has worked. There was a time when I was seriously thinking of running an open WAP and helping set up an open mesh network so all of us in the building would have free easy to use Wifi. But I simply don't have the resources required to fight any kind of accessory charges that could come from some sleaze looking at child pr0n from my node,and if the PRO-IP act is passed even though my software is paid for any kind of investigation could cost me my computers and thus my livelihood simply because I can't find the receipt to some software I bought ages ago.

And saddest of all I don't see this getting better. The world seems to be getting more facist by the day,with the multinational megacorps able to simply buy all the laws they want. When I first got into the net through BBS in the early '80s I dreamed of all the innovation that would come from all of us being linked together. Now I'll be surprised if in 5 years we in the USA have a net at all. Between the nightmare that is the patents and copyrights minefield, copyrights becoming so long that my grandkids would be lucky to see a copyright granted today expire,and more and more draconian laws like DMCA,PRO-IP,and this boneheaded one here,it really wouldn't surprise me if we do end up with a DRM locked PPV Internet in which "The right to read" is only for those with a credit card running a locked OS. But as always this is my 02c,YMMV

Re:Not a thief

[PottedMeat]

Of course not right.

The door is passive. The modem/router is active.

PM

Re:Not a thief

[PottedMeat]

What's the nametag for? o.0

Re:Not a thief

[Illbay]

Not true. Haven't you heard? The U.S. Supreme Court has now granted full U.S. Constitutional protections to laptops. Even if they're being detained at Gitmo.

Re:Not a thief

[JPLemme]

Lets beat the metaphor to death. It's like letting your neighbor's sprinkler water your grass. If your neighbor didn't want to share the water with you he should have moved the sprinkler or put up a fence or something.

Re:Not a thief

[zmooc]

The terminology of DHCP is even more clear than that of a simple login-form. It OFFERS you a LEASE. Next you REQUEST permission to use that LEASE after which the server ACKNOWLEDGES you REQUEST for a LEASE to use the network. Misunderstanding this is impossible if you speak english.

A door doesn't, it merely opens, after which you still haven't been offered, granted, requested or acknowledged permission to enter the house.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

If my router is set up for wide open access, I'm granting permission for anyone to use it.

But who set up your router? If you didn't set up your router, then anything your router announces to the world is irrelevant. If I knew you set up your router to allow wide access, then my usage of it would be legal. If someone else set up your router (like say the factory) then you never explicitly gave permission for me to use it.

The map is not the territory. If there's a router announcing services to be available, how do I as a passerby know that it's intentional versus mistaken?

If there's a post on Craigslist announcing that everything in your house is available to be taken away, does that mean that everything in your house is available to be taken away gratis?

Re:Not a thief

[Zerth]

So I imagine you frequently stand outside of buildings hoping someone will notice you and let you in because obviously the automatic sliding door with the words "Entrance" on it is clearly not for you.

Re:Not a thief

[ProfessionalCookie]

And Joe, who knows nothing about wireless security is likely not to give a care who connects to his network. Whether you like it or not the hardware IS giving you the ok to use the network. If it was misconfigured that's Joe's fault . . . possibly Jane's.

There are some networks that need to be secure but honestly I just consider it common courtesy to have an open AP on every connection I'm in charge of. I hope people use it (especially since there's no cell service out here) and I hope people don't abuse it. Looking at my traffic graphs it looks like I've been helpful to few poor souls and haven't really taken any hits for it.

Now if only we had FiOS.

Re:Not a thief

[MarcoG42]

I didn't put a sign outside my house saying you could come in and *USE* my equipment. People broadcasting an SSID with an unsecured router are, essentially, inviting people to come use their connection. Ignorance shouldn't be an excuse. You bought the equipment, learn how to use it.

Re:Not a thief

[macslas'hole]

You left out the one key factor in your analogy. There is a BIG FLASHING NEON SIGN AND A LOUDSPEAKER that say "OPEN FOR BUSINESS".

Re:Not a thief

[evilandi]

I believe it is a lesser crime to enter without breaking in.

Correct. Burglary is the act of breaking AND entering AND committing theft (logical AND; all three must happen). Theft is the intention to permanently deprive someone of physical property. Since accessing open WiFi does not involve depriving someone of physical property (neither permanent nor temporary), it is neither theft nor burglary.

Fraud covers many crimes such as obtaining goods or services through deception. Since there was no deception, there was no fraud.

A door does not reply with a message granting me access; the fact that it is open, closed, locked, unlocked, slightly ajar or otherwise is legally irrelevant - the important thing with burglary is that you had to break something to gain entry and then take something without permission, with no intention of giving it back.

An open WiFi router does specifically reply with a message granting me permission. The fact that it uses a particular protocol or particular encryption is legally irrelevent - the important thing is that it replied back with a message specifically granting me permission. Users are authorised.

(Declaration of interest: I run a deliberately open WiFi hotspot - albeit heavily firewalled and bandwidth-throttled. )

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

IAAL (as in I AM A LAWYER) and doesn't work this way, I am sorry.
The posterior court decisions regarding this matter are all against this kind of tricky argumentation you using. Basically, you MUST have the EXPLICIT permission of the Access Point owner, including what you CAN and you CAN'T do.
If you don't have those permissions EXPLICITLY, there is no hidden-agreement or such.
You are violating the law, the Access Point owner rights, and you WILL be punished as such.

Basically, as the regular /. claim is that Internet is just another public service, as water, sewer, electricity, you can't just go and connect to this public service whenever you want by violating the public concessionary company rights. You can't just pull an electric wire from the street to your house, and you can't just go and connect your laptop to a WiFi network without a previous agreement with whoever is responsible for such service.

Re:Not a thief

[hackstraw]

Well, I sasked your door permission to open by turning the handle, and when it did, since it was unlocked, I entered your house while you were gone today....

Since when does your door end up on my property or out in public property? There are laws against trespass which wikipedia says is "the criminal act of entering another person's land or property without permission of the owner or lessee". Seems a little different than having your wifi be unprotected and sitting on _my_ property.

"Stealing" WiFi is the same as stealing broadcast TV or radio.

Re:Not a thief

[ProfessionalCookie]

No, no the judges make up criminal law too. At least here in California they don't care what the legislature ... or the people think. They just do what makes-sense to them. *sigh*

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Nametag = IP address

Re:Not a thief

[plasmacutter]

This is US -- we don't have real laws that get updated with precise description of what is and isn't a crime. "The law" is whatever the last time judge decided after examining the bank balances of the two parties. fixed

Re:Not a thief

[DeadTOm]

Every wireless router comes with multiple warnings both on and in the box about securing your wireless network. Every one I have purchased had a separate sheet in yellow or orange or some other obnoxious color with huge lettering on it telling me that I needed to secure my wireless network. Also when configuring your wireless router most (every one I've ever used) configuration panels/wizards tell you if your wireless network is open. Not to mention that common sense would dictate that if you don't have to do anything special to access your wireless than neither does anyone else. Failing to do anything to attempt to render that situation implies that you don't care if people access it freely. I think you'd have a hard time proving that the owner of the router didn't know it was open.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

according to CALEA, having a wifi router MAKES you an ISP. If you provide the 'last link' you're the ISP. As such you must provide the feds with real time wiretapping capabilities or suffer a 10K a day fine when they ask. You also can't disable the service if you realize the error of your ways when you get a tap request.

That would be my defense - excuse me Mr. Wifi provider, are you registered under CALEA? OOoh so I'm not guilty of theft, I'm actually guilty of helping the feds find someone who isn't a registered wifi provider

I'm AC on this because that law downright scares me.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm (quite legally) connected to wifi at a public library at this very moment. I'm definitely not stealing anything. In fact, I would argue that the wifi has taken over the one's and zero's entering a particular part of my computer's memory chips at the moment. I'm not concerned, it is only temporary, after all. Just changing bit patterns. Nothing stolen, nothing changed. And I am able to affect some of those ones and zeroes, this message being an example. But only temporarily. When I disconnect, it'll all be gone, back to random bits, especially when I turn the computer off. Typical idiot legislators and illiterate decision makers, screwing up the internet, screwing up access, etc., putting us at an economic, knowledge and expertise deficit/disadvantage compared to places where such idiocy does not exist.

Re:Not a thief

[Theoboley]

Along these regards... I was at one time broadcasting my SSID as my lastname+wireless with WEP encryption. Well it just so happened that a neighbor down the road was picking up on my signal. At least they had the common courtesy to call me for the password, which I then told them no and changed the SSID shortly thereafter. Point being is, instead of freeloading (which they couldn't have anyway, being average computer users) there are still some decent people in this world. It almost makes me feel bad about denying them wireless access. Almost...

Re:Not a thief

[mapkinase]

That is exactly the situation when you like them to be opposite to what they are, isn't it?

Re:Not a thief

[SBrach]

Well if you really want to beat it to death....

It's like your neighbors sprinkler getting your dirt front yard wet, and you decide to throw down some grass seed. Sure your neighbor is growing you a lawn with his water and it may cost him a little extra but it would be trivial for him not to. Nothings changed for him other than the fact that you decided to start benefiting form his actions.

Equating using some ones WiFi with breaking into their house and using their internet connected PC is silly. If you dont want to share, hit the "Setup Security" button that most new routers have.

Also, I keep hearing this "what if they pay per GB" nonsense. Other than cell phones, are there many pay per usage plans?

Re:Not a thief

[Q-Hack!]

New Mexico beat you to it.

Re:Not a thief

[Innova]

A bad analogy is like a leaky screwdriver.

Re:Not a thief

[omnipresentbob]

IPv7? You either overestimate the proliferation of computers or people.

Re:Not a thief

[dogdick]

There are a lot of interesting topics raised from this article...

First, with how many cities are offering free wifi how is the layman to know the difference between a inproperly secured router and a free public service.

Second most operating systems will default to conncecting to an open network if its available, again the layman doesn't know the difference.

My mom is the type of person that 'has the internet installed on her computer' (the whole internet:)).. She doesn't understand the concept of networks and routers...

I know that ignorance doesn't excuse you from law but we are getting to a apoint that the avwerage person needs a Net+ certification just to use the internet legally

Re:Not a thief

[cawpin]

Actually, no. It's still breaking and entering. The breaking part doesn't have anything to do with "breaking" something to gain access. It means to break the plane of entrance which, in and of itself, is a crime so the analogy of it to Wi-Fi access is not correct.

Your example of taking a drink gives us the following POSSIBLE charges.

1. Breaking and entering
2. Burglary (stealing the water that has monetary value.)
3. Theft (same reason)
4. Robbery (entering a structure with the intent of committing a felony. Since you were planning on getting a drink, which is a crime in itself.)

My definitions of burglary and robbery may be reversed, I haven't looked them up in a while.

Re:Not a thief

[IkeTo]

I'm more thinking in the line of intent. What is the intent that a typical citizen install a wireless router. My guess: "for himself to be able to access the broadband he has subscribed". If you see an open wifi signal, what is the most likely intent of the person enabling it? My guess is still, "for himself to be able to access the broadband he has subscribed". Does the average intent include "to allow arbitrary people to access it"? Well... I don't think so. Then it is a break-in for somebody just access it. Just like if somebody leave a key at a hidden corner around his gate at the openly accessible side of his house so that he can open the gate in case he has forgotten his key, if you find the key and open it, you are still breaking in. Of course he might not be able to catch you, but that is not the point. The point is, you are treapassing.

In a world where the norm of people installing wifi is to have a WPA key locking everything out, the rules will be very different. It is not a technical thing at all, it is a human thing. To resolve such issue, no spec document will tell you the answer. That answer has to be come from social norms.

Re:Not a thief

[pem]

I live in Texas. We use doors to keep heat OUT!

Re:Not a thief

[JoeMerchant]

Perhaps WEP is analogous to locking a car door, with the window down, keys in the ignition and running.

Re:Not a thief

[Spy der Mann]

You're right... because the "intruder" does not take ANY PROPERTY AWAY from the wifi "provider/victim".

The case of wifi is very particular because the user pays a FIXED FEE. Not even plugging your tv on your neighbor's house would be equivalent.

Re:Not a thief

[MoonlightSeraphim]

I believe it is a lesser crime to enter without breaking in. no, the analogy he is making is that it's like 1st & 2nd degree murder. Both are still crimes and murder but the sentence for each is different.

Re:Not a thief

[PFI_Optix]

Sure. I found your car key in your house (the door was unlocked, remember) and took it for a drive. I returned it safe and sound, so what's the harm?

What do you mean you don't have an unlimited gasoline supply? You pay per gallon? What?

Satellite internet providers will throttle a user down siginificantly if their use exceeds so many GB per month. By using their wireless network, you are consuming bandwidth they pay for and causing them to be throttled when they might not be if you hadn't connected. Not to mention people who actually do pay per MB/GB.

An unsecure wireless network is NOT an invitation, and negotiating a network connection does not equate implied permission to use the network. Just because you can do something unimpeded does not make it okay. I've seen malfunctioning routers that SHOULD be using encryption fail do to so. The configuration showed encryption as being active, but it worked as an open access point.

Re:Not a thief

[cawpin]

"the important thing with burglary is that you had to break something to gain entry"

Completely WRONG. The "breaking" part doesn't mean you break something. It means you are breaking the plane of entrance, walking through a door, entering a window.

Re:Not a thief

[HTH NE1]

IPv7? You either overestimate the proliferation of computers or people. Reasonable limits aren't.

Re:Not a thief

[plague3106]

No, it's more like you using your cordless handset to use a neighbor's cordless base unit to make phone calls... which is illegal, by the way.

Re:Not a thief

[vitaflo]

No, the purpose of a door is to allow access. I'd like to see you access your own house without any doors on it, much like I'd like to see you access a wireless signal without a wireless router. The very concept of a door is to allow that access in the first place. To deny access you add a lock to the door, similar to adding a secure login to a router.

Re:Not a thief

[cjb658]

Ethics aside, your router is actively sending beacons that solicit itself as an available device to connect to. The beacons come to my house. Some operating systems (ironically Mac & Linux, but not Windows) default to connecting to any open access point, so I may 'steal' your interwebs without having any say in the matter at all.

Re:Not a thief

[fish_in_the_c]

intresting, so if I leave my access point open and log nothing no one can prove _I_ did it.

( that may or may not of coarse stop me from going to jail ;)

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

what about an open door?

Re:Not a thief

[anothy]

it's even worse (for the prosecution) than this: the conversation between nodes typically starts with the base station advertising that it offers unfettered access. it issues an invitation. when i respond to the invitation, i ask for permission (in the form of a join attempt and subsequent DHCP request), which is then granted and your defense comes into play. the frequent analogy of unlocked front doors just doesn't hold.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Look, until you figure out a way to create a "bad car analogy", nobody is going to get it.

Re:Not a thief

[liam193]

No, but if you sshd sent an email to me saying I opened up this port for you to connect go ahead, then yes you granted permissions.

I can't even begin to comprehend why some have such a problem understanding the beacon thing. When you have a open wifi network with SSID broadcast, your device is sending out a signal that asks people to connect. It's not the same as an open door. It's an open door and a person standing next to it with a bullhorn saying, anyone can come in.

Re:Not a thief

[TJamieson]

Oof. True if and only if the signals are unencrypted. The point at which you begin decrypting signals is the point where it becomes illegal.

In fact, since that's the law for satellite communication (in the US, anyway) I would think that WiFi laws would be similar -- open APs are broadcasting unencrypted into your property, therefore you have legal right to make use of the signal. WEP/WPA cracking is where it stops being legal.

Re:Not a thief

[SanityInAnarchy]

I'm not the GP, but... I have never done the first two. The third, though, is done by default by some OSes -- and here in the US, I would go by what the router is configured to broadcast. Seriously, if it says "private", that implies that someone knew how to change the SSID, but not so much as to even turn on WEP -- WTF?

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I asked your door to open by turning the handle. And it did - it removed a latch and swung open, clearly acting as you'd set it up to allow me free access. Mechanical process? Check. Automated response? Check

Re:Not a thief

[curecollector]

The only crime committed is that you didn't pay for bottled water.

IANAL... but while entering may not be B&E in the the case where the door is unlocked, I imagine you can still be hit with a criminal trespass charge. Probably depending upon the state.

Re:Not a thief

[morgan_greywolf]

In most states as I understand it, it's the difference between breaking and entering and trespassing

Nope. There's a term for 'breaking and entering' without the 'breaking' part. Trespassing is entering onto someone's property without permission. The term your looking for is 'unlawful entry'. Still a misdemeanor, but a more punishable offense in most states than trespassing.

Re:Not a thief

[SanityInAnarchy]

But you know very well that the only reason the AP is open is because the owners don't know how to secure it. Their fault. This is one of the most trivial things to learn about computer security.

And, consider the other poster's analogy: While I can see how it's easy to do so, the fact remains that these people are by accident broadcasting that their network exists, and handing out IP addresses (and DNS, gateway, etc) to anyone who asks.

At a certain point, claiming ignorance is no excuse.

Re:Not a thief

[morgan_greywolf]

Every joe six pack runs that stupid cd that comes with the router, and it guides them through, step by step, VERY CLEARLY, how to configure, AND SECURE their router.

Every?

Re:Not a thief

[The_Quinn]

This is where that analogy fails, because a house is still property. My apartment is, however, my property and what's in it is rightfully mine. Just because something is on your property does not make it *yours*. If I am on your property, you cannot take my clothes and claim they are yours. If I drop my wallet you cannot take it. If I sing a song, you cannot record and sell it. You cannot take my picture and market your products with it.

Airwaves do have a property status, and though I do not go into great detail here, your argument that simply because something *exists* on your property means that it is yours to use freely as you wish is just wrong.

Re:Not a thief

[91degrees]

The one I set up for my parents didn't. Brown box and a quick setup guide. Not sure about the box or literature for mine but the config doesn't give any warnings. The proof that the owner didn't know it was open would be to ask him whether he knew his network was open. It would be up to you to find reasonable doubt that he was telling the truth. Typically this would include suggesting some motivation for him to lie.

Re:Not a thief

[wolferz]

... that is rather ridiculous. Perhaps next you will tell me that, because I left my car door unlocked and the keys in the passenger seat, my car is giving you permission to steal it from me.

Never mind the obvious stupidity in leaving myself open like that. That's not the issue. The issue is you are saying leaving myself open makes it not stealing. Computers/routers can't give you permission to access them in the legal sense as computers and routers do not have the capacity to reason. They can give you permission to access them no more than the wall of a building can give you permission to paint graffiti on it. They are only doing what they are designed to do based on the original designers intent, not the intent of the owner, and certainly not their own intent since they can't have intent.

If the router came pre-secured and the owner had intentional removed such protections it could be argued, likely without success, that they were giving every one implied permission to use the device. However, since such devices typically come with all such safeguards turned off and since most users do not understand nor care to understand the implications of such the courts will rule the such permission is not implied.

The permission you speak of is purely an IT concept and is different from the permission required by the law the same way a bank that you place your money in is different from a bank that helps you maintain speed through a curve on the freeway. One means that access has been granted by one computer to another computer and does not imply that you, the person at the computer, are supposed to have permission to use it, simply that you successfully gained access but not necessarily not authorized access. The other means that you were expressly given permission to use something... and worth noting is that that permission applies even if for some reason you CAN'T access it because of, for example, the inability to authenticate (ie you are authorized but you don't have access).

Re:Not a thief

[liam193]

How about your SMTP server accepting my spam? Is that also fair game? Again this one is a case where I make the first connection. In the case of WiFi, the access point that was sending beacons made the first attempt. One could argue that if you were sending the beacons and didn't intend to allow me to connect, you violated the FCC rules that your radio signals are not allowed to interfere with others devices.

What about exploits giving me access to your system? Again, this is a "break in" not a connection to a service that solicited the access.

Buying a wireless access point is similar to going into a store where there is a box with flyers in it that says, "Free - Take One". You go the manager and say, "I need a box like that to put my pens in. Will you sell me the box?" You buy the box and take it to your business to put your own stuff in it, but you don't remove the "Free - Take One" message from the box. Or in the case of setting a new SSID and not enabling WEP or disabling beacons, you repaint each letter in a different color. Later you have a customer come by and take your pens. Who was wrong here?

Re:Not a thief

[Seraph787]

Technically if there is no sign of break in, such as no broken windows or locks, then it is hard to prove theft and is not covered by insurance. I am not sure how the law works but this is how insurance works.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

so I may 'steal' your interwebs without having any say in the matter at all

Nonsense. You have the choice. You can change the default configuration on your leeching computer, just like you're implying the the bandwidth provider off of whom you're leeching should change their router.

Re:Not a thief

[MrPeach]

The only apt analogy is this:

Your neighbor has setup a physical network connection on his lawn with a sign that says "free internet" on it. All you have to do is walk up to his property line and plug your computer in.

No physical trespass has occurred, only bits are being exchanged. The exact same as using someone's unsecured Wi-Fi.

A secured Wi-Fi would be the same physical connector on his property line, but without the "free" sign and with a locking cover. Clearly you are exceeding your authority if you jimmy the lock and then plug into his internet connection.

So - an analogy that works and makes sense. How bizzaaaaaa!

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

5. Profit!!!

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Your example only makes sense if you denied the person owning the router access to the internet.

We're assuming your goal is to only make use of the WiFi, not remove it from the other person.

Your example would make more sense if you entered the house (without breaking in), sat on the guy's sofa, and watched his Cable TV.

Now, depending on how the guy advertised the entry to his house (was the door just closed? was the door locked? was the door left open? did the door have a sign saying "all those who enter should make themselves comfortable, one seat per guest, only, please ----> Seats this way"?) this "crime" could range from not being a crime at all (advertising seats available, one per customer) to being break and enter (felony, IIRC).

If the door is unlocked but closed, this is trespass, generally a misdemeanor charge. I would be amazed if a judge gave more than 3 months probation for something like this.

Now, call me stupid, but running public DHCP is like advertising "Free seats, take one for yourself and write your name on it until you leave". Running a WAP without any encryption is like leaving your door unlocked.

Now, if your door is unlocked, it's not an invitation in, per se. DHCP, however, seals the deal. It's the sign that says "Free seats, take a breather in this place, and stay as long as you like" above the door. Unless that door's locked, nobody would look at you oddly for going in.

That being said, a house with a sign like that would quickly be declared a public nuisance, wouldn't it?

BTW: Leaving your door unlocked *is* considered an invitation to take your stuff to insurance companies. Insurance companies will only pay out on theft claims if you can prove the BREAK part of BREAK and ENTER, as in a damaged door, smashed glass, etc. There have been many cases of criminals using key bumping and insurance not paying up unless you have a video camera on your door lock. So, your example's still only half right, since you'd end up in prison, but the other person would be out his stuff quite permanently, assuming you already hocked it and spent the cash.

Re:Not a thief

[obi]

I've often thought of doing the same - I wouldn't mind sharing my bandwidth, being neighbourly and all. The only thing stopping me is that someone could do something clearly illegal using my IP address as a starting point. If the cops show up at my door one day, I'm not sure I'd like to deal with the hassle of trying to explain it all away using some DHCP logs or something.

How do you deal with this risk - do you consider the risk nearly nonexistent, or do you have some other safeguards?

Re:Not a thief

[SeekerDarksteel]

An unsecure wireless network is NOT an invitation, and negotiating a network connection does not equate implied permission to use the network.

Did you check your email this morning? If so, did you call up Google or Yahoo or your ISP or whoever provides it and ask them if you had permission to connect to their server?

Did you call the person hosting TFA before clicking on the link asking if you had permission to access their server?

Of course not. That's preposterous. Because the nature of a computer network is DEFAULT ALLOW. If it were not, the internet as we know it today would be impossible. Quite literally, the fact that I _can_ connect to a webserver makes it okay. The fact that I _can_ connect to an SMTP or POP3 server implies I have permission. And the fact that a wireless router grants my laptop an IP address is literally the router saying "Feel free to use me however you want."

Just because people don't realize this fact doesn't make it any less the case. Otherwise, I could set up a webserver, buy a domain, then sue anyone who connects to my webserver for accessing my computer without my permission. I pay per GB of bandwidth the server uses, how dare you connect to _my_ webserver and use _my_ bandwidth.

Re:Not a thief

[Torinaga-Sama]

502: 192.168.0.101(you)

(Is "You Have No Permission to Speak" still a valid NNTP error message?)

Re:Not a thief

[lastchance_000]

Actually, I believe the definition of robbery requires the threat of violence.

Re:Not a thief

[wolferz]

"simply that you successfully gained access but not necessarily not authorized access."

should be:

"It simply means that you have successfully gained access but not necessarily authorized access."

Re:Not a thief

[Kankraka]

Yes, every joe six pack, who happens to run that cd that says something along the lines of "run this cd before doing anything else", will be given step by step easy to follow, very clear instructions on how to plug in the router, attach network cables, set up wireless access, and secure the wireless connection.

Re:Not a thief

[Ephemeriis]

intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access Then, I have never stolen WiFi. I have never accessed without authorization; as I have never cracked a WEP or WPA password scheme. This, I think, is the crux of the problem. This is what many people don't understand... And we geeks are apparently doing a bad job of explaining.

If you have an unsecured access point anybody can connect to it with nearly-zero effort. Certain versions of Windows would connect automatically without even prompting you. Other versions warn that it might be unsafe to connect to an open access point, but say nothing about whether you actually have permission to use it or not.

If I'm sitting in my car in a parking lot, and turn on my laptop, I cannot tell the difference between an AP that was intentionally left unsecured for public use and one that was accidentally left unsecured because somebody didn't know what they were doing. They both show up as unsecured. Sure, I guess an SSID like "FreeInternet" or "PrivateNetwork" might be a hint... But entirely too many people - even those that intentionally set up a secure network - leave the SSID as "Netgear" or "Linksys"

What am I supposed to do...just start knocking on doors until I find out who owns the AP and ask if I can use it?

And what if two people both have unsecured Linksys APs with the SSID of "Linksys"...but one did it on purpose so others can get free Internet, and one just didn't know any better. And I get explicit, written permission from the first guy to connect to his AP. But I can't tell the difference between them because they're both called "Linksys" and I wind up connected to the wrong one?

This isn't a real-world situation where you can actually see physical boundaries, walls, doors, signs. This isn't a case of knowingly entering somebody else's house just because they didn't lock the front door.

This is more like a case of finding a nice little plot of green grass with a fountain in the middle of it... That looks just like the public park up the street... And has absolutely no signs indicating whether it is private property or not... And when you stop there to get a drink from the fountain some guy shows up and yells at you for trespassing and stealing his water.

It isn't that hard to secure your wireless these days. Just about any AP makes it trivially easy to pick a unique SSID and some kind of encryption. It'll only take a few minutes of your time. And if you can't be bothered to encrypt your network, you really can't expect any kind of privacy on it. Random strangers will connect to it.

Of course, actively bypassing encryption is a crime. That goes without saying. It doesn't really matter how broken WEP is or how easy it is to crack... If you're actually cracking it you're going beyond what you've been granted.

But if it's unencrypted... Everyone's been granted full access.

Re:Not a thief

[mithras invictus]

That is not insightful at all. He never entered your house, never invaded your privacy, and nothing was missing afterward. It's more like your neighbor running a radio station that you decided to listen to. It turns out later that he would like to be paid a subscription fee or something but never ever mentioned that.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

Since accessing open WiFi does not involve depriving someone of physical property (neither permanent nor temporary), it is neither theft nor burglary.

Nonsense. It's theft of services. That bandwidth IS now gone, forever. The owner of that pipe may have been at a remote location transferring files, and was slowed down. The ISP providing the pipe may meter the bandwidth. That you're so anxious to split hairs and use semantics to dodge the fact that leeching someone's paid-for services isn't any different, ethically, than leeching water out of their hose says a lot about your agenda. Set up all the free wifi you want. Put up a sign that says people are free to use it. Do you welcome people to recharge their batteries from your outdoor outlets? Who cares about the technical protocols involved. A leech is a leech is a leech. You know it, the leech knows it... everyone here knows it. All of the slippery attempts to cravenly hide behind the hardware protocols is practically Clintonian in its oily semantics, and is just a transparent attempt by people to chip away at the larger issue of "information wanting to be free." It's a proxy fight in the larger philosophical battle over whether or not an artist's work should be ripped off without consequence, or whether people who invest in network infrastructure should be able to have a say in how it's used, etc. Some people want a leeching society as the norm, and some people don't. It's as simple as that.

Re:Not a thief

[Martin Blank]

No. The same FCC regulations that cover the use of that spectrum also protect people from claims of interference. You only have a claim if you can show that the equipment in use by the other person is interfering with other electronic equipment, and even then there may be limits. You cannot complain, for example, that their microwave oven, which disrupts your wireless signal because it leaks somewhat around channel 9 and you use something in the range of 6-11 inclusive, is degrading your experience because that's simply a risk that you accept when using equipment in the 2.4GHz spectrum. The same thing applies to Bluetooth and 2.4GHz phones, which can interfere with all channels, though equipment in this spectrum is generally designed to co-exist fairly well.

Re:Not a thief

[decep]

The worst that you would be charged with for openning an unlocked door might be tresspassing, but turning a knob would not be considered "asking for authorization."

With open wifi, one could argue DHCP has authorized them to use the network since the wifi router grants access after a request for an address has been made. In effect, the owner of the wifi router has authorized you for access by proxy.

If you put all the stuff in your house on the sidewalk and setup a sign that says, "Free Stuff", I think that is the equivalent of a wife router with SSID broadcasts and DHCP enabled (obviously with no encryption and MAC filtering).

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the purpose of a door is to allow access. I'd like to see you access your own house without any doors on it...

No. The purpose of a doorway is to allow access. The purpose of a door is to restrict that access.

Re:Not a thief

[khellendros1984]

Yes, especially in countries outside of the US. And where they aren't pure per-GB plans, then they have a relatively low cap, such that when you exceed that amount you are charged either higher fees or the speed of the connection is cut significantly.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

A better analogy is the "eks-rated" drive-thru that my friends and i used to squint to look at from a distance. We didn't pay to watch, but because they didn't properly block off our view we could see and used up some of their "visual bandwidth." We were not criminals because we didn't step onto private property but watched from a public vantage point. Same thing with Wi-Fi that is available without security from a public vantage point. If you are not standing on private property, then you are not violating any property laws, right? If I call someone and their answering machine picks up and i leave a message, am i violating their private property? The router sets the transactions much like your answering machine--if you are a participant in their LAN to access publicly viewable material and not accessing private files inside other computers in the LAN then I don't understand where the violation of property or service availability occurs. If I greatly effect their bandwidth that would be the equivalent of me standing in public space and placing a palm frond in front of a paying viewer of the drive-in movie--hmmm. Where does an affect on a private network by a "guest" go from not violating private property/service acquisition to violating property/service acquisition? I guess that would be the crux of the issue. Interesting discussion ....

Re:Not a thief

[jmpeax]

The issue is one about identifying the meaning of an open network. That is, what's the perceptible difference between a network purposefully left open for public access, and one that is private, but mal-configured?

As far as I can tell there isn't one. That's why the house analogy fails.

This isn't to say, of course, that stealing bandwidth isn't wrong. It's just that when there's no way for people to know that they're stealing it, I don't think they should be punished.

Think of big cities with lots of wireless networks in range at any given location: some will be operated by hotels and restaurants and be intentionally open, and others will be badly configured home networks set up (unwisely some would say) in apartments. I face this situation every time I use a laptop in the centre of London or Paris.

Re:Not a thief

[hypergreatthing]

ohh, by that same respect i should be suing broadcasters everywhere for tresspassing into my home? I never invited tv signals or fm radio signals into my home at all, but they come in anyway. I even put a sign outside that says no em radiation allowed yet they bypass my super secure barrier. I don't get it, will the government please help me by passing idiotic and stupid laws that protect my stupidity please?

Re:Not a thief

[khellendros1984]

Don't give me that screwdriver business. It's like a leaky car, and you know it!

Re:Not a thief

[18hrs]

The primary purpose of a door is to provide an in/out mechanism. A bolt or lock would be the component used to deny access. Therefore having a door would be analogous to broadcasting the signal and using a bolt to enabling WPA or WEP.

Re:Not a thief

[Fast Thick Pants]

Suppose you bought a used car lot, but not to sell the cars, just to have a nice inventory onhand for your friends and family who live nearby. You want to make it easy and convenient, so you get all the cars rekeyed so the same key will operate them all. You want to announce this service and distribute the keys, but it's too much trouble to look up each person's mailing address. So you get 1000 copies of the key made and bulk-mail them to everyone in the zip code, addressed to "Occupant", with an invitation that says "Feel free to borrow one of my cars!"

Naturally, you assume that only the friends and family you intended will use the cars. Imagine your surprise when you see strangers borrowing the cars!

Is this bad? Well, it's not doing anyone any harm... as long as you have enough cars left over for your friends and family too... as long as the strangers don't run over pedestrians with your cars and get the cops on your ass... as long as the local car rental company doesn't find out and come break your kees for stealing their business... Hmm, all in all, maybe it'd be safer to give the keys out only to selected individuals!

Re:Not a thief

[jasen666]

You're assuming Joe Bob redneck or Grandma Mabel knows how to do this, or even that they *can* do it.

Re:Not a thief

[PFI_Optix]

did you call up Google or Yahoo or your ISP or whoever provides it and ask them if you had permission to connect to their server? Did you call the person hosting TFA before clicking on the link asking if you had permission to access their server?

Obviously not, any more than I asked permission to enter a store. A web server is a lot different than a WAP in function and in intent. An unlocked door at a business and an unlocked door at a residence are similar.

Re:Not a thief

[somersault]

From wikipedia:

It is common to see examples that attempt to show that the IPv6 address space is extremely large. For example, IPv6 supports 2^128 (about 3.4x10^38) addresses, or approximately 5x10^28 addresses for each of the roughly 6.5 billion (6.5x10^9) people alive today.[1] In a different perspective, this is 252 addresses for every star in the known universe[2] - more than ten billion billion billion times as many addresses as IPv4 supported. Now, I don't know about you but I think that is quite reasonable for now. When we all need 5x10^28 addresses each (not to mention the extra addresses each person can get behind a NAT) then there will be a problem.. in the meantime, "5x10^28 IP addresses should be enough for anyone" ;)

Re:Not a thief

[PFI_Optix]

what's the perceptible difference between a network purposefully left open for public access, and one that is private, but mal-configured?

I think this is where common sense has to be taken into account. If I park at Starbucks and grab your open wifi connection from the apartment complex next door, it's a lot different than if I sit down in my suburban back yard and hit an open WAP when there's nothing within range but other homes. The former can be dismissed as an honest mistake; the latter cannot.

Re:Not a thief

[jc42]

No wait, this is Slashdot... Does anyone have a car analogy?

Sure do; a much better one than the previous reply.

A couple of blocks from me, there is a short (3 blocks) street which it turns out isn't owned by the city. It's owned by the people who live along it. This happens hereabouts sometimes. The street connects to four city streets, has normal-looking street signs, and there are no "No Trespassing" signs anywhere. I lived here several years before I learned that that one street isn't a public way.

So when I drive on that street, am I committing criminal trespass?

I'd expect that the answer is "Of course not! Who'd be stupid enough to charge you for driving on an open street?"

The answer to that seems to be "A lot of people on slashdot. The same ones who think that using an open wi-fi access point without passwords or encryption is a criminal act."

I'm sorta glad that the people posting here don't (mostly) work for law enforcement. I'd be constantly arrested and charged with crimes that I couldn't have known I was committing.

My wife and I both have wireless laptops. I have a Mac Powerbook, she has a Vista laptop (which she hates ;-), and we also have an OLPC SO. All of them occasionally connect to the several open neighborhood wi-fi APs. She doesn't notice this, but I do, because I occasionally do things like sshing to one of my home linux boxes. If my Mac or OLPC has connected to a neighbor's wi-fi from the patio, I'll get "No route to 192.168.1.17", and know immediately what the problem is. (She'd be baffled, but she doesn't use ssh, and her VPN to work works ok via the neighbors' APs.)

According to many people here, we are criminals. I consider this nonsense. A bunch of us in the neighborhood run open wi-fi access points as an act of friendliness toward each other and visitors. The wi-fi part of the spectrum is officially supposed to be open and usable by anyone, just like the public road system. Considering us criminals seems anti-social and obstructionist in the extreme.

When I was in nursery school, I was taught that nice kids share their toys. It seems that some people here never learned that lesson. I wonder if they learned any of the other useful social lessons that people have tried to teach them.

But that's another analogy for another discussion ...

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Bad analogy. I ring your doorbell and a ticket drops from the mail slot that says "You're free to enter the house and watch some tv."

That was even worse. More accurate analogy: you have a loudspeaker shouting "HI! COME IN!" to all passersby. I ring your doorbell, and a key to the house and a nametag pops out of the mail slot.

Don't want me in your house? Don't advertise free admission then give me a key and a nametag.

Not quite, you have to go into the house to get the key and the name tag, it just happens that this house left the front door unlocked. If you didn't go in the house to ask for the key you wouldn't have gotten the key only the speaker telling you there was potentially a key in the house...

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Why does everyone keep talking about DHCP? DHCP is a service that is offered after a connection is already made. If someone has DHCP turned off, then its ok to connect to the wireless signal?

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

walking in someones house is breaking and entering.

that is if they didn't give you permission

Re:Not a thief

[jmpeax]

Exactly. However, I suppose incorporating this into law may be more difficult because anyone is allowed to set up a public network.

Re:Not a thief

[Rary]

If my router is set up for wide open access, I'm granting permission for anyone to use it.

If I don't put a fence with a locked gate on my yard, am I granting permission for anyone to come hang out in my yard anytime they want? I don't think it's illegal to do so (at least until I've warned them that they're not welcome), but it's hardly an open invitation.

In general, laws are designed to work like this: that which is not expressly forbidden is permitted.

But it doesn't have to be expressly forbidden by the individual, it can be expressly forbidden by the law, which, in this case, it is.

In other words, just because I don't wear a sign saying "don't kill me" doesn't mean it's okay to kill me. The law says "don't kill anyone", and that's good enough. Similarly, the law says "don't access a computer system without authorization". And, no, that doesn't mean authorization from the system itself, but authorization from those individuals with the authority to grant authorization.

If a defense of "I asked the router for entry and it granted me entry" is valid, then using social engineering to get someone's password and then entering the password would also be valid. After all, you entered the password and the system said "come on in", therefore you're authorized.

Re:Not a thief

[dubl-u]

Essentially, I asked if I could use the network, and, acting on your behalf since you set it up, it said I could when it gave me the information required to use the network. That's exactly it.

I have opened my wireless network on purpose. It's an invitation to neighbors and passers by to use my bandwidth. If I didn't want that, I'd put a password on it.

I take all open wireless networks to be similar invitations.

Re:Not a thief

[Sleepy]

No. It's more like, your neighbor blasted music so loud you could hear it... and you danced to it etc. without "paying" an entertainment fee.

Re:Not a thief

[jc42]

It's not the same as an open door. It's an open door and a person standing next to it with a bullhorn saying, anyone can come in.

Actually, a better analogy would be the sort of door that a lot of stores have, which opens automatically when a person (or a large dog) approaches. That's clearly an invitation to enter, and it is intended as such. Making it a crime is just bizarre.

I can see a lot of slashdotters saying "Why would a store allow that? People will just enter and steal stuff." I'd consider this more of a reflection on the writer's anti-social or criminal intentions. Most people, when faced with an automatic door (or even a plain door) on a store will consider it an invitation to come in. Nobody would expect to be charged with criminal trespass or theft for just walking through an open door.

Re:Not a thief

[Orange Crush]

A wide-open wifi network, broadcasting its SSID is an invitation to use it. It's a bowl of candy on the front porch at Halloween with a sign that says "help yourself." Ethically, you should only take one piece, and not the whole bowl (i.e. hog all the bandwidth).

The router has been configured, either by its owner or manufacturer, to broadcast its name and assign addresses to any computer that asks for one.

I leave my wifi running this way on purpose. Guests can come over and use my broadband on their iphones, laptops, etc without having to fuss with any settings. If neighbors want to use it, and can actually get a useable signal from my anemic little wireless router, they are welcome to.

If someone is getting all indignant over other people using their wide-open wifi, yet they did not make even the slightest effort to secure it (at least disable SSID broadcast), then I think they're being ridiculous. Even if someone doesn't know how to configure their router, ask a friend. Someone freeloading off your wifi using reasonable bandwidth isn't causing you any harm, and you probably wouldn't even notice anyway.

Re:Not a thief

[wild_quinine]

The primary purpose of a door is to provide an in/out mechanism. No, the primary purpose of a door is to close an opening. An opening which has a door is called a doorway. An opening without a door may be referred to as something else. The door is the barrier by which an entry is closed and opened.

I'll grant you that in common parlance the word doorway is often shorted to just door, but technically that is not correct.

Re:Not a thief

[Genom]

I'm sure according to the law, that'd be like seeing someone with their front door open, walking inside and taking their stuff.

Not so. In your example, the owner no longer has their "stuff". With the case of Wifi, it's more along the lines of seeing a large, comfortable couch sitting on the sidewalk as you walk by. You sit on the couch for a while and enjoy the breeze, then you get up and walk away.

Now, it's obvious that *someone* owns that couch. It being on the sidewalk (a public place), with no signage or other means of deterring folks from sitting upon it, means there's nothing to stop you from having a seat, nor anything to tell you that anyone doesn't want you sitting there.

While you're sitting on the couch, you're taking up space. If many people sit on the couch, folks will get crowded, or some may be unable to sit down. However, you don't take up all of the couch yourself. And, once you get up, that space is now available for someone else.

Once you leave, the situation is exactly the same as it was before you arrived. Noone has been deprived of any property.

Re:Not a thief

[Fast Thick Pants]

Wait wait, better -- you bulk mail out the invitation to "Occupant", but it doesn't include the key. Instead of getting the cars rekeyed, you just have a giant rack of keys, and you hire a guy, Vito Linksysio, to hand out the keys as needed. Now, you *could* give Vito pictures of people who are allowed to borrow the cars, but that's too much trouble. You *could* tell him that people have to know a password to get a car, but that's too much trouble. So you just tell him to hand a key to whoever shows up.

And even though you've mailed the invitation to the entire zip code, you're still shocked, shocked to find that strangers are borrowing the cars. How forward of them!

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe it is a lesser crime to enter without breaking in. no, the analogy he is making is that it's like 1st & 2nd degree murder. Both are still crimes and murder but the sentence for each is different. That's exactly my point. It's still a crime.

Rinisari said: Your router didn't stop me, so it must be legal.
Morgan_Greywolf retorted by saying: By your logic, your unlocked front door didn't stop me, so it, too, must be legal
Jeppe Salvesen chimed it with: It's not as bad if you didn't have to do the breaking in.

That is where I pointed out that "illegal" means "illegal" and that we are not discussing the serverity of the crime, we are discussing whether it is a crime at all. One illegal activity can't be less illegal than another.

You, then, procede to chime in by fully agreeing that both are still crimes, in addition to pointing out that one is more severe than the other, which has no bearing on the discussion, as started by Rinisari.

In addition, I point out the contradiction in Jeppe's argument: It is a lesser crime to enter, without breaking in, but as long as I'm only entering to drink a little water from the faucet then, the only crime I committed is not paying for the water I drank.

Let me break down Jeppe's agrument for ya:
1) It is a crime to break and enter.
2) It is a crime to enter, without breaking (albeit a lesser crime but, a moot point, anyway).
3) It is a crime to enter and drink water, if I don't pay for the water; There's no question that I entered the house legally, the only actual crime was stealing the water.

I, then, am modded as a troll for presenting a perfectly valid argument that noboby seems to have the basic, 5th grade reading skills to comprehend.

Jeez, this is Slashdot. I cant be the only genius here.

Re:Not a thief

[Just Some Guy]

Why does everyone keep talking about DHCP?

Because DHCP is typically what gets you that nice layer 3 connection.

