Ex-Microsoft Employee Arrested For Leaking Windows 8

SmartAboutThings (1951032) writes "Alex Kibkalo, a former Microsoft employee has been arrested yesterday for stealing and leaking company secrets. The former software architecture engineer is accused of leaking early Windows 8 builds to a French tech blogger with whom he was communicating inside a forum. The ex-Microsoft employee also stands accused of leaking some Windows 7 program files and also an internal system meant to protect against software piracy. Kibkalo is said to have leaked the Windows 8 code in the middle of 2012 because he was angry over a poor performance review."

Comments

Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

A developer stole the code he was working on? How does that work?

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

A developer stole the code he was working on? How does that work?

Because his work is not really his. It belongs to the corporation. Everything belongs to the corporation. Space, time, all matter and all energy belong to the corporation according to the corporation. They got the lawyers to make it happen. He doesn't.

Re:Stealing?

[cheesybagel]

Work for hire. It isn't his to begin with. Plus he probably had code he did not write there too.

Re: Stealing?

[tysonedwards]

It wasn't solely his work.

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

I assumed it was more along the lines of crimes against humanity.

Re:Stealing?

[flagg9483]

Yeah, blah, blah, corporations are evil and holding down the poor hard working honest guy. Nonsense. If I start a small corner store business making widgets, then hire you to help. I instruct you have to make my widgets, give you the tools and material to do it, pay you as we agreed, then you steal my inventory and give/sell it to someone then you are a THIEF. Just because it is software doesn't make it belong to you, and just because it is a corporation doesn't give you moral superiority.

Re:Stealing?

[nbritton]

The developer stole nothing, one element necessary for theft is intentionally depriving the owner of their property and the owner was never deprived of their property. This is conversion

Re:Stealing?

[Opportunist]

Theft is in nearly every jurisdiction that I could think of defined as taking something movable from the possession of someone else with the intent to keep and the intent to deprive the original possessor of its use.

So, no. The only part that might be fulfilled is the "intent to keep", but that's not enough (if that would stick, buying something would constitute theft, because people usually buy stuff with the intent to keep).

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, blah, blah, corporations are evil and holding down the poor hard working honest guy.

The following is my opinion.

Greed is when you place making money above all else and don't care about the harm you do to others to achieve that. Problem is, publically traded corporations have a legal obligation to increase profits every legal way possible.

That's why publically traded food companies get to pick from over 15,000 chemicals they can add to food that DOES NOT need to be listed on the label. These chemicals are often addictive, increase appetite, and have a lot to do with all the fatasses in the USA. Fat people eat more food and buy more food. Note that most of Europe doesn't allow these additives. But that's okay, because regulatory capture means the FDA allows whatever the corporations want, and that increases profits! Oh and there's the revolving door between employment at these corporations and cushy positions at the FDA. It's corrupt to the fucking core man.

Oh did you know most "diet food" will make you GAIN weight? Research it yourself. What did you expect when profits matter more than anything else?

I don't know if all corporations are evil. I do know that when corporations control things that are far too important, evil always seems to happen. Maybe it is like government. Not inherently evil, but evil people really just love positions of power. Power and control and money are about the only things sociopaths get off on.

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's larceny.

Re:Stealing?

[DaMattster]

The developer stole nothing, one element necessary for theft is intentionally depriving the owner of their property and the owner was never deprived of their property. This is conversion

In an interesting sense, you are technically correct because the owner is not being deprived of anything. The owner, Microsoft, still has the code and is thus deprived of nothing. This fits better under industrial espionage law. Unfortunately, case law precedent makes it possible to prosecute the actor under theft statutes.

Re:Stealing?

[flanders123]

A developer stole the code he was working on? How does that work?

The same way it works if a mechanic that works on your car doesn't own your car, and the carpenter that builds my house doesn't own my house.*

*This analogy applies to everyone except Mark Zuckerberg.

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Work for hire. It isn't his to begin with. Plus he probably had code he did not write there too.

Pretty much 99% of the contracts you see in the programming world (and a lot of other industries) state that anything you develop while on company dollar you don't own nor can you take it with you. Sometimes you might even have a clause that states you can't develop anything off company time unless you get legal permission from your employer before hand.

Re:Stealing?

[RabidReindeer]

The developer stole nothing, one element necessary for theft is intentionally depriving the owner of their property and the owner was never deprived of their property. This is conversion

In an interesting sense, you are technically correct because the owner is not being deprived of anything. The owner, Microsoft, still has the code and is thus deprived of nothing. This fits better under industrial espionage law. Unfortunately, case law precedent makes it possible to prosecute the actor under theft statutes.

Theft of secrets. Yes, the original blueprints, code, whatever, remains with the original owner. What has been stolen, however, was the exclusivity of the trade secrets. And trade secrets are only protected as long as they are secret.

This being Windows, 8, probably the most applicable route to prosecution is Illegal Disposal of Toxic Waste, but nevertheless...

Re:Stealing?

[gnupun]

If I start a small corner store business making widgets, then hire you to help. I instruct you have to make my widgets, give you the tools and material to do it, pay you as we agreed, then you steal my inventory and give/sell it to someone then you are a THIEF.