DHCP is a service that is offered after a connection is already made. If someone has DHCP turned off, then its ok to connect to the wireless signal?

Interesting question. I'd be less inclined to connect to a non-DHCP WAP because it's not going out of its way to permit you to use it.

Re:Not a thief

[Hyppy]

Trespassing? There is no physical entry onto somebody else's property happening here. Radio signals are being transmitted. If we are to consider transmitting signals through a couple walls trespassing, then the Wi-fi router's owner is equally guilty.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

If the satellite signal is broadcast on a frequency specifically allocated for public use and is not encrypted, then it sure would be.

Re:Not a thief

[Endo13]

Except that security system also includes a big neon sign or a loud bullhorn advertising it's availability and free access to anyone and everyone.

Re:Not a thief

[firewrought]

If a defense of "I asked the router for entry and it granted me entry" is valid, then using social engineering to get someone's password and then entering the password would also be valid.

No, because you had to defraud someone to get the social engineering to work.

If I don't put a fence with a locked gate on my yard, am I granting permission for anyone to come hang out in my yard anytime they want?

Why does everyone want to complicate this? Open WAP==free for respectful public use; Close WAP==public use prohibited. Simple. Why make this a legal problem when a WAP owner can specify for themselves open or close? I want to be able to do either with my WAP, and I want mobile appliances to be able to communicate with whatever open WAP they can see without fear that some overzealous DA is going to jail a productive member of society on a technicality.

Re:Not a thief

[Clockwinder]

Well, I sasked your door permission to open by turning the handle, and when it did, since it was unlocked, I entered your house while you were gone today. Since nothing was bolted to your floor, I proceeded to help myself to your TV and associated A/V equipment, your PVR, your Playstation 3, and your Wii. Additionally, your study door similarly allowed me to enter your study, where I noticed some computer equipment that wasn't chained to the desk, so I left with that, too. Since your doors granted me permission to enter your house, and they were acting on your behelf since they are on your house, you have no reason to complain. Right? When your door is in MY living room, sure!!

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey! That's the combination to my luggage!

Re:Not a thief

[devman]

Except that you could apply that logic to just about any hack. Any system will certainly be obliged to act on any valid instruction, it's the whole basis of hacking. So because I executed buffer overflow to root a machine means that that must have been authorized because the computer let me do it? It's not as clear cut as people make it seem. Where are the lines drawn, and who gets to draw them.

Re:Not a thief

[GlL]

One thing that I have not seen in this discussion is the most plausible scenario. User A buys a wireless router and plugs it in and makes no configuration changes. User B buys the same extremely popular model of router (rhymes with dinksis) and also does not configure it.

User A goes to visit someone who lives next door to user B. When user A powers on his laptop it AUTOMATICALLY connects to user B's network with no prompting from User A. User A's instant messaging client AUTOMATICALLY connects to its server, also with no action performed by User A.

How many barely computer literate people are going to end up with felonies because of this?

Here is my solution:
Router manufacterers ship the router with the wireless network and internet access disabled by default. When a user connects to the router the first time, a setup wizard walks them through connecting to the internet, changing the default password and configuring the wireless network with WPA2 personal as the default option for security. (If you work for a wireless AP manufacturer: Why don't you already do this?)

The law in question seems to be a very poorly thought out attempt to fix a technical problem with a non-technical solution. Especially since a technical solution will do more towards prevention than some law a majority of the country has no idea actually exists.

Re:Not a thief

[phulegart]

You are arguing semantics with a cute and clever twist on word usage and multiple definitions for the same words.

Your router has no rights. Your router does not have a legal power of attorney to make decisions for you that will stand up in court.

Your router is no different than a latch on your gate. If you do not lock that latch, it might make the difference between "Breaking and Entering" and "Criminal Trespass", but both are still criminal activities. You cannot argue that the latch on the gate gave you permission to access the property, because it did not bar your access. A router might be more complex than a latch, but neither is intelligent.

Now, the law is all about intent. What's the difference between manslaughter charge and a murder charge? Intent. You know you are accessing a router that is not yours. You know that you should not be accessing it without expressed permission from the OWNER of the router. Thus, you are committing a crime not only because you are stealing wi-fi access, but because you KNOW you are accessing it illegally. You can add all the semantic bullshit you want. It doesn't change the facts.

1. This is not your internet connection.
2. You do not have the permission of the OWNER of the equipment to access the connection.

With those two facts, your connection to the router in question is illegal.

An SSID of "default" or "linksys" is NOT an invitation. IT is an indication at the very least, of someone who does not know very much about their equipment. You can not assume that an open router with a factory SSID is supposed to be accessed freely. It doesn't matter what you personally believe it means when you see a default SSID. An SSID of "Free Internet Access" is an invitation.

So go ahead and use your clever justifications. All you are proving is that you are good with words. Your actions as a Wi-Fi Thief stand on their own merits.

Re:Not a thief

[mollymoo]

Better analogy: you knock on the door, a 5 year-old answers, you ask them if you can come in and they say yes. While the child and the router are capable of granting access, nether one can grant you the necessary permission.

Re:Not a thief

[mdozturk]

I don't ask permission before I point my browser to a website either. How is DHCP any different?

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

Put up a sign that says people are free to use it.

He is. He's broadcasting on public frequences, in the clear, actively accepting and responding to DHCP requests, carrying traffic, etc.

Who cares about the technical protocols involved.

People who are not ignorant idiots, or at least those who don't blame others for their own ignorance.

Some people want a leeching society as the norm, and some people don't. It's as simple as that.

And some just want a society where the user of a service can't be held liable for using a service that is advertised as open even if only as a result of the owner's ignorance. Much the same as similar situations like walking into a store that the owner forgot to lock and set the sign to 'closed', or wandering around the yard of someone who left a 'yard sale' sign up long after it ended.

Some people want a leeching society as the norm, and some people don't. It's as simple as that.

No, it isn't.

Re:Not a thief

[R3d M3rcury]

Not entirely.

You see, in the analogy, his network is analogous to his house. You are entering his network by way of a router in much the same way that you entered his house.

Re:Not a thief

[xrayspx]

I'm not buying it until they tell me how many IPs there will be for every page in the LoC. No measurement actually counts until it's measured in units/LoC.

Re:Not a thief

[raddan]

Ford Prefect: "Imagine you've got this bath. And it's ebony. And it's conical."

Re:Not a thief

[Khyber]

did you call up Google or Yahoo or your ISP or whoever provides it and ask them if you had permission to connect to their server? Did you call the person hosting TFA before clicking on the link asking if you had permission to access their server?

Obviously not, any more than I asked permission to enter a store. A web server is a lot different than a WAP in function and in intent. An unlocked door at a business and an unlocked door at a residence are similar. Except Windows XP's default for Zero Wireless config is to connect to the first available WAP, without any user interaction. The average user isn't quite aware of the internal things that happen that make their internet work, and wouldn't know how to connect to their own network and only their own network unless they were instructed to do so by a technician.

Re:Not a thief

[JesseMcDonald]

"The law" is whatever the last time judge decided after hearing a shouting match between two attorneys.

You're over-simplifying things. In particular, while precedence can be applied from any prior case, it is only binding in the event that the prior case was the ruling of a higher-level court. That rule is in place so that people can rely on the application of legal principles remaining consistent from one case to the next. If the precedent is wrong, or incorrectly applied, there is always the possibility of appeal. In my (albeit limited) experience it tends to be the rulings based on the written laws that make the least sense, most likely because detailed, written laws cannot take into consideration the unique circumstances of each case. Case law takes into account the principles and reasoning behind the decision, not just the definition of the offense and its designated penalties.

The standard disclaimer about not taking legal advice from some random Internet commenter applies, of course.

Re:Not a thief

[sharkey]

Have you ever spoofed a MAC address?

Yes, so that I could use my Linksys WRT54G between my Windows PC and Comcast, my ISP.

Have you ever connected to an access point that did not broadcast its SSID?

Yes again, I have turned off SSID broadcast on my WRT54G.

Based on my answers, apparently I would be a criminal in the Netherlands for doing no more than hooking my own equipment up to my ISP and taking one small step to making it NOT annouce itself to the world at large.

Re:Not a thief

[Hyppy]

I think I will convince my friend to set up an open WAP in his house, which is about 20 meters from a Starbucks. Then, he can press charges against any iPhone users who walk by. Perhaps, even civil suits! A $30/month connection could make us millionaires! I mean, they were OBVIOUSLY stealing my wi-fi!

Re:Not a thief

[Rary]

No, because you had to defraud someone to get the social engineering to work.

What if I guess the password? Is a weak or obvious password the same as saying "come on in, you're authorized"?

Why does everyone want to complicate this? Open WAP==free for respectful public use; Close WAP==public use prohibited. Simple. Why make this a legal problem when a WAP owner can specify for themselves open or close?

Because we're talking about technology that so few understand. Most people aren't aware that they have a choice, or what their choice implies. I'm not saying I agree with this law (I'm undecided), but until people are more educated about the technology, it's just not as simple as you want to make it seem.

Re:Not a thief

[Fnord666]

palegray.net wrote:

This man was charged with a felony because the owner of the connection failed to educate himself on how to use a point and click interface to secure a home wireless router. Was he up to no good? Maybe, but we don't know for sure, and it's beside the point.

To quote the referenced article:

According to the police, Benjamin Smith III was seen by Richard Dinon outside Dinon's home on the night of April 20, 2005, sitting in a parked SUV and using a laptop computer. When Dinon went outside to deposit his trash, Smith quickly closed the laptop and tried to hide it.

It's clear from his actions that he understood what he was doing and whether he thought it was wrong or not.

Re:Not a thief

[Red Alastor]

According to many people here, we are criminals. I consider this nonsense. A bunch of us in the neighborhood run open wi-fi access points as an act of friendliness toward each other and visitors. The wi-fi part of the spectrum is officially supposed to be open and usable by anyone, just like the public road system. Considering us criminals seems anti-social and obstructionist in the extreme

Agreed. If consumption by other parties is a problem, then throttling people using your router to a level acceptable to you is the answer. Oh and it's okay from time to time to use imagemagick on picture people sharing your bandwith request.

Re:Not a thief

[cayenne8]

"And the router owner pays extra for downloading a certain amount of GBs per month. "

What? Doesn't everyone have the unlimited internet broadband access from Cox, Comcast, AT&T...etc?

Seriously...I know some countries do seem to have these charge by the usage fees....but in the US, does anyone really have a plan that says you only get xGB month, and we charge you more for over that? I'm not talking about people with super heavy p2p usage that get nailed, but, for most people...don't you pretty much get unlimited usage? I can't imagine that someone hitting your open wifi for a bit is going to affect your billrate or quality of service.

Re:Not a thief

[prockcore]

and then you used a universal remote to change the station.

Re:Not a thief

[palegray.net]

It's clear from his actions that he understood what he was doing and whether he thought it was wrong or not. No argument there. The issue is the broader ramifications of laws against using open connections, such as innocent people going to jail for using a business owner or private person's connection when they have no objection to such behavior. It has happened.

Re:Not a thief

[18hrs]

The reason for an opening in an enclosure is to provide an in/out mechanism. However creating the opening weakens the enclosure, therefore establishing the need for a door: a mechanism to preserve the enclosure and provide an in/out mechanism. Thus the door and the opening are functionally equivalent.

Re:Not a thief

[extremescholar]

"Decrypting" is a method of altering the signal, usually with the benefit of getting some content from it. Doesn't a microwave alter the signal? What if my microwave "decrpyted" the signal? Would my microwave then be considered illegal?

Re:Not a thief

[prockcore]

yes, but DHCP must do that to work. I could DDOS your computer and not be breaking the law according to you.

These conversations would be different if routers came locked down by default and the owner had to intentionally open them up.

The fact is, if you find an open network you have no way of knowing whether or not the owner intended it to be open. It's best to just assume it's an accident and that you DON'T have permission.

Read through these comments and you see just how far people are willing to stretch in order to justify getting free wifi.

Simple question: are there peeping tom laws? How could it be illegal to sit at someone's window and stare inside when they have the ability to draw the shades?

Re:Not a thief

[palegray.net]

Once again, the basic foundation of law is simple: That which is not expressly forbidden is permitted. I do not require your consent to receive and transmit on radio frequencies emanating from your home with no authentication mechanism is between my computer and the public Internet. It's exactly as if you had a bunch of CAT-5 line running out to the street with connectors just waiting for someone to walk by.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Previously I would have agreed with you, but in this case I am using the legal rather than common sense definition of "reasonably". It's based on a recent German decision in court (they seem to have had lots of fund hacker decisions recently....) which decided that people were liable for child porn downloading on their access point because they had only used WEP and not WPA encryption! In other words, the court didn't consider a WEP encrypted WLAN as closed....

Re:Not a thief

[prockcore]

"Stealing" WiFi is the same as stealing broadcast TV or radio.

No, it's the same as using a scanner to make phone calls using your neighbor's cordless phones.

Re:Not a thief

[Sancho]

All of this just shows why analogies aren't good to talk about with pedantic people. No analogy is going to be perfect. The ultimate question is whether or not receiving a DHCPOFFER is considered authorization. That's all that needs to be determined, and no "real-world" analogies are going to be good enough to convince anyone with knowledge of computers and networking.

Analogies in the computer world? Well, if I forget to set a password on my shell account, does the computer's willingness to grant you a shell count as authorization? Generally, no. People have authorization to use specific resources, but misconfiguration may cause access to be granted erroneously. Almost every wifi router on the market comes misconfigured.

Re:Not a thief

[jgarra23]

Note that I don't disagree with you at all but let me know when you find a judge that goes along with this.

Re:Not a thief

[Joe the Lesser]

And in California you can marry them!

Re:Not a thief

[lbgator]

I don't understand your stance. I think everyone agrees that open WiFi is used by leechers. I thought the debate here is whether or not leeching should be illegal.

I think the majority of the above discussion amounts to appreciating open networks, but respecting closed networks. It seems to me that you understand that sentiment... but it makes you angry. I admit that I am kind of confused by your stance - perhaps you could clarify?

Re:Not a thief

[prockcore]

It doesn't issue an invitation. It issues an SSID. It's no different than my having my house numbers on the side of my house, visible from the street.

Re:Not a thief

[Sancho]

And what about all of those routers that were bought before whatever cutoff point you arbitrarily choose was reached? The first three wireless routers I owned did not push encryption from the CD.

Re:Not a thief

[Joe the Lesser]

On the other hand, if you drop your wallet at his apartment, you can't barge in and accusing of stealing it when he looks inside to see who's it is.

If you leave a piece of paper you can't sue him for reading it.

He's not taking possession, but he is interacting with.

Re:Not a thief

[Hungus]

no you committed:
1) theft of service (water),
2) trespass,
3) burglary (entering a premises with the intent to commit a crime ... see theft of service)
and possibly 4) breaking and entering.

there is a reasonable expectation of security embedded in common law

Re:Not a thief

[Convector]

I wouldn't be so sure. Bender's a nonvoting felon, after all.

Re:Not a thief

[Illbay]

Hm. Can my laptop and I adopt children? Although I'm not exactly sure what sort of parent that it'd be. It appears to have "issues" with pornography.

Re:Not a thief

[zmooc]

DDOS is breaking the law by any means since it is always done with the intent to disturb something. Stalking, which annoying somebody through their windows is, is so too. And logging onto networks of which I don't know the owner is something that my phone does multiple times a day. Why would this be any different if it happens on a different radio frequency with a slightly different protocol?

Re:Not a thief

[Joe the Lesser]

No, it's more analogous to just a car.

Any car can be easily stolen, but we lock them anyway.

Re:Not a thief

[prockcore]

Maybe they have a device that doesn't work with WEP. I still remember when it was recommended that your router and your pccard were made by the same manufacturer because of incompatibilities with WEP.

Re:Not a thief

[prockcore]

Since when is an SSID broadcast equivilent to a circus barker?

The fact is, even though I have WPA on my router, I still broadcast my SSID.. most people do.

The SSID broadcast is no different from having my house number on the side of the house for all to see. It lets you locate my house, it doesn't grant permission to come in.

The SSID lets you locate my router, it doesn't imply permission.

Re:Not a thief

[SeeSp0tRun]

That is actually still considered breaking and entering. Ironically, the only people who are allowed to enter an unlocked residence without permission are emergency services or federal agencies. Yes, even to take a drink from the leaky pipe under the stairs.

What a world we live in huh?

Re:Not a thief

[Sancho]

I tend to think that a DHCPOFFER is not enough to provide authorization, but even I can see the difference between open wifi and guessing SSH passwords. With open wifi, you tend to have beacons inviting clients to join up. There is no authentication phase, so there's no opportunity to reject in the first place. There's no technical differentiation between authorized and unauthorized connections. This makes declaring your intentions pretty difficult, actually, if you do want to run free, open wifi, and that's a good enough reason to want all open wifi to be legal authorization.

Re:Not a thief

[Kankraka]

Nor did my first few, however D-Link and Linksys now make a large point of encouraging the users to run the cd first, wireless networking really has taken off in the last two to three years, which is about when I noticed my last Linksys "B" router I purchased came with a cd, stating to run it before continuing. The masses have adopted wireless because laptops are just insanely cheap compared to 4 years ago. Back two or three years ago, the early adopters never encrypted any of their AP's, probably because it just worked out of the box and they didn't care to learn. Now far, far more networks are encrypted, usually with some level of WPA, and there are far more AP's in any given metro area now too.

Re:Not a thief

[Prof.Phreak]

WEP/WPA cracking is where it stops being legal.

But why? Would it be legal if they used ROT13? My opinion is that if they don't want it used, they shouldn't be sending these signals through my brain---irrelevant of encryption. Any encryption used for things that literally travel through my brain are fair game to be b0rken.

Re:Not a thief

[SeeSp0tRun]

From what I understand, ignorance does not hold up in a court of law. While it is unfortunate that someone could download kiddy porn from your network, you still retain some sort of liability for allowing them access to the gateway licensed to you. Logging into your router and adding an encryption takes less than 5 min for most household (or apartmenthold) wifi, and should be taken advantage of. If not to protect yourself from prosecution, to save your own bandwidth, and fuel... get ready for it... capitalism (couldn't resist).

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

The fact that they are broadcasting signals into your space is defense with some merit. However, since you have to do the same to get access, it doesn't hold up too terribly well. It would be different if they were broadcasting the whole internet to you and you just had to listen.

Re:Not a thief

[wild_quinine]

The reason for an opening in an enclosure is to provide an in/out mechanism. However creating the opening weakens the enclosure, therefore establishing the need for a door: a mechanism to preserve the enclosure and provide an in/out mechanism. Thus the door and the opening are functionally equivalent. They're not functionally equivalent. An opening is something you can get through, and a door is something designed to stop you getting through an opening. (A doorway is simply an opening that happens to have this barrier installed.)

Serving as an 'in/out mechanism' is the purpose of the opening, not the purpose of the door. The door is there to stop it being an 'in/out mechanism' when certain states obtain (i.e. when the door is closed).

If you don't need to close a door, you don't need a door at all! And when a door is closed, it is a barrier to entry. It's very straightforward really.

Re:Not a thief

[droptone]

What if I guess the password? Is a weak or obvious password the same as saying "come on in, you're authorized"?

A bad lock is still a lock.

Re:Not a thief

[Chas]

A door does not announce:
Hi! Here I am! (SSID broadcast)
I'm unlocked! (No WEP/WPA or MAC limitation)
Please come in! (Assigns an IP address)
Here! Help yourself! (Assigns a gateway and routes packets.)

So you're comparing apples and cheese graters.

Re:Not a thief

[Osurak]

computerhuisvredebreuk Gesundheit

Re:Not a thief

[SeeSp0tRun]

...the important thing with burglary is that you had to break something to gain entry Just a side note...

Breaking and entering refers to breaking an imaginary plane in space.
Consider an open door:
If you enter this door without permission, whether it is open, closed, or whatever you wish it to be, the plane of the interior is broken. This is why breaking and entering is often misused and misunderstood. Nothing has to be physically broken (window, lock, door frame, etc...

I digress from the topic at hand though... What evilandi said still holds true.

Re:Not a thief

[The End Of Days]

You want the right analogy for this situation? It's like walking into an open restaurant, looking for a table where people are getting up to leave, and eating the food off their plate. It's not really harming anybody, but it's still a scummy thing to do.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

It's like the neighbors wife laying naked in the backyard. It's there, there is nothing to prevent you from viewing it.

Re:Not a thief

[rfunches]

Use a router which you can flash with something like DD-WRT, and then run a module which "subnets" guests connecting via Wi-fi onto a different part of the network. Then you could limit that network to, say, ports 80 and 443, and set DNS to something like OpenDNS which can prevent access to some sites (unless you want to maintain it yourself).

Re:Not a thief

[SBrach]

The comparison still stands though. You pay for bandwidth. You pay for water. If you aren't carefull with either you run the risk of paying for someone else to benefit. When you buy a router it is a trivial task to enable a simple wep key when you first set it up. You pretty much have to make a decision to allow anyone within range to connect. Cracking a key however, that I consider stealing.

Re:Not a thief

[Cederic]

You'll be telling me you can't enter a field without a gate on it next.

Or driving a boat onto a lake without going through locks.

A door's purpose it not to allow access. The doorway's purpose is to allow access. The door's purpose is to act as a movable barrier.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

I think the majority of the above discussion amounts to appreciating open networks, but respecting closed networks. It seems to me that you understand that sentiment... but it makes you angry. I admit that I am kind of confused by your stance - perhaps you could clarify?

This is about people who are technically savvy enough to spend time reading and posting on slashdot, but who pretend that they can't tell the difference between a router that someone has not bolted down vs. one that someone has labeled as free for all to use.

What makes me mad? People who say that it's the dumb person's fault if they can't be bothered to lock down their wifi... but at the same time they play dumb and say tha their Mac's default setting - which, just like the router, can be easily changed - is to latch onto anybody's pipe that it can find. So, rather than change their OWN computer so that it isn't a cruise-control leecher of other people's bandwidth, they'll prefer to say anything named "linksys" is a deliberately advertiesed, publicly-intended service, just like the owner's garden hose, which perhaps they can also reach from the sidewalk.

I don't buy it. It's completely disengenuous. It's a thinly veiled attempt to keep simple ethics out discussions about computer and network use. It's a lame argument intended to make it sound like they're idiot savants who can get debian to run on their laptop, but can't use a child's common sense to know when it's appropriate to download porn and run bittorrent on someone else's paid-for ISP account, and find - despite being able to compile their own OS, can't "figure out" how to make their own machine ask if it should jump on someone's router.

Those who say they'd never, EVER jack into someone's electricity or use water from their outside tap (because, gosh, that just wouldn't be right!), but who blame the homeowner for shrewdly luring them into using their household router ... complete BS. They know it, and everyone else knows it. This is about staking out an absurd position in hopes of normalizing the notion that smart tech people are entitled, culturally, to use other people's stuff. It shows in how they feel entitled to free entertainment because they know how to get it with somewhat reduced odds of getting caught, and it shows in how they prefer to spin their use of a neighbor's broadband. Same damaged moral compass in both cases. This has NOTHING to do with people who actively label their router as free for use. All of the analogies about unlocked doors in safe neighborhoods are pefectly apt - it's the ethically damaged people here who are twisting themselves in knots to explain how a default hardware protocol is, in their minds, an actual invitation from the person who bought the router at Best Buy, for them to use it as they see fit. It makes these theoretically smart, technically astute people look EXACTLY like the untrustworthy, sneaky, "hacker" types that are so stereotyped in the wider culture.

Re:Not a thief

[Dread_ed]

If you simply enter a house, stand around inside, and leave when asked without breaking anything, you have committed no crime.

I have GOT to try that! Where do you live? :)

Re:Not a thief

[harl]

Something that always bothered me that's similar to this. On trucks and ads you'd see things like "visit us at www.companyname.com". That's a server not a web page. Does that now allow you to access anything on that server? They asked me to visit that server.

Re:Not a thief

[Red Alastor]

I can't imagine that someone hitting your open wifi for a bit is going to affect your billrate or quality of service.

Hitting for a bit is mostly harmless but downloading massive amounts of movies / games / porn isn't.

Re:Not a thief

[DigitAl56K]

They didn't ask you to send wifi signals back into theirs either ;) Unlike listening to your neighbors music, using their wifi requires broadcasting on the part of both parties.

Re:Not a thief

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Can you sue for interference? (not that I'm sue happy, just curious..)

No. To extend the analogy, if the neighbor is playing loud music, but the law says they can play music up to 90 dB, then you cannot call the authorities. Electronic devices all have to meet maximum allowable EM emission requirements to get sold in the US. Look on the back of a microwave, or a WiFi router and you'll see information on EM emission, and how it meets code X,Y, or Z.

Now, if they have modded their electronics to exceed that limit, you may have a case. But I don't know how one could determine that. And it's probably a criminal, not civil, matter. Hmmm... I believe the stereo is as well.

IANAL.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

"Then again, a great many people seem to think that even WEP encryption is an open invite to use the system, given the easy of cracking it."

I know you didn't claim to hold this view personally...but that is absurd. It's like saying that because it's easier to break a window than to get through a deadbolted steel front door that if I have a house with a glass front door a criminal can't be prosecuted for breaking in.

Re:Not a thief

[Blkdeath]

DHCP is a service that is offered after a connection is already made. If someone has DHCP turned off, then its ok to connect to the wireless signal?

Interesting question. I'd be less inclined to connect to a non-DHCP WAP because it's not going out of its way to permit you to use it.

While I'm relatively on the fence regarding open versus secured WAPs, I still think it's highly rude and inconsiderate to intentionally connect to someone else's Internet connection without prior consent whether DHCP is enabled or otherwise.

If your interface was pre-configured for the 192.168.0.0/24 subnet which seems to be the most commonly used on SOHO routers nowadays would that make it ok to browse their connection? What if they had wireless security enabled but it was so weak your computer bypassed it in a mere matter of seconds? What if what if what if ... ?

See, this becomes a fine line people walk where they moralize / rationalize doing something wrong, illegal or grey because it's easy. Look at all the analogies that have popped up both for and against; people are struggling to justify their positions but what it comes down to is this; a plug and play hardware device, most likely purchased from a big box retail store, has been installed in a person's home. In most cases I'd wager that the majority of these devices are installed by people who do not understand wireless networking. My experience in a retail computer store confirmed that when I had to work for every home installation up-sell because people literally do not understand the risks and consequences involved in plugging in a default-configuration home router / access point.

The long and short of it is this; an access point is pre-programmed to do what it's told, and per default the absolutely vast majority of these devices are pre-programmed with defaults that make it EASY for the home user to get up and running. Any additional complexity such as wireless security, MAC address filtering, etc. will result in confusion, lack of understanding, support call overhead, and inevitably lots of product returns by people who just give up. That leads to a loss of revenue for the companies in question and that's decidedly bad for the bottom line. The catch 22 is that no company wants to be the first to introduce a high security (and therefore complex) wireless access point so consumers continue to purchase the regular insecure models in droves.

Now, here we have a situation where a very high percentage of home users out in the wilds of the urban jungle are operating insecure, wide-open wireless access points without knowing it. Since the people have not allowed implicit access to their network except for ignorance of technical facts and specifications, can we really assume their router is enough of an authority to redistribute their Internet access? I might add that in most all cases this re-distribution is actually a violation of the AUP which could actually get the people disconnected, suspended, or penalized in some way (capped, throttled, etc.) and/or cause them undue over-usage charges. Is this something we can actually moralize because a technical device handed out an IP address or SSID?!?

For decades, people have lived with VCRs that blinked 12:00 perpetually. Now, however, we have new technology that broadcasts the network equivalent of 12:00 to anybody within (antennae) ear-shot.

Myself, I've done it in a pinch, but atleast I know I was wrong to do it.

Re:Not a thief

[archkittens]

IPv7? You either overestimate the proliferation of computers or people. after all, experts predict that one day we may have the need for as many as four computers in the continental united states!

Re:Not a thief

[Z34107]

Your neighbour is transmitting their open-access signal into your own house for you to use. Your analogy is therefore broken.

Not exactly. Your neighbor may be transmitting a signal into your house, but it's most likely not for you to use.

Besides, you transmit a signal into his house when you use his network. If that's not "breaking in" in this weird network-is-my-house analogy, I don't know what is.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

As long as I still get some profit of it, I would keep my routers (one at home, one at my grandma's house, and another at my girlfriend's) open with no encryption, and then demand any asshole that enters my network.
Not a considerable income, but I've got enough for some years of broadband.

Re:Not a thief

[harl]

If all you're doing is listening then the logic holds up.

Your logic falls apart when you start transmitting signals back to the router and using the network hardware that is located on private property.

Re:Not a thief

[jmorris42]

> Well, I sasked your door permission to open by turning the handle,
> and when it did, since it was unlocked, I entered your house while
> you were gone today.

Bad analogy. Better would be I knocked on your door and a lady opened the door and said "Hi." So I asked if I could borrow the phone to call AAA and arrange for a tow. And she said "OK." Turns out she was just the maid and the homeowner got all freaked out for some reason when they found us in the bedroom getting our freak on.

Your AP is acting as your agent in this transaction, when I ask it for a 'cup 'o bandwidth' and it says "Sure, have some." it isn't my fault if you later don't think I should have been using your network. Tell your AP not to give your stuff away to strangers. If somebody tricks it they have crossed the line and should be punished, but you can't put people in jail for politely asking for permission and taking Yes for an answer.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

An unsecured router gives you permission to use someone's Wifi in the same way that an unlocked door gives you permission to enter their house. After all, they set up the protocol by which turning the handle lets you in, and the door acts as their proxy. All you'd need is a video of you turning the handle and the door responding by opening up and thus giving you permission, and you should do fine in court.

After all, it's completely absurd to think that permission has to be obtained from the owner when it can be so easily implied by the workings of an off-the-shelf automaton.

Re:Not a thief

[Chosen Reject]

Why can't the latter be dismissed as an honest mistake?

From my house I can discover upwards of 5 different wireless APs. My wife and I are technically competent enough to connect to our wireless AP. However, a lot of our friends are not. They just start their laptops and connect to the first one they can.

Judging by the distance a wireless AP can serve, the distance between homes, and knowing the kind of people my neighbors are (that is, many are technically competent people) I would guess without asking any of them that at least one of those APs was intentionally left open. In fact I know at least one is, because mine is.

So how then can you chalk up the Starbucks example as an honest mistake, but not a friend of mine who thinks he is connecting to my AP?

Re:Not a thief

[jagilbertvt]

I wouldn't recommend using it though, as that might cause you some trouble.

Re:Not a thief

[Hatta]

An unsecure wireless network is NOT an invitation, and negotiating a network connection does not equate implied permission to use the network. Just because you can do something unimpeded does not make it okay. I've seen malfunctioning routers that SHOULD be using encryption fail do to so. The configuration showed encryption as being active, but it worked as an open access point.

An unsecure HTTP server is NOT an invitation, and negotiating an HTTP session does not equate implied permission to use the server. Just because you can do something unimpeded does not make it okay. I've seen malfunctioning HTTP servers that SHOULD be using SSL fail to do so. The configuration showed encryption as being active, but it worked as an open web server.

Do you see how it would break the entire internet if we went to a default deny status for open servers?

Re:Not a thief

[Omestes]

By simple ethics, you mean, of course, YOUR version of simple ethics.

My version of "simple" wifi ethics are different than yours. I will use open connections, but I don't use them like my own private connection. I don't hit their bandwidth, I open my mail, I check /., I quickly look up somesthing on Wikipedia, and then I leave. To me this is ethical, I treat people how I'd like to be treated. And I treat their open connection as I would hope the treat my often-open connection (I only bolt it down when I'm using something bandwidth intensive).

If treating people with common courtesy is unethical to you, fine. I can live with that, secure your damn network, and go on with life, since the issue no longer effects you. I'm sick of ethics being a "preachy" point. If you don't like gay marriage, don't go gay and get married, if you don't like "damn dirty leeches", don't do it, nor facilitate it. Last I checked, there was no universal ethics, so stop preaching as if you know them.

For the record, if its hot out, and your hose is near the sidewalk, I will grab a quick drink as well. It doesn't cost you anything (well maybe $.00005 in water), and I don't hold property as the be-all-end-all of all issues.

Wifi is less consequential than my $.00005 "theft" from you, since it costs you nothing. You lose nothing, someone gains something, where is the ethics here? Or is greed and mindless territoriality a basis for ethics now? I always default towards the good of others, if it doesn't hurt me, THIS is ethical.

I'm a geek, and I have no feeling of entitlement. I use whats available, if no harm comes to anyone. I don't feel bad about it, since there is no reason to. I don't even need analogies, or hand waving, since NO HARM COMES OF IT. I'm not in your house, I'm not snooping your network, or reading your bank information, I'm posting on goddamn /., using perhaps a two second small burst of your precious bandwidth. If this disturbs you so much, perhaps you should read the paper more, there are far more disturbing things out there. If you feel "violated" by this, I, not to mince words, don't really care, since your obviously not violated enough to do anything about it. Generally I prefer to use others actions as a guide to their intent, and not handwaving, words, or law.

Bandwidth isn't really that limited of a commodity, especially if the person who bought it isn't using it. When I'm making toast, my connection is wasted, so what do I care if someone uses it?

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Analogy really only holds if municipal wifi is the norm in the area, and if the privately-owned open WAP's SSID is similar to the ones used by the municipal WAPs.

Re:Not a thief

[jagilbertvt]

And what if the network has DHCP disabled, and you configure your network card with a working static IP? Just because a DHCP service is enabled/running doesn't mean you had permission to request an address from it.

How would this be any different than walking into a companies building and plugging in an ethernet cable to a jack in the wall and getting assigned a DHCP address? Just because your PC was given an address doesn't mean you were authorized access to a network.

The authorization to access a computer or network comes from another human being, not from a service running on the network.

Re:Not a thief

[robogobo]

Whoever modded you down needs to revisit some AWESOME 80's films.

Re:Not a thief

[griffjon]

You're probably the type who randomly steals songs by listening to them on the radio, and steals TV from the airwaves. Hell, you probably even steal light from the SUN. It's unrepentant a-holes like you who are ruining it for the honest, hardworking people at RIAA/MPAA and the like. If I set up a sprinkler system and it is watering your yard, you damned well better come over, knock on my door and ask permission for your plants to thrive off of my watering. I would absolutely be in my right to rip them up for stealing my water.

This seems entirely clear and cut-and-dry to me, I don't understand why you people don't get it that stealing is stealing, even if you're not stealing anything! /sarcasm

Re:Not a thief

[agallagh42]

Wifi with WEP or WPA configured would be more reasonably comparable to a house with a closed front door. WPA if the door is locked, WEP if it's not.

Wifi without security is more like a storefront, with a sign out front saying "come in, we're open".

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. I better change the name of my open network before you pump some buckshot into my neighbors. I don't care if people use my network so I just plugged it in and let it go as the default. People have been using it without asking me... should I pick a more appropriate SSID?

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd even argue this further saying that it's like entering a yard without a no trespassing sign to take a sip from the hose. There's not even really a door.

Re:Not a thief

[jc42]

Yah; analogies only work if you don't look at them too closely. But sometimes, an analogy is the only way to get the concept across to people who don't understand the technology.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, finally someone with some common sense (and ethics). Awesome rant. I love how the first guy to reply is twisting himself in knots trying to rationalize, rationalize, rationalize. "Oh, it doesn't hurt anyone... much!" Ridiculous. Grow some morals, people.

Re:Not a thief

[eebra82]

Just because something is on your property does not make it *yours*. If I am on your property, you cannot take my clothes and claim they are yours. If I drop my wallet you cannot take it. If I sing a song, you cannot record and sell it. You cannot take my picture and market your products with it. You took it a bit too far, almost as if you wanted to read my reply out of context. Obviously, it is illegal to steal. I was actually referring to the airwaves in my apartment.

Re:Not a thief

[Blkdeath]

You're right... because the "intruder" does not take ANY PROPERTY AWAY from the wifi "provider/victim". The case of wifi is very particular because the user pays a FIXED FEE. Not even plugging your tv on your neighbor's house would be equivalent.

What of bandwidth overage charges? What about limiting the user access to the full amount of bandwidth they're paying for in the first place? What about the fact that it's just a jackass thing to do?

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't confuse the analogy. It's like knocking on the door, the butler (router) answers the door and says "Come on in, the faucet's over there." Then the homeowner gets home and doesn't realize that the butler was supposed to let you in and thinks you broke in.
 
Point being, your butler is only as good as what you tell him to do.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't that a bit like saying a thief isn't stealing your possessions when he takes them from your house, because you left your front door unlocked?

Re:Not a thief

[Hobbs114]

An unlocked door at a business and an unlocked door at a residence are similar.

Not really. Both would be considered private property. The business could just as easily file trespassing charges as an individual home owner.

The difference is the social acceptance of walking into an open business and an open residence.

For example, in the USA private property owners have the right to limit the access of people to their land. Therefore, I would have to ask to talk a walk on a farmer's land. (Also note that a farm is a business, and I'm sure they don't want you waltzing around on their land with or without a fence)

On the other hand, in Scandinavia it's known as all man's law. Where all men have a right to explore the land. It's accepted that no one can limit where you go, and there are often days to celebrate this concept in which people are encouraged to go explore the landscape.

While, there may be implied differences, it's simply a social issue, there is no legal difference between the two.

Re:Not a thief

[sunburntkamel]

Not only that, Most consumer routers, and especially routers issued by ISP's (at least in my experience) default to creating a WEP or WPA password/passphrase. The plaintiff would have to have specifically chosen to remove the password. Not that there might not be good reason (*cough*Vista*cough*), but it would still be an active choice to open their network.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally I would be willing to give someone the benefit of the doubt if they were accidentally connecting to my router, but seriously, how is it sad that the guy was war-surfing outside someones house?

Re:Not a thief

[rantingkitten]

That is such a silly and tired argument. Here on slashdot we all understand how it works -- the computer asks for a dhcp lease and the router gives it one. Fine. But does anyone here really think that an unsecured wireless signal is really a reflection of the owner's intention, or is it just that the owner is ignorant of how to secure their stuff?

I'm not going to get on a high horse about the ethics of it, because I've deliberately leeched off my neighbor's connection when my DSL got cut off while I was unemployed. And last week I deliberately cracked a WEP key for a friend so she could use the internet in her new apartment while waiting for the cable monkeys.

That having been said, to pretend like an insecure WAP is an open invitation by the owner to help yourself is inane at best and dishonest at worst.

Around here we're fond of mocking ignorant users who make us fix their silly self-caused IT issues. Yet it's those same users who trot down to the store, grab a wireless router, plug it in, and call it a day because hey, now they have wireless. And we expect them to suddenly be cognizent enough to set up WEP or WPA encryption? They don't know any better.

Unless the SSID is something obvious like "Free Wireless", merely having an open WAP means nothing. If I forget to lock my door, are you going to argue that you asked the door "permission" to enter my house by turning the knob, and the door "granted" permission by obligingly moving the bolt out of the way and swinging open?

The user's ignorance is not something to be protected or lauded by any means. But don't try to blur that ignorance into intention, because it doesn't work.

Now, if wireless routers started coming with *some* form of encryption by default, that'd make the entire issue go away. Unfortunately, very few do these days.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Well that's just a realistic scenario now, isn't it?

** rolls eyes **

Here, how about another realistic scenario:

There is this guy who needs wireless access, but the cheapest wireless access available costs $32,490,475.12 per month and has a bandwitdh limit of 145,396,630.1GB's per month. Although he is rich, he can barely afford it. He doesn't have and choice; he desperately needs wireless access so, he buys it. Now this wireless router is powerful enough that the signal can be received anywhere in the world. The problem is, since he is the only one in the world that can afford wireless service, the problem of needing the service locked down hasn't been exposed, so WEP/WPA encryption hasn't been invented, yet; there is no way to lock it down. Everyone else in the world just happens to have laptops with wireless cards in them.

Question: Ethically, should the rest of the world be allowed to glom onto his connection without helping him pay for it?

Oh, what am I saying? This is an American website, filled primarily with American users. The obvious answer is: "Fuck him. I'm gonna git me some free shit. YiiiiiiiHaaaaaaa!!!!!!"

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets say I open my laptop and leech someone's wireless and start downloading copyrighted material via a p2p network. If anyone's at fault here, it seems like it should be me, but what about the owner of the connection? If they're giving me "permission" by simply not putting in a WPA key, as some of the claims in the comments here seem to indicate, wouldn't they be guilty by aiding and abetting? Can those that don't put in keys be held responsible for nefarious action done over their network if it wasn't them?

This excuse is already a defense for some of those being charged with illegal downloading by the RIAA / MPAA. If that's the case, then they are hardly giving permission for anyone to access their networks, and then it becomes a form of trespassing. How about if this is done in a cafe that offers free wireless, could they be guilty too?

Ok, i'm starting to go off topic here. But if you're wondering, I've been leeching wireless for a couple of years now and don't feel any guilt about it at all :)

Re:Not a thief

[Hognoxious]

Even if you change the default behaviour it sometimes does wierd things. My home router has a hidden SSID and my laptops set to use it as the default. But if the laptop's been connected to another one it forgets all about it (or rather, seems to ignore it) and goes back to what you said - connect to anything.

Usually I have to manually change its settings in some way to remind windows it exists.

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

Mmm... good analogy, but the previous poster's was much better ;)

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, no, burglary is a breaking and entering of the dwelling of another at nighttime for the purpose of committing a felony therein. Even if you intend to steal and so not, it's still burglary.

Trust me, ask anyone that's taken PMBR Bar preparation course and they'll tell you the same.

And yes, at common law it does have to be at nighttime, though many states have codified it to include any time.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

fail. for one, be logical here... in almost every case of an open wifi connection, the person has unlimited access (sure there are exceptions, but it's not the rule). find me a car with an unlimited gas mileage plan, please! and one that you and i can drive at the same time!! (btw, your analogy is already broken right there.)

but aside from that, believe it or not, there actually are open wireless connections that exist in the world, and they're there on purpose. find me a car that is free and open for anybody to use, please!! (oh right, they don't exist)

here's a better analogy... if your neighbor turns on his sprinkler system and the water goes over your fence, are you allowed to put a plant underneath it? i believe most people would say yes. they could restrict your access to their water by making adjustments to the sprinkler, but they did not do so. as long as they are pumping that water into your lawn you can continue to make use of it.

now... replace "sprinkler" with "router", and "water" with "wifi signal".

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

It is not a realistic scenario, no, but a good analogy. Whereas yours is unrealistic and not analogous to the situation at all. WEP/WPA certainly exist, and if someone is monopolizing the bandwidth available through your open AP, you have the option of securing your network.

Now, take your flame/troll crap elsewhere :(

Re:Not a thief

[HTH NE1]

Now, I don't know about you but I think that is quite reasonable for now. When we all need 5x10^28 addresses each (not to mention the extra addresses each person can get behind a NAT) then there will be a problem.. in the meantime, "5x10^28 IP addresses should be enough for anyone" ;) What I mean is that limits should be unreasonably large or else they will prove to be unreasonably small. A reasonable limit will invariably be proven too low. Preferably, limits should be done away with when at all possible, but if they must exist, let them be unreasonably large.

Reasonable? If every person required one new IP address every millisecond it would still take 1.58444 x 10^18 years to exhaust them.

And I meant it jokingly here. IMO IPv6 gets it right by setting a very unreasonable (-ly high) limit. But, since you didn't laugh, I have to be serious now.

With developments today, I wouldn't be surprised if someone finds a reason to consume huge swaths of IP addresses rapidly. Maybe not by assigning every RFID tag a unique IPv6 address, but who knows how many may actually be in a single product. Or maybe, taking your figure of 5x10^28 IP addresses per person, that's a big address space in which to randomly route packets to prevent their reassembly by an outside party. You may just have to do that to protect your privacy against the ubiquitous microscopic self-replicating cameras floating around everywhere like grains of dust, each with their own IP addresses as well.

There's another phrase, I think it goes, "Programs will expand to fill available memory." If you give a huge space for IP addresses, expect IP assignments to grow to fill that address space. Even to waste it by doing sparse allocation.

There are programmers out there today that think not consuming a processor 100% all the time is a waste of processing power, so they write wastefully inefficient code all the time to utilize the processor all the time, ignoring the needs of other concurrent proceses.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

The key thing you missed is that (AFAIK) all SOHO routers come with WEP/WPA enabled by default now. You need to actively open up your network these days.

Re:Not a thief

[calyphus]

If all you're doing is listening then the logic holds up. Your logic falls apart when you start transmitting signals back to the router and using the network hardware that is located on private property.

Hmm, listening?

Router: I'm here. Computer: Will you talk to me? R: Sure, I'll even let you talk to the world through me. C: Cool, and they can talk back. R: Yep, all the blogs and porn you can handle. ... If I overhear a conversational snippet, from a table next to me, that interests me and I interject. The people at that table can act offended that I invaded their space and reject me from joining, however little, their conversation; or they can accept and allow me to join their conversation. A wi-fi access point is much the same

Re:Not a thief

[Jardine]

That could presumably be false if whoever is paying for the service pays for a limit GB/month allowance

They shouldn't leave their hose hooked up to a water fountain on the public sidewalk with a sign flashing "Drink From Me!" on it.

Re:Not a thief

[DriedClexler]

Is random capitalization supposed to make your post more convincing? ... ;-)

Re:Not a thief

[harl]

That's nice but completely off topic. We were talking about private spaces. You're talking about public spaces.

Re:Not a thief

[aliquis]

But then again Bender lives in the third millenium where the hottest girls parents wants _YOU_ to make their daughter pregnant.

And here we are back in the second millenium, without cool robots, hot girls and even less approvals from their parents to knock them up. I was so much born in the wrong millenium :(

Amy: If you are reading this please unfreeze my remains and marry me.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

Besides, you transmit a signal into his house when you use his network. If that's not "breaking in" in this weird network-is-my-house analogy, I don't know what is.

This whole analogy doesn't make any sense. The frequency he's transmitting on is public. He doesn't need anyone's authorization to transmit a signal on that frequency. The router and such might be private, but there's an "open" sign posted on them.

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

No one would assume that they are authorized to use someone's electricity, water, etc. There is no fucking DHCP server assigning you fucking hoses when you physically trespass into their yard. Sorry, bucko. You lose.

Re:Not a thief

[Achromatic1978]

So it's more like entering an unlocked house to take a sip from the faucet. The only crime committed is that you didn't pay for bottled water.

Uhhh, what? Trespass for one comes immediately to mind...

Re:Not a thief

[mr_matticus]

The hell they aren't!

During business hours, you're a business invitee to the property. You have tacit permission to enter, but the owner can still ask you to leave.

There is no such license to enter private property. If the owner hasn't expressly authorized your presence, you're trespassing.

The only way these are similar is that if you use an unsecured wifi network, you must take responsibility for the fact that you may be trespassing. Locked or unlocked, it's still their network. You don't get to enter the house just because the door's open. And before anyone complains about "unsolicited radio waves"--guess what? Radio waves aren't actionable as a nuisance, nor are scents (apart from those indicative of health code violations), nor are the damn photons flying into your eyes. If you want to be certain you're not doing anything improper, seek permission and don't use unsecured networks unless you know you've been authorized. Otherwise, you bear the risk of being at fault for unauthorized access, just like when you go berrypicking in the woods.

Re:Not a thief

[Achromatic1978]

Right, and the fact you can connect to that server and run your little local privilege escalation, that's not a crime either, because it -could- let you do it. And then it let you have root access to a DB server, and that's not a crime, because it -let- you. And it gave you all the information within those databases, because you asked and it -let- you, so that's not a crime either.

You just keep telling yourself that.

Re:Not a thief

[Z34107]

The whole "networking" thing lends itself to too many analogies. So let's try again:

You can transmit on the 2.4GHz public spectrum. Now, because Joe Q. Public is too oblivious to lock up his router does not give someone else de-facto permission to use his internet connection. Just like forgetting to lock your car does not give you permission to joyride on roads.

Joyriding on public roads is not okay, because the vehicle you stole is private.

Using someone else's bandwidth just because you can is likewise unacceptable. Public frequency, but a privately-owned router, modem, and network you're connecting to.

Now, someone using your internet can only be expected if you can't trouble yourself to figure out how to use WEP or WPA keys. On Linksys products (WRT54G routers and WUSB54G adapters) you push the "Secure Easy Setup" light on the router, and the "Secure Easy Setup" button on the adapter's software. They all handshake and encrypt your network. Push 2 buttons and your network has a password!

Other routers/access points I've installed might not have something that simple, but it's usually a box you check in the setup. Then again, there are people like my friends parents, you took the WPA encryption off because "a password would be too hard."

So, back to the topic: Using someone's internet and router just because you can is unlawful and unethical, even if your access is due to their negligence. A public spectrum is not license for wardriving; it just means you don't to hassle the FCC to get an access point set up in your house.

Re:Not a thief

[mr_matticus]

A door does not reply with a message granting me access; the fact that it is open, closed, locked, unlocked, slightly ajar or otherwise is legally irrelevant - the important thing with burglary is that you had to break something to gain entry and then take something without permission, with no intention of giving it back. It is relevant. It's a complete fabrication to compare wifi access to burglary. It's trespassing. It's also not simple theft, it's theft of service, a legal term, I assure you, completely outside your contrived "take something physical, no intent to return" construction. Fence or fence, lock or no lock, violating someone's property is trespassing.

the important thing is that it replied back with a message specifically granting me permission. Users are authorised. No, they aren't. If you're not the owner of a property, your grant of permission is irrelevant. Your gardener doesn't get to say who gets to come on your land, and your router likewise doesn't get to decide who gets on your network. You must authorize entry. Whether the access point is secured or unsecured is no substitute for permission. You are free to authorize users to the network, but any user who gains access without knowing whether or not they have permission explicitly assumes the risk that they may be committing theft of service and the digital equivalent of trespassing. It's up to the owner of that network what, if anything, to do about it.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

Public is too oblivious to lock up his router does not give someone else de-facto permission to use his internet connection. Just like forgetting to lock your car does not give you permission to joyride on roads.

He isn't just not locking up his router - he has it configured to broadcast its openness to everyone.

Joyriding on public roads is not okay, because the vehicle you stole is private.

If my joyriding is within the speed limit and everything and if the owner of the vehicle gave me permission (accidentally or not) then it sure is.

Using someone else's bandwidth just because you can is likewise unacceptable. Public frequency, but a privately-owned router, modem, and network you're connecting to. ...
o, back to the topic: Using someone's internet and router just because you can is unlawful and unethical, even if your access is due to their negligence.

Again, it isn't just someone else's property and reachable on a public frequency, it is actively doing things to advertise itself and its status to me and give me access.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

So if you go through a parking lot "asking" the car door if it is locked or not and you find an unlocked one you're allowed access?

I'm not absolving network owners the responsibility of securing their networks, they should and it's their duty but that isn't the same as carte blanche access permission. Maybe if they had WPA2 Enterprise and you actually were "challenged" by an authentication server you might be able to make a case. Serving up DHCP isn't the same as authorization.

Re:Not a thief

[Z34107]

Don't be pedantic. He doesn't have "it configured to broadcast its openness to everyone." I'm guessing he didn't configure it at all, let alone intentionally configure his device that way.

A misconfigured router is not an open invitation to a private network.

Re:Not a thief

[geekoid]

"So it's more like entering an unlocked house to take a sip from the faucet. "
No it's like walking up to the house, and the house saying "Come on in".
So it's not theft of anything.

Now if the house says "You have to give me information to get in" and then you lie about who you are, or decide to go through the window, you have committed a crime.

Routers give you permission to enter.

Re:Not a thief

[geekoid]

No. You also can't do the same thing for cordless phones, satellite signals, or a number of other items the broadcast.

You can coat the inside of your house with a mesh to block signals.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Burglary is the act of breaking AND entering AND committing theft (logical AND; all three must happen). Theft is the intention to permanently deprive someone of physical property. Since accessing open WiFi does not involve depriving someone of physical property (neither permanent nor temporary), it is neither theft nor burglary.

Definitions of legal terms always depend on the jurisdiction. In law, we can't rely on plain English or "common sense". "Burglary" and "theft" will have the definitions they are assigned in the statutes and case law for that jurisdiction, no more, no less. For example, in Alabama law, breaking is not a required element of a burglary charge (Sections 13A-7-5 through 7). I don't know the law of other states specifically, but I doubt that's anomalous.

So, depending on the law of the relevant jurisdiction, it may not be correct to say "the important thing with burglary is that you had to break something to gain entry".

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me help clean this up in the best way I know how. It's like if your neighbor's WiFi router were transmitting cars through the air to your house. You didn't ask for the cars, but you go ahead and get in one and drive off. Is that a crime?

Re:Not a thief

[geekoid]

"
An unsecure wireless network is NOT an invitation, and negotiating a network connection does not equate implied permission to use the network."

incorrect.

My computer detects a signal, and tries to authenticate. The router say authentication isn't needed and here is an IP address.

Clearly an invitation.

"Just because you can do something unimpeded does not make it okay"
Except the router gives your computer permission.

"I've seen malfunctioning routers that SHOULD be using encryption fail do to so"
so?

"The configuration showed encryption as being active, but it worked as an open access point."
Your broken equipment isn't the responsibility of others.

If you sent me an invitation to a party on accident, and I showed up, I would not be trespassing.
You can ask me to leave, but you can also get people off your network was well.

DO you really want to live in a world where you have to second guess everybody's 'true' intentions? I don't, I'll take implies intentions any day.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

IANAL, but AFAIK: It's burglary to enter a house without permission, even if the front door is unlocked. That's a separate crime from theft.

Your mileage may vary (different states have different laws)

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

I'm a geek, and I have no feeling of entitlement

Other than your sense that you are entitled to determine whether and to what degree your actions impact someone else, even as you make use of their equipment and services, likely putting them in violation of the ToS from their ISP. Your ethics provide for your cozy comfort as you deny that choice to the person who is paying for what you want to use. It is the height of sleazy, patronizing elitism.

"No harm comes of it" that you know of. You have no way of knowing whether you're on a metered pipe (especially since you're not "snooping" around the network infrastructure on which you're intruding). You have no way of knowing if outbound DNS lookups are being cached, and will get someone in some sort of hot water, just because you click a link on a slashdot page.

If you feel "violated" by this, I, not to mince words, don't really care

So, someone who has a thousand dollars in their wallet won't, in your superior judgement, miss one of those dollars - especially since you are the wise person who will be putting it to better use, and have judged to what degree it won't be missed. How about $10? $100? I mean you have no sense of entitlement, other than you claim on being the authority on how much of people's possesions and services should be up for grabs, or used by you.

Your insistance that your claim on someone else's stuff is superior to their own claim on it certainly does define "your" ethics, that's for sure. Hypocritical, condescending, faux-holier-than-thou, situationally convenient, leeching prig ethics, basically. Leeching is one thing... but stating that you, rather than the person who has purchased the gas for the ride on which you're going to stow away, are the best judge of who should get and use what... amazing. Do you even hear yourself?

So, should everyone, including people with laptops choked with malware primed to become a kiddie porn dealing bot server on someone else's IP address, be able to use the neighbor's bandwidth as long as their judgement is that they're not really hurting anything? Or are you saying that the ethics tilt your direction because you're just too smart and sophisticated, and thus subject to different ethical standards? What a strange view of the world you must have. I think I know how you vote, too. Whatever you do, don't let the peasants make their own decisions! But, it's OK to stop by once in a while and milk one of their cows for your latte, right?

Re:Not a thief

[Repton]

Here in New Zealand, unlimited broadband is unknown --- everyone has traffic caps.

I have never come across an open wireless network that would let me browse the 'net for free. I think they are out there, but they're very rare.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

So, using somebody else's wifi is like this, right, a man walks into a bar, and there's a man smoking in the corner (illegal in the UK now, but assuming it weren't). He then comes over to you, and tells you that you're not allowed to breathe the smoke that he's exhaling, because it's his smoke.

Or, you're queuing to get into a club. You get to the door, and the bouncer lets you in. Then, a few days later, the RIAA try and sue you for hearing music you shouldn't have heard because actually, the club was only supposed to be for people whose surnames begin with the no-longer-used letter zog.

Or, a headteacher is showing the parents of a prospective student around a school. They sit at the back of a Maths lesson. After the parents sat through the whole Maths lesson, the teacher comes over to them, and tells them they weren't actually allowed to listen to that lesson, because they weren't supposed to be in the school.

Or, right, there's a car, and it's unlocked, and open, and it's got a numberplate. There's a sign in the window saying "This car is going to ". You get in, and sit in the back seat. The stereo's wired up to some kind of sensor, that detects whenever someone gets in the car, and it plays a track on a CD, telling them that they are such-and-such a number of person to enter the car. Welcome. Oh, and there are an infinite number of back seats, but only thin people are allowed to use them if there are lots of people trying to sit in the seats. Then, the driver gets in, and drives to whereever he was going to go to anyway (admittedly a little slower, due to the extra weight), and gets out, and everything's hunky dory. And then, the driver complains that all those people were sitting in his car.

Are any of those good analogies? Please please please tell me I can do analogies? I even got a car one in!

Re:Not a thief

[somersault]

Fair enough, I consider a reasonable address space to be unreasonably large though, if I may use such oxymoronical language :p I agree that there are definitely a lot of wasteful and inconsiderate idiots out there - most of them probably gravitating towards management jobs at Microsoft :p When I first learned to code I had a 5Mhz Amiga with 1MB of RAM, it always seems crazy to me that anything these days could ever be slow with thousands of megahertz, gigabytes of RAM and highly powerful dedicated graphics and sound processors.. that we still are living in days when some people just accept monstrosities like Vista as being remotely viable software makes me sad.

Re:Not a thief

[Jaime2]

... consider this: when you use a resource I have made freely available, you're not denying me access to it. Even better... I set up my router in range of your router on the same channel, but I secure mine and you secure yours. We both use the Internet service that we each pay for. It turns out that my using my ISP actually deprives you of some availability of your service, yet I broke no laws. How about if one of us buy a repeater and it turns out that it repeats both of our signals to both of our respective routers? It seems that legally I'm stealing from you, yet there is no way other than lead wallpaper for me to not steal. Any law that is this confusing to apply to reasonable scenarios is obviously a horrible law.

Re:Not a thief

[palegray.net]

That's a very good point, quite illustrative of the fact that laws where it's hard to determine the difference between an offending and injured party are bad.

It's not a perfect example, since unless our respective Internet connections were at least as fast as our LAN we would really only be degrading LAN access, but you could easily make that a point as well. Well thought out.

Re:Not a thief

[el americano]

When an analogy exaggerates rather than illuminates, then it's useless. You need to ask yourself once you're finished if using someone's open network is the same as entering their house and robbing them blind. Of course it's not. I don't see anyway to make it physically entering someone's house comparable to reading your e-mail at the expense of their internet speed, which they may or may not be using at that moment.

Since the unlocked door was what you thought of first, it may be worth reviewing how open wi-fi networks actually work. An open wireless router is broadcasting its network name and telling everyone that's it's open. When you ask to join, you are told you can join - kind of like anonymous ftp, without the "have fun" message. In the end, you are never in their house, so you are not a potential physical threat to their family or property. It is unlike a door in every case.

There is no door.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

No one would assume that they are authorized to use someone's electricity, water, etc. There is no fucking DHCP server assigning you fucking hoses when you physically trespass into their yard. Sorry, bucko. You lose.

Yeah, it's almost like you don't need DHCP to reach over to the wall of a townhouse from a sidewalk and turn on a faucet. That particular protocol involves... water flowing as soon as you engage with the device. And all you have to do is look at it, right there in front of you, to see that it's "available." So, the only thing that stops you from using it is... the knowledge that it's not yours to use, even though there's no sign on it saying "this isn't your water to use."

Classic, though... pretending that it's the protocol that makes the ethical difference, not the fact that you're leeching, regardless of what service you're leeching.

Re:Not a thief

[DigiShaman]

We are describing someone enter the wifi connection and use it to connect to the internet, NOT take other things.

Except internet bandwidth is what's being stolen. Say you have some grand parents in their 80s. They bought a wireless router and set it up the best they could. It works, but with not WEP or WPA security. Just wide open. Now imagine some punk next door is leeching off their connection with uTorrent, watching porn, and blowing out spyware with his zombie infected shitbox for a PC.

At this point, you can imagine your grand parents broadband connection has slowed to crawling 14.4kbps modem connection.

But no, some of you on Slashdot still don't think its theft do you?

Re:Not a thief

[Dan541]

Since your doors granted me permission to enter your house, and they were acting on your behelf since they are on your house, you have no reason to complain. At least the insurance companies agree with you.

Re:Not a thief

[Dan541]

It's not stealing if its a public broadcast. If someone listens to my conversations on CB Radio and even joins in I have no right to complain it's an unencrypted public channel after all.

WiFi frequencies are also public channels for public use if you don't encrypt your transmissions you have no right to complain.

Re:Not a thief

[Dan541]

An unsecure wireless network is NOT an invitation, and negotiating a network connection does not equate implied permission to use the network. Just because you can do something unimpeded does not make it okay. I've seen malfunctioning routers that SHOULD be using encryption fail do to so. The configuration showed encryption as being active, but it worked as an open access point. Ok so I can sue the next person who access's one of my websites since I did not give them permission to access my server.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

He has a router.

The router is configured open.

Therefore, he has his router configured open. Do those two hypothetically obvious facts really meet your standard for pedantry?

Of course the network is public and others have an invitation on to it - the router in question is (mis)configured to make it EXACTLY THAT. To say it isn't doesn't even make sense.

And the whole question of the owner's intention is completely irrelevant to the question of whether someone should be punished for using that network. It doesn't matter if the owner didn't want his network to be public - it simply IS public. If you don't want a public network, don't create a public network.

I can't put a sign on the front of my house saying "open house" or "yard sale" and then expect the cops to cite anyone that shows up for trespassing.

Re:Not a thief

[pyro_peter_911]

Where is BadAnalogyGuy when we need him?!?

Peter

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's more like taking a sip from a garden hose that's been left running on somebody's front lawn as you walk by. Sure, it's their water to waste as they please, but you could assume if they cared about it, they'd turn off the tap.

I'm tired of this unlocked front door bullshit analogy. If it's a door, it's one that opens automatically when you knock.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I have never seen the need to steal access. Nearly every location that I have been to has a free service called "Linksys".

Re:Not a thief

[SanityInAnarchy]

Would said device not work without the SSID broadcast, though?

Oh, and there's always MAC filtering.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

As it's against every ISP's policy (that I know of) to run an open router, then everybody is legally responsible (at least under civil contract law) for the configuration of their routers (ie they were informed that they had to configure their router when they read their TOS contract which they had to sign when they got their 'net connection (oh, didn't read it? Well you're still responsible for it)). As such, they have made an informed decision whether or not to run an open network. Ignorance is no excuse, you've been informed. Legally it's been established that if someone performs a criminal act using your network, you're responsible, it follows that you are responsible for your network's configuration. Ok, now someone opens up a Wi-Fi sniffer, which doesn't send any packets- and lo and behold there is a router which is actively advertising that it's an open network over signals which pass through their home. That IS the equivalent of hanging a sign on your car asking people to take it for a joyride. What's not to understand?

Re:Not a thief

[iamhassi]

"anybody who 'intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access"

Actually that's not stealing wi-fi. According to the wikipedia on wardriving "The court ruled that although he had "contacted" or "approached" the computer system, this did not constitute "access" of the company's network." because when he connected to networks that had password protected routers he didn't try to bypass them.

So, using a open wi-fi network is not considered "accessing" a company's network and is not illegal.

Re:Not a thief

[iamhassi]

"covers anybody who 'intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access').""

Someone didn't look up what "access" means.

http://cyb3rcrim3.blogspot.com/2006/02/access.html

"Allen was charged, essentially, with gaining "access" to Southwestern Bell's computers without authorization. The State's evidence showed that, in this era of dial-up connections, Allen had been wardialing, i.e., had used his computer to repeatedly call Southwestern Bell modems that could let a caller "enter" the Southwestern Bell computer system. The evidence also showed that if a call went through, the computer determined if it was answered by a modem or by a person, after which it terminated the connection.

The Kansas statute (like some state statutes in effect today) defined "access" as "to approach, instruct, communicate with, store data in, retrieve data from, or otherwise make use of" a computer. Kansas Statute Annotated section 21-3755. The state argued that, at a minimum, Allen had "approached" the Southwestern Bell computers, but the Kansas Supreme court disagreed. It agreed with a U.S. Department of Justice report which concluded that this use of "access" was unconstitutionally vague because it did not provide sufficient notice of what is forbidden; as the DOJ report pointed out, this interpretation of "access" would criminalze mere physical proximity to a computer... It therefore upheld the lower court's dismissal of the charge against Allen.

Re:Not a thief

[Klatma]

I was on jury duty in Michigan and the case I had to sit in on was a "home invasion" case. We were instructed that there was no such thing as breaking and entering any more, it is now called home invasion. It can be either second degree or first degree depending on if anyone is home when you break in. It also does not matter if the door is wide open, if you enter someones home without permission it is home invasion. But to get on topic, it really doesn't make sense to try to create an analogy for theft of WiFi, and theft of property. They are completely different. I will agree with previous posters that say if the network is unsecured and open, then it should be implied that the operator of the device wants to let his neighbors use it. But if they take the time to secure it, then they don't want to share it with everyone else.

Re:Not a thief

[el americano]

"intentionally accesses a computer..."

And you did not access their computer. In most cases the wireless access point is a DSL router or plugs directly into one. Even when data routes through a computer gateway, there still is no access in the sense of accessing files or logging in. I'm surprised that nobody has successfully fought these charges yet. I recall someone was arrested for using a cafe's free wi-fi service from outside the cafe, even though the owner didn't care. That is monumentally stupid.

Re:Not a thief

[thedarknite]

A better analogy would be that the wireless network is your entire property and the house is an individual computer. If your front gate is unlocked then there is an inherent permission to enter the yard.

Re:Not a thief

[Dan541]

Problem is you can't ask a door anything!

But you can ask a computer!

Re:Not a thief

[MidnightBrewer]

If a person's ISP puts a monthly usage cap on their service and charges them overage, then you're costing them money. If you engage in illegal activities on their wi-fi network, then you may be setting them up to get their service canceled, or worse, since they're the ones who take official responsibility as the legitimate customer. If you decide to run a Bittorrent or two while you're at it, you degrade their paid-for internet experience with your bandwidth-hungry selfishness.

Finally, this is all ignoring the fact that their equipment is running off of electricity, which they are also paying for, and that by the watt/hour. At the very least, you should be just as guilty as if you were siphoning off water or electricity (the latter of which you actually are). Taking advantage of open wi-fi may be easy, but "easy" doesn't give you the moral high ground by any means.

Re:Not a thief

[Jarik_Tentsu]

Noone has been deprived of any property. Most of what you say makes sense. Like the way the couch is on the sidewalk.

But I disagree about the no one being deprived of property. They're being deprived of a *service*.

Bandwidth is limited. And we all probably know how significant it is, especially when we're on the edge of being capped/shaped every month. It is a consumable product.

Using your analogy, I think a better one would be someone leaving a membership card on a table somewhere. You pick it up, you go use up all the remaining points on that membership card for a service. While you're not stealing a product, you are using up credit for a service, which costs money.

That being said, I don't think the defence of "I *willfully* attempted to connect to that wireless network" works. IT's the same as "Willfully" taking someone's membership card which you know is theirs and using it. Sure, they were the ones who left it there, but you used it. On the other hand, arguing that your computer automatically seeked out and connected to their network is another thing.

~Jarik

Re:Not a thief

[PFI_Optix]

And in a situation like that, they couldn't very well be prosecuted, as it would be unintentional.

Re:Not a thief

[Nibbling Hell Goat]

WiFi isn't the first signal you've found floating about your apartment. Working by that yardstick, you own all the content that floats through on FM radio too... Which is patently untrue. Are you paying installments on furniture or a telly or anything else? They're not legally yours either.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

The router doesn't pay the internet bills and isn't the account holder. It has no legal authority to grant access to a third party. Therefore, using someone's internet based on a router's invitation is more like accepting hot goods. Except where you can try claiming you didn't know the goods were stolen, I doubt you'll find it too easy claiming you thought the router had signed up for its own internet account and was letting you into its network out of the goodness of its own heart.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

What if this sign asking people to take your car for a joyride is written in microdot, can only be read with a microdot camera, and nearly every car sold in the world came pre-configured with the sign engraved somewhere on the car?

Except the catch is, only a small percentage of the population are even aware of its existence (of which you're not one), and what's more, the exact location it's engraved on the car varies from model to model, and even fewer people know the exact locations on a select number of models?

And now your car gets taken for a joyride. The joyriders hit and kill a pedestrian. And now you're on trial for manslaughter, possibly murder, because it was your car and you have no proof you weren't driving it. Is it your fault for being ignorant and not removing the sign?

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Good for you, sir, and fucking bravo. At least there are some people left in this society who have a grasp on these, what I thought would have been most basic morals.

Re:Not a thief

[lpq]

Ah, but a door/lock isn't designed to require an active-two way handshake.

Your door isn't assigning me an IP address on your network.

Sorry -- I assume that an open network means I can use it as a non-threatening/non-attacking guest.

You *walk* into the lobby of some businesses -- like Kaiser -- they even have signs saying the WiFi is provided
as a convenience.

It's rare to have a sign as well as an open net. Also, unlike the breaking and entering -- the presumption is
that you are there to "take" something -- not just use the bathroom and leave.

On a net, the accessing of the net is the point -- there is no ulterior motive to attack the property or contents of the owner or commit any illegal act.

Re:Not a thief

[zmooc]

It is supposed to make terms that are explicitly defined in the DHCP spec more clear, but obviously in your case I've failed miserably at that purpose.

Re:Not a thief

[evilandi]

I wouldn't mind sharing my bandwidth, being neighbourly and all.

I wrote an (admittedly slightly out-of-date) bandwith throttled and firewalled open WiFi howto.

someone could do something clearly illegal using my IP address ... How do you deal with this risk

I don't see it as a risk so I don't deal with it.

I deliberately don't keep logs, other than those required to maintain DHCP leases until their expiry (I think I set it to 24 hours). However, the system is open so it is possible for someone else to sniff the traffic and keep logs.

If a poorly-informed policeman or prosecutor wants to waste everyone's time, I have more than enough funds and legal insurance to hire an expert witness. Note that I'm in England so all legal fees are almost always refunded unless you're found guilty. Also in England most buildings insurance comes with cheap legal insurance for all members of the family (cheap because, as I said, unless you're guilty, it gets refunded anyway).

This kind of thing has gone to court several times in England and the defence of "you cannot identify an individual person by IP address alone" has always won.

If the cops show up at my door one day

British coppers don't carry sidearms [1] so this is a distinctly less scary encounter for us. We consider the police to be mostly friendly, if a little overworked, under-educated and easily excitable. They're just people, if they make mistakes it's usually no big deal. It isn't like we have the death penalty or anything and with CCTV everywhere and mandatory recording of interviews they don't really have any opportunity to beat you up. If you're in the right then the system almost always does work, and almost always pretty swiftly.

[1] Some of them do keep SMGs or assault rifles in their cars, but they only get called in if you wave something that looks like a gun. I have several things that looks like guns (ie. guns; my three target pistols) but I'm not stupid enough to wave them in the direction of any human, ever, not even when I'm sure they're unloaded. Most rural schools teach gun safety as part of the general/social/citizenship curriculum, or at least offer it as an after-school option.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I very much doubt someone is going to leave their house unlocked when they are out. What an idiot post.

Re:Not a thief

[evilandi]

it's the dumb person's fault if they can't be bothered to lock down their wifi

s/dumb person's fault/community-spirited person's generosity/

s/can't be bothered/don't choose/

The solution to your perceived problem (which I don't perceive as a problem) is for all WiFi routers to ship in a factory-set safe state.

This could be solved by either:

* Totally locked down by default (mean-spirited), or

* Open but bandwidth-throttled and firewalled by default (community-spirited but still cautious)

The argument between you and me boils down to which of these two we think should be the default. I'd agree that fully open by default is pretty naive.

What we need is some kind of WiFi "secure by default" badge that the industry can agree on and put on their boxes. Then all the customer needs to know is that any box they buy that carries that badge, is safe for them to use without significant further configuration.

Re:Not a thief

[Jeppe Salvesen]

Maybe this analogy is the best yet:

Using an open wifi router is like knocking on a door with a sign that says "please knock", and then receiving a reply from a robot saying "please enter and make yourself at home"?

Re:Not a thief

[somersault]

Would you accept the metric measured in abridged libraries of congress? I don't have time to count all the pages in the full thing at the moment.

Re:Not a thief

[evilandi]

"Felony"? I don't understand your foreign language. Please speak English. I know what English is, because I am English.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it's exactly like that. In both cases, the thing granting the access is not the legal owner of the property/network/internet account, does not have the authority to grant access, and is therefore still deemed trespassing/theft of service.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

You need to actively open up your network these days.

I set up my brother-in-law's Linksys box, nice and tight, right down to a MAC list. Well over a year ago. Everything's been great, the kids next door can't get to it, etc.

Big thunderstorm. Power gets wonky. Internet connectivity seems to have gone away. Had him power-cycle the devices (cable modem and router). The router came back up in ready-for-the-anonymous Linksys mode. Just like that. Would it have done that with the latest firmware? Hard to say. Haven't gotten over there to check, yet. Has he suddenly decided that it's OK for his neighbor's kids to surf pr0n over his pipe? Has anything, ethically, changed about the nature of leeching, because of a reset? How hardware behaves "these days" doesn't change the physical platforms that are already, in the millions, deployed all over the country.

Re:Not a thief

[6Yankee]

This is US

No - this is Slashdot.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I would imagine that's like saying because the neighbor did not put a lock on his/her water spigot, he obviously made it available for me to utilize his resources while he pays the bill and it decreases his water pressure while he was trying to take a shower.
Had he been educated enough that people wanted to steal his water...

This faulty thinking is what enables a thief to sue a victim after falling down the person's stairs while robbing a house. I would imagine this criminal may outrage the same kind of person who also uses next door's WiFi.
Or does this fall into the crime range of stealing cable? Acceptable crimes in society... Not in my book.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Um... am I the only one who noticed that the law refers accessing a COMPUTER without
authorization?

You're just riding on their network. You are not accessing anyone's computer without authorization. The wi-fi discussion related to this law is moot, since this law does not restrict access to a *network*.

Now, if you hopped on their network and started messing with their systems, that's another
story. But just riding their wifi to access public websites is no crime according to this law.

 

Re:Not a thief

[Fred_A]

You know.. if the neighbor is playing loud music, you can complain to the authorities about that... Couldn't the neighbour just counter-report you to the RIAA because you've been listening to his music. You thief ?

Re:Not a thief

[Animaether]

indeed not - personally I don't connect to any network, even if it says "come on in! the coffee's on me!" without finding out just who the heck's wireless that is and whether it's really okay to use it.

But google for "using wep deserve" or so; yes, it's absurd, but there are lots of people who do think this way. And given the existence of tools that automate the procedure of grabbing MAC/WEP and adjusting system settings to enable a logon, there's plenty others who promote this notion.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, look - another eBayed 3-digit Slashdot UID. How nice.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Except internet bandwidth is what's being stolen.

s/stolen/given away/g

FTFY. HAND.

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

Trespassing onto someone's private property to steal goods is very different from accessing a wireless signal that has been transmitted to your home and that you have used your laptop to ask permission for a DHCP lease. It's more analogous to asking your neighbor (authorization control) if you can use their hose. Wireless is more like the neighbor having a sign up in the front lawn saying "Feel free to use the hose." You are telling me they should expect neighbors to look at it and think the sign is only for the individuals who live in the residence?

Next you will tell me listening to the radio is illegal, because I haven't asked the local stations permission to listen to their broadcasts :\

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

Trespassing onto someone's private property to steal goods is very different from accessing a wireless signal that has been transmitted to your home and that you have used your laptop to ask permission for a DHCP lease. It's more analogous to asking your neighbor (authorization control) if you can use their hose

No, it's more like owning the same make and model of wireless phone system, and using it to get a dialtone on your neighbor's landline, and making long distance calls. If the base station lets the handset establish that two directional path, why, that's just an invitation, isn't it? Give me a break.

If I can stand on the sidewalk (public property) and reach the end of the hose that someone has watering their garden at the end of the yard, and some of that water is running out onto the sidewalk (broadcasting, see?), is that an invitation, as far as you're concerned, to bend over, grab the end of hose, and use it to start washing your car? WiFi bandwidth is consumed, like water. Your lame attempt to treat it like listening to the radio is a classic misdirection, and only works on children and the technically clueless. If you're really that clueless yourself, then I recommend actually reading up on how it works.

Re:Not a thief

[Hoi Polloi]

Yah, but after all that waterboarding and beatings they don't work too well anymore.

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

Sounds like I'm rattling you. Good. It's funny that you won't discuss this, just spout off worse and worse analogies. And now you are resorting to name calling. Nice!

You are calling me simple minded, while saying that water spilling out onto the sidewalk is somehow akin to broadcasting?! At least the handset one is a decent analogy. The difference though is that cordless phones are not intended to interface with others' phones, whereas wireless routers are intended to set up a wireless network which any computer with the proper vicinity and equipment can attempt to access. And if you don't want them to, secure your damn network! Sure, those phones are poorly designed. (Why not have a unique key for each phone?)

I say my previous hose analogies stand. And you don't have a retort to them do you?

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

That is just ridiculous. The whole point is that there are certain ways you advertise servers and computer networks as open, i.e. you don't block access. Clearly, disregarding the intentions of your host by bypassing their security measures is not at all like that.

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

Not exactly. Your neighbor may be transmitting a signal into your house, but it's most likely not for you to use.

Then he should keep his signal out of my house!

Besides, you transmit a signal into his house when you use his network. If that's not "breaking in" in this weird network-is-my-house analogy, I don't know what is.

It's just as much "breaking in" as his transmitting a signal into your house.

All this discussion about where the signal goes is meaningless. What matters is that there's an established protocol for requesting and receiving access. Stick to that protocol, and you should be fine. If he doesn't want his network to handle my requests and my traffic, then it's perfectly possible for him to set his router to refuse my traffic. And he neglects to do that, he still doesn't lose anything meaningful.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

I say my previous hose analogies stand. And you don't have a retort to them do you?

I don't need one. You're comparing a technology that doesn't need IP addresses to work with one that does. What you're NOT doing is finding a way to tap-dance around the tact that you're splitting semantic hairs to avoid the real issue: you think it's OK to rip off a service that your neighbor is paying for. In order to not say, "Yes, you're right," to that, you're resorting to apples/oranges over the physical manifestation of the service, and pretending that turnining a faucet handle (and becoming the ONLY user of that pipe) is any less of a protocol than using your computer to turn on the other kind. The person paying for their broadband and for their water isn't feeling the need to put up a sign that says, "ask first," but in the interests of defending your urge to lay claim to his broadband, you're willing to say, "I don't have to ask first if I can heist his services without leaving footprints in his grass."

And if you don't want them to, secure your damn network!

This is my all time favorite bit of shrill, sophomoric foot-stamping. If people don't want their lawn furniture stolen, they should chain it to the house! If they don't want the gasoline syphoned out of their car when it's parked at the mall, they should hire armed guards! Never a mention that neither would be an issue without someone doing the stealing. You'd rather have an arms race than simply acknowledge the eons old utility of a sense of decency among neighbors. You'd rather apologize for stealing if you get busted than simply ask permission you're likely to get anyway. Um, except you seem like the sort that would apologize for stealing the water, but not for stealing the bandwidth. And it's that hole in your value system - the blindspot you've developed just because it's a computer through which the theft occurs - that we're actually talking about, here. And now, you will again try to explain how ethics have nothing to do with it, because RF is involved, and it's only rude if you have to physically touch something. Would you feel the same if you were comparing stealing cash off his kitchen table to hacking his PayPal account? There's no difference ethically, just as their no difference between his broadband, his water, and his electricity.

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

An unsecure wireless network is NOT an invitation, and negotiating a network connection does not equate implied permission to use the network. Yes it is. Yes it does.

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

did you call up Google or Yahoo or your ISP or whoever provides it and ask them if you had permission to connect to their server? Did you call the person hosting TFA before clicking on the link asking if you had permission to access their server?

Obviously not, any more than I asked permission to enter a store. A web server is a lot different than a WAP in function and in intent. An unlocked door at a business and an unlocked door at a residence are similar. With a wifi connection, you can't tell if it's business or residence just by looking at it. The only way you can tell if it's open or not, is if it advertises itself as such. It's the only thing you can rely on, so it's what you have to rely on.

If someone buys a shop and uses it as a residence, but leaves the door open and the "open" sign on the door, can you really blame passersby for walking in, thinking it's a shop?

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

During business hours, you're a business invitee to the property. You have tacit permission to enter, but the owner can still ask you to leave. Exactly. And then you leave. But until that happens, you are allowed to enter, and don't have to assume that the business owner will object.

There is no such license to enter private property. If the owner hasn't expressly authorized your presence, you're trespassing. And how do you tell the difference between a business and a residence? One has an open door with an "open" sign on it, and the other doesn't. If someone disguises his house as an open shop, you can't be blamed for accidentally trespassing (but you should still leave when requested).

The only way these are similar is that if you use an unsecured wifi network, you must take responsibility for the fact that you may be trespassing. Or you may not be.

Locked or unlocked, it's still their network. Which may be intentionally open for you to use.

If you want to be certain you're not doing anything improper, seek permission and don't use unsecured networks unless you know you've been authorized. Fortunately the protocol has foreseen in requests for permission and authorisation.

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

No, you're trying to say using someone's wifi is stealing when in fact it isn't. That's where we disagree. Of course stealing money from someone is wrong whether you break into their house or gain unauthorized access to their PayPal account.

I'll finish by saying that property is a convention, one where access is by default denied. I don't lock up my lawn furniture, or even my car. However, the convention regarding servers and networks has been that access is by default permitted. That's what you are missing. In general, you attempt to connect to a server/network and are either allowed access or denied. SERVERS/NETWORKS ARE NOT THE SAME AS CARS OR LAWN FURNITURE. And if I put up a sign that said "Feel free to use my car or lawn furniture," I wouldn't try to say someone who did so was stealing or trespassing because the sign "was only meant for me."

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

yes, but DHCP must do that to work. I could DDOS your computer and not be breaking the law according to you. DDOS isn't even part of this discussion. Why bring unrelated crimes into it in order to discredit perfectly legitimate behaviour?

The fact is, if you find an open network you have no way of knowing whether or not the owner intended it to be open. It's best to just assume it's an accident and that you DON'T have permission. No. It's best to assume it's intended to be open, because it is, and there's no other way of figuring out if it's intentional or not. And often it really is intentional.

Meanwhile, while using someone else's network, no matter how explicit or implicit your permission was, don't mess with his stuff.

Re:Not a thief

[rootooftheworld]

exactly? BTW, whos the stupid cunt who left their door unlocked, cuz im runin' low on liquor.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I just asked my computer what the meaning of life is, it stared back at me for a few minutes and I gave up on it giving me an answer. Then I asked it what 2+2 was. Same result. Then I tried it with my wireless gateway. Same result.

Sorry but you can't ask most computers a question.

Maybe the routers where you come from have microphones and speech recognition software on them, but I've never seen one myself.

Providing user input to a program isn't asking it a question... it's providing user input to a program.

The input you provide to the door, is provided by using the interface (the doorknob). If it's secured, the knob won't turn. The password is a key in your hand which you insert into a lock.

The input you provide to the router, is provided by using the interface (wireless protocol). If it's secured, it won't just let you in. The password is a string of text, which you insert into a formfield, which is the interface to an electronic lock.

It's the same. That router is a doorway (sometimes called a "gateway") to your network. Whether or not it's "secured" doesn't change the fact that you don't own it, yet are using it without the owner's permission.

With a physical object, this is called "theft", with domicile, it's trespassing.

Even with speech recognition, you still aren't asking it a question, you are providing input to a program. In order to be able to ask a computer a "question", it has to be capable of learning and pass the Turing test. Otherwise it's a canned response and the question you asked was just user input which resulted in a query/response.

Humanizing computers by saying you ask one a question is ridiculous and not even close to what's really happening.

-Viz

Re:Not a thief

[rootooftheworld]

satelite? we're talking about apartments here. Cable/DSL with unlimited (not) access, is the norm for most users in city, and thats where it counts.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

No, you're trying to say using someone's wifi is stealing when in fact it isn't.

They're paying for it, you're using it, and you haven't talked to them about it. You're stealing it.

You're trying to get around that fact by splitting hairs over the evolving legal fine points regarding computer and network use when those things happen to come under scutiny in the prosecutorial sense. You're complete avoiding basic ethics because you've got some flimsy - and possibly not well applied - cover. That doesn't change the ethics, not one bit. Someone who is well educated on this subject, and sets up a residential router that they intend for you to use - they're going to lable the node "use_4_free" or something similar. That is, now, a common convention. The absence of such an announcement in the node's name isn't - in real life, be a decent human being terms - any different than the absence of a sign saying "use my water for free" on your well spigot at the end of your driveway. The practical, cultural rules of engagement should apply across the range of the services that a person has purchased for use on their property. That you're digging around for a way to avoid that is quite a mystery to me, actually.

You just can't make yourself say it, can you? Come on, repeat after me: "I should come to an understanding with my neighbor before using his stuff." Is that so hard? Can you not see how that contributes more to a civilized society than, "I should come to an understanding with my neighbor before using his stuff, except for the stuff that's new-fangled, and which it didn't occur to him to prevent me from using, because it wouldn't occur to him that I'd be a leech without asking."

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

I am not digging around, I have valid points that you don't care to address. I am not digging around at all. I've had the same points this whole thread. That you refuse to address. If you had some sort of logical retort to them, I would be happy to listen. But, this is how servers and networks have worked for practically their entire history. By not preventing access, you are granting said access. It is tantamount to putting a sign in your ... of fuck it. I've said this already. If you want to have a discussion fine, but otherwise bugger the fuck off.

Re:Not a thief

[ZenDragon]

In Texas, you have a legal right to shoot anybody trespassing on your property, regardless of their intent, without your consent. Your only excuse need be that you felt that you were in danger, which your actions must also reflect. In other words, you cant shoot them in the back while they are running away, or if it is obvious they did not intend to cause harm (i.e. a Girl Scout lol), and you have to give warning, either verbal or by a posted sign.

Obviously there are a lot more laws regarding this but most of them are difficult to prove after the fact.

If somebody is in my house when I get home, without my consent, I can reasonably assume he is there to cause harm and have every right to stick a knife in his chest.

I cant imagine that any state would legally protect anybody in entering another persons property without consent as in the situation that you describe.

Re:Not a thief

[gurps_npc]

Stolen = TAKEN and not useable by someone else. Learn english.

Using something without permission without moving it is not stealing.

You are correct that using it may decrease the availability for them, but that is NOT stealing. Similarly when I violate a products license it is NOT theft. I may be using it illegally but it aint theft.

If I enter your grandparents house turn on your TV and change the channel, it may disrupt your grandparents old VCR set to record their favorite channel.

But I have NOT stolen anything.

One of the major problems you guys have is the fact that you are calling everythign theft. When I hit you and you bleed it may still be a crime but it is NOT theft of your blood. Saying it is makes you look really bad, it does NOT convince us you are correct.

Stop trying to misuse words and you might actually make sense. You might be right, but misusing the language makes you sound foolish, it does NOT convince anyone with enough brains to see through a rather silly ploy.