Everything you say is true when we're talking about general production of physical widgets -- the raw material and production equipment belong to you and your employee performs simple repetitive, non-creative actions to build the widget for you. But does that analogy also apply to intellectual property, like software? In this case, the employer pays for a chair, a desk, electricity, cube/office, and a computer with software. None of these items are terribly expensive and are one-time investments. A developer can easily purchase them himself.

The employer then essentially provides a spec (which is often just a extremely vague set of requirements) and a monthly salary. We can therefore say that most of the software is created by the creative talent and skill (the raw material and machines in your analogy) of the developers. Does the work created by the software dev still completely belong to the employer for a few thousand dollars because of a few words written in the employment contract? I think not! Most of software is written by developers with little contribution from the employer and therefore should be licensed to the employer the same way a song is licensed by the musicians to record labels, how writers license their books to publishers etc.

Re:Stealing?

[Bert64]

The exclusivity of the trade secrets was not stolen, neither party has exclusivity anymore...
The exclusivity was destroyed, since no noone has exclusivity.

Re: Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

All those evil chemicals. It is such a scary word when you pretend that water is not a chemical. I'm so tired of hearing these conspiracy theories based on anecdotal evidence and flawed research which disagrees with the vast majority of independent and governmental research. But of course anyone who disagrees with you is just a shill right?

Re:Stealing?

[The Grim Reefer]

The employer then essentially provides a spec (which is often just a extremely vague set of requirements) and a monthly salary. We can therefore say that most of the software is created by the creative talent and skill (the raw material and machines in your analogy) of the developers. Does the work created by the software dev still completely belong to the employer for a few thousand dollars because of a few words written in the employment contract? I think not! Most of software is written by developers with little contribution from the employer and therefore should be licensed to the employer the same way a song is licensed by the musicians to record labels, how writers license their books to publishers etc.

That sounds great, except that's not the contract that was agreed upon. If the agreement states that the developer is licensing the code to the employer, then great. But if a developer chooses to enter into what is currently the standard contract, then no, it doesn't work that way. If the developer enters into this type of agreement, then they can't simply decide it's going to work the other way. They can renegotiate with the employer for a different contract or leave the company.

And there is a considerable investment by the company. Not only do they need to pay for the items that you describe, but software, network expenses, and keeping those computer up to date. Chairs and desks do wear out. And rent and electricity are not one time investments. However the real expenses are in the marketing, packaging, support of the product, etc. If it was as simple as one guy sitting at a computer and coding all day, then every developer would have their own business. But it's not that simple. How many software companies go under and lose all of the invested money? Someone has to finance it all, so they are taking a big risk. If you think otherwise, you are even more naive than I would have guessed.

Re:Stealing?

[The Grim Reefer]

In that case you just stole my comment right there. If I had lawyers I could make you go to prison. Right? Of course I know the code wasn't his. But is this theft?

Tell that to all those who lost their bitcoins at Mt. Gox. It wasn't real currency, it was simply 1's and 0's right?

Re:Stealing?

[k8to]

"Theft of trade secret" is a thing.

It's kind of an odd concept. When you accept that exclusive ownership of something is a intellectual property thing, then someone who shares it while under a contract to not do so is depriving you of that exclusion. Your trade secret is no longer secret and your advantage is taken away from you.

This stuff stems from guild laws, like the secrets of making good parmigiano-reggiano or whatever that were supposed to be kept within the organization and were only shared with you if you agreed to abide by these terms.

Personally, it seems quite awkward to use the verb "theft" in this context, and I would not choose to do so, but it is established usage. Additionally, I find the whole protected trade secret concept sort of awkward, but I might not fully grasp what it is needed to protect in a modern context.

Re:Stealing?

[nedlohs]

Right. "work for hire" is the efficient way of sating that.

Re:Stealing?

[cusco]

Don't forget support staff, project managers, meeting rooms, collaboration software, networks, servers, version control software, backups, accountants, HR staff, janitors, and security guards.

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most of software is written by developers with little contribution from the employer and therefore should be licensed to the employer the same way a song is licensed by the musicians to record labels, how writers license their books to publishers etc.
 
That's why you should develop software on your own and license it out. Otherwise you're agreeing to the terms of your employment. You don't like that agreement? You think your work is worth more? That's fine, just don't let the door hit you on your way out.
 
There's tons of people right here on Slashdot who think your time and money invested in producing digital media isn't worth the licensing cost because "it's just a copy"... Given your attitude, you're probably one of them. Don't let that little fact stand in your way. Go out and produce something and see how far you can get. I honestly wish you the best, you could make a ton. But if you fail don't cry to anyone about it. After all, "a chair, a desk, electricity, cube/office, and a computer with software. None of these items are terribly expensive and are one-time investments. A developer can easily purchase them himself. " Right?
 
Here's your big chance to prove to us that you can do it.

Re:Stealing?

[HairOfTheBambit]

The employer is paying the software developer for the work he's doing while he is there. If you want to have your work licensed, free lance, and then license your code. Do it without the tools and time and resources provided by an employer during working hours. There are lots of projects and people who do this. Specify it in the contracts you create.