As for that particular case, that is a technological and social problem. You want to solve it fine do so:

Pass a law that it is illegal to sell any device without a Random password installed. Have the password written on the inside of the box.

But don't try to arrest people doing something that they are CLEARLY not doing.

Re:Not a thief

[Mr. Beatdown]

But in DC, it is now illegal to own or carry one within the city limits.

Re:Not a thief

[LifeWrecked]

Door Schmoor. The (moral, albeit, maybe not legal) issue doesn't change! If you are STUPID enough to leave your door unlocked, then you fully deserve for someone to have their pick of your TV, etc, etc.

If someone sets up a wirless network, they are MORALLY obligated to secure it, if they don't want everyone and their in-laws to utilize it (this is exactly what I've done with my router, which I use for work, play, and my cell phone).

Paul S (AKA: LifeWrecked)

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

Eh dude, you know... I shouldn't have been such a dick at the end there. You have valid points. Not that I have had a change of opinion >:) I happen to see Great things happening if all open networks can be seen as free use (mesh networking, shared resources, to name a couple).

Peace man, maybe next time we won't break each others' balls so much...

Re:Not a thief

[Alex Belits]

Why would anyone ebay an account that has my real name on it since the beginning on the site?

Re:Not a thief

[mr_matticus]

If someone disguises his house as an open shop, you can't be blamed for accidentally trespassing (but you should still leave when requested) A network is always private property unless it's operated by the government, so the point is moot. If your intent is to say that it's okay to use a shop's unsecured wifi without permission, you are seriously out in the woods.

Which may be intentionally open for you to use. Absolutely. But it is your responsibility to check with the owner first, or bear the risk of being held liable for trespass.

Fortunately the protocol has foreseen in requests for permission and authorisation. The router has zero authority to give permission, unless you're aware of any access points who are legal owners of property. Only the owner of the property (or tenant with dominion) has the authority to grant or revoke permission.

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

Come on now, it's not like the person with the public network is intentionally giving you permission. It's not like you're going to go up to him and say, "Thanks for letting me share your network" because you obviously know he didn't intentionally give you permission. And you're completely wrong if you think accidentally leaving cars opened gives permission to drive it.

Re:Not a thief

[Eil]

That's a pretty moronic metaphor. No matter how you look at it, a house is not equivalent in any way to a wifi signal and removing things from it is not equivalent to accessing the Internet. See my sig for further explanation.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

I tell my guests "Don't drink the water."

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

Come on now, it's not like the person with the public network is intentionally giving you permission.

I never said they were intentionally giving permission - just that they were giving permission and that's all that matters. It is impossible to tell just what is going through their mind when I see this "open network" sign being broadcast all over the place. When you walk in to a store with an "open" sign on the front you don't know that the owner is actually thinking "I WANT the store to be open" at that moment, so do you call up the owner, verify his identity and ask the owner himself permission each and every time you want to enter the store??

And you're completely wrong if you think accidentally leaving cars opened gives permission to drive it.

Not a valid analogy - a car being open is not in and of itself a sign of permission.

Re:Not a thief

[DigiShaman]

WTF are you talking about. Your so wrong with your twisted logic, it's sad.

Face it, if you leech of someone else wireless connection without their explicit verbal or written consent, it's theft. End of story! Why? Because you would otherwise be depriving them of quality of service. They paid for broadband, they should get it.

Your logic runs more along the lines of taking the garden hose from the side of your neighbor's house to water your lawn. Just because it's freely accessible doesn't mean you have the right to use it. Until you've been given permission, LEAVE-IT-THE-FUCK-ALONE. It's not yours to use!!!

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Their signal is no more "in your house" than airplane flying over your house is "on your property" ... self-serving justifications to the contrary.

Re:Not a thief

[PFI_Optix]

By that logic, plugging a laptop into a corporate network and receiving an IP address is permission to use their network.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Your logic runs more along the lines of taking the garden hose from the side of your neighbor's house to water your lawn. Just because it's freely accessible doesn't mean you have the right to use it. Until you've been given permission, LEAVE-IT-THE-FUCK-ALONE. It's not yours to use!!!

Same mistake you guys always make. This is a false analogy.

Your neighbor's hose is not designed to ADVERTISE its availability for use, and your lawn is not designed to AUTOMATICALLY REQUEST watering. That's where the analogy fails, because many computers, RIGHT OUT OF THE BOX, will ask your neighbor's wi-fi router for a connection. And many wi-fi routers RIGHT OUT OF THE BOX will grant it.

Call it theft if you want, but it's defective by design - your neighbor may not intend to give away access, but the router manufacturer made that decision for him. Likewise your computer's manufacturer made the decision for you. "Connect automatically to available networks." Congrats you are now a thief.

Re:Not a thief

[cromar]

Eh dude, you know... I shouldn't have been such a dick at the end there. You have valid points. Not that I have had a change of opinion >:) I happen to see Great things happening if all open networks can be seen as free use (mesh networking, shared resources, to name a couple). Peace man, maybe next time we won't break each others' balls so much...

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

Not a valid analogy - a car being open is not in and of itself a sign of permission.

Your analogies are not valid because putting a sign on a door and having a computer are two different scenarios. Common sense dictates that a store is open when the lights are on, the door open, employees and possibly customers wandering about.

Common sense also dictates that not all open networks are intentionally so. Having a computer does not make you a network security expert. Computers generally come open with exploits. It doesn't give you permission, and you know that but you're being willfully ignorant.

Aren't you going to acknowledge that you don't steal broadband with the victims in front of you? Obviously because you know they'd probably be upset if you told them, as you don't have permission.

Technically what you are doing is stealing and lying about it. Just as if a store was left unlocked it does not mean that you were "given permission" to take whatever you wanted.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

By that logic, plugging a laptop into a corporate network and receiving an IP address is permission to use their network. I do that all the time. If I've got permission to enter their building, bring my laptop, and sit down at a desk, I usually have implicit permission to plug into their network. If there are any particular restrictions, somebody tells me.

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

If someone disguises his house as an open shop, you can't be blamed for accidentally trespassing (but you should still leave when requested) A network is always private property unless it's operated by the government, so the point is moot. If your intent is to say that it's okay to use a shop's unsecured wifi without permission, you are seriously out in the woods. We're using the shop as an analogy here. I'm not talking about using a shop's wifi, I'm talking about entering private property which is open and advertised as such. Like a shop. Or open wifi (although you're not actually entering anything in that case).

Which may be intentionally open for you to use. Absolutely. But it is your responsibility to check with the owner first, or bear the risk of being held liable for trespass. If you want to enter a shop, do you first track down the owner of the shop to ask his permission to enter the shop?

Fortunately the protocol has foreseen in requests for permission and authorisation. The router has zero authority to give permission, unless you're aware of any access points who are legal owners of property. Only the owner of the property (or tenant with dominion) has the authority to grant or revoke permission. The "open" sign on a shop window has zero authority to grant permission to enter the shop, yet its presence counts as sufficient reason to assume you've got permission to enter as long as nobody asks you to leave. Thw wifi protocol just does this in a more explicit manner.

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

Back in the 1990s, I asked the local police the same question -- they were hassling me for dialing into a telephone number and using an unpassworded terminal server (for PPP), actually under this very law. I pointed out the machine was unpassworded, and answered the phone for anyone who dialed. They said "Oh that's nice, but you did not have explicit permission."
I asked next "OK, there's these web sites all over that will serve up content to anybody who connects to them -- am I supposed to go and check with the police if it's OK to access every single one? They are not passworded but don't explicitly say I am allowed to access them either." They dropped the case and had the terminal server owner secure it. IANAL, and they aren't either, but it starts to make the po' real nervous when you point this out.

Re:Not a thief

[mr_matticus]

I'm talking about entering private property which is open and advertised as such. Like a shop. Or open wifi (although you're not actually entering anything in that case). An open wifi network is not advertised as a shop or other business enterprise. The analogy doesn't make sense.

If you want to enter a shop, do you first track down the owner of the shop to ask his permission to enter the shop? BUSINESS INVITEE. A wifi network is not a shop. It is private property.

The "open" sign on a shop window has zero authority to grant permission to enter the shop, yet its presence counts as sufficient reason to assume you've got permission to enter as long as nobody asks you to leave. Thw wifi protocol just does this in a more explicit manner. The "open" sign in a shop window was intentionally placed there by the owner to alert business invitees that the shop is open for business. The presence or absence of such a sign does not count as sufficient reason to assume you've got permission. The actual status of the store does. An "open" sign on locked door doesn't change the fact that the business is closed and that you do not have permission to enter.

Re:Not a thief

[ScentCone]

No big deal. My main concern is that folks here - who focus on the technicalities of both how things work and of what might be possible - often lose sight of the fact that most real-life technology users are just Average Joes. It seems VERY important to me that we (the nerdocracy) err on the side of NOT seeming to ever favor habits or cultural trends that would come across to Average Joe as just simply bad manners (to say nothing of ripping them off). Why? Because they vote, and don't generally see the big picture or the future. And when they sense that smartass nerd types are just looking to pull one over on them (from their perspective), then tend to not feel so bad about supporting sometimes absurd policies that actually ARE bad for everybody. Good manners - even the point of inconveniencing nerds - make the world ultimately the sort of place where smart and nerdly people will have more sway over how things are done.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

Your analogies are not valid because putting a sign on a door and having a computer are two different scenarios.
Common sense dictates that a store is open when the lights are on, the door open, employees and possibly customers wandering about.

Of course they're different, and that isn't what I said. If I go buy a building that is a store and the seller leaves the lights on and "open" signs in front and I don't bother to take them down then I damn well better not be angry if I show up some day and find someone wandering around. It doesn't matter what state the seller leaves the building in - the building is entirely my responsibility when I take possession. The same applies to computer equipment - especially the kinds that broadcast messages on radio all over.

Common sense also dictates that not all open networks are intentionally so.

Their intention is irrelevant. And some people DO run open networks intentionally. I can't tell the difference between the two if both APs are sending the same kinds of "this is open" message. There are MANY ways in wifi to express "this is private".

Having a computer does not make you a network security expert.

It doesn't make you a security expert but it does give you the responsibility to know basic things about your equipment or hire someone who does.

Computers generally come open with exploits. It doesn't give you permission, and you know that but you're being willfully ignorant.

Key word: exploit. There's a difference between breaking weak security and using something that not only has NO security but is advertised as public. The presence of ANY security would at least express an intention of wanting a private network. You can break down the door to my house if you wanted to even if it is locked, but if you do that you can't possibly say that it looked like a public place if you do.

Aren't you going to acknowledge that you don't steal broadband with the victims in front of you? Obviously because you know they'd probably be upset if you told them, as you don't have permission.

I definitely would. If they then corrected their expression of their network's status to me even by simply saying so I'd be happy to get off of their network.

Technically what you are doing is stealing and lying about it.

Wrong. Technically - in every sense of the word - I'm using an open serivce that is actively advertised and offered to me.

Just as if a store was left unlocked it does not mean that you were "given permission" to take whatever you wanted.

A store being unlocked is not communication saying "this is free" in any case. In any store "this is free" is only ever communicated by a sign saying "free sample" or something. In that case I'm not guilty of theft whether they put the wrong thing on the sample table by accident or not.

Re:Not a thief

[Eivind]

Sometimes they are. Sure, it's possible to exhaust 128 bits of address-space by gross mismanagement, but then the problem is the mismanagement, not the address-space.

2^128 is 340282366920938463463374607431768211456 that is a very large number. Currently we are 7 billion people on the planet, aproximately, which means there's 340282366920938463463374607431768211456 ip-adresses for every human being on the planet.

If we instead spread them over the planets surface, then there is 226854911280625642308 for every square cm of land-area (aproximately 1/5th that if you also need ips for every square cm of water)

Re:Not a thief

[Jeppe Salvesen]

The robot was configured to let people in by its owner...

Re:Not a thief

[TJamieson]

I personally agree with you wholeheartedly, but unfortunately (at least in the US) that is the way the law is written.

We'll have to wait for a suddenoutbreakofcommonsense for this one!

Re:Not a thief

[XenoPhage]

Couldn't the neighbour just counter-report you to the RIAA because you've been listening to his music. You thief ? You know.. I was going to include something to this effect in my original post, but I was reticent to invoke those particular demons... But now you've done it.. The RI** search engine has already locked on your post and fed it into the "can we sue for this" engine... It's all downhill from there..

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

As ostentatiously hard as it may be for you to understand, even if a store owner was so negligent as to leave his store open with a mistakenly placed item on the "Free Sample" stand which you decide to help yourself to, the owner would still have every right to not only be angry but to prosecute you for "Breaking and Entering" and/or theft.

Just because someone else is being negligent does not mean you now have permission to use their property and be faultless.

Their intention is not irrelevant. If you were to stumble upon an unlocked car with the keys in it with a sign that broadcast "Free Car" it would be highly unwise of you to take advantage of that so called opportunity. The owner may not have placed the sign on the car or had the intention of others driving it, which would mean that you're stealing.

Moreover, even if their intentions were true, you would be equally liable for driving it. What if something went wrong, you were drunk, or you were to kill someone? Is it insured? Is it stolen? Do you truly have permission? You'd better find out, otherwise you are a complete idiot and criminal.

Again, common sense dictates that a reasonable person would not appropriate property anonymously. That goes for you and the owner. Especially in the case of property that could be used to commit a crime.

Someone being irresponsible does not translate into a situation that's okay or justified to take advantage of.

The mentality that you exhibit is akin to the erroneous belief that if someone wants sex, it's okay to give them HIV; which also lends itself to the belief that if they truly wanted it, it's okay to shoot them, or to eat them.

If someone informed you that the network you're driving is not intended for you, they could call the police and have you arrested. It doesn't matter how reckless the security is on that network. Using a network without explicit permission is not only criminal, it's wrong.

A network that is broadcast and open does not translate into open and offered to you. You are equivocating.

Re:Not a thief

[MobyDisk]

No. It is not.

Cordless handsets and base stations are not intentionally made to be universally compatible. They don't have a handshake protocol for allowing anyone with any standard handset to connect to your base station. And there's not a switch for "allow anyone to connect to this base station" on them. To do so would require hacking the handset, or getting 1 in a million lucky to have the same ID.

Re:Not a thief

[MobyDisk]

No. It is not.

Firstly, food is a consumable item so that isn't even close. Food does not broadcast it's existence to everyone around and offer itself. Food does not have a special protocol where you can ask the food if it is okay to eat it, and it responds with okay.

If you want a food analogy, try this. It's like walking around a public park, and finding a food that is growing in the park, that is not being eaten at the moment. The food instantly replenishes after someone eats it. An automated machine there is shouting "eat this food" and offers an ID # to anyone who wants the food.

- Bandwidth is not available in a fixed quantity. It is a fixed rate (hence the food replenishes)
- The router has security options, and they were turned off
- The router announces to everyone that the bandwidth is freely available.
- The computer automatically connects to the router when within range (I didn't even go that far in my example, because this food analyogy is just really far off the mark and it is hard to get there from here)

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

As ostentatiously hard as it may be for you to understand, even if a store owner was so negligent as to leave his store open with a mistakenly placed item on the "Free Sample" stand which you decide to help yourself to, the owner would still have every right to not only be angry but to prosecute you for "Breaking and Entering" and/or theft.

Just because someone else is being negligent does not mean you now have permission to use their property and be faultless.

No he can't. According to http://dictionary.law.com/default2.asp?selected=98&bold= breaking and entering is:

1) the criminal act of entering a residence or other enclosed property through the slightest amount of force (even pushing open a door), without authorization. If there is intent to commit a crime, this is burglary. If there is no such intent, the breaking and entering alone is probably at least illegal trespass, which is a misdemeanor crime.

I did have authorization. The store owner may not have meant to give it, but he did. If that isn't authorization then you're effectively arguing that anyone who ever shops at any store and doesn't buy anything or uses an automated checkout system is committing a crime.

You seem to believe that "authorization" is the exact same thing as "an intention to give authorization in the owner's mind". It isn't. The former can obviously be an impersonal form of communication, such as your authorization to use this web site, and the later is merely a thought in the owner's mind.

Their intention is not irrelevant. If you were to stumble upon an unlocked car with the keys in it with a sign that broadcast "Free Car" it would be highly unwise of you to take advantage of that so called opportunity. The owner may not have placed the sign on the car or had the intention of others driving it, which would mean that you're stealing.

It would be unwise because A) it is illegal B) keys in ignition alone does not communicate "free car" C) anyone could trivilally put a "free car" sign on any car, unlike creating an open access point.

Moreover, even if their intentions were true, you would be equally liable for driving it. What if something went wrong, you were drunk, or you were to kill someone? Is it insured? Is it stolen? Do you truly have permission? You'd better find out, otherwise you are a complete idiot and criminal.

I don't deny I'd be liable for my driving when driving that car, nor do I deny that I'd be responsible for my actions when using an open access point.

Again, common sense dictates that a reasonable person would not appropriate property anonymously. That goes for you and the owner. Especially in the case of property that could be used to commit a crime.

No it doesn't. I take property anonymously all the time. There are free samples at the supermarket ocasionally. There are two newspapers published for free around here that I ocasionally read. I frequently use restrooms at private truck/travel stops on the freeway without buying anything - in full view of the staff who never say anything. Sometimes I even use private driveways to turn around in when I make a wrong turn.

If there is so much as a traffic cone in the drive way, I won't use it. If there's a "restrooms for customers only" sign I'll buy something first. If the AP so much as has SSID broadcast off, I won't use it because while these things prevent me from doing very little they at least communicate "I don't want you to use this" to me on the owner's behalf.

Someone being irresponsible does not translate into a situation that's okay or justified to take advantage of.

As you can see from the numerous examples given, it depends entirely on just how they're being irresponsible.

The

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

An open wifi network is not advertised as a shop or other business enterprise. The analogy doesn't make sense. No, it advertises itself as an open network. Just like a shop uses an "open" sign to let people know they can come in, an "open" sign of a wifi network tells people they're free to use it.

BUSINESS INVITEE. A wifi network is not a shop. It is private property. A shop is private property too, but it's property that tells people they can come in. Just like open wifi tells people they can use it.

The "open" sign in a shop window was intentionally placed there by the owner to alert business invitees that the shop is open for business. The presence or absence of such a sign does not count as sufficient reason to assume you've got permission. The actual status of the store does. An "open" sign on locked door doesn't change the fact that the business is closed and that you do not have permission to enter. And similarly, if an open wifi denies you an IP, or refuses to handle your traffic, or anything else like that, it's apparently not so open as it claims to be.

So far, the analogy still works fine.

Re:Not a thief

[mr_matticus]

No, it advertises itself as an open network. Just like a shop uses an "open" sign No. The network is not a business. The analogy fails. Leaving the door to your home open is not an invitation for strangers to enter.

A shop is private property too, but it's property that tells people they can come in. Are you an idiot? BUSINESS INVITEE. You can enter because you are licensed to do so as a business invitee. You are not a business invitee to a wifi network. You must have express permission from the owner.

So far, the analogy still works fine. No. The router or access point does not have legal authority to grant or deny permission. The property owner must. The wifi network is not a business or commercial enterprise. You are not a business invitee to that network.

Honestly, it's not that difficult to grasp. An open network is no different than a house with an open door. It is not a business, nor is it like a business. It is not giving you permission by assigning an internal IP to your machine; the network has zero authority to grant or deny legal permission to use.

Re:Not a thief

[mcvos]

An open network is no different than a house with an open door. A house with an open door and a big sign saying "please come in!", and a guy at the door who shows you in.

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

I would assume I might be trespassing as soon as I find an absence of a clerk in a typical store. Therefore, I would be dishonest if I declared a Mistake of Fact.

You are being slothful and pedantic and avoiding the logic that, Again: Common sense dictates that a reasonable person would not appropriate property anonymously. That goes for you and the owner. Especially in the case of property that could be used to commit a crime, such as cars and computer networks.

A computer that has been configured open by a third party or manufacturer does not mean that you have permission to use it by the owner.

"I don't assume that because nobody wants HIV."

Why would you assume that nobody wants HIV or for you to drive their abandoned car but in the case where you want to use other peoples' networks, networks that can be used to commit serious crimes that could destroy their life, you conveniently fail to assume that nobody wants you using their network?

Willful ignorance, not mistake of fact.

A network that is 'open' is not 'open' in the sense that you have been granted a right to use the network any more than an empty building with the doors open grant you the right to be inside of it.

You can continue to filibuster but you're trespassing and you're wrong. You are either an idiot, a sociopath, or quite possibly a troll.

Re:Not a thief

[mr_matticus]

A house with an open door and a big sign saying "please come in!", and a guy at the door who shows you in. There is no sign and no guy at the door. You can't seriously be this dense.

It's just a street-facing house with an open door.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

I would assume I might be trespassing as soon as I find an absence of a clerk in a typical store

You would be wrong. Every definition of the word "trespass" I see on google necessarily involves a lack of permission to enter property. Obviously you have that permission - the open sign on the door gives you permission to be there until the owner tells you to leave or the stated closing time ocurrs.

Therefore, I would be dishonest if I declared a Mistake of Fact.

You mistook no fact by being in a store with an unlocked door and an open sign on the front. The store IS open whether the owner forgot to close it or not.

You are being slothful and pedantic and avoiding the logic that,

You accused me once of this already and I responded to it already.

Again: Common sense dictates that a reasonable person would not appropriate property anonymously.

You said this in your last message and I responded to it in my last message.

A computer that has been configured open by a third party or manufacturer does not mean that you have permission to use it by the owner.

You've been saying this for a while now and you've been ignoring my response that giving permission is not necessarily the same as the THOUGHT to give permission.

Why would you assume that nobody wants HIV

Because nobody does, probably because it causes a slow, painful and expensive death. Of course, if they expressed that they did want it, more power to them.

or for you to drive their abandoned car

I responded to this in my last message already. There was no valid expression of permission to do so.

networks that can be used to commit serious crimes that could destroy their life, you conveniently fail to assume that nobody wants you using their network?

That's pretty sad sensationalism you have going on there. An open access point and Internet access itself cannot be used to destroy someone else's life. I don't assume nobody wants an open access point because it simply isn't true. Many people, myself included, run them that way and want to run them that way. If you need more examples just look around in the replies to this story.

A network that is 'open' is not 'open' in the sense that you have been granted a right to use the network any more than an empty building with the doors open grant you the right to be inside of it.

I already answered this for you several times.

You can continue to filibuster but you're trespassing and you're wrong. You are either an idiot, a sociopath, or quite possibly a troll.

No, that would be yourself you are describing. You keep saying the same things over and over again and either are unable to comprehend my responses or are just willingly remaining ignorant.

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

If you really think you've answered anything effectively then you need to go back to logic school or get your sociopathic head examined.

The only thing you've presented are pathetic fallacies.

Permission to be in a store is not exclusively dictated by the absence of a clerks authority or signage. In fact it's more the opposite. A clerk would need to be present to oversee the store, sign or not, as common sense dictates, a store with merchandise and valuables that could be stolen would not be left unattended. This is all thanks to dishonest people like yourself. But do tell me how an empty store and a sign are going to conduct business and decide when you've over-stayed your welcome. And don't forget to tell your sign to lock up at night and secure the perimeter. You imbecile.

Equivocation: Open network = Open Store, Open Privilege, etc.. Even when a store is mysteriously empty you assume that it's okay to enter and do business. Fine. Then much like a network, make it a plain building with an open door. It's not permission to enter. You would be trespassing. I would think so, but then I'm not a psychopath like you.

You even said earlier that you could drive a car if you were accidentally given permission but than later recanted that when I described a car that said "Free" and had the keys in the ignition. Why? Because you figured out it could have been a mistake. That's the whole issue you've been trying so desperately to avoid. That many networks are open by mistake. But by avoiding that you create absurd conclusions that signs and computers and cars are sentient and capable of making and discerning those who should be granted legal privileges to property and not their human owners.

Do you really think that "The Sign" or "The computer said it was okay." is going to stand up in court when the owner says you stole their car or trespassed on their network?

False Dilemma: A network is being broadcast as open therefore I have absolutely no choice but to assume that it must be 100% okay and right and justifiable for me to use it at no fault. Like Duh, I had absolutely no responsibility or clue that someone might not want anonymous people browsing their network. It's not like someone could use it to commit cyber crimes or anything wrong or sensational like that.

Well do you assume that anybody wants an unopened access point, or do you assume like a disingenuous idiot that all open access points are intentional? The majority of them are open by default because a third party decided for the owner, of which a majority are incapable of administering. That you can't tell the difference without asking the owner doesn't make it okay or rational for you to assume that it's okay for you to use it.

But if "giving permission is not necessarily the same as the THOUGHT to give permission." then you agree they shouldn't be treated the same. Therefore you are wrong.

All this WiFi stealing has melted the part of your brain that's not supposed to be filled with baloney.

You're a liar and a thief.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

If you really think you've answered anything effectively then you need to go back to logic school or get your sociopathic head examined.

Someone who completely ignores my arguments and simply repeats the same things but starts calling me "imbecile" here and "idiot" there tells me I need to go back to logic school... very interesting...

Permission to be in a store is not exclusively dictated by the absence of a clerks authority or signage. In fact it's more the opposite. A clerk would need to be present to oversee the store, sign or not, as common sense dictates, a store with merchandise and valuables that could be stolen would not be left unattended. But do tell me how an empty store and a sign are going to conduct businessa nd decide when you've over-stayed your welcome.And don't forget to tell your sign to lock up at night and secure the perimeter. You imbecile. Equivocation: Open network = Open Store, Open Privilege, etc.. Even when a store is mysteriously empty you assume that it's okay to enter and do business.

None of this has anything to do with your assertion that being in an unattended store is breaking and entering or trespassing, and that taking an item mistakenly placed on a free samples stand is theft because I'm not "doing business". I never said I was. That would inolve me buying something which I by definition cannot do in an unattended store. And when I've overstayed my welcome was already established: it is when the stated closing time ocurrs or a clerk tells me to leave. I said it was ok to enter and be there simply because of the sign and you said that was criminal in various ways.

Fine. Then much like a network, make it a plain building with an open door. It's not permission to enter. You would be trespassing.

It is not like that at all. The network is not unmarked and passively "there" with no expressions on it. You even said earlier that you could drive a car if you were accidentally given permission but than later recanted that when I described a car that said "Free" and had the keys in the ignition. Why? Because you figured out it could have been a mistake. For the second time, no, I decided it was not ok in your example because A) anyone can put any sign on any car they want - there is no indication whatsoever that the owner put the sign there himself, and B) keys in an ignition is not an expression of permission to take a car.

That's the whole issue you've been trying so desperately to avoid. That many networks are open by mistake.

I'm not avoiding that at all - I completely acknowledge that networks are left open by mistake. It is the ENTIRE POINT of what I'm saying - that if the OWNER makes a MISTAKE and leaves signs around saying "I'm open", because the OWNER made a MISTAKE in giving me permission, I could not have done wrong. If I were using his property contrary to his communicated permission to me, only then am I doing wrong. This is a COMPLETELY different situation.

But by avoiding that you create absurd conclusions that signs and computers and cars are sentient and capable of making and discerning those who should be granted legal privileges to property and not their human owners.

I came to the conclusion that computers and cars are sentient? I said nothing of the sort. Here, lets try this once again but with bullet points. I wonder if you'll continue to ignore it, put words in my mouth, and simply call me a sociopath or an imbecile or an idiot. I said this:

* There are impersonal expressions of permission, like signs.

* Those impersonal expressions can be contrary to the owner's actual intent sometimes.

* When we encounter these impersonal forms of permission we HAVE to be able to assume that they are true because it is impractical to directly seek personal permission directly from the owner all the time.

Do you really think that "The Si

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

That a door is open and permits you entrance does not mean that you have a legal permit to be there. The same applies to a network. Any arguments as such are fallacies of equivocation.

If someone puts a sign on my house that says "Free Stuff; do what you like" with the door open and you decide to help yourself even though no one's home, you would be truly naive to think it's okay to enter and take everything. Even if a door is completely open you can be found guilty of Breaking and Entering or Trespassing.

Why is it necessary for you to argue what doing business means and every other fine detail? Trading money or goods or getting free samples is what's meant by business but that or the sign doesn't make it okay for you to be there. The presence of clerks does. It's common sense.

If you are going to admit that the store is not open for business because there's a lack of a clerk then what the hell are you doing in there removing merchandise? You have no business in there then. That's trespassing and theft. A sign in the absence of a clerk does not mean you have permission.

Open for business because the door was open with a sign, yet absent a clerk is not analogous to an unsecured network. I reject your argument so make a better one.

As for your criminal liability:

Let's say the clerk was murdered in the back, and there's a "Free" suitcase filled with cocaine. You throw it in your trunk and drive off. You get pulled over. You can't argue Mistake of Fact here because you should have looked in the suitcase and you should have checked to see if everything was legitimate, just as with a network. The fact that you didn't when you have every right and responsibility to verify legitimacy proves that you are in possession of cocaine. You could even make it $1000 from the safe and conceal it in a box of something else. The same would apply. Ignorance is not an excuse here.

First a car can be used if permission is accidentally given to you (you need that for your principle to stand up) but then it can't. Fails your principle therefore you are wrong. Then a store can be entered and merchandise can be taken unless the clerk or sign tells you otherwise yet the clerk is absent to tell you otherwise but you stubbornly refuse to acknowledge this, so I present an alternate example of an average building with the door open. That means we've moved on by the way.

A) anyone can put any sign on any car they want - there is no indication whatsoever that the owner put the sign there himself, and B) keys in an ignition is not an expression of permission to take a car.

The same follows for the majority of open networks. You've failed to prove your point or stick to your principle and you keep doing so, which indicates that you neither believe what you are saying or know how to argue honestly or cohesively. You're on the defensive so you're agreeing and disagreeing according to emotion and not truth. The truth is that you don't get adequate permission and you don't really care.

There are only limited situations that would permit you to argue Mistake Of Fact, and this isn't one of them. You can't argue ignorance when using networks that you admit are left open by mistake. You not only are allowed to get permission, you have a responsibility to do so. The fact that you don't proves that you know and don't care if you're doing something wrong.

* When we encounter these impersonal forms of permission we HAVE to be able to assume that they are true because it is impractical to directly seek personal permission directly from the owner all the time.

Okay, and what if a sign said my property is open, take my car, my property, give me AIDS, kill my dog, shoot my wife, rape my daughter, slit my throat, and leach my internet.

We just have to assume all of those signs are placed there intentionally and by the owner and that they bestow rights upon us. We have no other choice and we're not guilty. And you don't want me to call you an imbecile?

It shouldn't stand u

Re:Not a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

This whole discussion reminds me of a comment I heard 20 years or so ago about satellite TV. At the time, the only service was C band, the type with the 7 foot dish in your backyard. Most of the programming was not encrypted, so all you had to do to watch it was set up the antenna and the set top box and you were good to go; no programming fees were required.

The broadcasters were pretty upset that John Doe in the middle of nowhere was getting for free that which John Smith in the city had to pay the cable company (and, in turn, HBO or whoever.) But they were ignoring the fact that by far the greatest percentage of dish antenna owners were unable to purchase cable at any price due to their mostly rural locations (not so with the current discussion on WiFi, but true for the satellite TV.) The broadcasters went so far as to say the dish owners were stealing the signal from them.

One dish owner had the perfect counter to that argument. He said that he objected to the broadcasters bombarding his home with their signal. Further, he said that in order to protect his family from the possible hazardous effects of the signal, he set up a protective device over his home that would reflect the signals away. Rather than simply bouncing them off randomly to harm someone else, he took the care to direct the signals to a device that would collect them and render them harmless. He also said that he connected this device to his television so he could monitor the signals, and even went so far as to connect a recording device (I think it was an old VCR) to preserve the signals as evidence.

kking

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

That a door is open and permits you entrance does not mean that you have a legal permit to be there. The same applies to a network.

I never said it did. I said that PLUS an open sign on the front door of a store does.

If someone puts a sign on my house that says "Free Stuff; do what you like" with the door open and you decide to help yourself even though no one's home, you would be truly naive to think it's okay to enter and take everything.

Because noone ever puts such signs on their property intentionally.

Why is it necessary for you to argue what doing business means and every other fine detail?

Because you brought it up and it is different from what I was talking about. I was talking about being in an unoccupied store. There's a difference. Even if you dismiss it as pedantry.

Trading money or goods or getting free samples is what's meant by business but that or the sign doesn't make it okay for you to be there. The presence of clerks does. It's common sense.

That's your opinion then, not mine. You think it is morally wrong to be in an unoccupied but marked open store for any length of time. You aren't making it make any sense to me, but clearly state that you believe it.

If you are going to admit that the store is not open for business because there's a lack of a clerk then what the hell are you doing in there removing merchandise? You have no business in there then. That's trespassing and theft.

I did not admit they weren't "open for business", depending on how you define that phrase. I said I could not buy something if there is no clerk. I can, however, look at things, try things, and simply be in there.

A sign in the absence of a clerk does not mean you have permission.

Permission to BE there? Why? You're waving your hand and merely stating your opinion and saying its common sense.

Open for business because the door was open with a sign, yet absent a clerk is not analogous to an unsecured network. I reject your argument so make a better one.

Well I've been rejecting your own analogies with actual arguments for a while now...

Let's say the clerk was murdered in the back, and there's a "Free" suitcase filled with cocaine. You throw it in your trunk and drive off. You get pulled over. You can't argue Mistake of Fact here because you should have looked in the suitcase and you should have checked to see if everything was legitimate, just as with a network. The fact that you didn't when you have every right and responsibility to verify legitimacy proves that you are in possession of cocaine. You could even make it $1000 from the safe and conceal it in a box of something else. The same would apply. Ignorance is not an excuse here.

So you're using that legal example to argue that the owner of an open AP is legally responsible for the activities of people who use it?

That obviously doesn't apply to computer networks, otherwise ISP and hosting companies could be legally held liable for their customer's or user's actions (anonymous or not). This is legally not the case for copyright infringment cases at least, per section 512 of the DMCA (aka the safe harbor clause). I don't know what it leagally means for other crimes, but the usual procedure is a law enforcement agency/court/victim asks the provider of service to the abuser to A) stop providing service to the abuser and B) provide any information about the abuser to LEA/court/vicim/etc.

I've been working for tech companies since 1997 or so and since then I can recall two instances where one of our systems had been broken into and then used to commit other crimes, and several other instances where someone we were intentionally provided access to was doing

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

No, you're talking about a store analogy that I've rejected. I'm talking about the actual network, and you repeatedly say that it's giving you permission to use it because it's open. It's not any more permission than a door's openness permits you through it would translate into the owner giving you permission to be there. The entire argument relies on a permissional equivocation. That means you're describing something with words that have different meanings in different contexts and erroneously applying alternate meanings.

Here's examples where you've equivocated.

Z34107: I'm guessing he didn't configure it at all, let alone intentionally configure his device that way. A misconfigured router is not an open invitation to a private network.

You: He has a router. The router is configured open. Therefore, he has his router configured open. ...the whole question of the owner's intention is completely irrelevant...

Again: I never said they were intentionally giving permission - just that they were giving permission and that's all that matters.

The above is not arguing, it's deceptions and fallacy. You're being fallacious. If you understood any of that you'd produce sound arguments. You're not going to persuade here with nonsense.

I was using that legal example to illustrate that You, and Not the wifi network, are liable because you have a responsibility to not break the law. Stealing wifi is a crime, even if the router is configured open.

I reject the store analogy because 1. Most open WiFi networks are not advertised stores that have an incentive to get people to do business on, patronize, frequent, etc.. and 2. Most open WiFi networks are left open by mistake. They do not have a sign on them, but if they did, I'd argue much like with the store, you should still not rely on anonymous signs as permission as the owner may still not have meant it, and if he didn't, you're breaking the law. And however irresponsible, the unaware network owner is not breaking the law, and if he was, it doesn't make you any less liable. It's not a defense.

But within your store argument: If I went into an empty store, I'd say "Hello? Hello?" I would NOT go "Oooh yay; FREE STUFF!! and I wouldn't try things and be there. But then we've established you have the shifty mind of a criminal, so I can see why you'd do that stuff. Moreover, the clerk can't supervise your presence, so to put it your way, No One would leave a store unattended.

How exactly does a random person putting a sign on a car he does not own apply to open networks?

Easily, the third-party manufacturer opened the network by default. You're the one who said it's okay to use someone's car if they accidentally gave you permission and you drive the speed limit. How does someone accidentally give you permission to drive their car anonymously? That whole concept doesn't even make sense to me, but it seemed to make sense to you when you remembered to uphold this charade.

I do acknowledge that a clerk can't tell me to leave if he's not in the store. That isn't my problem - it is his, and it doesn't make me wrong to be there.

No, it's your problem and it is wrong for you to be there. You seem to be incapable of responsibility like an antisocial.

I'm not allowed to argue ignorance of the fact that the owner is miscommunicating his intention? That's what I'd be arguing.

You are not allowed to argue that, as a WiFi network that is open by default, is not the owner giving you permission to use it. When it's a crime, you can't argue that some people (like you allegedly) give anonymous permission so you have to anonymously assume all people do. It's the other way around.

It would not work in court either. especially if you were being prosecuted for tresspassing and said "It was completely open; it's his fault." That's not a defense.

Slashdot is not my neighbors' wifi.

I'm not saying that all signs must be ignored. I'm sa

Re:Not a thief

[setagllib]

Even before WPA, WEP was so well-cracked that it could be argued that relying entirely on WEP is an act of criminal negligence. It really comes down to who has the better lawyers, of course. A couple of weeks after I first set up a home wireless network, I learned to use IPSec and OpenVPN.

Re:Not a thief

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

No, you're talking about a store analogy that I've rejected. I'm
talking about the actual network, and you repeatedly say that it's giving
you permission to use it because it's open. It's not any more permission
than a door's openness permits you through it would translate into the owner
giving you permission to be there.

And I reject your analogy that open wifi is analogous to an open door. I'veprobably said that already.

The above is not arguing, it's deceptions and fallacy. You're
being fallacious. If you understood any of that you'd produce sound
arguments. You're not going to persuade here with nonsense.

Ok, I can do the whole dismissive hand waving thing too: there is nothing
fallacious about those statements.

They do not have a sign on them,

They DO have a sign on them. A broadcast multiple times per second on apublic radio frequency with security status. An active request-response
between client and router. I could go on... It is so well advertised that,
as many other people have mentioned, it is easy for an even an unskilled
user to even _accidentally_ use that AP.

They do not have a sign on them, but if they did, I'd argue much like with
the store, you should still not rely on anonymous signs as permission as the
owner may still not have meant it, and if he didn't, you're breaking the
law. And however irresponsible, the unaware network owner is not breaking
the law, and if he was, it doesn't make you any less liable. It's not a
defense.

[...]

Slashdot is not my neighbors' wifi.

I'm not saying that all signs must be ignored. I'm saying the one's that
don't truly give you jurisdiction or rights should be treated with
skepticism, especially when ignoring them opens you up to criminalliabilities, like a private network configured open by default, or an open
door, or an unattended building with allegedly free stuff. Ignorance and the
irresponsibility of others is no defense here.

And now you've finally agreed that not all such signs must be ignored, but
now you simply draw the line at which ones those are arbitrarily. What,
exactly, to you, is a sign that gives you rights? What the law says? That
would be very little in the case of open wifi. And "X is not wifi" - THAT'S
your answer to my question?

You're simply being arbitrary and saying "well it is my personal moral
opinion that this is wrong, therefore it is wrong! Any attempt to say
otherwise is illogical and lacking in common sense".

And I never even brought the whole issue of wether or not random open wifi
use is LEGAL or not. I flat out said so several replies ago. In fact, there
was a story on slashdot months ago where someone was arrested in wisconsin I
believe for using an open coffee shop wifi AP from his car. He plead guilty
to some minor charge and paid a fine. If your moral standard is simply
"whatever is legal is right and whatever is illegal is wrong", then stop
wasting your time. I'll be happy to agree that open AP use might be illegal.
There is no point in arguing over what is or is not black letter law.

Re:Not a thief

[Domo-Sun]

You defeat sloth through repetition.

If wifi is left open by accident and by it's nature permits individuals through it, much like a door being left open by accident where visible, it does not in and of itself translate into a right or permission by the owner for you to be using it, legally or morally, or by fallacious equivocation. What's the relevant difference for you to reject that? Reject it for a reason.

Everything about what you've said above is fallacious. Your problem is that you wouldn't recognize fallacious if it bit you in the ass, and that makes you sound like a sociopathic idiot.

Again, 'advertised' and 'sign' are ambiguous words synonymous with places of business. Just because there's a signal transmitted by a network does not mean it's the equivalent of a merchandiser advertising for the sale of goods through and by the frequenting of his property. Wouldn't you agree? Don't be unreasonable because you're trying to disagree with me so aggressively and so emotionally because you think it makes you win the argument. It doesn't. You need to stop equivocating all these words to mean what they don't.

A sign that gives me rights is the explicit permission given by the owner, not one anonymously placed without the owners permission where it would be completely unreasonable and selfish for me to assume grants me rights at my convenience because I wanted to steal wifi anonymously.

You have the mind of a 4-year-old and a criminal.

no theft here

[Telecommando]

I don't access other computers, I only connect to access points.

Re:no theft here

[KingArthur10]

Routers/Access Points are computing devices more sophisticated than the computers of the early 80s.

Re:no theft here

[SQLGuru]

If your LinkSys router is running some flavor of Linux, is it not a computer? Even your microwave is a computer.

In this case, you aren't accessing the computer, you are communicating with it.....you are accessing the NETWORK without (human) permission.....which the law (as stated in the summary) doesn't cover that situation.

Layne

Re:no theft here

[nanop]

We'll today'll be the last time I heat my burrito in the microwave in "Executives Only" lounge, lest I be charged under Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47...

Re:no theft here

[sm62704]

Your subject is correct, the summarry is wrong.

steal
      Audio Help /stil/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[steel] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation, verb, stole, stolen, stealing, noun
-verb (used with object)
1. to take (the property of another or others) without permission or right, esp. secretly or by force: A pickpocket stole his watch.
2. to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment.
3. to take, get, or win insidiously, surreptitiously, subtly, or by chance: He stole my girlfriend.
4. to move, bring, convey, or put secretly or quietly; smuggle (usually fol. by away, from, in, into, etc.): They stole the bicycle into the bedroom to surprise the child.
5. Baseball. (of a base runner) to gain (a base) without the help of a walk or batted ball, as by running to it during the delivery of a pitch.
6. Games. to gain (a point, advantage, etc.) by strategy, chance, or luck.
7. to gain or seize more than one's share of attention in, as by giving a superior performance: The comedian stole the show.
-verb (used without object)
8. to commit or practice theft.
9. to move, go, or come secretly, quietly, or unobserved: She stole out of the house at midnight.
10. to pass, happen, etc., imperceptibly, gently, or gradually: The years steal by.
11. Baseball. (of a base runner) to advance a base without the help of a walk or batted ball.
-noun
12. Informal. an act of stealing; theft.
13. Informal. the thing stolen; booty.
14. Informal. something acquired at a cost far below its real value; bargain: This dress is a steal at $40.
15. Baseball. the act of advancing a base by stealing.
--Idiom16. steal someone's thunder, to appropriate or use another's idea, plan, words, etc.

Accessing a hotspot without authorization may be a crime, but so is smoking pot. Is smoking marijuana "thieft"?

You are correct, TFS is wrong. If I steal your truck you don't have access to your truck. If I hide in its bed and ride downtown with you without your knowledge, it may be wrong and it may be illegal but I didn't steal anything.

Re:no theft here

[morgan_greywolf]

If your LinkSys router is running some flavor of Linux, is it not a computer? Even your microwave is a computer.

My microwave runs Linux? *stares at microwave in awe*

Re:no theft here

[sm62704]

Routers/Access Points are computing devices more sophisticated than the computers of the early 80s

A musical Hallmark card has more computing power than an early mainframe. So what's your point? Is your pocket calculator a computer?

Re:no theft here

[poopdeville]

It certainly is.

Re:no theft here

[xtracto]

Nah, it probably runs netBSD

Re:no theft here

[rodney dill]

If its a crime of theft it would be against the ISP, by leaching off someone else you are depriving them of their revenue. Probably a moot point as its a crime either way.

Re:no theft here

[STrinity]

But is connecting to a router really "accessing" it? To me access would mean I connect and then go to 192.168.0.1.

Re:no theft here

[Machtyn]

Legal definition of Computer states:

A computer is a device that computes, often a programmable machine, which can perform a programmed list of instructions and respond to new instructions given to it. An electronic computer accepts data, manipulates data, produces results, and stores results.

As noted here, a microwave could be considered a computer by this definition. It is a programmable machine, it performs a list of instructions, etc. Your TV, remote, watch, cell phone, mouse, vending machine, car, can all be considered a computer under many federal and state definitions of a computer.

Re:no theft here

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't think that "2. to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment." (which clearly covers non-tangible things) might be analogous?

Besides, when you use someone else's WiFi without permission, you are consuming slices of bandwidth-in-time where the owners might have been. Thus, your transmissions are depriving the owner the use of said slices at the given time. And, you have no way of giving them back.

To put it simply: Say I can transmit 100 packets in 1 second on my network. If you transmit 10 packets in a second, you have deprived me of 10% of my resource.

Of course, you have also deprived me if your packet is already transmitting at the time one of my systems wants to send a packet. That's a transmit time slice I can never get back, because you took it from me.

(Side note: clearly, appropriating copyrighted music without right is "theft" under the definition you provided here.)

Re:no theft here

[Zero__Kelvin]

Unless the Access Point lacks a processor, perhaps powered by a mouse running after food in one of those wheels, then it is a computer.

Re:no theft here

[sm62704]

You don't think that "2. to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment." (which clearly covers non-tangible things) might be analogous?

Maybe, but I don't think so; I read that as "2. Plagairism".

Besides, when you use someone else's WiFi without permission, you are consuming slices of bandwidth-in-time where the owners might have been

But if it's an open access point with no password or encryption, it's obvious that the access point's administrator intended for it to be used freely. If he did it out of ignorance rather than on purpose that's his bad, not mine. If the sign on the store says "open" and the door's unlocked, he can't prosecute me for trespassing simply because I'm inside.

Side note: clearly, appropriating copyrighted music without right is "theft" under the definition you provided here

That's not exectly on topic but I don't see any definition of "theift" there that would pertain to copyright infringement. #2 clearly is about plagairism; taking credit for someone else's work. #1 is about property, which IP isn't, as you only have it for a "limited time". You don't own a copyrighted work. You can't steal something from me unless I own it. If I rent a car from Avis, it's not my car. If you steal it, you didn't steal it from me, Avis will be the one who calls the cops and if it's recovered, the cops will give it back to Avis.

Information doesn't want to be free, but whan it isn't neither are you.

Re:no theft here

[BlueCollarCamel]

Is smoking marijuana "thieft"?

Well, is it YOUR marijuana?

Re:no theft here

[sm62704]

Can you get arrested for stealing my marijuana?

Officially a crime?

[skirmish666]

Could you clarify, a wifi hotspot is classified as a computer? It's intentionally accessing a network for sure, but don't know about a computer.

Re:Officially a crime?

[palegray.net]

It's a computer. Home networking appliances are simple devices compared to your desktop PC, but they're still computers. More sophisticated routers can be bought or built for cases where things like multiple authentication methods, traffic shaping, etc are needed. At the end of the day, they still perform the same basic functions as an el cheapo Linksys router.

Now, to make a simple analogy, if I leave a desktop computer running in the middle of the street, powered on and lacking any authentication mechanism, should I be able to throw a passerby in jail for using it to check his email?

Re:Officially a crime?

[Bandman]

I suppose it would depend on how literal the judge/jury were.

It's a computer. It's also a networking device.

Re:Officially a crime?

[poopdeville]

Now, to make a simple analogy, if I leave a desktop computer running in the middle of the street, powered on and lacking any authentication mechanism, should I be able to throw a passerby in jail for using it to check his email?

No, obviously not. Your intent is fairly clear.

On the other hand, if every car had a constantly-turned-on computer installed (on their door, facing out, say), with no authorization or authentication enabled by default, such that turning the security features on is relatively difficult to most people, intent would be a bit more difficult to determine.

Re:Officially a crime?

[DavidTC]

Or, if you were to connect a computer to a publicly accessible network and let people use it remotely, perhaps by connecting to a specific port and issuing commands to display files, should you be allowed to throw people in jail for that?

The whole thing is absurd and based on people, sometimes even judges, failing to understand what is meant by 'without authorization'. People have an inherent authorization to use any computer in the world that they can legally reach. (Without, for example, trespassing into back areas at a store.)

Authorization must be revoked for access to be unlawful. Either personally 'I order you to never access my systems again', by public notification 'This computer for employees only', or by connection prompts.

This is because you don't need permission to use things of other people. I know people think you do, but you really don't. It's only theft if you deprive people of the thing. It is not theft, or even criminal in way, if you sit on someone car, or pick up a book someone left laying around and read it. It's only theft if you remove the thing so they can't use it, or 'use up' or damage the thing so you can't give it back.

In fact, the most logical prosecutions of using a wifi signal have gone for 'theft of electricity', which at least makes some logical sense, although that's a bit like charging someone for 'theft of electricity' when they walk in a building and make an air conditioner work a bit harder.

Re:Officially a crime?

[palegray.net]

I'd make the case that with home routers left unsecured, the intent is also crystal clear. Every manual I've seen for such devices warns the consumer to set up WEP encryption at a minimum, and to change the default router admin password.

Re:Officially a crime?

[palegray.net]

This is because you don't need permission to use things of other people. I know people think you do, but you really don't. It's only theft if you deprive people of the thing. It is not theft, or even criminal in way, if you sit on someone car, or pick up a book someone left laying around and read it. It's only theft if you remove the thing so they can't use it, or 'use up' or damage the thing so you can't give it back. You really ought to read my other posts on this story. I'm in agreement with you; I was merely addressing the question of whether a wireless networking router qualifies as a computer.

Re:Officially a crime?

[Anonymous Coward]

and my sister's flashing VCR clock is an invitation for you to bring over a movie to watch because the manual clearly states to set the clock to enable time based recording.

Re:Officially a crime?

[poopdeville]

Even in your computer example, intent is not "crystal clear" unless you have left a message indicating that the computer is for public use. I've left my computer on and (according to you) available in places like public libraries, and would be pretty damn annoyed if I found someone using it to check their email while I went to grab a book.

Intent in the wireless router case is utterly opaque.

Re:Officially a crime?

[Dan541]

No but anyone could legally pick it up and take it away.

Re:Officially a crime?

[xouumalperxe]

I know people think you do, but you really don't. It's only theft if you deprive people of the thing. (...) It's only theft if you remove the thing so they can't use it, or 'use up' or damage the thing so you can't give it back.

(I hereby apologize for resorting to a car metaphor)

Let me get this straight: If I know for a fact you're sleeping, and then manage to open and start your car without damaging it, go for a ride, and then put the car back before you wake up in the morning, it's not a crime as long as I pay for the gas I spent? I mean, all that's left is charging me with "theft of tyre rubber".

Ok, perhaps the car lock and ignition key are an implicit way of saying "you don't have permission". Let's make it a bike, then. If I leave my bike leaning on a shop window while I go inside, it's legally acceptable for you to pick it up for a ride until I need it back unless I chain it to something? Is that what you're saying?

Either way, in the specific case of WiFi, there's most definitely a component that is the accrued traffic, which I have to pay for if I don't have an unlimited plan, and there's a case for identity theft (seeing as my wifi router/xDSL modem's MAC address and/or IP could be used to trace back your actions online to me).

Re:Officially a crime?

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy bad analogy!

Don't you see a difference between: (1) I wire up my phone on the street to look like a payphone with no coin slot so you can make calls for free, versus (2) I use an old-style cordless in my home with no security?

I would expect passers-by to make free calls on my "payphone". But it's still wrong for you to use a handset to connect to my cordless base station and make free calls on my line. Even if the base station allows you to. Even if I'm not home and not otherwise using my line. Even if you only make toll-free calls that don't end up costing me any money. Maybe it's not theft (tresspassing perhaps) but it's sure as hell wrong!

Re:Officially a crime?

[DavidTC]

If I leave my bike leaning on a shop window while I go inside, it's legally acceptable for you to pick it up for a ride until I need it back unless I chain it to something?

If you had some magical method of determining when the person would need it, yes.

As you do not have such a method, all removing of items from the place people found them is generally considered theft. (Unless they clearly do not belong there and are relocated somewhere safer, like a lost and found.)

It is not theft to sit on someone's bicycle and make vroom sounds. It is not theft to lean sticks against it and make a modern sculpture. It not theft to ride it around in tiny circles, as long as you can convince the courts you were not actually leaving with it. It is not theft to charge people money to have their picture taken on the bike. It is not theft to ride it to the owner to place it in their possession again, as long as you can convince the courts that's what you were doing.

It is only theft to remove the bike with the intent to deprive them of said bicycle. (And 'intent' doesn't mean 'purpose of your actions' under the law, it means 'as a knowing consequence of your actions', so don't go quibbling there.)

But I gave examples of those things, so I can only conclude you're trying to disagree with me while not actually disagreeing with me.

You can argue that those things should be theft if you want, but they are not. General theft is 'theft by taking', and you must, duh, actually take the thing to commit it, not just use it in place. (In fact, some places require that you permanently intend to deprive the owner of it.)

There are other forms of theft, such as theft by conversion, which would cover you damaging someone else's property. (Or, technically, turning it into any form that the owner cannot use it. Like eating it.) Sometimes that's also considered 'theft by taking' and conversion is just used for crimes where you were giving the goods specifically. (As in, 'hold this coat for me', and when you come back they've sold it.)

But there's no such thing as 'theft by using something'. There's 'theft of service', which you are probably going to argue applies to using open wifi, and I could debate you, but instead I'm going to argue it applies to you using this website and ask you to leave. (Did you get permission before you came here? I think not.)

Re:Officially a crime?

[xouumalperxe]

Nah, I wasn't trying to be clever and disagree while not openly doing so. I just found it slightly silly that "borrowing without asking permission" is legally acceptable (well, presumably in the US, I guess it might vary by country legislation). On the wifi thing, except for traffic accrued I have to pay for, potential impersonation/identity theft issues, and choking my connection rendering it unusable for me (but then that one is theft under the definition you described), I don't find it much of a problem. It's just that those three -- especially the second insofar as P2P and infringement charges are involved -- are pretty much enough to seal the case for me.

I ain't a theif

[Anonymous Coward]

Since it says intentional, that means the fact that 30-50% of the time I connect to one of my many neighbors routers rather than my own, since I don't plan to do so it ain't stealing. Of course since I have an open policy and allow my neighbors on my wi-fi as well, it means they ain't stealing. We're just sharing what we ought to in a nice neighborly manner.

Re:I ain't a theif

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting that this article appears next to the new SUSE 11.0 released article. Wonder if CmdrTaco hinting that we "borrow" some connections on each and every computer in the house and help feed the torrents?:P

This can be argued, but...

[idiot900]

As it is officially a crime to steal wi-fi (Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code, which covers anybody who "intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access")." Would this apply to an access point which advertises its SSID and doesn't demand credentials from users? I would argue that it authorizes everyone to use it. To draw an analogy, it isn't just leaving your front door unlocked, it's leaving it unlocked and putting up a sign that says "Please come in!". So I don't see how accessing an open access point is a officially a crime.

But then again, I'm not a lawyer.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[Yvanhoe]

To draw an analogy, it isn't just leaving your front door unlocked, it's leaving it unlocked and putting up a sign that says "Please come in!". That is even worse, that is acting as an ISP without accepting the many liabilities that are associated (in the weird world of US laws) and possibly with the intent of eavesdropping on your "client" traffic. To go further in your analogy, it would be like offering free lodging in unhealthy hazardous building and with the right to steal other peoples wallet.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[Se7enLC]

To extend on that analogy - it's not like the front door of your house, it's like the door of a business.

An advertised SSID is identifying an available service. Just like a sign that says "bookstore" or "Starbucks" advertises the service available inside.

When I walk up to the door of the starbucks, I pull on the handle. If it's locked, I assume it's closed and I leave. If it's open, I go inside. Same with a wifi access point. If they have an advertised SSID and don't set a password it's the same as putting up a business sign and having the door unlocked.

In fact, a number of companies use this exact business model for wireless. Starbucks, TMobile, etc.

1). Connect to a wireless network without explicit authorization
2). Open a web browser.
3). A web page displays asking for credit card payment or other credentials for use.

On an open network, you're already surfing google before you get to step 3. And if that is committing a crime, so is accessing starbucks wireless.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

>To draw an analogy, it isn't just leaving your front door unlocked, it's leaving it unlocked and putting up a sign that says "Please come in!".

Close. I'd say it's worse, it's more like putting up a sign that says "This is the Johnson household. Would you like to enter? I have free IP addresses and cookies for you!"

Re:This can be argued, but...

[Just Some Guy]

To draw an analogy, it isn't just leaving your front door unlocked, it's leaving it unlocked and putting up a sign that says "Please come in!".

Double that for access points in commercial places. You can argue (and I would disagree) that residential WLANs are meant to be private, but I would say that a business's hotspot is exactly as open as their front door. If it's unlocked and there's a sign saying "OPEN", then it's meant for me to use.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[JCSoRocks]

Besides, how else are you supposed to get Internet when you first move? It took Comcast two weeks to come and set me up (and I'm a business customer). I'm sure it'll change one day... but until then, checking for and using a neighbor's wifi is just another part of moving!

Re:This can be argued, but...

[sm62704]

To draw an analogy, it isn't just leaving your front door unlocked, it's leaving it unlocked and putting up a sign that says "Please come in!".

More like a store with a sign that says "open".

Like the store, if the hotspot is open nobody should be able to say you are trespassing if you then enter.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[ccguy]

I would argue that it authorizes everyone to use it. To draw an analogy, it isn't just leaving your front door unlocked, it's leaving it unlocked and putting up a sign that says "Please come in!". So I don't see how accessing an open access point is a officially a crime.

Fair enough. For then and following your own analogy, when you use someone else's connection you should behave as when you are in someone's house.
For example, when you visit someone you obviously are going to be with them, and they are going to see what you do.
Would it be OK if I had this running, and therefore could listen to your conversations?

Re:This can be argued, but...

[idiot900]

Fair enough. For then and following your own analogy, when you use someone else's connection you should behave as when you are in someone's house.
For example, when you visit someone you obviously are going to be with them, and they are going to see what you do.
Would it be OK if I had this running, and therefore could listen to your conversations? I wouldn't like it, but I would have no basis to complain about it. Anything sent over the wire or air in plaintext is visible to everyone, so I can't possibly expect privacy through an open access point. You aren't the only one I have to trust not to sniff my plaintext data - I also have to trust everyone who has access to each router at every hop between me and the destination.

Being a nerd I knew this already, but getting the general public to understand this concept is a bit harder...

Re:This can be argued, but...

[91degrees]

it's leaving it unlocked and putting up a sign that says "Please come in!".

Do you consider a "welcome" mat to be an invitaton?

Re:This can be argued, but...

[jcgf]

Others have thought of that too. They have SSL tunnels for that problem.

Sometimes it's fun to have two laptops and set one up so that it accepts SSL tunnel connections and then retunnels them to another machine somewhere in Malaysia (etc). Then set it up so that this first notebook is on one neighbors wireless(A) and then use the second on the other neighbors wireless(B) so that it tunnels through the first notebook (on A). That way if the owner of B runs wireshark, he will see lots of packets going to A and be like "wtf?".

Re:This can be argued, but...

[xPsi]

For most users, it would be more like every front door comes with a big sign that says "please come in" written in a foreign language. In this analogy, 1) door manufacturers probably need to stop doing that if people who know the language take the invitation literally and violate the intentions of the people who bought the door; and 2) people who buy should learn what their door says. Cultural convention and user intent also plays a role here. For example, again as an analogy, many people have door mats that say "welcome," "please come in," or "our home is your home" or some other inviting greeting. All of these could reasonably be interpreted as "please come in," but no one would use that as a defense in court for entering someone's home uninvited (even if the door was unlocked) because these phrases are understood as a cultural platitudes, not a literal invitations.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[mollymoo]

A machine cannot grant you permission, it's just a machine. All a machine can do is grant you access. A human being has to grant you the permission. Argument by analogy just doesn't work for this - it's not a house, or a car, or a sprinkler. It's a wireless network. If it's not your network you don't get to decide who has permission to connect. Incidentally, the "sign" doesn't say "please come in", it says only says "here is network X".

Re:This can be argued, but...

[causality]

A machine cannot grant you permission, it's just a machine. All a machine can do is grant you access. A human being has to grant you the permission. Argument by analogy just doesn't work for this - it's not a house, or a car, or a sprinkler. It's a wireless network. If it's not your network you don't get to decide who has permission to connect. Incidentally, the "sign" doesn't say "please come in", it says only says "here is network X".

But that machine didn't just magically materialize out of thin air and set itself up as an open, unsecured access point and advertise this fact to anyone who will listen and hand out IP addresses to all comers as a product of random chance. A human being put that machine there, and either set it up that way or (if that is the default configuration) allowed it to remain set up that way.

Here is my question: Why is there always a veiled effort to pretend like people are somehow not responsible for the configuration and operation of the equipment that they chose to buy and use of their own free will? If someone wants to buy a wireless router without learning what it does and how to configure it according to his wishes, he should be free to do so. If this produces results that are not to his liking, what right would he have to complain about a situation that he had 100% control over from the beginning? Does this really make sense to you?

I really want someone to explain this to me. I have asked for an explanation of this mentality in the past, and so far no one has managed to actually answer the question I was asking. To hopefully increase the chances that you will answer the question I was asking, and not some other, I'll state right now that there is a big difference between ignorance and incompetence. Ignorance = lacking knowledge or understanding of something. Incompetence = lacking knowledge or understanding of something, and insisting on doing it anyway without first obtaining knowledge/understanding. They are two entirely different things and the situation described here is incompetence.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

>Do you consider a "welcome" mat to be an invitaton?

I don't know, do you consider the "welcome to windows 98" startup screen to be an invitation to use it, or a scare tactic?

Personally, at the time I considered it an invitation to use the Operating System. But I know now they were really trying to say "Fuck Off".

So yes, I do see your point. Welcome mats should scare the shit out of everyone after that.

Re:This can be argued, but...

[mollymoo]

Your question is a red herring. It doesn't matter if the person intended to configure their router as requiring a password or not. If it's not yours and you're not sure you have permission to use the network you do not have permission to use it. It's really that simple. The default position for dealing with other people's property is that if you don't know for certain it's OK for you to use it's not OK for you to use. Why do you think different rules apply to wireless networks than to everything else? Why do you think an inadequately secured wireless network constitutes permission to use it? You're implying that it's OK taking things from people without permission if they are ignorant of or incompetent at adequately securing their stuff. That's just pure bullshit. It's not OK either legally or morally. It's not yours so you don't get to make the decision whether it's OK or not.

Authorization

[Hatta]

Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code, which covers anybody who "intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access"

Open routers have a policy of allowing authorization by default. As such, using an open router is not illegal under this act. If you have to crack anything, then it is illegal. But a simple open router is no different than an open anonymous FTP site, web server, irc server, etc.

Re:Authorization

[Anonymous Coward]

and as such, I then doubt that "53%" have actually done it.

Re:Authorization

[origin2k]

Taken from the article

... make me miss the old days of trying to crack YouHaveSomNerv's password ...

To me this is where the author crossed the line...

Re:Authorization

[Anonymous Coward]

Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code, which covers anybody who "intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access"

As part of the initial wifi handshake, there is an authorization request. Use any wireless sniffer and you will see it. The access point will respond with either success or failure. If the AP replies with success to an official authorization request, haven't you been granted authorization?

Or is there a more formal legal definition of authorization?

Re:Authorization

[rakzor]

Open routers have a policy of allowing authorization by default. Open doors have a policy to allow authorization by default, too.

Re:Authorization

[el americano]

If you're referring to a closed, unlocked door, that is a physical barrier, which is not analogous to an using an open wi-fi signal.

Re:Authorization

[zafo]

I agree. I see nothing in Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 that suggests "it is officially a crime to steal wifi". The law was specifically written to delineate what constitutes fraud if a "protected computer" of the United States government, a financial institution or a computer involved in interstate or foreign commerce is accessed. In each case, the law is violated not only by intentionally accessing the computer, but also by obtaining information.

Does access to a computer even occur? Access through a router to the public Internet does not automatically mean we determined a computer's IP address on the local network, cracked whatever protection was present, and accessed information on it.

How Guilty?

[stewbacca]

How guilty do I feel when my computer/phone/whatever connects to a wide-open wifi signal without even prompting me to do anything? How about, "not at all"?

Not At All?

[D Ninja]

But how guilty do we really feel? About as guilty as I feel when I drive above the speed limit.

Re:Not at all?

[Creepy]

I'd have to say the same - I never feel guilty. When I'm on the road, I may leech off a hotspot (possibly from a nearby hotel) to check my e-mail or maybe stocks. I've never felt guilty about this, and it may actually influence where I stay the next time I go through that area. I can see prosecuting abusive use, but IMO, they are offering this service to gain you as a customer, whether it be now or in the future. There is no reason why they can't set up a neighbornode or other captive portal - a local coffee shop here has exactly that - you need to register to gain access to the wider internet, have throttled access and a time limit (and register with an e-mail address, though you can fake that like I did - I also spoofed my MAC address because I can).

As for leeching off neighborhood wireless, I can't say I do it - the 5 routers on my block are all secure. I was tempted to offer up a free wifi hotspot for a while, but a coworker bought my WRT-54G when I upgraded to a high-speed wireless-n (my laptop had it built in), so I decided it wasn't worth it.

Re:Not At All?

[Anonymous Coward]

That is until you get pulled over (or get caught mooching wifi)

Re:Not At All?

[ArtemaOne]

Any of you ever put a pocket knife in... your pocket? Concealed weapon. Highly illegal. Did you feel the pangs of guilt?

Re:Not At All?

[D Ninja]

Nope. Not then either. I feel stupid and angry at myself because I got caught, but not guilty. I deserve the ticket that I am getting.

Re:Not At All?

[mh1997]

Any of you ever put a pocket knife in... your pocket? Concealed weapon. Highly illegal.

I have a concealed weapons permet from VA and I checked theirs and other state police websites on the rules for knives. I found the following question and answer (not exactly, but close) on every website I checked:

What weapons are covered under the CCW license? Click here for answer

...Any knife other than an ordinary pocket knife or hunting knife....

Re:Not At All?

[RobinH]

But how guilty do we really feel?

About as guilty as when I walk up to a phone booth, pull out the phone book and look up the address of a place I'm looking for, and then leave the phone booth without using the phone.

Re:Not At All?

[FishAdmin]

Any of you ever put a pocket knife in... your pocket? Concealed weapon. Highly illegal. Not necessarily. Even assuming that you DON'T have a concealed weapons permit, there's no Statute classifying a knife as an illegal or concealed weapon, at least in my home state of Indiana. For more info check out: http://www.handgunlaw.us/documents/USKnife.pdf.

Re:Not At All?

[Omestes]

Here a pocket knife isn't a concealed weapon, UNLESS it is double-edged, or over a certain length (6", I think, or roughly as long as your palm held width-wise). Most pocket knives, then, aren't considered concealed weapons. Depending on where you are, and circumstances, most police won't bother you for having something that bend the rules in your pocket.

Anything larger, or double edged, must be worn visible.

I think most states/cites/counties have roughly equivalent laws on this.

Re:Not At All?

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting. You are obviously far more conscientious about connecting to open wireless connections than I am.

I can neither confirm nor deny...

[Ngarrang]

...that I may or may not be using yours or someone else's unsecured wi-fi access point, Definitely maybe not, to post this response.

Re:I can neither confirm nor deny...

[Anonymous Coward]

Get off my access point you darn kids!

This story is stupid

[pilbender]

WiFi hotspots are all over. I've connected to dozens of them. That's what they are for.

So the only way a person *knows* it's not intended to be a public network is by having someone complain about it after the fact. Lots of people leave their WiFi open at home as a "public service".

It's different to intentionally circumvent protections that are in place, like WEP or restriction by MAC address. That's prying open a locked door so to speak.

Sometimes I think these article summaries are intentionally worded to get slashdotters cranked up. Okay, it worked on me.

Re:This story is stupid

[gblackwo]

Sometimes I think these article summaries are intentionally worded to get slashdotters cranked up. Okay, it worked on me. Intentionally worded? CmdrTaco posted/approved the article, he knew what he was starting.

Re:This story is stupid

[peragrin]

Now there's a slashdot worthy debate. Does CmdrTaco know what he is doing or is he simply spewing what someone else wrote?

Re:This story is stupid

[sm62704]

Sometimes I think these article summaries are intentionally worded to get slashdotters cranked up.

YHBT.
HAND.

Re:This story is stupid

[wolf12886]

Sometimes I think these article summaries are intentionally worded to get slashdotters cranked up. Sometimes?

Re:This story is stupid

[pilbender]

I wish I could mod you funny for this one. Thanks! I needed a good laugh!

Not a crime under common law

[scubamage]

Well, the definition of common law as I understood it, was that it was based on what the common person would view as illegal. People can pretty much unanimously agree that murder is wrong, as is theft. Malicious computer use is also viewed as bad (though for many geeks it still has a pretty fascinating "whoa, thats pretty neat" factor). If the majority of people see no issue with borrowing wifi, then the common person would no longer see it as a crime. Therefore it isn't a common law. Maybe I'm just overanalyzing this. Silly lawmakers and their technological prowess - or lack thereof.

Re:Not a crime under common law

[k_187]

That's great and all, but you can't get out of a speeding ticket by saying, everybody else speeds!

you're right that somethign isn't illegal until there's precedent to make it illegal. The law on the books is sufficient for that.

Re:Not a crime under common law

[Se7enLC]

Good luck applying that "common law" to sharing MP3s. Almost nobody thinks it is wrong, but the law still prosecutes those that do it.

Not to mention downloading TV shows. People who pay for cable would be shocked to find that they are breaking the law if they download a recording of a show from a friend.

Re:Not a crime under common law

[will381796]

Yeah, that's not what's meant by "common law." Common law is law that is created from the bench, based upon the rulings of judges. This is in contrast to legislative laws that are created by our elected representatives. Common law has nothing to do with how something is seen by a "common person".

Re:Not a crime under common law

[Anonymous Coward]

Surely the "common person" is the regular guy who buys a WAP from a computer shop and sets it up advertising an SSID of "NETGEAR" and no WEP and expects only himself to use it on the DSL line he pays $X per month for.

It's quite obvious to me that he would view this as theft, just the same as he'd view it as theft if he accidentally left his car unlocked and someone borrowed it for a few hours. "You should have locked your car" is not a defence (at least, not in my country).

Basically, since the guy stealing wi-fi knows it's "unethical" he knows that the owner of the WAP does *not* give him implicit permission to use his wi-fi.

Let's face it, the only reason we have laws is because people engage in behaviour they know to be unethical. If no-one did that, we wouldn't need laws.

Re:Not a crime under common law

[scubamage]

Please explain then how this law should apply to the person who has their laptop set up to use whatever wireless connection is available, and upon walking past a concrete wall, their laptop automatically moves on to said open netgear. There was no mens rea, and the person 'committing the crime' had absolutely no intention of committing a crime. Not everyone who uses a wireless network that isn't theirs is a criminal. Heck, most people don't even know that its illegal - I learned when I was in college.

Re:Not a crime under common law

[will381796]

I'm not arguing that your position is flawed...simply that your definition of common law is incorrect. The problem is with technologically illiterate individuals in the justice system and the fact that most people you'll find on juries will also be relatively computer illiterate. Unfortunately our law's aren't keeping up with the times.

Re:Not a crime under common law

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice point but you're answering a different question. The point was this is how most non-technical people would view it - a point of view which has had almost no representation in these comments.

In any case, "ignorance of the law is not a defence; not because everyone knows the law, but because everyone would plead it".

I didn't say everyone doing this is a criminal. But the guy in TFA was doing it deliberately and knew it to be unethical. Let's stick with that, can we?

Not at all?

[pla]

But how guilty do we really feel?

Although I think the answer to that depends on how much (and how) we use it, I'd say that most people don't feel at all guilty about using any convenient access point for short, low-bandwidth activities.

If I need directions while out and about, I'll find an open AP and pull up Google Maps. No guilt whatsoever, and I wouldn't mind if someone used my AP for the same; In fact, I'd consider this one of the greatest side-effects of ubiquitous open WAPs, the ability to share a small trickle of a resource I never need all to myself (and to use it when I similarly need that small trickle of data).

Now, regularly using a neighbor's wireless to avoid needing to pay for your own ISP (unless you have an agreement to split the cost - Of course, the ISPs hate this, but I see no ethical problem with it) or downloading kiddie porn or sucking a large portion of the available bandwidth... That gets into abusive territory, and such people should feel guilty.

Blame Windows

[sunderland56]

Windows is, by default, configured to automatically connect to new networks. Which means, it is configured to silently break the law, without your knowledge. The 53% of people who admit to stealing WiFi is probably really higher - many people don't know where thier bits are coming from.

The power went off in my house the other day - and nobody noticed. The four or five laptops in use all silently switched over to a neighbour's network. I can't see that being considered a crime.

Re:Blame Windows

[D Ninja]

Ignoring the fact that accessing an unsecured network is not a crime, not knowing the law is no excuse for committing a crime.

For example, a friend of mine recently received a speeding ticket. He hadn't been paying attention and didn't know that the limit had been reduced to 25MPH. (He was doing 40, thinking he had been in a 35 zone.)

Re:Blame Windows

[Joe the Lesser]

This isn't about not knowing the law, it's about not knowing you're breaking it.

A better analogy would be if your friend's speedometer said 25 when he was actually doing 40.

Re:Blame Windows

[Totenglocke]

Well the relevant thing in the case of the speeding ticket is, was the change in the speed limit clearly marked? I know many places around where I live where you can be on a road with a speed limit of say 45 or 50, turn onto another road, and not see a speed limit sign for several miles. If I was on one of those roads and got a ticket because I had to guess at the speed limit due to a lack of signs, you'd better believe I'd be suing.

Re:Blame Windows

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows is, by default, configured to automatically connect to new networks. Not true. Windows only connects automatically to "known networks". The fact that your four to five laptops switched over to a neighbour's network means that you connected to them earlier - criminal!

Re:Blame Windows

[tompaulco]

I know many places around where I live where you can be on a road with a speed limit of say 45 or 50, turn onto another road, and not see a speed limit sign for several miles. If I was on one of those roads and got a ticket because I had to guess at the speed limit due to a lack of signs, you'd better believe I'd be suing.
Most communities have a "default" speed limit, which you are supposed to go if there is no posted speed limit. Unfortunately, there is no way to know this default speed limit for every community that you could be driving through. Also unfortunately, ignorance is no excuse, so just to be safe, you should be sure to download and read the thousands of pages local regulations of each community that you will ever drive through. If they are not available online, you should visit the city hall, without driving, because you don't know the rules yet.

Re:Blame Windows

[Gandalf_the_Beardy]

Under UK law speeding is an offence of strict liability. If you are breaking the limit, that is there is actus reus as the legal beagles say you are guilty. For more severe offences, there is the additional requirement of mens rea - guilty mind, or there has to be intent. I would imagine that US law would be similar.

Re:Blame Windows

[DavidTC]

Not knowing the law is no excuse.

Not knowing the facts is an excuse.

If I drive off in a car that looks like mine, that started with my key, and it turns out it wasn't my car, I am not a car theft.

(This actually happened to a friend of my brother. My brother loaned his car to someone and they 'returned' the wrong car late at night, which unlocked and started with his key, resulting in search for my brother's car the next morning. Which ended when the police realized they were already looking for a different stolen car of the same make, model, and color, and quite logically decided to see if they could find each car at the other location.)

Re:Blame Windows

[sco_robinso]

Agreed.

Windows, ever since SP2, does not just automatically connect to any old network out there it deems fit. It will automatically connect if you've connected to it before, but by default it doesn't just connect to random open networks without even asking you and telling you that networks are available. You would have to do one of 2 things - 1) Specifically enable joining networks without asking', and/or B) Join the network manually at least once.

The key here, since it's all based on how the judge interprets the law, is it just play ignorant. 'Geez, the interweb told me there were networks available, so I connected. It just said Linksys, and my interweb box says linksys too'.

But does this really need to be debated on /.? Anyone with a wide open linksys will not even have a clue, and by no reasonable means will you be able to be tracked anyway.

Re:Blame Windows

[Creepy]

In the US, ignorance is not an excuse.

    A US officer that pulls a guy over for going 40 in a 25 can write a ticket for going 15 miles over the speed limit as well as a ticket for defective equipment in the car. I got a warning for both of these in Wisconsin (going ~65 in a 55) and the officer said he would have ticketed me for both, but said he was at his quota so was going to let me off with a warning. I was very lucky - I was 18 at the time, driving a junker and it in fact had a defective speedometer, odometer, and cruise control (which would accelerate about 20 mph over where I set it) and had I been ticketed, I would have gone to jail because I didn't have a credit card or enough cash on hand to pay immediately (as per the Wisconsin law, at least at that time - not sure what it is now). I actually had him lead me out to get to the correct speed because I was on my way to Chicago and had a long way to go (I was close to Madison at the time) and was scared shitless about getting pulled over again (incidentally, I have NEVER been pulled over again - I don't generally speed).

Re:Blame Windows

[Blakey Rat]

The State of Washington has "default" speed limits, based on the type of road you're on. IIRC, residential streets are 25 MPH, arterials 35 MPH, country highways 45 or 50 MPH and freeways 60 MPH. Been a long time since driver's ed. though. And I'm not sure if this applies in other states.

Re:Blame Windows

[weave]

Better never "know" a SSID called linksys. I find myself auto-connecting to that one all the time on my iphone :(

Re:Blame Windows

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows, ever since SP2, does not just automatically connect to any old network out there it deems fit. It will automatically connect if you've connected to it before, but by default it doesn't just connect to random open networks without even asking you and telling you that networks are available.

There are plenty of people who don't have SP2, but from what I've seen Windows connects based on SSID, not BSID, so if your home network is an open Linksys, you'll still connect to any open Linksys automatically.

Re:Blame Windows

[Anonymous Coward]

Vista makes you explicitly say that you want to connect to an unsecured network.

Re:Blame Windows

[ulash]

<quote>Windows is, by default, configured to <i>automatically</i> connect to new networks.</quote>

As stated before, any version of Windows that's up to date will NOT connect automatically to new networks if they are not protected (barring the user having specified a preference explicitly in the past for connecting automatically to unsecured routers of a given name in the order you specify).

plenty of us just give it away...

[Anonymous Coward]

At home I've got a completely open wifi access point for all my neighbors to use. Since none of them are all that tech savvy I don't need to worry about them hogging bandwidth through bittorrent and the like. I figure that as long as my own access to Internet is unobstructed, why shouldn't I let others partake in it for free?

Re:plenty of us just give it away...

[despe666]

Here are a few reasons why this is a bad idea. 1. You are accountable for any illegal activity that happens on your account. Your neighbor may not be tech savvy, but wait until their nephew or grandson shows up and wreaks havoc on Limewire. 2. I assume this is not a problem for you, but by default, security software usually put the LAN in a trusted zone. Malware may spread quickly on a LAN you do not have control over. 3. If one of them discovers the joys of bittorrent, you can kiss your bandwidth limit goodbye (assuming you have one). My wi-fi is protected by WPA and MAC filters. It may not be 100% foolproof (what is anyways?), but it will keep most if not all of the trouble out.

Re:plenty of us just give it away...

[SQLGuru]

Those unsavvy neighbors are the best reason to lock it down. You never know which one of them will introduce any sort of virus / trojan / bot onto your network leading to a significant increase in attacks on your computer (even if they are against a Linux box, it can still be a DoS). I'd be more apt to share my network with tech savvy people that I trust....but they'll be the ones most likely to consume all of my bandwidth. So I just lock it down and hog it all myself.

Layne

Re:plenty of us just give it away...

[nurb432]

I don't think you are accountable for *illegal* activity since you didn't actually commit the crime, that would be like leaving your door open and being arrested for sexual abuse because a burlger raped your underaged daughter during a robbery.

So far having an open wifi isn't against the law, tho you are violating the AUP of your ISP most likely and can be cut off.

Viruses and malware? Shouldn't be an issue if your inside network is properly protected. The wifi is on the outside of your DMZ, right? If others spread it around, thats their problem.

Re:plenty of us just give it away...

[Anonymous Coward]

Next up on your local news channel: The AC before me charged with possessing kiddie pr0n, claims their access point was open and someone else did it. AC thrown into a PMITA prison regardless. More Details at 11.

Re:plenty of us just give it away...

[despe666]

You may eventually be able to prove you didn't download that child porn or plot that attack, but when SWAT comes knocking on (more like bashing in) your door because they put 2 and 2 together and got your name from the ISP, the damage is done.

Re:plenty of us just give it away...

[nurb432]

That problem exists more-so if you secure your wifi.

How do you prove it wasn't you since you were 'secure'? At least if its wide open you have an argument in court in your favor.

Personally i don't secure mine due to the extra hassle and false-security, but its only turned on when i'm using it.

Re:plenty of us just give it away...

[Dan541]

Drop the analogy,

"I didn't do it" is a pretty piss poor defense don't you think? It's not like a guilty person would ever think to deny their actions.

Argh...

[Oxy the moron]

The way this summary is worded makes my head hurt...

No, I didn't read TFA, but I think it's funny that we have to discuss the "ethics" of stealing Wi-Fi. I've always thought that leaving your access point open, broadcast, and unencrypted was akin to leaving things you didn't care for at the end of your driveway. Leaving it in that state is like saying, "Come and take what you want!" Everyone can see it. Nothing is guarding it. And there is nothing saying that it isn't up for grabs.

At least if you turned off the broadcast, you would remove the "everyone could see it" condition, and that would provide some sense that you want it to stay private. Granted, that's like covering your items at the end of a driveway covered in a tarpaulin, and isn't going to prevent anyone that really wants it, but it removes the notion of the underlying contents being there for the taking.

Re:Argh...

[Anonymous Coward]

Where I live (France), going through an opened door
(front door of a flat) without being invited in is legally trespassing. So if someone forget to close their door, we are still not supposed to enter.

Re:Argh...

[igny]

I see a lot of things changed since WW2.

If this was wikipedia...

[VMaN]

If this was wikipedia, "stealing" in this context would be a weasel word...

If a router is handing out IPs, how is that stealing?

Unless we are talking wpa/wep encryption cracking, or possibly abusing the connection, I don't see what the problem is.

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[Zelos]

I have a usage cap on my ADSL. Anybody else using my connection is therefore stealing something in the non-RIAA sense of the word: any bandwidth somebody else uses is an amount I can't use.

(and yes, my WiFi is using WPA2 with a long passphrase, that doesn't change my opinion that anyone using somebody's WiFi without permission is an arsehole).

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you get "permission" to use Slashdot's server to post that message?

Connecting to an open WiFi access point is exactly the same thing.

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[tompaulco]

If a router is handing out IPs, how is that stealing?
Well, considering that routers come from the factory configured to allow anyone access, and that changing this is not trivial to the average non-technical human being, I think that something needs to be done. We need to somehow make sure that people who intend to offer free wireless are, and the people who don't wish to aren't made to do so by default. I don't think it should be illegal to connect to an open wireless AP, but I also think that you should have to go out of your way to make your wireless open. Yes, this flies in the face of the Microsoft philosophy (sell software to everyman, but assume that everyone that buys one is an IT professional capable of locking it down because by default it's wide open.)
It's kind of like buying a fancy new color billboard for your gas station that comes with a complex programming interface and by default it says "free gas".

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[Oktober Sunset]

You can't steal something that is given to you. If a router gives me bandwidth for free, and the owner runs out of his allowance, well he shouldn't have given it all away should he?

I have a limited supply of cakes, if I put up a sign saying free cake, then I get home and find there is no cake left for me, I can't cry that they all stole the cake. I foolishly gave away my cake. If the sign reads 'Private cake: only for eating by Oktober and his housemates' and it is locked inside a cage, then that would be a different situation. Claiming I didn't know how to configure my cake sign and I just left it with the default 'free cake' message makes no difference,

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[Zelos]

So if someone leaves their bike unlocked on the street, you'd have no compunction in taking it? They didn't bother to lock it up, right, so that's their fault? Or if you saw a clumsy person drop a $20 note, you'd be fine with not telling them and keeping it?

Note - I'm talking ethically, I don't care about the legal side of things. There are plenty of legal things that you can do that still make you an arsehole, like not holding doors open.

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[Dzimas]

* If a router is handing out IPs, how is that stealing? *

It's probably not, if you're assigned IP address. But things are a bit different when you start *taking* the subscriber's bandwidth, especially if you do it for months on end. To use the dreaded coffee shop analogy, you're welcome to grab a chair at an empty table (the IP address), but I think they'd get annoyed if you helped yourself to a vanilla no fat extra hot soy and goat cheese latte every morning.

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[Oktober Sunset]

If there was a sign on the bike that said 'free bike: Take me' or the $20 note had a post-it attached saying 'free money, keep me' then yes I would have no trouble in taking it.

Just as I would see a difference between finding a book and finding a book saying 'Free Book'. If I was on my university campus and saw an unlabeled book left on a bench I would take it to lost property. If I saw a book saying 'free book', I might take it if it looked like it might be good.

The cage around the cake is not important, the sign is the important part. If I came upon a cake with a sign saying 'Anyone may eat this cake' or with a button saying press here if you wish to eat this cake, and pressing the button gave the message 'You may eat this cake, here is your cake eating number' then I would feel it is ok for me to eat the cake. If the sign said 'Only Bob McMonkey may eat this cake' or a button to press which then asked 'are you Bob Mcmonkey?' y/n, it would be clear that taking the cake and eating it would be wrong, and telling the sign that I was Bob McMonkey would be wrong too, even though it would be easy to do.

Re:If this was wikipedia...

[anothy]

i think we can all agree that since you're using any form of encryption or access restrictions on your WiFi net, someone breaking those to access the net would be stealing (or breaking and entering, or whatever the right term for violating the relevant code is).

the extension you're making, though, that anyone who accesses a WiFi net without permission is "an aresehole", doesn't follow. if you're not using any form of access control, you are issuing explicit invitations in the form of broadcasts from your router. there's absolutely no logical or ethical reason someone shouldn't respond positively to those invitations. if you're foolish enough (or, who knows, generous enough) to issue invitations to use something they only have in limited quantity (as in the case of usage caps from your ISP), that's their own issue/prerogative.

Crime

[JustKidding]

As it is officially a crime to steal wi-fi in the US, maybe.

Some people actually do live outside the US. This may come as a surprise to you, be we even have electricity and computers.

Also, in many places, the law is quite a bit more reasonable. Where I live, it is only illegal to access a system when a reasonable effort has been made to protect it (so an open access point doesn't count), and even then, they have to prove you intentionally did that.

Re:Crime

[anothy]

in the US, maybe.

not even. the US is made up of tons of smaller jurisdictions; even for fedral issues like this one, every level below the Supreme Court is broken up into jurisdictions that are not guaranteed to interpret the law in the same way. unauthorized access laws have only been tested in regards to WiFi in a very small number of jurisdictions, with inconsistent results, and neither of those were federal cases (meaning the law cited in the summary is inapplicable).

Not at all, but...

[Dripdry]

my girlfriend's router conks out EVERY Monday, sometime between midnight and 7am. I keep meaning to put a faraday cage aorund it, and we've tried a number of different fixes. Now the whole thing is down.

My point? If the technology isn't there to reliably and consistently allow internet access which is *being paid for* then I see no reason why we shouldn't piggyback off someone else until the problem is solved. Redundancy and all (isn't that how the Intertubules are designed anyway)

On the other hand, if we all did that and piggybacked, obviously it would be a problem.

sure, we understand that...

[airdrummer]

but try to explain that to a local cop who's accosting you for parking in front of a house:-P

and if you do try, the thug might take offense:-(

Re:sure, we understand that...

[dreamchaser]

Depending upon where you are and the local laws, if you are parked in front of someone's house you could be cited for loitering. There is almost always a way for cops to detain/ticket someone if they want.

Broadcast = Permission

[Toe, The]

Indeed. I don't know how the law is interpreted, but I cannot imagine how anyone who broadcasts an unencrypted radio signal can complain if someone else picks up that signal. It would be like a TV station claiming that you are stealing their content because you tuned into their channel.

You could say that a wifi router is different from TV because the activity is two-way: but the wifi router chooses to respond to me. If the owner of the router never bothered to tell their router not to respond to me, then is it my fault that it does? Am I guilty if my computer merely pings their router because it created a response on that router? They are the one who initiated the communication by broadcasting hello packets.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Just Some Guy]

Am I guilty if my computer merely pings their router because it created a response on that router? They are the one who initiated the communication by broadcasting hello packets.

Complicating matters is that certain popular OSes (XP, I'm looking at you) tend to auto-connect to the strongest signal available, no matter how nicely you ask them to stop doing that. If you're closer to your next-door neighbor's WAP than your own, and Windows decides to use his without asking your permission or even telling you, then can you really be considered guilty of anything? And doesn't that mean that the world's largest OS vendor considers "default allow" to be the correct interpretation of WAP etiquette?

As little as I'm a fan of MS, I think "that's the way Windows does it automatically" would be a pretty good defense against criminal intent, even if a jury disagreed with the legality of the actions themselves.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Anonymous Coward]

but the wifi router chooses to respond to me.

This is crucial. The Wifi Router is NOT a person. PEOPLE grant authorization to use wireless routers, not routers. So there is an issue of intent here.

What would you say about these cases?
1) Person has linksys router, with default SSID, and open access.
2) Person has router, with SSID 'freeInterButts', and open access.
3) Person has router, with SSID 'private', and open access.
4) Person has router, with strong encryption.

Authorization is only granted BY A PERSON in case 2. Yes, the other cases are common, and 1 and 3 are stupid. I don't dispute that.

Am I guilty if my computer merely pings their router because it created a response on that router?

This is pretty interesting. If you think router users should be on the hook for what their routers do automatically, you should be on the hook for what your laptop does automatically. After all, you can configure your laptop to NOT respond to Hellos or initiate SSID lookups (which are initiated client-side).

Obviously, there is an issue of intent here too.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Anonymous Coward]

Anonymous Coward checking in:

If "that's how my router did it automatically" is no defense for someone using unsecured wireless, then "that's the way Windows did it automatically" defense should definitely cover it.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[sulfur]

This is not exactly true. XP only automatically connects to networks that have already been added to Wireless Networks list in interface properties. It means that the user must manually connect to unprotected network for the first time in order to add it to the list. After that, XP will autoconnect to this network when available (until it is removed from the list). I'm not sure if XP connects to all networks with this SSID ("linksys" being the popular one), but I assume it does.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

. It would be like a TV station claiming that you are stealing their content because you tuned into their channel.

DirectTV used to get really pissy if you tuned into their satelite signals without paying, even if you lived in canada where they did not sell service.

Granted you needed to break their encryption to do so, so it isnt directly comparable, but meh. I think if you're flooding me with RF waves I should have the right to do with them what I want.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[eloy4]

One thing I think about broadcast is, the signal is actually on your property. I mean, nobody asked your permission to broadcast a radio signal on you house, so you are on your right to do whatever with that signal, aren't you?

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[i love pineapples]

Additionally, there seems to be no differentiation made between wireless APs of the same name. When I go to visit my parents connect my laptop to their AP, creatively named "wireless". My upstairs neighbor has given their WAP the same name, so if I neglect to remove "wireless" from my list of preferred networks once I return home, my laptop will auto connect to my neighbor's network.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[getherSpoon]

I cannot imagine how anyone who broadcasts an unencrypted radio signal can complain if someone else picks up that signal. It would be like a TV station claiming that you are stealing their content because you tuned into their channel.

An interesting argument. This is slightly off topic, but in Virginia Radar Detectors are illegal. Yet their sole job is to pick up on openly broadcasts signals sent from radar guns. The radar gun is sending out a broadcast radio wave into the open air... and yet, when a radar detector picks that signal up and reacts to it, that is considered a crime.

To me it's the equivalent of this tee-shirt. The shirt picks up a signal.. doesn't read it per se, just picks up on its existence... much like a radar detector mounted in a car.

The only difference I see is that someone with a radar detector is more likely to use that signal to break the law. But to me, until the driver actually breaks the law (speeding that is), then where's the crime?

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Anonymous Coward]

No version of windows will ever connect to a newly-discovered, unsecured access point on its own. It has to be saved as a preferred network before that will happen.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Martin Blank]

That's part of the design. The client has no knowledge of whether the AP is stand-alone or part of a larger network. It will automatically attempt to reconnect to a new AP if it loses connection as part of the roaming specifications.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Endo13]

Wrong. In all of the first three examples you give, the owner purchased the equipment and set it up in such a manner that it advertises its availability and offers access to anyone. Unless the equipment is defective, the intent of the owner is largely irrelevant. If you purchase and activate new equipment, the onus is on YOU to figure out how it works and set it up to achieve the results you want.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Anonymous Coward]

Also how do you know if the Linksys that pops up on your connection list is an open for sharing free WiFi, or someone's misconfigured router? I think that if you have WiFi and you don't take steps to lock it down, you have no right to complain ( seek compensation ) when someone from the outside uses it to download pr0n. If you take reasonable steps to lock down your network, and someone purposely circumvents those steps to gain access to your network, then a crime has been committed.

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't own the airwaves, just like you most likely don't own the mineral rights to "your property" nor the water rights.

Whether they transmit through the space you're currently in, you can't effectively claim ownership or assume that they are trespassing. You have a deed that grants you ownership of a frequency spectrum? Or maybe one that allows you dominion over one near or on your property?

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[FoolsGold]

Vista changed this. In Vista, any new networks are not automatically connected to unless they were in the past and have been set to automatically connect. By default, Vista will flash the networking icon and report "Wireless networks are available", but doesn't auto-connect anymore.

Of course everyone hates Vista without actually using it, so it doesn't matter, right? :)

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[Anonymous Coward]

Well I don't have a wireless network of my own. But there are two routers setup as ssid "linksys" probably have never been configured at all. Now here is the odd thing. I have windows XP running currently. And sometimes my connections jumps back and forth between the two and gives me NO notification whatsoever, sometimes it doesn't even show it got disconnected and is reconnecting. I will just randomly get "connection reset from server" errors when it hops networks and I can see my ip change. Now say one of those was my router and my network. Should I be doing a possibly illegal act by not changing any of the default settings?

also weird thing though vista wouldn't connect to either network. it just kept trying to connect endlessly, but both ssid's were shown in the log file

Re:Broadcast = Permission

[rentmej]

This is actually funny on my iPhone.
Every time it finds a new AP it will ask you if you want to join "NetworkX". So, from that point on, every time it finds an unsecured network called "NetworkX" it automatically connects you.
While back I connected to a AP where everything was default.
Few days later I was on the bus wondering why I kept getting a WiFi signal then loosing it every time we went past an apartment complex.

Re:Not a thief - depends

[Anonymous Coward]

It depends from country to country:

• In Singapore you can be arrested for using an open access point because it is not clear that it was set up for you to use.
  
• In Germany you can be arrested for having an open access point because it is clear that you have set it up for others to use.
  

Ahh.. the logic of law.

firmware update

[Easy2RememberNick]

What would really be wrong is if someone went to the settings tab and uploaded a new firmware update only to discover it was corrupt which ends up bricking the neighbour's router.

  The neighbour not being tech savvy has to buy a new one. His lack of knowledge cost him money.

Re:firmware update

[jcgf]

That's a damn good idea! I thought I was slick when I used to choose a password for them and then leave (war driving-not at my house). Well, I'm sure that I made a few call tech support at least.

Does the law really say this?

[feenberg]

Here is a link to the actual law:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sec_18_00001030----000-.html

In addition to "intention" there seems also to be a requirement for damage or fraud, or revealing atomic secrets. I don't think it is obvious that using a wi-fi router based on a DHCP reply is improper under the law, although the syntax of the law is complex. Walking up the front walk of a home to ring the doorbell isn't necessarily trespassing, even without permission.

tsoat

[Tsoat]

Encrypt your signal or expect people to use it. It's that simple folks

"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[Anonymous Coward]

I leave my access point open on purpose. Anyone can connect, and I even named my router "Open Access Point". If someone connects, I don't think they're stealing from me.

At some point, I think society would be better served by everyone leaving all of their access points open. I love the idea of mesh networks and eliminating the need for everyone to have a wired connection to the internet.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[gatkinso]

In that case they are not stealing, but you are - from your ISP.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[Anonymous Coward]

Not if your ISP said go ahead and do it. Some have even cut a deal with FON.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[stubear]

You're right, stealing isn't the right word because you're allowing access to your WiFi. How did you get modded insightful though? You clearly didn't RTFA and you don't even understand the basic concepts being discussed. It appears that you didn't even RTF summary which is just plain fucking lazy.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[Legion303]

Depends on the ISP. Speakeasy, for instance, encourages users not only to share but even to resell their access.

Good luck with that shit ISP you have that tells you sharing is a crime, though.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[MerlinX420]

"Stealing" Internet? In order for it to be "stolen" someone would have to "own" it. So your telling me that ISP's "OWN" the internet?

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[ProfessionalCookie]

No, it's ok, I bought Unlimited Access ;)

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[STrinity]

It depends upon the context. Under current conditions, no. But if ISPs start charging by the gigabyte and you use my router to download 50 gigs of pr0n, you're stealing from me.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[svnt]

"Open Access Point"

It might be paranoid but I always avoid residential-area access points with names that sound a bit too legitimate.

I prefer SSIDs that sound like real people are behind them, like "jennifer", "ihatethispieceofshit", or "chrislovesmen".

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[wes33]

How did you get modded insightful though?

I think it was to bother you, personally.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[gatkinso]

They only own your access, not the whole net - and if you voilate their TOS in that regard, then you are stealing.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[gatkinso]

Easy for Speakeasy to say - they didn't spend a dime to build infrastructure. When a storm hits and there are guys out there in trucks fixing the lines, well it sure as hell doesn't say "Speakeasy" on the side of that truck.

Someone has to pay for the fancy fiber optic line coming into my house. ISP's sell access - and if you provide access to others against their TOS then you are stealing.

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[Darkk]

You realize of course you're leaving yourself wide open for illegal activities from people you don't even know. Can you honestly trust people these days? Most people are honest but few out there aren't so why chance it?

Re:"Stealing" isn't the right word.

[Legion303]

"ISP's sell access - and if you provide access to others against their TOS then you are stealing."

And since Speakeasy is an ISP whose TOS explicitly allows customers to share their connections, I'm not sure what point you're trying to make.

The fault is the tech

[TheLink]

It's not well thought out. Otherwise you wouldn't have this issue in the first place.

If I want to share my WiFi it isn't easy to make it known of my wishes and my terms and conditions - after all, though I share it, I might say I log access, (mac addresses, urls etc) just in case someone does something illegal, so that if the cops come, I could throw them that bone to chew on, instead of them chewing on me.

If it were well thought out, it would be easy to have secure encrypted _anonymous_ connections:
1) no need for people to enter a password to get encryption
2) people cannot see each other's traffic - snooping is possible in some encryption modes, for example if everyone knows the WEP key, they can figure out each other's traffic, so you'd need some WPA mode, but these require username and passwords, you could give everyone the same username and password, but there's no standard for Windows, Linux, Mac to try "anonymous" usernames and passwords ala anonymous ftp.

And also there would be a standard way to get info about a wifi zone, and to prompt the user if the info/T&C changes, say when you computer connects to a different AP.

So the tech still needs a fair bit of work.

Re:The fault is the tech

[Anonymous Coward]

This is completely off topic but your signature must be the most clever one for a some time. I was *this* close to writing a bug report... Oh, and a good post. Shame that I cannot mod you up anymore :D

Re:The fault is the tech

[anothy]

WiFi certainly has problems, but it's thought out better than you give it credit for. the issue is just that the objectives of the designers (and many users) are not the same as yours. your complaints are valid, but they aren't an issue of how well thought out the protocol is, they're an issue of making different trade offs. the more options like this you force on the protocol itself, the harder you make it to configure and the more barriers to you (on both client and server side) you impose. just because the designers made different decisions than you might have doesn't mean they didn't spend time on the questions.

Re:The fault is the tech

[TheLink]

Thought out better? No I don't think so at all.

They could have copied concepts from https/SSL, and things would be significantly better.

Maybe I have high standards, but in my opinion the WiFi bunch started with crap (WEP what a joke), and have continued screwing up since e.g. with WPA PSK, once you know the PSK, you can decrypt ALL communications that used that PSK. So it's a waste of time for FamousCafeBrand and friends to get customers to use WPA PSK. Current popular implementations of WPA Enterprise are too hard - too hard for Mr Latte Drinker and too hard for Low Wage Cashier to explain to Mr Latte Drinker.

With the current dismal state of affairs, FamouseCafeBrand has to leave their WiFi access wide open.

What happens then if you see ten open APs called "FamousCafeBrand"? Are they all legit? Or is there MITM going on? You can't tell.

In contrast if things were done right, when connecting, people might get a pop up saying "The AP cert for FamousCafeBrand.wifi does not appear to be signed by a trusted CA" or "The cert does not match", and they get asked "Do you still want to connect?".

People could still click through, but at least you would have done about as much as you can and should.

I would actually be happy if you can prove me wrong - show me a WiFi set up using current available technology that would work easily and securely for the Mr Latte Drinkers, or Aunt Mays of this world.

Just getting by

[BIK]

When I was homeless, it was the only internet access I had.

Lets Be Reasonable...

[Anonymous Coward]

What's the cost of leeching of someones wifi? If you're not downloading a season of The Office with bit-torrent, or watching high-definition streaming video with your neighbors unsecured wifi then I cant imagine that you'd have any great impact on them. I have a cable modem connected to a wireless router at my apartment -- and I leave it unsecured intentionally for the sole purpose of helping someone out who needs to get online. For everyday browsing, emailing, and use of aptitude (I really don't do much more than that I guess) I'm fine with two or three guests in my routers DHCP table. I think the lesson we should take from wifi leaching is that for general purpose internet use, what most of us do, everyone having their own cable modem and paying a media-mega giant 60 bucks a month isn't necessary. If we got less up-tight about trusting our neighbors, it's another area where things could be cheaper.

I don't get it

[leoboiko]

I don't see what's the drama with open access. I leave my AP open on purpose, with an essid starting with "free_" to reinforce the idea, and a simple QOS setup to give me priority over my neighbors. I can't even notice when they're using the net, and I counted more than 10 different MAC addresses so far. More people using the net == good. It's not like I need all my bandwidth 24/7...

in b4 "but pedophiles will get you jailed, think of the children!!" -- I'm no more responsible for that than the hot dog vendor in the corner would be if ninja terrorists employed his hot dogs as lethal weapons.

Re:I don't get it

[antdude]

Where do you live so we can use your Wifi? [grin]

Re:I don't get it

[PottedMeat]

He should watch his hot dogs more closely because when those ninjas vanish into a puff of smoke someone will need to take the fall.

Re:I don't get it

[gwbennett]

I did this. Had 2 routers at home, and 2 separate networks. One called public, and once called private. One day I got an email from a lady several states away saying my IP address was "stalking" her, and that she was working with law enforcement to figure out why. She already had my name, address, profession, and IP address. I replied that I had had an open network, and sent her a screenshot of the MAC addresses/host names connected at that time, and also a log of all DHCP leases that had been issued on that network the previous week. I also unplugged that router. I never heard anything more of it, but even having to "defend" myself to that extent was not worth the hassle just to be the nice guy in my apartment complex who violated COX's TOS and gave out free internet. So now it is no longer.

Re:I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

Bad analogy and a godwinning in the sig... impressive...

Re:I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm all for open access. I'd LOVE to leave my AP unsecured and available for people. But until there's either black letter law or substantial case law PROVING that if someone else uses my AP to hack the Pentagon then *I* won't end up in jail, I'm locking it up. I agree that it's REASONABLE that you're not responsible, but what assurances do you have that the legal system (what country are you in?) concurs?

Re:I don't get it

[leoboiko]

"grammar nazi" is a well-established idiom, it doesn't trigger Godwin.

as for analogies, I'd rather have more analogies with ninjas and hot-dogs than yet another one about cars.

Re:I don't get it

[leoboiko]

I have no assurance, but I refuse to cower in the confort of my middle-class life out of fear of stupid laws. If I get in trouble, who knows, maybe *I'll* establish the legal precedent; it would be a nice story to tell to my kids! At the very least, I'm sure I could generate some media attention out of it.

Re:I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

in b4 "but pedophiles will get you jailed, think of the children!!" -- I'm no more responsible for that than the hot dog vendor in the corner would be if ninja terrorists employed his hot dogs as lethal weapons.

But the hot dog vendor is going to have a hard time convincing a jury he isn't a ninja terrorist

Re:I don't get it

[Dan541]

How would some random person get your email address just from your IP?

Re:I don't get it

[gwbennett]

I have a domain name that is dynamically updated to my public IP. So an IP-to-DNS lookup makes it easy.

And of course having the police get it for you doesn't hurt.

It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

I just want to point out that whether it's a crime or not to tap into your neighbor's wi-fi misses the point. Whether it's illegal or not, it is unethical. Here's why:

1. It puts your neighbor at risk for any illegal activities done by you that get traced to their IP address.

2. It boosts their bandwidth use higher than it otherwise would have been. Even if this doesn't directly harm them, it causes indirect harm to all the ISP's paying users because they have to subsidize your freeloading.

If you're stealing wifi right now, do the right thing and pay for it. SOMEONE has to pay for it, and it's not right to have someone else pay for you.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[DragonTHC]

it's like finding money in a parking lot.

sure, you could track down the owner, but it's in your best interest to just keep it.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

it's like finding money in a parking lot. sure, you could track down the owner, but it's in your best interest to just keep it. That's a poor analogy because taking the money doesn't put the previous owner at risk, nor does it cost them (or anyone else) anything. Try again.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[russotto]

To your #1 -- if I'm using my neighbor's wi-fi and NOT doing anything illegal, there's no issue.

To your #2 -- Believe it or not, it is not per se unethical to obtain a benefit without incurring a direct cost. That hair-shirt version of ethics is ridiculous.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[Just Some Guy]

If you're stealing wifi right now, do the right thing and pay for it. SOMEONE has to pay for it, and it's not right to have someone else pay for you.

I bet drinking fountains ruin your day.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

If you're stealing wifi right now, do the right thing and pay for it. SOMEONE has to pay for it, and it's not right to have someone else pay for you.

I bet drinking fountains ruin your day.

The owner of the drinking fountain knows people are drinking from it and has budgeted for that. A better analogy would be stealing water from someone else's garden hose.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[smallfries]

Your logic is terrible. It is not unethical to use wifi because "you may then do something illegal with that wifi". It would be unethical to do something illegal on your neighbour's wifi. If you still have trouble understanding this then consider a car analogy: "It is unethical to drive a car because while driving that car you may do something unethical".

A customer pays an ISP to use bandwidth. Many ISPs (mine included) don't have terms to say that you must not offer wifi access to other people. If your neighbour lets you use his wifi, and the bandwidth has been paid for then nobody is freeloading and nobody is harmed.

You need to learn what a logical implication is before you try and use one.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

To your #1 -- if I'm using my neighbor's wi-fi and NOT doing anything illegal, there's no issue. To your #2 -- Believe it or not, it is not per se unethical to obtain a benefit without incurring a direct cost. That hair-shirt version of ethics is ridiculous. #1 -- the point is putting someone else at *risk*. Even if you drive someone's car 120 mph and don't do any damage, it's still wrong to put their car at risk like that.

#2 -- I guess tapping into the electrical grid is fine in your world then. I simply disagree with your ethics, and we'll have to agree to disagree and leave it at that.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

Okay, I'll bite. The point is the risk itself. One of the reasons "borrowing" someone else's car without them knowing is wrong is because you're putting their car at risk. This is a problem even if (lucky for them) you do no damage.

Again, freeloading creates the issue of forcing everyone else on the system to subsidize you. Whether the ISP has anything in the contract about it is irrelevant.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[dapsychous]

1. Simple solution: Don't do illegal activities on their network. If you are doing illegal activities, you're probably not terribly concerned with ethics, anyway.

2. Right. OK. By that token you're saying that when I take a penny out of the penny tray at the gas station, it hurts the other customers because they have to subsidize my freeloading. Seriously. Get a grip.

Compare what I use in bandwidth to check my email compared to the level of bandwidth that is available to a paying customer. If I used 100Kbps for 10 seconds, I've downloaded a crapton of email. Plus, the ISP has a reasonable expectation that this account might be operating at near their peak bandwidth capacity, and if they don't have the infrastructure to support that, they have no business offering that level of service to begin with.

I'm on my neighbor's wi-fi, using a router I installed for them, running encryption that I configured, connected through a WRT54G with DD-WRT that I set up. I have my laptop, iPhone, desktop computer, and XBOX 360 on their wireless. They know that I am on their wireless, and they approve. THEY HAVE NEVER NOTICED ANY SLOWDOWN AT ALL, even when I'm playing online.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

To the moderators -- the fact that you disagree with something does NOT make it a troll (which is what I see my post was modded). Slashdot's definition of "troll" is "a prank comment intended to provoke indignant (or just confused) responses."

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[russotto]

#1 -- the point is putting someone else at *risk*. Even if you drive someone's car 120 mph and don't do any damage, it's still wrong to put their car at risk like that.

This is just more hair-shirt ethics. Almost every action I take creates some risk for someone else. It's unavoidable. That said, I don't see how my use of my neighbors wi-fi for _legal_ activities puts my neighbor at any significant risk for prosecution for my _illegal_ activities'

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

This is just more hair-shirt ethics. There's that phrase again. How do you define "hair-shirt ethics"? I googled "define hair-shirt ethics" and nothing came up.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[dapyx]

No, it's more like someone else's garden hose with a sign next to it: "Please, Feel Free to Serve Yourself".

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jbash]

1. Simple solution: Don't do illegal activities on their network. If you are doing illegal activities, you're probably not terribly concerned with ethics, anyway.

Flip the scenario around. Would you want to take responsibility for things that complete strangers do on your wifi without your knowledge? If the answer is no, then you should apply the same ethical standards when you're considering other people than when you're considering yourself.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[smallfries]

But you are not biting anything. I pointed out that your logic was flawed, so there is no debate about the quality of your points.

If you insist on arguing about something that you have already shown to be wrong on, then:

1. I never mentioned borrowing someone else's car. I was pointing out that simple substitution into your original claim showed that it was circular.

2. As explained, using bandwidth for free is not necessarily freeloading. Again, as explained nobody is subsidising your use if it has been paid for.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[jcgf]

If you're stealing wifi right now, do the right thing and pay for it.

No.

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[KeithIrwin]

Of course I wouldn't want to take responsibility for things that other people do using my open access point. As such, I don't take responsibility for it. I'm not sure why you think I would. Just because I open my access point doesn't mean that I'm responsible for what other people do with it. Providing someone a tool which can be used for many purposes doesn't mean that I'm responsible if they use it to commit a crime. If I lent my neighbor my shovel, and he used it to kill his wife, it's not my responsibility (you know, unless I could reasonably foresee the events. If he came to me and said "I need something to kill my wife with." and I said "Here, have my shovel", then obviously it would be my responsibility.)

The whole "you're responsible for any traffic which comes down your connection" is just something which ISPs say to try to get you to be careful. It doesn't mean that you're legally responsible for crimes which other people commit. And if the cops show up or the RIAA files suit, the proper response is "It wasn't me. I run an open access point. I don't keep logs. It could have been anyone, but you might want to check people who live nearby first."

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[russotto]

Hairshirt: A garment of rough cloth made from goats' hair and worn in the form of a shirt or as a girdle around the loins, by way of mortification and penance.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07113b.htm

Re:It *is* unethical to steal wi-fi

[Anonymous Coward]

You're missing the elephant in the room. Since I am responsible for what goes on on my WiFi connection I need to know that no-one is using it illegally, not have vague assurances from someone whose ethics are already questionable at best. If someone is using my WiFi without permission I would *assume* they were doing something illegal on it until it was proven otherwise. But of course the WiFi thief wouldn't want to talk to me about it, still less prove his intentions, because he's a self-justifying prick who believes anything he *wants* to do is OK, and then invents post-hoc weasel words for why it's not unethical.

We see this in warez dls, music dls, movie dls, and now in Wifi thievery. It's obvious that WiFi thieves are downloading warez, music and movies illegally. The mindset is exactly the same.

oh boy

[gTsiros]

They rob me of quiet and peace. i never make noise. They gun their 50cc twostroke scooters at 2am. i spent 100 bux (70 euros give or take) to fix my car's muffler so it is SILENT where they PAY to make them louder. they toss their garbage wherever they like. i try to recycle. the rest of the apartment block is drenched in tobaccosmoke stench. when/if i smoke i make sure to neutralize the smoke.

i don't feel guilty at all and don't you dare start with the "two wrongs don't make a right" crap. /torrenting as we speak

Re:oh boy

[gTsiros]

Then again... if i go over and explain the situation to them (explain what to do to secure it etc) maybe afterwards they will listen if i politely ask them to mind others with their noise (music, scooter, yells)

I thought that law was un-enforceable

[random coward]

I thought that law was unenforceable, since the RIAA violates it routinely and it is never enforced against them.

In Germany, you are a thief

[Conley Index]

Contrary to anything anticipated, a German court just ruled that someone did a criminal act connecting to an open wifi.

The DHCP package you take as an invitation was interpreted by the court as a telecommunication message not intended for the recipient and thus illegal to read.

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[russotto]

The DHCP package you take as an invitation was interpreted by the court as a telecommunication message not intended for the recipient and thus illegal to read.

Which is insane, as the DHCP reply packet was actually _addressed_ to the recipient. But why should the law be sane? Much easier to start with the conclusion (Guilty, guilty, guilty! Burn the hacker!) and come up with some plausible sounding justification for it.

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[Creepy]

There have been arrests for it in the US for several years. I'm not sure how many of these were prosecuted, but I've heard of others and I believe one was prosecuted (but it may have been Michigan, which has separate laws).
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060622-7111.html
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070522-michigan-man-arrested-for-using-cafes-free-wifi-from-his-car.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/07/07/tech/main707361.shtml

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[pwizard2]

The DHCP package you take as an invitation was interpreted by the court as a telecommunication message not intended for the recipient and thus illegal to read.

Does that mean that packet sniffing is also illegal in Germany? Promiscuous mode lets you see everyone's traffic (e.g. packets) on the same wire. All I have to do is set up in a Starbucks or someplace that has lots of people on wifi and I can keep an eye on everyone's net activities (as long as the traffic is unencrypted)

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[bryce4president]

Then they need to stop sending it to my address. If its addressed to me and it makes it to my computer then guess what... I can read it. Sucks to be in Germany.

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

That is not in the least in question. Your employer scanning his own employees without a warrent is mostly illegal, let alone scenarios as you describe. In fact what you describe is illegal in most counties including the USA (wiretapping law covers this). The exceptions are typically for legitimate network maintainence activities, which basically boils down to being the network owner in the US.

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[moxley]

"Packet sniffing..." Is that what they're calling it in those German videos these days?

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[Anonymous Coward]

The DHCP package you take as an invitation was interpreted by the court as a telecommunication message not intended for the recipient and thus illegal to read.

That's about as sane as saying it's illegal to open a letter addressed to "Current Resident" @ my address. The packet was, after all, explicitly designated to be received by the machine answering to that MAC address.

No, even better, it's like saying it's illegal to read the Mailer-Daemon response I get when an e-mail bounces back...

Re:In Germany, you are a thief

[TheSpoom]

Amen, I'd mod you up if I hadn't already posted here. Frankly, making an unsealed envelope addressed to you "illegal to read" is insanity and nigh-totalitarian.

"But how guilty do we really feel?"

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't wish to comment on whether using someone's WiFi connection is morally wrong or not. I definitely have done that before.

I'd instead like to discuss the phrase, "but how guilty do we really feel?" It strikes me as moral relativism in its purest form: "but, your honor, I FELT like I should have Internet access." And it is troubling because you can seemingly justify anything if you try hard enough. I feel like I shouldn't have to go to work some days. They'd get along fine without me...but I know deep down I'm just being lazy and grumpy that day. The problem is me, not the fact that I have to go to work everyday. (I applied for a full time job, after all, if I want it to be a part time job or have a flexible schedule I should arrange for that myself.) I find the notion very disturbing because it usually reeks of someone feeling they are entitled to certain things from society they wouldn't have otherwise. Sally Undergrad absolutely MUST have the latest Usher album right NOW even though she will have enough money to buy it tomorrow from iTunes.

Delayed gratification seems to be this quaint notion replaced by a selfish, "me me me" notion that we've embraced wholesale from materialism. And nobody seems to care that we're unable to wait for anything. I'm not saying we need to live as monks, but if you think materialism has no spiritual implications, you've had the wool pulled over your eyes.

lolwut

[snarfies]

As it is officially a crime to steal wi-fi (Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code, which covers anybody who "intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access")."

1) That is not a complete sentence.
2) So long as I'm not cracking into a locked router, I have authorization to use it.

Civil Law vs. Criminal Law

[essinger]

Well, the definition of common law as I understood it, was that it was based on what the common person would view as illegal.

IANAL, but I think you are confusing civil law with criminal. Criminal law is governed by statutes passed by the soveriegn authority. The article sites a statute. The "reasonable man" standard refers to the duty individuals have toward one another. So it's more applicable in torts.

Get over the 'theft' idea people

[nurb432]

You didn't *take* anything. This is as bad marketing as 'stealing music' or 'stealing sat TV'.

short answer

[tacokill]

Routers are computers.

They have CPU's. They have memory. And they perform tasks....like routing packets, firewalling, stateful packet inspection, VPN server, etc.

Re:short answer

[skirmish666]

I guess this depends where you draw the line & I'm not sure about that. My HDTV box has a CPU and memory, and performs tasks like decoding MPEG streams, timeshift & remote recording but no jury in the world is gonna convict my roommates buddy who walks in and watches the football without my permission for computer hacking. There's so many things in my house that fall under this category: dvd players, hi-fi units, even microwaves have basics microprocessors but I wouldn't classify them as computers.

If it's open- I'll use it!

[neowolf]

My philosophy is if someone is ignorant enough to leave a WiFi connection open- I'll access it if I have to. I've generally only done this in "emergencies" where I need to take care of a problem at my office and I'm not where Internet access can be had "legitimately". It's usually easy to find an open connection within a block or two of wherever I am.

I DO NOT try to break WEB/WPA keys or otherwise circumvent any security on a connection. In that respect- I believe I am within the law. I also only use it to access the Internet, and I don't try to crack/hack anything on the open network (even though they would likely be easy prey).

I do know several people in my neighborhood that use others' open WiFi connections as their primary Internet access. I just think that's dangerous and cheap.

Re:If it's open- I'll use it!

[anothy]

My philosophy is if someone is ignorant enough to leave a WiFi connection open...

hi. you're an ass.
my access point is open. i'm well aware of all the security implications. there is no ignorance. are you really not able to tell the difference between someone being permissive and someone being ignorant? or do you just have such a low opinion of people that you assume all ambiguity resolves towards ignorance?

Illegal versus Unethical.

[Jaywalk]

Now, regularly using a neighbor's wireless to avoid needing to pay for your own ISP (unless you have an agreement to split the cost - Of course, the ISPs hate this, but I see no ethical problem with it) or downloading kiddie porn or sucking a large portion of the available bandwidth... That gets into abusive territory, and such people should feel guilty.

If we're looking for a "legal" definition, these activities (with the exception of the kiddie porn) are unethical rather than illegal. If someone leaves a WAP open with the understanding that others may use it, they're leaving themselves open to others who abuse the privilege. A bit like telling the neighbors they can borrow stuff from the workshed and assuming they'll return it in good condition. Those who abuse the privilege should feel guilty, but they shouldn't be arrested.

And if the neighbors ain't neighborly, it's time to padlock the workshed.

Stop misusing the word "stealing"

[szquirrel]

For fuck's sake, do we have to go over this again? Stealing means that the perpetrator takes something away and the victim doesn't have it anymore. It doesn't apply to accessing someone's wifi, it doesn't apply to unscrambling a pay-TV channel, it doesn't apply to copying a digital file.

If you're going to cast "unauthorized use" in terms of robbery, then don't cry about how your rights are being taken away when you get prosecuted as a robber for making use of something that someone else couldn't be bothered to secure properly.

Re:Stop misusing the word "stealing"

[ShapeGSX]

A number of ISPs are experimenting with a usage based bandwidth model. If you utilize bandwidth from a person using such an ISP, it really is stealing.

Re:Stop misusing the word "stealing"

[mweather]

Unless they invite you by broadcasting the fact that their wifi is there and open.

Re:Stop misusing the word "stealing"

[anothy]

Stealing means that the perpetrator takes something away and the victim doesn't have it anymore...

...without their permission. if you come to my house (or, say, pull up to the curb outside my house), i give you a gift, and you drive home, taking it with you, there's no theft. so even in the case where my ISP imposes a usage cap and your use means those bytes are no longer accessible to me, if i've invited you to use them (as happens in the case of unsecured WiFi networks), there is no theft.

Mod parent up

[Anonymous Coward]

Mod parent up beyond 5. It's not stealing wi-fi if you are assigned an IP address and allowed to access the Internet.

The story is about US Law

[Rob the Bold]

Some people actually do live outside the US. This may come as a surprise to you, be we even have electricity and computers.

What's with the feigned outrage? To quote the summary:

Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code

There are sometimes stories and discussions on Slashdot that are obliviously US-centric. This is not such a case -- the summary clearly frames the subject.

Absolutely

[Jane Q. Public]

The presence of an OPEN wi-fi network should (does) constitute "authorization".

Kismet found 150+ networks in my apartment complex

[Anonymous Coward]

I live in an apartment complex. Last month I fired up kismet (running on Fedora 9) for a week to see how bad the problem was. It found over 150(!) network, and most were either open or WEP only (with packet counts going up at regular intervals). Very few were WPA/WPA2. Now it isn't surprising that WPA2 has so little penetration but more that the message of open/WEP just isn't secure hasn't reached the masses. I bet others could chime in with similar statistics.

- a former CISSP but still a white hat hacker.

My Ungrounded Lightning

[Doc Ruby]

When I use WiFi signals that are in the air somewhere that I've got a right to be myself, like in my own home or office, I feel the same way about using it as I do when I use an electrical ground wire. Or reading a newspaper in the incident light.

If those electrons or photons are trespassing in my private property, whoever sent them there is fortunate that I don't take countermeasures, in court or with a lethal focusing reflector.

Re:My Ungrounded Lightning

[Just Some Guy]

When I use WiFi signals that are in the air somewhere that I've got a right to be myself, like in my own home or office, I feel the same way about using it as I do when I use an electrical ground wire. Or reading a newspaper in the incident light.

And I like cabbages for their plasticity. Yow!

Re:My Ungrounded Lightning

[seandiggity]

If those electrons or photons are trespassing in my private property, whoever sent them there is fortunate that I don't take countermeasures, in court or with a lethal focusing reflector. You could always get them back with some loud sex and an elliptical reflector dish.

Re:My Ungrounded Lightning

[Doc Ruby]

One man's pith helmet is another man's myth helmet. Yow!

Then don't look at someone's watch or TV

[trolltalk.com]

intentionally accesses a computer without authorization

Today's watches, wall clock displays, etc., have embedded computers with more brain power than those vacuum tube jobs a generation ago - so purposefuly looking at the time is "accessing a computer". Did you get authorization?

How about that clock radio? Or that big-screen display in the store? Did you get authorization before accessing the data that was being displayed?

Or the display at the local checkout counter, that tallies up your bill? That cash register has an embedded computer. Did you get authorization before watching it total up your bill?

The person further on who makes the analogy between an unsecured wifi and an unlocked door misses one important difference - I am doing more than "opening an unlocked door", I also am trespassing. I can access an unsecured wifi without any physical trespass.

However, to make things more obvious, I have 2 wireless routers. I'll be reflashing one of them to provide public access on a limited basis; more people should, since it's darned convenient to be able to look up google maps when you're lost (and google does a better job than a gps).

Authorization

[Anonymous Coward]

If no password is required, which usually requires intentional additional effort on most systems, usage is authorized.

Re:Expensive Water

[mrslacker]

Guess you don't live in Southern California.

other way around

[Anonymous Coward]

Can an open wifi hotspot operator be prosecuted for unauthorized use of MY computer when he serves me an IP address I (as a person) haven't specifically asked for ?

I had that happened - after reinstalling wifi card drivers, the WPA settings got wiped out and it automatically joined my neighbors network without me noticing it for 3 days.

What if he snooped on my traffic, or more likely facilitated someone else to snoop on my now unencrypted traffic due to his (in)actions during configuration of his router ?

I didn't do it

[electricbern]

I didn't steal it, it was just laying there in the middle of the street.

iPhone

[hummassa]

Was he up to no good? Not necessarily. Any iPhone owner could be charged with this felony, because the bloody phone will connect (by default) to ANY open wifi network it encounters from time to time and check the emails.

So, that is the story:

1. Go to AT&T, buy an iPhone, activate it.
2. Go near JoeClueless home, automagically download your emails.
3. Go to pound-me-in-the-a$$ prison because JoeClueless is, well, clueless...
(cue to 4. ... 5. Profit!!! jokes)

?!

Re:iPhone

[chrisj_0]

Any iPhone owner could be charged with this felony, because the bloody phone will connect (by default) to ANY open wifi network it encounters from time to time and check the emails. Didn't Windows XP do the same thing for a while (pre service pack ?) Couldn't microsoft be blamed and charge with being the accessory since their software is designed to "hack wifi"?

Re:iPhone

[18hrs]

nah, you'd go to a minimun-security joint for that. I hear they have conjugal visits.

Re:iPhone

[Anonymous Coward]

the bloody phone will connect (by default) to ANY open wifi network it encounters from time to time and check the emails.

That's a dumb policy on Apple's part. I have a non-Apple phone that does 802.11, and I notice all the time that most commercial free public wifi (mostly set up by businesses for the benefit of their patrons) require you to use the web browser to agree to a EULA-type thing before you can do anything useful, such as checking email. So when I connect to a new network I always check the web browser before checking email, otherwise the mail program tries to make TCP connections and never gets a SYN/ACK back. I also really doubt Apple is clever enough to handle this scenario in a way such that the email program won't hang until timeout in such situation.

I haven't seen this...

[jskline]

Uummmm.... Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code, which covers anybody who "intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access"

If I read that right; it's referring to a "computer" specifically! First off, if I am accessing a WIFI connection that is OPEN, and the only place I go to is the available Internet; How is it then that I am accessing someones computer??? Secondly; How does that "exceed authorized access" especially when the connection is obviously available and fully OPEN??? Again, I'm not accessing someones computer on that connection; I'm going to the Internet.

The first statement is very specific and refers to a "computer". I'm not going after the computer. The second statement is so ambiguous, that it makes no specific associativity to the first sentence at all, much less anything else.

Who wrote the language for that law; a 5nd grader??

Re:I haven't seen this...

[Mox-Dragon]

5nd? It sounds more like it was written by a 3th grader.

My serious nontrolling question

[dogdick]

I'm one of those guys that comes across like a million crappy old wifi routers and I usually installing ddrwt or openwrt on them to play around.

I live in a huge apartment complex with a crap load of completely open networks. I've got in the habbit of setting up wireless repeaters for the open networks around me. I figure hey I'm near the pool whoever left this open may appreciate that they can get their network by the pool now, sweet.

So first I'm curious what's the legallity in that... I'm not using "the internet" I'm just extending the range of something openly provided.

Second since it IS my router if I decided to peak at nonssl traffic going across my bridge what's the legal harm in that... I'm not cracking a secure protocol just looking at what's freely available over http.

HYPOTHETICALLY of course.

Even better analogy

[GameboyRMH]

You ring the doorbell, a ticket drops from the mail slot that says "You're free to enter the house and watch some TV", and the door swings open for you, and a lighted path to the TV illuminates on the floor. Valuable objects may be in plain view, but messing with them in any way wouldn't be ethical, since they are clearly personal, whereas access to the TV isn't.

Re:Even better analogy

[TheSpoom]

I'm sorry, without the car, I'm lost.

Re:Even better analogy

[Joe Snipe]

You ring the doorbell, a ticket drops from the mail slot that says "You're free to enter the house and watch some TV", and the door swings open for you, and a lighted path to the TV illuminates on the floor. Valuable objects may be in plain view

Why do I feel like I am going to be eaten by a grue?

it is not stealing if i'm freely sharing

[johnrpenner]

sharing is not stealing -- if i'm freely sharing the service.
what ever happened to manners and common courtesy??
i live on a small island in canada, and people are friendly.
they like to help and share with one another -- we leave
our doors open, because we trust one another.

it is wrong to presume that using an open wifi is always stealing -- i leave our wifi open and unencrypted as part of the friendly sharing of resources so that people, if they are in the area, and have a need, may respectfully use this point of internet access.

part of being a considerate 'user' of an access point that someone has thoughtfully left open for you is to not abuse the extension of such consideration -- you're a guest, and someone's being nice to you by leaving their system open for you -- they're giving you a chance to check your email when you're stuck somewhere and in a pinch -- it would be inconsiderate to hog all their bandwidth by downloading or streaming video on their connection.

when people start abusing such signs of consideration, the people who are otherwise friendly end up having to close off this courtesy, and encrypt everything. just like spam -- those who abuse the ability to freely email anyone -- a few bad apples spoil it for the whole bunch.

Re:it is not stealing if i'm freely sharing

[DigitalSorceress]

While I believe you are 100% morally correct, I would wonder if many ISPs wouldn't regard such sharing as a violation of the Terms of Service.

I'm not saying you should stop doing what you're doing because I think it's gret. However if I were doing the same, my ISP and their lovely TOS would probably claim that I don't have the right to authorize anyone outside my home to access THEIR network without paying. It's rubbish, but I just bet that this is how they'd interpret it.

More likely though, this is fine and dandy as long as your trust in your neighbors is rewarded with honorable actions. Maybe on a small island community where folks help and respect each other, but I know I'd never leave my AP open because I'd be worried that some stranger would use my connection to do stuff that would be traced back to my IP address and get me in trouble. I wish I could trust the way you can, but I've been kicked in the butt too many times - my trust has been abused far too often in the more urban surroundings in which I live.

It makes me so happy that I'm planning a road trip along the Gaspe Peninsula, up to PEI, and down to Nova Scotia in a couple months. I just love the folks I meet whenever I travel up that way.

Re:Not a thief - depends

[Anonymous Coward]

And in Soviet Russia, wireless router opens YOU!

My body is my own.

[EWAdams]

You transmit radio waves through my body without my permission. I am therefore entitled to do anything with those radio waves that I like. If you don't like that, stop transmitting.

Incidentally, the same applies to laws against radar detectors, police scanners, listening to shortwave radio in repressive countries, and so on. If you irradiate my body without my permission, you can't complain when I make use of the radiation.

Re:My body is my own.

[Zelos]

Bad analogy. Unless you find reading somebody else's network traffic particularly useful, I guess.

retribution

[dziban303]

Someone in the neighborhood was using our WiFi to use BT and it was eating up our bandwidth. In addition, Cox suspended our service for a day because they saw copyrighted material flowing over the network (Entourage, I think. This would never have happened if it had been I that set up the router, as I always secure my networks.) In any case, I was so irritated by it that I did some snooping and noticed this genius had file sharing enabled. So I had a look around his PC, found some images of him getting his pathetically small ween smoked by some ugly chick, then sent said images to everyone in his outlook address book. I also printed this image to his printer with a warning not to steal wifi in the future. I secured the router at that point and kicked him off, but if I hadn't, I'm sure we wouldn't have seen him around any more.

Re:retribution

[Anonymous Coward]

So let me get this straight. You accessed his computer without permission. Then took pornographic images and distributed them to others without knowing their age. And you are the one complaining that he should use your network that was unsecure in the first place? Nice! How many laws did you break?

There is Computer Hacking, Distribution of pornographic material (posibly to minors), you stole printer ink in the printing of the image.

Your a TARD!!!

Next time secure you network or don't complain.

Re:retribution

[Anonymous Coward]

One can't help but wonder why someone as "leet" as you even bothered to keep his wireless open for abuse in the first place. It's almost as though you wanted something like this to happen so you could feel big when you hosed another person's social life. Course this is all probably just a big lie.

Re:retribution

[Agent__Smith]

You are my freeking hero... That was FUNNY.

In Germany...

[Anonymous Coward]

it was recently ruled by a district court that accessing a public, unencrypted access point is a breach of anti-wiretapping legislation.

the US Gov does it

[Anonymous Coward]

I used to work for one of the agencies of the US Dept. of Commerce. In visiting some of my coworkers in a certain building in the Washington DC area, I found that they were using wifi from the Ford dealership next door. I used it myself when I went to this building for meetings, and it seemed that the people working there used it as a matter of course. They even joked about thanking the dealership for the free internet access (though I'm sure they never did). I think there was no wifi in this building because of security concerns.

Cmdr Taco will sue us all

[kanweg]

If I visit a website, I'm accessing a computer according to that article. How do I know it was meant to provide me access. I didn't receive an e-mail from Cmdr Taco that it would be OK to visit ./

There are websites with passwords, so I shouldn't go there. That is fair. But isn't it equally fair to assume that if it isn't locked, it is OK to enter. I'm not very good at mind-reading, you know. And face it, there is no one to ask.

As to the router being a computer. Does it HAVE to be a computer. It could be a hard-wired thing, couldn't it. Just the fact that they made it fancy and all with features I don't use, doesn't mean I have to know the type of router to know whether I break the law or not, do I?

Bert

DHCP RFC

[scorp1us]

From the DHCP RFC

"3.1 Client-server interaction - allocating a network address...

      1. The client broadcasts a DHCPDISCOVER message on its local physical subnet...
      2. Each server may respond with a DHCPOFFER message that includes an available network address..." [emphasis added]

So the server not only replied to your discover request, it offered you a choice of addresses.

The law does not compile to machine code

[91degrees]

And once again we have a computer geek's response to the law.

With a computer, when I give it instructions, I have to be very explicit about what I tell it. If I tell it to rm -f ./* and it turns out I'm running as root and in /bin/ it will delete everything there and pretty severely break my system. Computers do what you say. Not what you mean.

We also know that the law is inflexible. And it is. But not that inflexible. It is not interpreted by a machine. It is interpreted by people. People who try to work out the intent of the law. A weasely "well the router gave me permission" isn't going to wash if it's pretty obvious that the owner of the wireless network just didn't know how to set the thing up. Nitpicking the meaning of computer is also a pointless waste of time. Yes, a PC or a Mac is a computer. So is a PC. You can probably even stretch the definition to a game console. There are limits! The fact that my car's engine also has a microprocessor in it does not make that a computer. There may be some devices that sit on the boundary, but a router is not one of them.

Please, just stop nitpicking over things that make sense to everyone else.

Have you accessed a network? Have you been granted explicit permission by the owner of the network? Would the owner of the network, be pleased that you had used his network?

set geography_mode = typical_American

[Hognoxious]

What if you're standing exactly on the border between Germany and Singapore?

Re:set geography_mode = typical_American

[es330td]

You would either be crushed by the mass of rock above you or cooked by the intense heat since the only way to go directly from Germany to Singapore is through the Earth.

Re:set geography_mode = typical_American

[level99]

What if you're standing exactly on the border between Germany and Singapore?

Then I for one welcome you as our new super giant mega Godzilla-like overlord, and you can use whatever access point you like. Seriously. Whatever you like.

Re:set geography_mode = typical_American

[91degrees]

There are two borders between Germany and Singapore. If you stand on one border, a member of the German Embassy staff will tell you to get out of their doorway and if you stand on the other, a member of the Singapore Embassy staff will demand that you move out of the way.

Re:set geography_mode = typical_American

[Gnavpot]

You would either be crushed by the mass of rock above you or cooked by the intense heat since the only way to go directly from Germany to Singapore is through the Earth.

Did you see the subject line of your post before submitting it?

Re:set geography_mode = typical_American

[Anonymous Coward]

In that case, you'd be arrested for connecting to your own open access point.

Re:set geography_mode = typical_American

[Anonymous Coward]

Some people don't have to be at the earth's core for everything to go over their heads.

Or more simply

[Anonymous Coward]

I never used it. The computer did.

And your computer let it.

Obligatory

[thatskinnyguy]

Overzealous Autoconfig

The confessions of a Wi-Fi theif

[tristian_was_here]

Wi-Fi theif: I was walking down the street when I discovered a house had wi-fi, I walked down the garden to realise that no one was home and a window was open and that's when I climbed through and stole all the wi-fi that I could see.

That concludes that all the wi-fi from a persons house was stolen.

You forgot to add...

[DeadDecoy]

I know where you live, I have your traceroute.

Re:You forgot to add...

[rodney dill]

Sorry I'm not at 127.0.0.1 right now, please leave a message... (beep)

Re:You forgot to add...

[Maxo-Texas]

You know where his geolocation in canada is... actually, he lives in Nebraska.

Re:You forgot to add...

[dugjohnson]

Nice callback to a previous thread!

Re:You forgot to add...

[Ferzerp]

Ok, I'll be a pedant again. The jokes that use 127.0.0.1 are using it as a substitution. As such, a name that resolves to 127.0.0.1 would fit the theme (a substitution). Technically, 127.0.0.1 is the loopback, but all mainstream os's that I know of by default resolve localhost to 127.0.0.1 as well. Either will work, and I definitely meant localhost (though loopback works as well).

The point is, it should say something like I'm not at ~ right now, or there is no place like ~. Definitely not there is no place like 127.0.0.1 though.

Re:You forgot to add...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow. youre dull.

Its a joke. There are understood protocols people follow and liberties you can offer when recognising and appreciating jokes.

Pendantry is not one of them and misses the point. Lighten the fuck up. Its not a murder trial and youre not an expert witness. Let it pass.

But I don't have any shares?

[sco_robinso]

I'm not into the whole Wifi hacking thing, but I got talking with my neighbor once a while back and he was thinking "It doesn't matter much anyway, I don't have any shares set up. Maybe some high-level hacker can get in, but I'm not too worried..."

Let's see... Start - Run - \\192.168.1.100\c$ - Adminsitrator / ~blank~.

You have shares my friend, they're called administrative shares. Phail.

Guilty? not me!

[Edam]

But how guilty do we really feel? As it is officially a crime to steal wi-fi Why should anyone feel guilty for committing a crime? The article seems to be confusing ethics and law.

The ancient legal principle is this:

[Iowan41]

If an apple from my tree falls in your yard, you are allowed to eat it. This is illegally ignored a good deal of the time when it comes to modern technology. Yet, by this ancient principle, if your radio waves land on my property, they are mine to do with as I wish, or I can sue you. It doesn't matter if we are talking about apples, broadcast communications, including those from orbital repeaters, or wi-fi. That is the legal, moral and ethical position. However, do note that those promoting an illegal 'law' have the guns and the prisons. Don't be stupid.

Re:The ancient legal principle is this:

[Kidro]

Er, what law is this that makes other laws illegal? You're arguing that your philosophy is a law that transcends other laws. Sorry, that doesn't work for me, or probably about 6 billion others on the planet.

Those who make the laws and judge cases based on those laws determine what's legal and illegal, not someone who claims some baseless "ancient legal principle" that has no place in any system of laws I ever heard of.

Seems sort of arbitrary

[Kidro]

The whole argument seems somewhat arbitrary. Each situation is a bit different. Some people (and businesses) purposely leave their connections open. Others purposely secure them. Yet others have no clue that a network can or needs to be secured to prevent others from using it. They certainly don't understand what bandwidth is. An overreaching law seems unfair, as how can anyone be sure they're connecting to a purposely open network, or, as others have pointed out, their computer just connected to the strongest signal, regardless of whether that person intended to use that network or not. When people use the sign-on-the-door analogy, it's a false analogy. It's more like saying someone sold a house to a blind person and painted, "FEEL FREE TO COME ON IN!" on the front and left a bunch of keys next to the door. The blind person who bought the house has no idea the painted words or keys are there. Now the person who sold the house included this information in pamphlets, even written in brail, but in a language the person buying the house couldn't understand (most people don't have a clue what WEP, WPA, encryption, etc. are, which is a like another language to them). Of course, we could all just say anyone who buys a router could just ask someone who is more knowledgeable to secure it for them. The problem is, many people aren't even aware they should be asking. If router manufacturers would make the default setting to secure the connection, the whole issue would be far less convoluted.

Here, this is the easiest, no tap dancing needed.

[barry99705]

If you aren't paying for it, STAY THE FUCK OUT OF IT!

Re:Not a thief (better analogy)

[oledoody]

better analogy: I'm walking in a beautiful landscape. THere are no fences, no "stay out signs, private property signs". But technically, in fact, the land is OWNED. How the fuck am I suppose to know? It's all beautiful and open and I love to wander and look, just like it should be. Also intent is a big part of the law. I'm not defacing or stealing.

Mod Parent Down.

[Kankraka]

Being 'forced' into XP due to my love of games, my primary machines have always ran it since SP1 release, even then, I used pre SP1 xp, and gradually upgraded from there. I have been using wireless since wireless B hardware became cheap enough (the 70~ dollar CAD for a NIC range) for my then after school job would allow me to afford. Never once, has windows automatically connected to the most powerful random network unless I had the AUTOMATICALLY CONNECT TO NON-PREFERRED NETWORKS box selected under the advanced properties for wireless networks. If there is no preferred network, it merely tells me some are in range, and asks me to select one if I choose to. This is how it's been since day one, that box has never been checked by default after any fresh installation either.

Re:Mod Parent Down.

[Just Some Guy]

Never once, has windows automatically connected to the most powerful random network unless I had the AUTOMATICALLY CONNECT TO NON-PREFERRED NETWORKS box selected under the advanced properties for wireless networks.

Moral of the story: your vendor went with different defaults than mine did.

Re:Mod Parent Down.

[Kankraka]

I've either owned, or had room mates/family own Dell's, HP/Compaq's, Toshiba's, and most recently an LG, first one I've ever worked with. Fresh out of the box, none of them ever automatically connected to either of my wireless networks (parents ADSL connection and my cable connection). Now I've never had the pleasure of owning a brand new IBM/Lenovo, I'd never touch an Acer laptop, so I cannot vouche for 100% of the more common vendors out there, but I personally have never encountered this out of the box.

Re:Mod Parent Down.

[Just Some Guy]

I have on a work laptop - maybe an older Sony? - that I never used much.

I believe you, but there are definitely out-of-the-box laptops that connect to anything in range. Maybe not all (or even most) of them will, but at least some do.

Re:Mod Parent Down.

[pluther]

Never once, has windows automatically connected to the most powerful random network unless I had the AUTOMATICALLY CONNECT TO NON-PREFERRED NETWORKS box selected

Whether the box is checked by default or not shouldn't really be an issue.

My phone will automatically connect to any unsecured wi-fi it comes across to download my email and voice messages and stuff.

I don't actually recall whether this was default behavior or if I checked an option somewhere along the way - possibly last year sometime when I first got it and was looking around to see what's available.

But, whether the option was checked by default or not really isn't the issue. The fact remains that it's an option you can enable by checking a box. According to your post, on XP the box is labeled "AUTOMATICALLY CONNECT TO NON-PREFERRED NETWORKS". Obviously that wouldn't be an option if it was illegal to do so. I think that you can make a pretty good case that a reasonable person would not be aware that enabling a standard operation that comes with the operating system could be a felony.

Re:Mod Parent Down.

[Kankraka]

I wasn't arguing the legality of it, I was merely stating that parent I originally replied to was relaying information that was not necessarily true to the fullest extent. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, nor am I saying I've never selected said box while wandering around downtown Edmonton to check my email and whatnot while on the go. XP, when set with the preference for all networks, will connect to the strongest AP in the area without encryption. Do I think using and unencrypted AP is illegal? No, immoral? Borderline, however I stifle that easily by leaving my AP unencrypted, and I welcome anyone in the area to use it in the event they need to. So long as you're not breaking encryption, spoofing MAC's, etc, I see nothing wrong (morally or legally) with connecting to an unencrypted AP, so long as you're willing to share access to yours as well.

Equivalent

[argStyopa]

Using an open-access wireless router is like looking through an unshaded window.

How is that treated, legally?

If my sexy, 18 year old neighbor is giving herself a baby-oil rubdown in front of their uncurtained picture window, what's her obligation in terms of privacy, and what's mine?

Re:Equivalent

[DriedClexler]

I believe there's a long-standing legal principle that "The eye cannot commit trespass."

Going *onto* the property to place your eye, however, is a different story.

Question

[azav]

Is accessing an open, unsecured, wireless access point actually accessing a computer?

Something to think about.

Re:Question

[Samurai Cat!]

Beat me to it.

Now, technically, I suppose you could consider a router a 'computer'.

But then - you could consider cell phones (and even many of your basic cordless models) computers as well, if you apply the same basic criteria.

So then - does that mean if I call someone on their cell phone, and they didn't grant me express permission before the call to do so - am I then "accessing their computer" illegally?

Food for thought. *munch*

California law

[BasharTeg]

Just for everyone's entertainment, the california statute that applies is:

California Penal Code Section 502(c)(3) and 502(c)(7).

And for all of the idiots stating that the "router" gave them permission, give me a break. The router isn't a legal entity, and only works in the way you interact with it. Just like the door knob.

I twisted the doorknob (initiated association with the accesspoint), and the doorknob gave me permission to enter by retracting the latch (allowing me to associate and giving me a DHCP lease). The owner of the door could have configured the door differently, by engaging the lock mechanism (using WEP or WPA), so since he didn't I'm free to enter and watch his HBO (use his broadband internet access). I'm not "stealing" from him, because it's not like he has less HBO (internet) now that I've viewed some of his HBO (internet).

A big part of what a lot of people are missing is, even if you had a point regarding associating with his wireless network because it is open (which you don't), that only gives you authorization to access his LAN. You still have no right to use his paid broadband internet services. You don't have that right, because you aren't paying the ISP, and because the owner of the access point doesn't have the right to share or transfer his right to use his internet service with all of his neighbors, just like I don't have the right to share my HBO programming with all of my neighbors. It's called theft of service. Even if you claim the right to access the wireless owner's network, you certainly do not have permission to access the ISP's network. And even if I run coax down my lawn, and put a coax jack at the end of my property so that people on the sidewalk can screw into it and watch HBO, that doesn't mean I have any right to share my HBO or that you have any right to leech service that you're not paying for.

Using someone else's wifi is a crime, because you're not just accessing their network, you're accessing their ISP's network without permission. Giving away your wifi by intentionally hosting open access points is very likely a breach of your contract with your ISP.

Re:California law

[SanityInAnarchy]

And for all of the idiots stating that the "router" gave them permission, give me a break. The router isn't a legal entity, and only works in the way you interact with it. Just like a laptop -- many of which are configured to auto-connect to any open wireless.

I twisted the doorknob (initiated association with the accesspoint), and the doorknob gave me permission to enter by retracting the latch (allowing me to associate and giving me a DHCP lease). Never mind that the doorknob also had a little built-in speaker screaming "Hey everyone! Free stuff in here!" (SSID broadcast.)

I'm not "stealing" from him, because it's not like he has less HBO (internet) now that I've viewed some of his HBO (internet). Except he does. If he's on a metered service, he does have less Internet. Even if he's not, I'd be sucking down bandwidth, possibly lagging him out if he's on at the same time.

that only gives you authorization to access his LAN. You still have no right to use his paid broadband internet services. No, the fact that the same DHCP lease also included information about available gateways and DNS servers, and that the DNS servers responded, and the gateway let me through -- I think that pretty much constitutes an invitation to use his broadband.

You don't have that right, because you aren't paying the ISP, and because the owner of the access point doesn't have the right to share or transfer his right to use his internet service with all of his neighbors, Really? How should I know? Shouldn't that be (again) their responsibility for not sharing their service with me (assuming they don't have that right), rather than my responsibility to ask them (and then their ISP) for permission?

What if they tell me it's OK? Surely, if I'm visiting someone's house, there's no meaningful difference between them sharing their Internet with my laptop, or inviting me to use their computer.

For that matter, if SSID broadcast, working DHCP, working DNS, and a working gateway aren't enough to authorize someone, is there any technological means by which I can declare a wireless network to be open and legal?

just like I don't have the right to share my HBO programming with all of my neighbors. As far as I know, it's still legal to throw your own superbowl party -- invite a few friends over to watch TV with you. So your analogy fails.

Giving away your wifi by intentionally hosting open access points is very likely a breach of your contract with your ISP. Then that is between you and your ISP -- not between every random passerby with an iPhone and your ISP.

Using someone else's wifi is a crime You've fallen into the same trap as the MPAA -- I bet you think sharing copyrighted music is a crime?

Wrong on both counts. When I go to the coffee shops in this town, they have public wifi set up, deliberately, explicitly as free for their customers -- one of them has a sign in the window from their ISP which advertises it.

And copyrighted music, of course, is entirely legal to share if you have permission of the copyright holder to do so.

Re:California law

[Anonymous Coward]

In which case its a civil matter (breach of contract for sharing internet, or HBO) not a legal one. Your analogy is good. Put a jack at the end of your lawn that says "free HBO plug in here". Someone who connects doesn't have to figure out if you do or do not have the right to share that HBO. The liability is on your (the person sharing) hands.

Re:California law

[Just Some Guy]

And for all of the idiots stating that the "router" gave them permission, give me a break. The router isn't a legal entity, and only works in the way you interact with it.

That's right. The router is only a piece of equipment: one that has been set up by its owner to allow anyone else to use it (whether the owner realizes that or not).

A big part of what a lot of people are missing is, even if you had a point regarding associating with his wireless network because it is open (which you don't), that only gives you authorization to access his LAN.

Then don't route my packets.

You don't have that right, because you aren't paying the ISP, and because the owner of the access point doesn't have the right to share or transfer his right to use his internet service with all of his neighbors, just like I don't have the right to share my HBO programming with all of my neighbors.

That's a hell of an ASS-umption. Any violation of the ISP's terms of service are between the WAP owner and his ISP. Furthermore, I'm not aware that all (or even most) ISPs disallow sharing the connection. Mine certainly doesn't.

And even if I run coax down my lawn, and put a coax jack at the end of my property so that people on the sidewalk can screw into it and watch HBO, that doesn't mean I have any right to share my HBO or that you have any right to leech service that you're not paying for.

Again, that's between you and your TV provider. I'm certain not on the hook for you violating your agreement - if in fact one exists that would prevent you from sharing your service.

Using someone else's wifi is a crime, because you're not just accessing their network, you're accessing their ISP's network without permission.

Assumption, and a hell of a big one.

Giving away your wifi by intentionally hosting open access points is very likely a breach of your contract with your ISP.

Possibly, but not certainly.

How you went from "possible against terms of service" to "illegal" is beyond me, but your grasp of the law sucks.

Re:California law

[Znork]

According to that legal argument it would also be illegal to access websites, send mail to someone, ping an IP address, or basically interact over any internet connection without prior explicit permission.

So as a matter of practical application of law, I'd have to disagree. If it's open, it's open and you can reasonably assume you are invited to utilize resources offered in reasonable ways.

Re:California law

[Anonymous Coward]

You do have a right to share your purchased broadband with whoever you would like on the street by having an ethernet jack outside your house, if you would like. If I pay for X mbps from Comcast (or Verizon, or ATT, or Whoever) and want to share it with neighbors over wireless I am allowed to. Businesses (smaller coffee shops) do this regularly without specifiying they are going to share with customers to the provider. And you COULD put a cable jack outside your house that people could plug into and watch HBO, so long as you aren't charging for it.

Re:California law

[Ungrounded Lightning]

So as a matter of practical application of law, I'd have to [say:] If it's open, it's open and you can reasonably assume you are invited to utilize resources offered in reasonable ways.

Make that "if it's open and can be configured to be open or closed" and I'm with you 100%.

When a computer system has an explicit permission grant/denial mechanism, it has been both reasonable and traditional to interpret the setting as an expression of the intent of the human in charge of the resource.

It's unfortunate that a number of vendors have shipped product with a permission mechanism set to "locks wide open" and not even informed their customers that there is a lock. That has led the legal system to deviate from the clear intent of the protocol designers.

Re:California law

[Hatta]

And for all of the idiots stating that the "router" gave them permission, give me a break. The router isn't a legal entity, and only works in the way you interact with it. Just like the door knob.

An HTTP server isn't a legal entity, it only works in the way you interact with it.

I twisted the doorknob (initiated association with the accesspoint), and the doorknob gave me permission to enter by retracting the latch (allowing me to associate and giving me a DHCP lease). The owner of the door could have configured the door differently, by engaging the lock mechanism (using WEP or WPA), so since he didn't I'm free to enter and watch his HBO (use his broadband internet access). I'm not "stealing" from him, because it's not like he has less HBO (internet) now that I've viewed some of his HBO (internet).

I opened a socket and sent an HTTP GET (initated association with the access point) and the http server gave me permission to read a document by replying with 'HTTP/1.0 200 OK' and sending me the document (allowing me to assciate and giving me a DHCP lease). The owner of the HTTP server could have configured it differently, by turning on SSL (using WEP or WPA), so since he didn't I'm free to access the server and retrieve the hosted contents (use his broadband internet access). I'm not "stealing" it from him, because it's not like he has fewer HTML documents(internet) now that I've viewed some of those documents(internet).

Does that make it clear enough for you? A router is not a door, it is a server. This is the way servers work.

Re:California law

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

And for all of the idiots stating that the "router" gave them permission, give me a break. The router isn't a legal entity, and only works in the way you interact with it. Just like the door knob.

I twisted the doorknob (initiated association with the accesspoint), and the doorknob gave me permission to enter by retracting the latch (allowing me to associate and giving me a DHCP lease). The owner of the door could have configured the door differently, by engaging the lock mechanism (using WEP or WPA), so since he didn't I'm free to enter and watch his HBO (use his broadband internet access).

Another stupid analogy. Does the doorknob have a sign on it that says "open"? Does it in any way communicate an intent of openness (real or accidental - doesn't matter) on behalf of its owner like an open access point, or an open sign on a store door, or a "free samples" sign at the supermarket? No.

That "open" sign may have been left on the router by accident, but that certainly doesn't make anyone guilty for using it.

Re:California law

[Frenchy_2001]

Sorry, but the one guilty of this "crime" in your words is the owner of the access then, as he is the one sharing the service without authorization, not the one connecting to it.

To come back to your analogy, if you enter an open door apartment and start watching HBO, you did not commit any crime that I know of. Trespassing needs the property to be marked as private and unavailable to the public (what a WEP key or an explicit name would do). If the owner finds you in his apartment, there is no crime until you refuse to leave when asked. Then you are trespassing. Why would you apply different standards to a wifi hotspot? The resource is freely available is unencrypted. The owner can either lock it or kick you out if your behavior (or even your presence) does not suit him.

After that, if the owner shares a resource he has no right to, then it is HIS problem to solve, not the one of the freeloader that just took advantage of a freely offered resource.

Re:California law

[mjwx]

I'm not "stealing" from him, because it's not like he has less HBO (internet) now that I've viewed some of his HBO (internet).

I know you are referring to California law, but I, like many others don't live in California. In many countries this is not the case, In many nations including Australia broadband internet connections have bandwidth limits after which it the bandwidth is shaped to 72K (technically still broadband according to Australian law, which classes anything above 56K as broadband). So if you have downloaded anything from my AP you have stolen from me (misappropriated might be a better term as you have made use of a service that someone else paid for without their knowledge or approval). I view it from an insurance perspective. If I leave my car unlocked and someone gets in and takes it for a joyride and crashes it into a power pole they have still committed a crime but my insurance will not pay up as I failed to use the security device installed by default in my car. I'm at fault for failing to prevent it but the other person is still charged with a crime.

Re:California law

[analog_line]

I'm not "stealing" from him, because it's not like he has less HBO (internet) now that I've viewed some of his HBO (internet).

This is actually less and less true now that metered Internet service is slowly spreading. That would pretty well fit the classic definition of theft.

You can't use a laptop in a car?

[Xocet_00]

"Last year a man in Cedar Springs, Mich., was fined $400 for mooching off somebody else's wi-fi--a police officer spotted him laptop-surfing in a parked car."

My laptop has an internal EVDO Rev A card that has become my primary mode of connecting to the net outside of my home. I've only had it for a month or so. I use this laptop in cars or other public spaces all the time. It seems unlikely that I'd be able to convince a police officer that I do in fact own the connection that I'm using to surf in a parking lot. It's an easy assumption to make that anyone using a laptop out in the open is likely using a nearby 802.11 network.

So, assuming the cop doesn't believe me, how is the fine given out? If I'm spotted, does the cop write me a ticket? Does he arrest me? Do I have to go to court and prove that I am, in fact, using a connection for which I've paid?

Hopefully there's more to that story than the article lets on. Hopefully showing the officer the "TELUS" logo on my connection app would be convincing enough. Otherwise, it seems like this sort of thing is very guilty-until-proven-innocent.

Re:You can't use a laptop in a car?

[Pitr]

Simple, you lawyer up and sue for wrongful prosecution. Depending on where you are, if it's an arresting offense, then you also get wrongful arrest. If the cop's a dick (which almost NEVER happens /sarcasm), then there may be further charges. If a cop has nothing better to do than try to enforce laws he really doesn't understand, they're probably not the kind of person you can reason with anyway, so all you can do is take them to task when they bark up your tree.

Also, AFAIK, there's no law anywhere in Canada (Which I assume is where you're from as I don't think TELUS has presence in the US) that prohibits the use of public wi-fi. That said, if you're traveling the US, you may run into trouble depending on where you are.

Re:Here, this is the easiest, no tap dancing neede

[azav]

I ran an open unsecured access point for several years for the purpose of allowing people free access.

It was not promoted. If people found it, they could use it. So would people who logged on without my permission be breaking a law? This seems counterintuitive and at least slightly stupid.

Re:Expensive Water

[PReDiToR]

Funny that, a lot of people don't.

Why doesn't everyone lock their doors? I live in a fairly nice part of my City in England, but the door remains locked at all times. Like the car. Use a door, lock it behind you as a sign to people that might want access without permission, even accidentally. The permission is either given in the form of a key, or by asking someone who is already in the property if they can gain access.

What, you let your postman open your door and drop letters on the mat? No, you make a slot for them to use so they don't need to enter your property to deliver your mail.
Same with WiFi. If you leave your router locked down, the default situation is "you don't have permission" but if you have a second router that advertises itself and has no encryption, you are definitely giving it away as so many people do.

These days more and more routers are factory set up to default to some kind of encryption (usually WEP, but it is a start) so that this problem can be a thing of the past. If you break the encryption you knew you were doing something wrong, just like breaking that big piece of glass at the front of the house and making entrance that way.

Wireless is like hosting a kegger.

[Toasterboy]

Running a wireless router is like hosting a kegger at your house with music blaring to the whole block and a big sign saying "FREE BEER!", standing at your front door, and handing a cup of beer to anyone who shows up.

Your SSID broadcasts the presence of your network. (the loud music)
It's unencrypted, and is handing out DHCP leases; (your agent handing out the beer at the front door to anyone)

The key is that when connecting to a wireless router, first you negotiate communications over the wireless. The devices negotiate the communication, and both devices agree to communicate using certain parameters; therefore the device has authorized you to communicate with it by negotiating the parameters. Then you request a DHCP lease, and by granting you one, the router has granted you permission to use the network. The device has negotiated communication on your behalf (you configured it to do so) and granted explicit permission to communicate over the network by doing so.

Sequence is: 1. Hey, can I talk to you wireless device? [device answers, yes, let's agree on a speed to talk at] 2. Hey wireless device, can I have an IP to talk on your network? [device answers yes, here is an ip so that you may communicate with any device on the network].

Looks an awful lot like explicit authorization to use the network to me..... The wireless device is your agent, if you don't want to explicitly allow all connections from random strangers then configure the device not to allow them on your behalf. If the device is configured to allow access like this then any reasonable person must conclude that the owner intends to share the device and the resources it is connected to with anyone who wants to use it.

Of course, the story changes if encryption is turned on, or if the device is configured to block certain mac addresses. Such a configuration clearly indicates that the intent of the owner is not to share.

Done.

Plasable deniability

[Anonymous Coward]

I personally have left wi-fi connections open explicity for the purpose of allowing anyone who happens to come along a chance to use a 'free' internet connection. This is rather analogious to giving someone movie tickes you aren't going to be able to use. I do so as a public service and in certain sub-culture it was at least common at one time to do so.

Given that, I believe i have a reasonable expectation that it is possible the someone else who leaves thier network wide open is acting as I have.

I'm most states if you don't want people wandering across an unoccupied lot, you are expected to post no tresspassing sings. Otherwise there is such a thing as a reasonable and incidental access.

On the other hand I'm not sure I want to pay a lawer the $300/hour it will take to defend me for the next 6th months if some yahoo decides to try and press changes over it.

Secure it dummy

[genghisphlip]

This should not be classified as a crime. Don't want anyone hitting your wireless? Secure it. Simple as that.

No such thing as a "wifi thief"

[Duncan Blackthorne]

Wireless Access Points all come with some form of encryption security, and all of them I've seen come with MAC address filtering. Additionally, you can configure the AP to not even broadcast it's SSID, and you can use static IP addresses on your private network instead of DHCP. ALL of these things come WITH even consumer-grade AP/gateway routers, and they ALL come with user's manuals that explain what these features do, and how to set them up. If you're too stupid to read the directions, too stupid to go get help if you don't understand them, or too stupid to do something to secure your AP, then you're too stupid to be using these technologies and likely shouldn't have them in the first place. On the other hand, if you really don't care who is connecting to your AP and/or think it's a cool idea to leave it wide open for your neighbors to use, then I say "good for you, and thank you".

All that being said, if I find an AP in reach of my devices that's wide open and allows me to connect, I'm going to assume one of the two above scenarios -- and go merrily on my way guilt-free, because it's not my fault in the least if you're a moron, and it's not illegal in the least if someone chooses to share their internet connection with whoever is in reach of the signal. Note here that I'm not cracking WEP/WPA keys to hack into someone's private network; if it's OPEN, then it's OPEN, and if I need it, I'll use it, guilt-free.

Oh, and to all you asshats out there who are going to cry to me, "You're stealing the service I pay for, you awful person you!", I say STFU , read Paragraph 1 of this post AGAIN -- because it's obvious that you're one of the morons that either can't understand how to secure your AP, or are too stupid to CARE -- yet you're going to cry foul at me for your own stupidity. Suck it up, read the directions.

Re:No such thing as a "wifi thief"

[Evets]

My wifi is wide open purposely. It makes it easier when I get a new device or when a friend comes over and wants to use their laptop.

Within the last year, my neighbors finally joined the WIFI club. I appreciate that their networks are all encrypted so I don't accidentally attach to their networks, and my guests don't either.

If someone were to abuse my network, I would lock it down - but in the last 5 years that hasn't happened to my knowledge. I've noticed strange devices attached on occasion, but traffic has been minimal and I've noticed nothing in the way of security breaches on my machines. I probably made someone happy that they could get to the net. Conversely, if those people were clever enough to cover their tracks, they were probably clever enough to break into a secure network anyhow.

Having an insecure network for me is a choice I make consciously, and I would by no means consider someone a thief for simply connecting to my network and accessing the internet.

Many people don't have insecure networks by choice, though. If they left a window open, or a door unlocked, it would be illegal to go into their house unannounced. Is it that much different for a network? I would think that since the signals escape the boundaries of my home that they are open to use by the public, but I think the debate is still pretty wide open.

The other point to consider is the responsibility for traffic generated from your endpoint. Does a network owner have responsibility to ensure that all traffic coming through a network is on the up and up? That's an interesting debate and I'm not sure what the answer really should be.

Re:No such thing as a "wifi thief"

[Duncan Blackthorne]

I get pissed off about this subject, as you can see.. but the fact of the matter is that this is something that can be cured by EDUCATION, but people don't want to be bothered to learn to properly use the technology they're purchasing -- then they wail and moan that people are "stealing" from them because of it.

Re:No such thing as a "wifi thief"

[rakzor]

Wireless Access Points all come with some form of encryption security, and all of them I've seen come with MAC address filtering. Additionally, you can configure the AP to not even broadcast it's SSID, and you can use static IP addresses on your private network instead of DHCP. ALL of these things come WITH even consumer-grade AP/gateway routers, and they ALL come with user's manuals that explain what these features do, and how to set them up. If you're too stupid to read the directions, too stupid to go get help if you don't understand them, or too stupid to do something to secure your AP, then you're too stupid to be using these technologies and likely shouldn't have them in the first place. On the other hand, if you really don't care who is connecting to your AP and/or think it's a cool idea to leave it wide open for your neighbors to use, then I say "good for you, and thank you".

All that being said, if I find an AP in reach of my devices that's wide open and allows me to connect, I'm going to assume one of the two above scenarios -- and go merrily on my way guilt-free, because it's not my fault in the least if you're a moron, and it's not illegal in the least if someone chooses to share their internet connection with whoever is in reach of the signal. Note here that I'm not cracking WEP/WPA keys to hack into someone's private network; if it's OPEN, then it's OPEN, and if I need it, I'll use it, guilt-free.

Oh, and to all you asshats out there who are going to cry to me, "You're stealing the service I pay for, you awful person you!", I say STFU , read Paragraph 1 of this post AGAIN -- because it's obvious that you're one of the morons that either can't understand how to secure your AP, or are too stupid to CARE -- yet you're going to cry foul at me for your own stupidity. Suck it up, read the directions.

And the 90 year old grandma down the road who doesn't understand the manual? Is it okay to use her wifi, then?

if it's OPEN, then it's OPEN, and if I need it, I'll use it, guilt-free. So you won't have a problem if I see your front door open and I just walk in and make myself a few grilled cheese sandwiches? Because of course, your front door was open, and you were too stupid to lock it, so you must have wanted people to enter? Right?

Re:No such thing as a "wifi thief"

[Duncan Blackthorne]

And the 90 year old grandma down the road who doesn't understand the manual? Is it okay to use her wifi, then? Sure it's OK. She can get her 18-year-old grandson to come set it up PROPERLY for her.

So you won't have a problem if I see your front door open and I just walk in.. Not the same thing. You're eating my food. I'll kick your ass for that.
Seriously though, if I leave my house for the weekend, forgetting to lock the doors and windows, and someone gets in and robs me blind? Sure, I'll be pissed that someone came in and robbed me. But it's MY FAULT in this case for being personally negligent and NOT ensuring that I properly used the locking technology available to me in the doors and windows of my house.

Answer me this question now, mister shameless troll: Are you really trying to convince me that you're supposed to be able to leave your WiFi AP wide open when you COULD easily secure it, and it's entirely MY fault if I connect to it and use it? Or if ANYBODY uses it? Seems to me that you, just as I stated in my original comment are an idiot, and you get what you deserve. Really, sorry to burst your bubble Mary Poppins, but it's a big, bad world out there, with Bad People in it, and you can't leave your AP wide open any more than you can leave your house unlocked, or the keys in the iginition of your car with the windows down, without someone coming along and taking you for everything you're worth. So, you can shut the hell up and stop your whining, unless you can make an intelligent, convincing argument to me how you have ANY room to bitch and whine to me about someone like me "stealing" your internet bandwidth from you when you can easily and simply secure it against such "intrusions". Oh, and by the way, if you're so upset about invisible radio waves coming into your house "without your permission", then I guess you're the same sort that can't have different foods on your plate touching each other, and you lay awake at night terrified about the dust mites that live in your bed, eating your dead skin cells; I probably shouldn't tell you about all the critters living in your gut then, either -- and I especially shouldn't tell you about the gnomes invading your underwear drawer while you sleep. I recommend you enclose your house in a Faraday cage to keep the bad, bad WiFi signals out of your house; it works pretty much the same way your tin-foil hat works to keep the signals from the aliens out of your brain.

..or, conversely: You could secure your goddamned effing AP with simple WEP encryption, or even dog-simple MAC address filtering, and stop whining about everyone "stealing" from you. Otherwise, it should be interesting watching you (through the hidden cameras and microphones planted throughout your house, of course) deteriorate over time because of sleep deprivation, as you stay awake night after night knowing that I (or someone like me) has got a +19dBi parabolic antenna pointed directly at your house because we need to "steal your Wifi".

Here is the best way to protect your network :

[Weezul]

Get yourself two wifi routers, attach both to your dsl modem, place all the security you can on one, configure the other as open, but only allow connections going outside your network, and restrict the posts to 1-100 and maybe 8080. Viola, no one will ever attack your router because there is an open router available, but said open router won't allow the bandwidth hogging P2P applications.

School Analogy

[Daryen]

In my opinion, accessing an open router may not be illegal, but it can still get you in trouble depending on who owns it.

Case 1: A university has a large sign out front broadcasting it's name and anyone can enter the campus. There are places you should know you shouldn't go on campus unless you are a student or teacher, and things you know you shouldn't do.

This is analogous to having a router with SSID broadcasting that assigns IPs to anyone automatically and gives them unrestricted internet access. You shouldn't access their computers or start printing stuff on their network printer. It's still assumed that you should use the router for legal purposes and it's polite not to kill it with bittorrent.

Case 2: A public school in a rural neighborhood has a sign out front, but you need to go to the front desk and get a nametag if you aren't a student. You need to state your purpose and leave when you're done. It would be trivially easy to go in a side door, but that would get you in trouble.

This is analogous to a cafe with a sign that says "Free wifi for customers." Sure you COULD access it out in the parking lot, but the legality of it is much more in the gray area, and it's possible they could attempt to bring charges.

Case 3: A private school in an urban area has no sign, and a large gate out front. You aren't allowed anywhere on campus without permission.

This is analogous to a wifi network with no SSID broadcasting and wep encryption enabled. It is clear that this network was not meant for your use.

You and the other slashtards don't get it.

[biolysis]

"If a router is handing out IPs, how is that stealing?"

It isn't. But just getting an IP isn't acessing the network, just like having a phone number isn't making a phone call.

The second you use my bandwidth to up/download something, you've removed my ability to use that bandwidth, and thus, have stolen it from me.

As to the "the router gives permission" garbage, the router doesn't have that authority, I DO and failing to deny you access is not in any way the same thing as permitting access.

Here's a thought exercise, if my router is handing out IP addresses, but my SSID is "NO, YOU DO NOT HAVE PERMISSION TO USE MY NETWORK SO PISS OFF!", what is the final determinant of whether you feel entitled to access or not?

Are you going to continue pretending the router giving you an IP is permission, even in the face of a clear message that it isn't?

No, every time this argument gets trotted out, people line up to cry out about routers "granting permission" which is hogwash. The router is a doorman, and even if he lets you in the building you are to blame when you start taking things that aren't yours.

Re:Expensive Water

[mrslacker]

Funny that, a lot of people don't. True enough - only a few tens of millions of us right now, but water the world over will soon be a big issue. I've not expressed an opinion on the WiFi issue, only a typical slashdot point about a bad analogy ;-)

Why doesn't everyone lock their doors? I live in a fairly nice part of my City in England, but the door remains locked at all times. Like the car. FWIW, I lived in an English city for 7 years. It's only in Canada you'd not lock your doors (if you believe Michael Moore).

What, you let your postman open your door and drop letters on the mat? No, you make a slot for them to use so they don't need to enter your property to deliver your mail. Or for drunkards to pee through :p I moved into a brand new English flat (that's apartment for those of us in the US) and my landlord asked me what type of letter box I wanted for precisely this reason.

Confession of a WiFi "Thief"

[MerlinX420]

I'm bring this computer to this new home. I turn it on. It connects to a Wifi Connection I believe is next door. The signal's not that great, but it lets me access the internet. I'm unemployed so I can't afford to get a REAL connection. A year has gone by... Nothing has changed. Never got as much as a complaint from the neighbor. I have a range extender sitting right in the window in plain view so it's no big secret that I'm using their Internet. Evidently they don't care. Maybe they left it open on purpose. Maybe they don't know how to secure it. From what I've seen on other networks provided by the same ISP's thou they set it up with WEP or other encryption. SO i gather that they the network owner intentionally opened it. So I don't consider myself in the wrong for using it. I've seen this similar posts about this subject here on /. for awhile. I just now after all these years of reading this site created an account, so I could post. Most of the time people already say what I think on a issue one way or another. Truthfully I think this is just another case of laws run amok in todays modern society. Finding more ways to make things that are not wrong, wrong by making a BS law about it. The whole issue of "Stealing" Internet however you define it is crap and garbage. No one owns the Internet. There should be no barrier barring someone from accessing it. This whole society has made me very distraught and filled me full of angst. I'm gonna stop now before I go into a rant... MerlinX420 (I do wish they would move the router a little closer!)

Re:Confession of a WiFi "Thief"

[Kidro]

While most people complain about "stealing" bandwidth or "the internet" (probably assuming "internet connection"), there is at least one valid concern. Many countries, states, provinces, etc. have laws that can hold liable the person who's name is on the ISP's contract for that connection if anything illegal is done on that connection, regardless of who actually committed the illegal act.

and I mean this in all sincerity

[Skye16]

I was waiting for the cars to come out. It's not a proper day at all without a car analogy!

WiFi as public service

[shani]

Lots of people leave their WiFi open at home as a "public service". Like me. I have a secure wireless network that I use for day-to-day use, but also an open wireless that I keep around for guest use. I labeled it "Open Wireless ($street_address)" so that people can see that it's open, and since they will see that the street address is the street they're on (or fairly close) they have a pretty good idea it is not someone's hacked Windows laptop. :)

Looking at the DHCP log, it looks like there are 6 unique MAC addresses that have gotten an IP address on it in the last 11 days or so. I guess my neighbors appreciate my hospitality.

I have no idea if this is allowed by my ISP, because I haven't read their terms of service. Since these terms of service are in Dutch and my mastery of that language is about equivalent to a 5 year old, whether or not I can read the terms of service even if I wanted to is debatable.

Re:Car Analogy

[Anonymous Coward]

You shouldn't be watching video while driving.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Car Analogy

[TheRaven64]

Well, you shouldn't be watching video streams while you are driving anyway.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

If you really want to pick up this analogy and run

[goldcd]

with it. Then it's equivalent to your neighbour playing his stereo so loudly in his house that you can hear it - and then him turning up your doorstep trying to charge you for stealing his music. Alternatively you can just remove the wifi part of the argument. You find a Cat-5 cable shoved through your letterbox and decide to plug your laptop into it. I'd have thought that the cable through your door was authorization enough to plug into it, much as opening a letter addressed to your house without a name on it doesn't immediately have you hauled in for interfering with the postal service. Personally I'm more than happy for anybody to use an open connection I leave about - maybe the problem is just that there's no easy way to differentiate between a deliberately open router and a purposefully left open one...

Re:Not a thief - depends

[TheRaven64]

So, set an access point up in Singapore, bounce the signal off the moon and use it in Germany? Latency of around 2s might be an issue, I guess...

Ditto the iPhone

[reptilicus]

My iPhone is set to automatically join trusted wireless networks whenever possible. If I stray into an area that has a wireless network with the same name as one I've legally joined before (ie "linksys"), then the phone will automatically join it, breaking the law and sending me to PMITA prison.

Sorry...but access alone is not a crime.

[Anonymous Coward]

TFA is very misleading.

Simply accessing the intarwebs using another's wi-fi router is not a crime, at least not under "Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code" which is more commonly known as 18 USC 1030.

Accessing a computer is step 1), but no crime has occurred until you also do such things as access protected government or classified national defense information, traffick in stolen passwords, impair medical diagnoses or treatment, engage in extortion, fraud, etc., etc., etc.

Take a peek at

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sec_18_00001030----000-.html

Why, no, Mrs. Bigglesworth...

[bheerssen]

I don't think blue hair is at all silly.

Oh, wait, what was the question again?

Open Wifi Differences From Network?

[mugnyte]

Physical Analogies
  Is unsecured Wifi the same as having a hot ethernet cable laying on the sidewalk?

  Is it the same as laying an unencrypted media disc out on a table in front of your house with content on it?

Network Analogies
  Is it the same as anonymous FTP against a remote machine?

  Is it the same as typing in a HTTP URL and downloading unsecured content in or through HTML?

  To me, its pretty similar to all of these.

It's stealing

[indytx]

"intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access")." Then, I have never stolen WiFi. I have never accessed without authorization; as I have never cracked a WEP or WPA password scheme.

No, the intent is to access the network. If it's not your network, and you don't have authorization, then you are using it without permission.

More importantly, when the major internet providers start charging for bandwidth, you really will be stealing from someone else. We're on the cusp of using other people's Wi-Fi being more like stealing someone's mobile phone minutes. Anyone want to argue in court that there was no harm caused to the person who had to start paying $.40/minute because you used up all the free minutes in their plan? No takers?

Seriously, it's not just the U.S.C.A. There's a statute right on point in Texas, Penal Code Sec. 33A.04, Theft of Telecommunications Service.

Re:It's stealing

[Just Some Guy]

No, the intent is to access the network. If it's not your network, and you don't have authorization, then you are using it without permission.

If I didn't have authorization, then I wouldn't know that it was there in the first place (because it wasn't broadcasting its SSID) or wouldn't have been able to connect to it (because I was lacking the encryption key).

Re:Not a thief - depends

[Anonymous Coward]

and in Soviet Russia, access points YOU!

MOD PARENT DOWN

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows has never automatically connected to open networks by default.

Exactly! Not to mention...

[encoderer]

On more than one occassion (Ok, on 2 occassions) I updated the guys firmware for him.

So in that case, it's like walking thru an open door, fixing a few things, taking a sip from the faucet, and walking out.

Also, I don't know if I agree with the closed-door analogy. Seems to me an open WiFi that broadcasts its SSID and doesn't require a key nor uses any MAC filtering is akin to just leaving your door wide open and then prosecuting somebody who dare walks thru.

Taking just one of those steps would, to me, signal the intent of the network owner that he doesn't want you there.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[plague3106]

On more than one occassion (Ok, on 2 occassions) I updated the guys firmware for him.

I would certainly think that to be illegal. Perhaps the owner DIDN'T want the firmware updated for some particular reason.

So in that case, it's like walking thru an open door, fixing a few things, taking a sip from the faucet, and walking out.

You'd still be charged with trespass and theft. And you've also assumed liability of your fix doesn't last or causes other damage. The point is, no one asked or gave you permission to do any of those things.

Also, I don't know if I agree with the closed-door analogy. Seems to me an open WiFi that broadcasts its SSID and doesn't require a key nor uses any MAC filtering is akin to just leaving your door wide open and then prosecuting somebody who dare walks thru.

All APs broadcast their SSID. It's required for WiFi to work. That only leave the open part. Unencrypted is not an inventation for you to use it anymore than you can legally or ethically listen in on an unencrypted cordless phone. Of course using the Wifi is more the equiovlent of using your neighbors cordless base station to place phone calls from your house. Also illegal, I believe.

Taking just one of those steps would, to me, signal the intent of the network owner that he doesn't want you there.

You're assuming the intent is to let other's use it; the owner may not have known others can use it unless more steps or taken, or the owner might not want the performance penality from enabling encryption. Just as the default answer to "can you enter my house without express permission" should be "no," so should the use of private Wifi spots.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[hexmem]

All APs broadcast their SSID. It's required for WiFi to work. No they don't, and no it's not.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[plague3106]

Yes, it is required. Without an SSID you can't connect, and the AP ends up broadcasting it anyway. Maybe you should read up on it, including the bandwidth issues that arise from telling the AP not to broadcast it often.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[Blkdeath]

On more than one occassion (Ok, on 2 occassions) I updated the guys firmware for him.

I'm going to have to agree with your other respondent; I'd be quite upset if you did that to any hardware on my network. Over the years I've encountered several incompatibilities with firmware on various devices and if some passer by had deigned to update it for me I'd find myself without connectivity or use of my own peripherals.

So in that case, it's like walking thru an open door, fixing a few things, taking a sip from the faucet, and walking out.

Likewise, what if the thing that was broken was part of an on-going investigation, vis domestic disturbance, break-in, or otherwise? What if it was one of those things that "adds character", or was intended to be fixed by a member of the household to make amends for a previous wrong-doing or what if the thing wasn't actually broken in the first place but was set up in a way that was particular to the owner's needs and desires?

It's a great attitude to want to be helpful, but forced, unrequested help can often be worse than the original problem.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[Blkdeath]

Yes, it is required. Without an SSID you can't connect, and the AP ends up broadcasting it anyway. Maybe you should read up on it, including the bandwidth issues that arise from telling the AP not to broadcast it often.

Can you fill in a little more detail or point me to a reference for same? My AP is set to not broadcast its SSID because I live in a dense area and I don't want to invite people to poke and prod at my network security.

I frequently transfer large files across my network, stream high definition video, etc. and haven't noticed any bandwidth problems. My computers, of course, are configured to connect to the correct SSID so other than a fairly typical few seconds delay in negotiating the WiFi connection and DHCP conversation I haven't noticed anything of concern.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[encoderer]

No, it's not. Perhaps you should "read up on it."

And seriously, you might get your yaya's being overly pedantic--that's certainly common here--but your replies lead me to think you're just being a dick on purpose, or you're really just clueless.

The idea that somebody with the SSID "Linksys," running without WAP or WEP, without Mac filtering, and with the SSID broadcast (which certainly isn't required), actually had a notion one way or the other about firmware? Does that pass the smell-test to you?

I didn't read the rest of your bass-ackwards reply, which is why I'm replying to this one. I learned enough about your POV from that very first sentence.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[encoderer]

How about this.. if you don't want your neighbors to be able to access or modify your WAP, then prevent your WAP from entering my house.

You are BROADCASTING. You chose to do this for your own convenience and cost. You most likely have other options available to you (Ethernet and Wireless Broadband) but you chose WiFi. Every decision has consequences.

And if I'm on your front lawn using your WAP, you've got an argument.

But I'm not. I'm in my own home. And your signal is leaking into it. What if I don't want it there? What if your equipment is interfering with something I own?

If you lived in an apartment and you flooded it, and water leaked into my unit, who are you to tell me that I'm not allowed to absorb it?

Finally, let's be real. I can imagine no sitution in which a person savvy enough to even know what firmware is would leave their WAP wide-open without expecting somebody might use it. That is, we're talking an SSID of "Linksys," no WAP, no MAC filtering. This is either somebody who doesn't know, or doesn't care.

In either case, it's hard to make an argument that upgrading the firmware is offensive to the owner.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[Blkdeath]

How about this.. if you don't want your neighbors to be able to access or modify your WAP, then prevent your WAP from entering my house.

Does the same apply to my cordless phone, cell phone, wireless keyboard/mouse, baby monitor, garage door opener, remote control, bluetooth accessories or any of a plethora of wireless devices that exist?

Finally, let's be real. I can imagine no sitution in which a person savvy enough to even know what firmware is would leave their WAP wide-open without expecting somebody might use it. That is, we're talking an SSID of "Linksys," no WAP, no MAC filtering. This is either somebody who doesn't know, or doesn't care.

You're moralizing. If something is wrong or illegal when it's hard, it's likewise wrong or illegal when it's easy.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[plague3106]

Fucking-a man, learn to google: http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/?p=43

As far as speed goes, you haven't NOTICED any problems. Did you actually benchmark your througput though? Hardware forums are filled with posts about these issues.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[plague3106]

Ya, it is: http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/?p=43 It's being broadcast while you're using the connection, no matter what your router is set to do.

It also don't matter whether or not the user even knows what firmware is, YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO ALTER HIS PROPERTY.

I can see why you don't understand the issues here if you stop reading at the first hint you disagree with something.

Man, new users are confirming my belief that people are raising dumber and dumber kids...

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[encoderer]

"You're moralizing"

No, actually I'm using a hypothetical argument against your hypothetical argument that the firmware wasn't updated because the guy didn't want it updated.

As for your other question: You should really think about what you're broadcasting. The vast majority of items you mentioned don't leak very far, if at all, outside of your structure.

Of the ones that do, if you take no steps to ensure privacy, don't be surprised to discover that you don't have it.

There is definitely a clear, broad line: If you have to actually DO SOMETHING to consume a signal that you know not to be yours, that's at best morally dubious and at worst illegal.

But if I'm seeking thru channels on a reciever and pick up you and your wife going at it via your baby monitor, how is that my fault? Ditto for cordless phones and cellphones. Of course, the latter 2 products include countermeasures for just that reason.

If you use something with a radio in it, you need to recognize what that means. You are broadcasting.

I have my notebook set to auto connect to any available network. If I turn it on and it finds a signal that you're broadcasting into my living room, that's no my problem, and it's not my fault, and I see no cause of action.

IANAL, of course, but I think of this like all privacy concerns. The legal test a judge or jury applies is "Was there a reasonable expectation of privacy."

Ignorance is not a defense. If you are broadcasting a signal with no countermeasures and no authentication and no monitoring, you do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Think of it another way... If I'm standing in my bedroom, and I look out my window into your bedroom, and you're enjoying your mate with the curtains open, am I being a peeping tom?

The answer is no: you're broadcasting yourself into my home. Your fault.

On that note.. It's been a good talk. I don't need to repeat myself, I think you can understand my position. I'm outta here for the night. Take care.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[Achromatic1978]

Do you also modify people's engine management computers in their cars, too, if you see an opportunity, if they strike you as "not actually having a notion one way or another".

Let me put it simpler for you: It's not yours. It's his. That means you don't fuck around with it, even if you think you know better than him.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[Achromatic1978]

But I'm not. I'm in my own home. And your signal is leaking into it. What if I don't want it there? What if your equipment is interfering with something I own?

Then lobby the FCC.

Or...

Sucks to be you. If interference was an issue, like you said, you have options. Why'd you go and get a device which must by law accept any and all interference given to it. You know, that whole public spectrum.

With the above, now I get suspicious when you mentioning upgrading his firmware, and interference with your equipment. Why would it not surprise me if in another you post you mention turning down the transmit power on his WLAN, too?

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[Blkdeath]

Fucking-a man, learn to google: http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/?p=43

If I felt the need to research every argument made on Slashdot I'd have to change my lifestyle to one that no longer requires a source of income. Your argument - your onus to provide evidence.

As far as speed goes, you haven't NOTICED any problems. Did you actually benchmark your througput though? Hardware forums are filled with posts about these issues.

Yes, I've monitored the speed with and without SSID broadcast. If you're going to ask me to run a series of obscure tests to determine that a particular protocol or application will be affected by x percent 4 times out of 5 I'm sorry, I'm not interested.

Now, do you have any documentation that demonstrates that speeds are adversely affected by disabling SSID broadcast by an access point?

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if you tell your router not to broadcast its SSID, it's still sent over the airwaves - in clear text, whenever a device connects to the router. Retrieving the SSID is therefore trivial, and doesn't require any form of cracking or breaking encryption. Once someone has the SSID, you're right back to square one - they can attempt a connection, and unless there is another form of security in place, they will be granted access.

You could argue that sniffing traffic for hidden SSIDs indicates some kind of specific, malicious intent to connect unauthorized to your network. But let's face it, we're not talking about people who accidentally connect to an open network here, rather those that intentionally do so; in which case there is absolutely no difference regarding either the technical process, the person's intent, the end result for all parties involved, and the immorality (if not illegality) of that behaviour.

Re:Exactly! Not to mention...

[plague3106]

If I felt the need to research every argument made on Slashdot I'd have to change my lifestyle to one that no longer requires a source of income. Your argument - your onus to provide evidence.

WTF? My arguement? You speak as if you know the implications of turning off SSID and claim a familarity with the protocol, when clearly you're not. Maybe when someone shows more knowledge about the subject you should look into it more, or at least accept what they are saying. I certainly wouldn't argue about particle physics because I'm not well versed in it.

Yes, I've monitored the speed with and without SSID broadcast. If you're going to ask me to run a series of obscure tests to determine that a particular protocol or application will be affected by x percent 4 times out of 5 I'm sorry, I'm not interested.

Now, do you have any documentation that demonstrates that speeds are adversely affected by disabling SSID broadcast by an access point?

As I said, there's plenty of forum posts out there, usually reporting speeds dropping from 5mbs to 3 mbs. But whatever, if you want to be ignorant, that's your proagative... but perhaps you should acknowledge it and refrain from making silly "no it's not!111!" posts.

How guilty do I feel? About as guilty as ...

[Anonymous Coward]

If my neighbor set up a water fountain right on the street curb with a sign saying "drinking water here", it was a hot day, and I decided to take a drink from it without knocking on their door to ask if it was okay. Actually, no, wait a second ... it would be more like having a fountain that was actually spraying water over the entire street and neighborhood, including my property.

It would be different if the fountain had a lock on it and a "private use only" sign. Then I wouldn't touch it.

Re:Not a thief - depends

[fastest fascist]

Clarification/sources on the Germany claim? Do you mean to say running an open wi-fi hotspot is illegal in .de?

Proposed code of ethics

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

Let usage be governed by the intent of the access point owner.

If the SSID says "Free WiFi" then it's OK to connect. If the owner has set up anything, even WEP, to control access you should assume they're denying permission and stay off. If the owner allows connections but sends you to a captive portal that says it's for business partners only and if you're not you should disconnect, then you were OK up to the captive portal but should disconnect otherwise.

The reason there's a debate is that the owner's intent is hard to discern given the current technology. If the SSID is Linksys, then if possible knock on the door, introduce yourself, and ask. That often isn't feasible.

In really ambiguous cases, fall back on the Bedouin tradition for using other people's wells while traveling. The standard there was that you were supposed to allow passing travelers to drink at your well, and that you could do the same on your travels, but that if you tried massive or commercial use such as watering your whole flock of livestock then desert dispute resolution techniques would come into play.

The equivalent for us would be not downloading ISOs or videos from someone else's wireless connection.

And of course don't use it for anything that's considered illegal: no unauthorized downloads of commercial music, for example.

Pedant?

[rodney dill]

I thought you were being the Pink Panther...
Pedant.... Pedant.... pedant.pedant.pedant...

My iPhone and Ubuntu break the law then...

[Anonymous Coward]

My iPhone and my Ubuntu box both do roaming mode by default and connect to any 'hot spot' it can find. I often find these hot spots to be NETGEAR and LINKSYS routers with all default settings and most likely privately owned and not intended to be made for public access.

Again -- am I responsible for what my OS and Mobile phone do by default?

Should I be going through my neighborhood to locate these open networks and secure them for the owner, or is that breaking the law too?

Re:If you really want to pick up this analogy and

[Orange Crush]

maybe the problem is just that there's no easy way to differentiate between a deliberately open router and a purposefully left open one...

Indeed. I think there may be no way at all to differentiate between a router left open deliberately and one left open purposefully.

Re:Expensive Water

[somersault]

my landlord asked me what type of letter box I wanted for precisely this reason Ew.. is that quite a common thing in England? I live in Scotland and haven't heard of anyone doing that, it's certainly not an everyday occurence at least (peeing in the street sure.. through a letter box, not so much!). My answer to the question in this situation would be "one with teeth" ;)

perfect analogy

[hypergreatthing]

Everyone equates wifi access to doors and whatnot, but it really isn't a good analogy for someone to understand.

WIFI access are like public telephones. Some of them are free, some coin operated, some of them have a lock on them letting only certain people use them and some of them are tucked away hidden for only the right people to know/use.

You can always find a public telephone, pick them up, hit some buttons on them, even fiddle around with them because they're public. If you break the lock on one of them you are doing something immoral and probably illegal. Though i'd say there's a big difference to one that has a metal lock on it to one that has a zip tie holding down the reciever.

If there is a payphone out there that's free to use yet has no sign on top of it, it should be as legal to use as one with a big sign that says "FREE ACCESS" on top of it.

Trying to see if it's free or not is not a crime. Tampering with or damaging it is illegal (I equate this to tampering with the local network or router if you do connect to one).

Being an HP48gx

[Anonymous Coward]

I would say yes. And its not near the top-of-the-line these days, but can still bzip/bunzip files, and has expandable RAM and ROM cards and talks IR or Serial...

Tm

Re:Being an HP48gx

[sm62704]

Actually a two dollar Chinese calculator really is a computer as well (albeit nowhere near as powerful as a scientific calculator); it is more powerful than ENIAC. Anything that's digital is in fact a computer. Your phone is a computer. Linux will run on a wristwatch.

But these days if it doesn't have a keyboard, monitor, and disk drives it isn't considered a "computer" even though technically, it is.

suggested tag

[Anonymous Coward]

badanalogyoverload

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:If you really want to pick up this analogy and

[DanTheStone]

maybe the problem is just that there's no easy way to differentiate between a deliberately open router and a purposefully left open one... I can see how that would be hard to differentiate... In fact, I can think of no situations with any difference between the two.

By Law

[Khyber]

You are free to do anything with any signal that reaches your property, including responding to it or blocking it altogether. I believe there are FCC rulings that back that up as well.

Re:By Law

[Blkdeath]

You are free to do anything with any signal that reaches your property, including responding to it or blocking it altogether. I believe there are FCC rulings that back that up as well.

Cite please.

Re:By Law

[Achromatic1978]

Right... so by that rationale no-one's ever been convicted or sued over breaking into satellite signals and doing that, because once the signal is on their property, it's theirs.

Wait, that's not true. Nice try, though.

Re:By Law

[Khyber]

Satellite stuff is encrypted. Normal OTA transmissions are not. That's what I refer to.

Re:By Law

[Khyber]

1972 RFI bill, first one ever introduced, if I remember correctly. Or at least it started the path to the ruling. It's been awhile since I brushed up on my communications history.

Keep an open network, with a hint of deterrence

[sfarmstrong]

A key factor here is etiquette and conventions. Where I grew up, people sometimes put old furniture out in front of their house for a few days before carting it off for disposal. It was an open invitation for anyone to take the furniture if it seemed useful. I expect that's a pretty widespread convention. Therefore, it's hard to accuse someone of "stealing" furniture from in front of a house, because the "thief" honestly and reasonably believes that the owner of the furniture was offering it openly.

From what I can tell, modern network etiquette works the same way: open access points are presumed to be free for interested takers. (Of course, excessive bandwidth usage is decidedly impolite.) When I run personal wireless networks, I prefer to keep them open for people to use. Likewise, when I connect to an open access point, I presume that I have their permission. They didn't explicitly give me permission, but that doesn't matter - I'm relying on a generally agreed-upon convention regarding wireless networks.

Of course, letting other people onto your network doesn't mean you can't mess with their heads just a little. I like to call my network "Panopticon."

It's not Stealing, it's "Borrowing"

[Anonymous Coward]

... like borrowing a cup of sugar in the 50's, only now you don't have to ask permission of your neighbors. Personally I borrow all the time from unsecured networks wherever I am (especially easy cities are Amsterdam and San Francisco); but since I'm usually mobile I'm not downloading large files or otherwise hogging bandwidth so really: what's the harm?!?

According to the FCC

[Khyber]

You're allowed to do whatever with any signal that crosses into your domain - your property. That includes respond to it, modify it, or record it, if it's OTA and unencrypted (certain licensing restrictions may apply.)

794 analogies later...

[MattPat]

... and we're all saying the same thing: using an unsecured wireless network isn't a crime. :) You *could* point out that, by laymen's definitions, a network is not a computer, and you are not accessing any computers that aren't public (ie, web servers, etc.). But then we'd miss out on all the fun with the analogies.

Wrong

[kiwimate]

Wrong.

steal may apply to any surreptitious taking of something and ... commonly applying to intangibles as well as material things.

And if you want to argue semantics about the definition including the word property then I suggest you look up the definition of the word property . (By all means look it up on Merriam-Webster too; people seem to trust Wikipedia as unimpeachable here, which is laughable considering the audience.)

Sadly, this entire thread has degenerated into nothing better than juvenile bickering over semantics. Why is it that almost any other topic on Slashdot can (frequently) inspire some genuinely interesting debate, but turn over to YRO and it becomes the sole province of a bunch of overgrown three year olds?

Indeed

[goldcd]

with a standard router you can name the SSID 'Please use me' - but that's about it. One vaguely interesting thing on the horizon are the dual SSID routers - the ridiculously over designed Belkin n router I understand allows you to have a private and a public/guest dual SSID thingie running. In my happy-clappy rainbow world all routers would be like that, with an option on setup for a 'non-LAN, throttled/low priority' public option available for easy selection on install. Think if people are given option to share without risk they'd click yes (well enough would).

Re:Indeed

[kcjefff]

Woosh! That's the sound of the joke going straight over your head. If you see a reply to your post modded Funny and you think it's serious, it's time to hang it up because no one is listening, Madonna.

Re:Indeed

[mcvos]

Woosh! That's the sound of the joke going straight over your head. If you see a reply to your post modded Funny and you think it's serious, it's time to hang it up because no one is listening, Madonna. No. A lousy joke should never be a barrier to meaningful contributions. The GP has a very good point. Don't be an ass by insisting crappy jokes are more important.

Re:If you really want to pick up this analogy and

[Thiez]

> You find a Cat-5 cable shoved through your letterbox and decide to plug your laptop into it.

Would that be a 'glory-cat-5-cable'?

i can't believe you leave your wireless open...

[castlekingsidex]

to those of you who broadcast their wifi with no authentication and with ssids like "Nojoke : free internet!" I question your sanity. This leaves your entire network open for all sorts of security attacks. It requires almost no knowledge to perform an arp poisoning and sniff for passwords using a man in the middle attack. The only way i would get on a free network was if I knew the owner. You might as well broadcast your social security number. Who knows what that "free" access point is actually doing (I already mentioned a man in the middle attack) Stealing wifi is a dumb idea for that reason alone.

WEP is analogous to locking a screen door.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

Perhaps WEP is analogous to locking a car door, with the window down, keys in the ignition and running.

IMHO WEP is analogous to locking the screen door.

It produces a barrier that is trivial to circumvent - but which declares the owner's/occupant's intent to deny access unless permission is explicitly sought and granted by other means. (Ring bell and be admitted, ask for and be given the password, etc.)

Owner does grant permission

[azzuth]

A clue here, sonny: inanimate objects cannot function on anyone's behalf. The owner must grant you permission. This ain't science fiction Actually, you configure those technological-yet-imanimate objects to interact with other people on your behalf. I would hate to get a phone call asking for authorization to access my router everytime someone tried to connect. That's what the router is for, it knows who to allow and who not to. And if I fail to specify rules, that is my problem.

A decent analogy would be a webpage.

If you create a webpage for yourself and your family and do nothing to lock the content (password, ip filter etc) it is open to the public. You could not keep an ip log and sue everyone who accessed your website because it is your responsibility to secure it to the level you desire. If you do not it is open to the public, because it is in the public's domain. Google will crawl it and people will stumble across it. It is not the user's responsibility to determine if they are allowed on that webpage because they can access it freely.

Re:Not a thief - depends

[Josef Meixner]

It isn't, but there was a rather strange lawsuit about open wireless access. I don't remember what it was about specifically (fraud, hacking, child porn, ...), but something ileagal was executed from that network. As the owner had an open access wireless router and could not provide any logs or other data to identify the real perpetrator, he was charged as an accomplice, I think.

This is entirely from memory, I think it was about two years ago.

Re:Kismet found 150+ networks in my apartment comp

[prockcore]

My DS doesn't support WPA.

Stealing Bandwidth

[Anonymous Coward]

Since ISPs are going to start charging per gigabyte, borrowing someone's connection is going to become a bigger deal. Imagine when people start getting charged extra cuz some neighbor downloaded 100 Gigs of movies using their open WiFi. I don't see a problem (morally, at least) with occasionally borrowing someone's connection so long as you are not being a jerk with it (meaning you are not going to cost the owner money, or get him thrown in jail by doing something illegal on his connection...) If you do cost the owner something, it's hard to justify it merely because the owner wasn't smart enough to protect his connection. That would be like someone taking a lawn mower from someone's shed merely because the owner didn't lock it. In either case, benevolent borrowing or malicious use are both illegal, sorry guys.

My computer has no intent

[Anonymous Coward]

and so it cannot steal your WiFi and cannot abuse your internet connection.

You can use your clever justifications to try to see me in jail for your ineptitude. All you're proving is you are good with words. Your actions as an idiot stand on their own merits.

PS

"Free Internet Access": what if you're in Brazil?

it happens

[Anonymous Coward]

up here in Alaska, somebody was charged for using a library's free wi-fi after-hours. Because it was after-hours. Even though they left the access available.

besides, I do believe it's stealing. You are using somebody else's bandwidth. If you have no explicitly asked the owner, you are not authorized. You say that your laptop is asking the router; the router is not the owner. You own a store, somebody asks a worker to enter a building (say it's after-hours), the employee doesn't know this person, but says yes anyway. What would you do if you were the owner? You wouldn't exactly be happy about the situation now, would you?

Ok, so people don't secure their wireless. It's because people don't know better. It should be common-sense in this day and age, yes, but some people just can't learn new tricks. I wouldn't completely blame it on the owners; sometimes they have abso-freakin-lutely no clue about wireless.

Going to court?

[Veggiesama]

Isn't it a bit silly to be arguing whether or not someone can be taken to court over stealing a neighbor's wi-fi?

If that isn't a frivolous lawsuit, I don't know what is.

It'd be much easier to charge the kid down the street $20 to set up your wifi for you, rather than bring someone to court, just because you didn't know how to set up a WPA pass-key.

I imagine most of these problems will be worked out in the coming years as wireless penetration grows and more routers come pre-equipped with automatic configuration settings.

Michelle Shildkret from Time?

[Anonymous Coward]

The headline implies that the submitter works for Time magazine. But I can find absolutely no evidence for that. Confessions of a credibility thief?

Amanda Kimmel for Presidentette!

[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

You'd think the protocol would suggest that not puttingn even a token password or encryption on your little wifi network implied any computer was free to use it.

Making it a responsibility of a computer user to ask a wide open wireless network to ask permission first seems rather silly.

Of course, monitoring traffic, searching for said password, or otherwise hacking into it without permission should indeed be illegal.

Why is it always so damned difficult?

(This neglects the philosophical notion that you should have the freedom to access airwaves on your property. This may not affect listening and cracking in this case, but would definitely forbid you from using the network, i.e. broadcasting off your property onto theirs.

Also keep in mind .....

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep in mind that most laptops will automatically try to find a signal when you turn them on. When it finds an unsecured network, it will try to connect. So if we're going to stick to the house analogy... (sorry), it's more like when you wake up and get out of bed, you realize you're on a moving escalator into someone's house. You have the option to turn off the escalator (turn off auto connect), or to just get off (cancel). There's no sign on the door, so is it a crime to just stay on there?

what is free?

[Anonymous Coward]

Would it be illegal to enter a movie theater, sit down and watch a movie if there's no one charging at the door and no one checking to make sure that only "permitted" guests are entering?

Re:Not a thief - depends

[Anonymous Coward]

It depends from country to country:

• In Germany you can be arrested for having an open access point because it is clear that you have set it up for others to use.
  

There must be something missing here, you definitely don't get arrested in Germany for just having an open access point.

RTFLaw

[Anonymous Coward]

Read the whole Title 18, Part 1, Chapter 47 of the United States Code. It has clauses about stealing data (financial, government, etc) and does not apply to wireless router accessing the internet. Bruhaha over nothing.

The real issue...

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that incompetent slackjawed fucktards are the ones making laws about shit they haven't THE FAINTEST FUCKING CLUE ABOUT. You can't "steal" a theoretically unlimited resource, and you can't "break in" to something that is fucking broadcasted willy nilly all over the place with a machine connected to it that is SPECIFICALLY designed to GRANT people access to its resources unless it is specifically configured NOT to do so. As soon as we get rid of all the idiot know-nothing douchebags that are making frivolous laws about things they don't comprehend in the slightest, we'll have this issue solved permanently. This isn't even a technological issue, it's an issue of human stupidity, specifically the stupidity of ignorant fuckwads that are currently making laws about shit they'll never grasp any more than an amoeba will grasp differential geometry.

Theft is theft, look to your moral compass

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, I've never seen so many contrived rationalizations for theft before in my life.

Did the owner intend or otherwise explicitly offer you wifi access?

Did you honestly and truthfully think you had been given free wifi access by the owner?

It really is a lot simpler than all of this obfuscation about DHCP, MAC filtering, etc. would lead one to believe.

Taking something you're not entitled to take is theft. Deal with it. Doesn't matter whether the owner is technologically ignorant or proficient, doesn't matter whether there is some slight ambiguity about whether a broadcast SSID or the granting of a DHCP lease constitutes an "invitation" or not, unless the owner communicates clearly to you "here, feel free to use my wifi", it's not yours to take.

The best way...

[meatflower]

The other day I had my laptop at a friends place. He doesn't have wifi, but there are at least 20 AP's that show up in this aparment complex.

One of them was completley unprotected, having the name "Belkin Gxxx" whatever the model was. Obviously the people plugged it in and just started using it.

I connected, checked my email, did the other small things I had to do. Then I tried logging into the router, as expected, the username and password were the Belkin defaults. I left it unprotected, but changed the broadcast name to

"Belkin lock up your shit"

Two weeks later I went back and I saw it again, this time named "Belkin says thank you" with WEP encryption.

Re:Expensive Water

[hkmarks]

Everyone locks their doors in Canada. Most of the time. Although the one person I know who's really paranoid about it got that way after living in Atlanta for a while.

My modem broke a few days ago. I can detect about 10 Wi-Fi signals from my house, and luckily one of them was open and I was able to access it. That let me (read /. &) email my ISP and order a new modem. (I tried calling them once and spent 2 hours on hold before I got to talk to someone. They reply to emails within a couple hours as well -- which isn't really faster but is a lot easier.) I'd be quite happy to leave my Wi-Fi open, except that I really don't know how to secure my own computers completely, and I don't really want to deal with slowdowns because a neighbour is leeching.

I see no problem

[56ksucks]

I leave my wifi open so anyone who needs it can use it. I think it only fair that others who have left theirs open should allow me to use it when I need a map on the road now and then. I have a couple of spots I sit by to get my maps. Some places are people I know, or McAllister's or something like that. Also, since most open routers still have "linksys" as the ssid and my laptop connects to any SSID named "linksys" without asking because I left mine that way I fail to see how I am liable for such a thing.

Also I agree, by not setting up a WEP key, WPA key, or MAC filter they have granted anyone in range permission to access the network.

Re:Expensive Water

[Laurence0]

"FWIW, I lived in an English city for 7 years. It's only in Canada you'd not lock your doors (if you believe Michael Moore)."

There's a big difference between locking your door when you're in and when you're out. We'll regularly leave the back door open if we're home, and it's a hot day, but if we go out, we do close and lock all the doors and windows. If the front door didn't lock itself automatically when it closed, we'd probably leave that unlocked at least some of the time as well.

Michael Moore found people who'd left their doors unlocked whilst they were home, and the doors he opened had people coming to see what was happening pretty quickly.

Issues?

[Fross]

Issues with pornography? More like a subscription.

Oops, I'll get out of your box now. You might want to secure that network though ;)

Funny...

[hummassa]

I personally have never seen that happening. I don't remember right now what was the thing at Starbucks in Orlando [January this year], but last year when I have been to Germany all wifi hotspots were just fire-and-go and here in Brasil things are that way, too -- except in airports, where you have something like you described.

to access somebody's network to which you did not

[Animaether]

have explicit nor implicit (and the operating system automatically connecting is, apparently, not considered implicit; although the lawmakers realize this behavior and weigh this into any potential court cases) access to. Smartass :P

HOW IS THAT NOT ANALOGOUS??

[Anonymous Coward]

It is not a realistic scenario, no, but a good analogy. My scenario is just as realistic, only better.

Whereas yours is unrealistic and not analogous to the situation at all. In a discussion regarding the unauthorized use of wireless access, how is my example, of unauthorized use of wireless access, not analogous? Oh, I guess you're right - an analogy would merely propose a similar situation, whereas my example proposed the exact same situation, but with the parameters taken to an extreme.

WEP/WPA certainly exist,and if someone is monopolizing the bandwidth available through your open AP, you have the option of securing your network. In my (sarcasm)realistic(/sarcasm) example, the problems posed by having an unlocked connection haven't been discovered yet; there is no way to lock it down. And who said anything about anyone monopolizing bandwidth? At 145,396,630.1GB's per month, it sounds like there is plenty to go around.

Now, take your flame/troll crap elsewhere :( Fuck off and die; I'm not trolling. But before you fuck off, you might want to bone-up on your reading comprehension.

Damn, dude - don't tell me all of that interfered with your understanding the point of the example: That it is unethical, not only to make him pay for your wireless access but, also to potentially be subject to the legal ramifications of your online activities, since he has no way to keep you out?

Re:HOW IS THAT NOT ANALOGOUS??

[cromar]

You are trolling, and pretty lamely too :(

Real life: you can secure your network.
Your example: security isn't "invented" ("Gee, who would have thought that if I am transmitting my wireless signal to the whole world, and for some reason everyone has wireless cards, it might get stolen? Gee whiz!")

So, for that reason and several others your story isn't analogous to the wireless we use everyday. Sure, it's an analogy, but not to contemporary wireless technology.

That it is unethical, not only to make him pay for your wireless access but No one's making him pay! He needs to put a damn password on his connection, if he doesn't want people to use it.

also to potentially be subject to the legal ramifications of your online activities Using someone's open wireless to surf or whatever is a lot different than using their wireless to commit illegal acts. You know, those are illegal. I hope you can see the difference there.

No Such Thing as Stealing Intangibles

[flyneye]

Information is free whether we say so or not.
This includes sound,ideas,radio waves,all things you cannot touch.It is absurd to put a price on literally "nothing".Foolishness.
          If by chance you disagree,then I shall begin to charge a fee for your sounds,radio waves(including telcos) and ridiculous ideas to cross the borders of my property line.

Something seems to be overlooked here.

[lasaboogy]

I don't think an unsecured wifi is an open invitation to use someone's network. It would be similar to walking around with a lan cable plugging it in to someone's data ports trying to see if you get a connection. Also I see a lot of arguments that your computer is asking for a connection to open networks one after another until it finds one that grants it permission and hands out an IP. Wouldn't it also be your fault for connecting to their network because you set your computer to auto connect to any network it can find. Therefore you would also be at fault because you configured your computer to connect just as they configured their router to be unsecured.

YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[Anonymous Coward]

Real life: you can secure your network.
Your example: security isn't "invented" Of course it hasn't been invented. It's what we smart people call a hypothetical situation. Kind of like the original car analogy is a hypothetical situation. Hey asshole, for my example, I need to demonstrate that it is impossible to keep other users out, but that doesn't give them the right to freely take advantage of it. Duh!!

No one's making him pay! He needs to put a damn password on his connection, if he doesn't want people to use it. He's got to pay because he is in dire need of wireless access. He can't lock it down because, in my hypothetical situation, there is no way to. What the fuck is so hard to understand?!? Like is said, it's a fucking hypothetical situation. Again, duh!!

also to potentially be subject to the legal ramifications of your online activities Using someone's open wireless to surf or whatever is a lot different than using their wireless to commit illegal acts. You know, those are illegal. I hope you can see the difference there. I guess you don't understand the definition of the word potentially then, do you? Yes, you're correct, using someone's wireless to commit illegal acts is very different. It is different because, it has the potential to create a big fucking lawsuit against the owner of the WAP, when it is discovered it is being used to download child pornography. For the third time, duh!!

How much more do I need to dumb-it-down for you?

Re:YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[cromar]

Yeah, sure, I'm the dumb one. LOL. You need to look up the definition of analogous. You're hypothetical situation doesn't correlate to the way wireless technology is used in the real world. Therefore, it is not analogous to any realistic situation. The other poster's example, while also unrealistic, is analogous because the activities within correlate to realistic situations regarding wireless.

And then you go on to use the argument that because open wireless networks have the potential to be used for illegal things... that using them should be made illegal. Brilliant. That doesn't have anything to do with whether using an open network is ethical or not.

Re:YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[Anonymous Coward]

You're hypothetical situation doesn't correlate to the way wireless technology is used in the real world. Therefore, it is not analogous to any realistic situation. What's not realistic about having an unsecured wireless connection? It happens all the time. That's the point of the fucking article. I'm just pointing out that whatever the reason is for it not being locked, it is not a justification for anyone else to use it.

Oh, and by the way, I just invented the quantum computer and finished writing a program that will crack any encryption scheme. There, now that is out of the way, I have the perfect, real world example. It will be impossible to lock down anything now.

And then you go on to use the argument that because open wireless networks have the potential to be used for illegal things... that using them should be made illegal. Brilliant. That doesn't have anything to do with whether using an open network is ethical or not. First of all, wired connections can be used for the same illegal things, dipshit. Second, I never said they should be made illegal, you fucking idiot. I said the owner of the WAP could be facing hefty fines or jailtime, if it can be proven that child pornography was downloaded. Regardless of whether the WAP owner did the deed, or not, he will be the one in court. We see that all the time with RIAA cases.

Christ!! Did all you people take "stupid pills" today? It's always funny how Slashdotters love to think they are the cream of the crop when it came to intelligence.

Re:YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[cromar]

Man, you are really bad at this game. It isn't analogous because everyone who has a wireless router has the option to secure it. It is justification to use it because it is an open invitation, like a webserver or any other server/network in the entire history of computing. You knock, and if the server/network lets you in, this is construed as authorizing such access. What you are talking about is like putting a sign in your lawn that says "feel free to use our hose," and then calling someone who uses it a thief.

Second, I never said they should be made illegal, you fucking idiot. Oh my bad, I guess I misunderstood you... I don't know how that could be what with your angry, rambling, incoherent style of writing. That and you didn't have a point with it, just: "What if?" Well so what? Whatever the point of your outburst at the end there, it isn't pertinent to the question of whether accessing an open network is ethical.

I know someone who seems like they took some "stupid pills," or maybe more accurately "troll pills," today but it sure as hell ain't me. The funny thing is that you don't realize what little amount of argument you have, and how full of holes it is; the funny thing is you don't realize you've lost this argument.

P.S. Does calling me names make you feel better about your ignorance?

Re:YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[Anonymous Coward]

Like I said, it's a hypothetical question. Here, let me further dumb it down for you:

What if there was no way to lock down the connection, is it ethical to use it, just because it's there?

I can't help it if you're not intelligent enough to understand the basic concept of that one, simple question. Nor can I help it if you're blind to how solid an argument it is, and how pertinent it is to the discussion.

It's like trying to get a religious nut to understand that I don't fear going to hell, because I don't believe it exists. You just don't get it. Well, maybe I shouldn't use any more analogies - you have a hard time comprehending them. So, let me put it plain and simple for you, I'm not going to bother wasting my time trying to explain it to the one person who didn't get it, because you never will.

End of discussion.

P.S. - Yes, calling you names does make me feel better about your ignorance.

Re:YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[cromar]

Dude, I don't even care about what your hypothetical situation is. IT IS NOT ANALOGOUS TO WIFI.

Re:YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[Anonymous Coward]

You just keep pretending you're right and then use that alternate UID, of yours, to give yourself a mod point. It's a pretty sorry state of affairs if you're that desperate for an ego boost.

(Here's a hint: I read your post at 11:26 and saw you were already modded up. 2 minutes?? - Come on, dude, it doesn't happen that fast naturally. Besides, you never get modded above a 2 so, that only shows me that you mod yourself up, but nobody else agrees with you beyond that.)

Come on, dude, just admit you're wrong. You can do it, don't be afraid. After all, you can still hide behind your UID(s) - I won't know you're real name. They say it takes a real man to admit he's wrong so, I guess I won't be expecting that from you.

And just to show you how much of a real man I am, I'll even allow you to have the last word.

See ya around, richard . . . I mean, dick.

Re:YOU SURELY ARE A DUMBFUCK

[cromar]

You are seriously a delusional fuckass.

Re:If you really want to pick up this analogy and

[GWBasic]

Indeed. I think there may be no way at all to differentiate between a router left open deliberately and one left open purposefully.

In Silicon Valley, there are a lot of networks with the name "free" or "open" in them. When browsing for the first time, the browser is directed to a TOS page.

It's really convenient when waiting for a haircut downtown.

Re:Reasonable limits aren't

[HTH NE1]

Sometimes they are.

IPv6's limit is unreasonable in that is unreasonably large. That's the point. Specifically, that's the good point. The bad point is when it is unreasonably small, usually because someone thought it was reasonably large.

The best point of "Reasonable limits aren't" is to avoid setting a limit at all and mandate coding for arbitrarily large numbers.

If we instead spread them over the planets surface, then there is 226854911280625642308 [IPv6 addresses] for every square cm of land-area (approximately 1/5th that if you also need ips for every square cm of water).

Yes, that's nicely unreasonable, even for a society that doesn't just live on the surface but rather builds tall (and deep) structures so people can live on top of each other.

Unless of course you need to use your IP as your encryption key. Worse if it needs to be prime: there are only approximately 2^128 / ln( 2^128 ) = 3.83534127545935 * 10^48 of them. Of course, you'd see that as an example of gross mismanagement, and you might be right. Still, I expect owning a prime IPv6 address would be more desirable than a composite one. Great for use as the public key for the NAT behind it. Assuming of course that it isn't one of the trivial primes, though they'll have their own interests. (Who wants/has 0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0002 ?)

But seriously, I think IPv6 stands the test of "Reasonable limits aren't" very well. It's limits aren't reasonable, but in the good way.

Re:Reasonable limits aren't

[RaNdOm OuTpUt]

Can't that be better written as "::2"?

Re:Reasonable limits aren't

[Eivind]

In principle you're right, offcourse.

In practice, it may very well be that the added complexity in millions of routers, nics and thelike of dealing with variable-length adresses (and thus by nessecity variable-length-headers) would cost more than the waste of constantly using adresses that are "too large".

Given that 32bit is obviously too little, the only real choice was 64 or 128 bit, 64 really should be enough, but I guess they wanted to err on the side of caution. 128bit is ridicolously large, but still likely CHEAPER to implement and deal with in real hardware than a variable-length adress that can be anything from 16 bits upwards. (and that would currently mostly be 32-bit)

You're right, leach.

[Domo-Sun]

I'm glad all you selfless hackers put computers in charge of humans. Just don't blame me when my honey pot sends you to jail. Blame my computer. That way I can get back to surfing the internet unimpeded.