I've been in all the different stages. Started out as a developer for companies, went to independent contractor, started my own business and hiring programmers who work under me. I am paying them for their time and their skills and their creative talent, and the result of their work. Why is a programmer more entitled to something than a welder? Because one is using creativity in their brain? Then how about an engineer designing bridges or planes or cars? Should they have everything they do be licensed also?

A company that wants to keep the best and most creative people offer good benefits, the right tools and appropriate salaries. Some may get stock or profit sharing. These are the rewards, payment, for the services rendered. Now, the one point I will make is that things you do on your own time (at home, after hours, on vacation) should most certainly belong to you. I remember a case where some big company said something the engineer did on their own time belonged to them, and I find that rather repugnant.

Re:Stealing?

[I'm New Around Here]

The following is my opinion.

Greed is when you place making money above all else and don't care about the harm you do to others to achieve that. Problem is, publically traded corporations have a legal obligation to increase profits every legal way possible.

Problem is, you are totally wrong in a corporation's legal obligation. I've read the lawsuit someone used to bullshit you with. It actually says the exact opposite of your claim. Corporations have the obligation to pay dividends to shareholders based on profits, but have no government-enforced mandate to make those profits larger.

The corporation, or the majority shareholder in the case of Dodge v. Ford Motor Co., can't squander profits just because they want to. Especially in the Ford case, where Henry Ford also wanted to keep shareholders from getting a large sum of money that was going to be used to set up a competing car company.

Here is a link to the pdf of the decision. It's nine pages long, and doesn't take too long to read.
http://www.businessentitiesonl...

Re:Stealing?

[nurb432]

But what id did is not really stealing. The original code was there ( unless he also erased all copies that Microsoft had, then we *might* be able to call it theft ). He engaged in infringement and fraud. Both illegal acts, but different things.

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Now, the one point I will make is that things you do on your own time (at home, after hours, on vacation) should most certainly belong to you."

You bring up an interesting point. This is actually something that is in almost every developer's contract. What I mean is this: your contract with your company either says that they own your work, whether it's at the office or anywhere/anytime else, or your contract says your free-time projects are yours and yours alone.

Most decent companies let their developers tinker in their free time and don't take control of their code. Not only does this make developers happy with the thought of "I could totally profit from something on the side", but it avoids many legal debacles, developers will train themselves on their own time(the 'training' may not be immediately relevant to the company, but the point is they're learning...at no expense to the employer), and is otherwise an ethical and respectful way to treat your employees.

However, there are companies that don't do this. Their contract lays claim to everything you do coding-wise, regardless of the relevancy to the company's industry, technologies used, and whether they pay you for it or not.

Every developer needs to ensure to protect themselves from this. It's a very small nuance to signing on with a company, and those who aren't aware of it are truly in a situation where "they don't know what they don't know".

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Stealing and theft are two different things. None of the elements of THEFT are required in order to STEAL something.

"Stolen" does not mean "thieved", though thievery is a kind of stealing. Squares and rectangles.

Re:Stealing?

[Hognoxious]

You're confusing him with the guy who designed it.

Re:Stealing?

[RollingThunder]

The exclusivity was not stolen - it was destroyed. For the exclusivity to be stolen somebody else would now have to have the exclusivity on that code, but they cannot, because the owner still has a copy.

Re:Stealing?

[LordLimecat]

But does that analogy also apply to intellectual property, like software?

Yes.

I could go into all of the reasons why its "yes", but it seems a lot simpler to link you to the definition for a "work for hire":
http://www.keytlaw.com/Copyrig...

Re:Stealing?

[TsuruchiBrian]

Corporations have the obligation to pay dividends to shareholders based on profits, but have no government-enforced mandate to make those profits larger.

They don't have an obligation to make them larger. They have an obligation to *try* to make them as large as possible. Executives don't go to jail for failing to make a larger profit. Executives will get sued and lose a civil trial if a shareholder can convince a judge that the executives did not *try* to make the company more profitable. This is because the executives in a company are the employees of the shareholders, and presumably the shareholders hired the executives under under a contract that mandates the executives would do the job they were hired for, which undoubtedly includes maximizing profits.

This is similar to hiring someone to tile your floor, paying them up front, and then finding out they never did anything. This is breach of contract.

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

The license you mention is a perfectly fine way to go. As I understand, some consultants do precisely that.

What is not ok is signing a contract that explicit states that your employer owns the software, and then acting like you still own it because you have philosophical objections to your contract. If you don't like it, don't sign it. If signing it is the only way you can make money, too bad, that's the only way you can make money and you are bound by the terms.

Re:Stealing?

[timmyf2371]

The employer then essentially provides a spec (which is often just a extremely vague set of requirements) and a monthly salary. We can therefore say that most of the software is created by the creative talent and skill (the raw material and machines in your analogy) of the developers. Does the work created by the software dev still completely belong to the employer for a few thousand dollars because of a few words written in the employment contract? I think not! Most of software is written by developers with little contribution from the employer and therefore should be licensed to the employer the same way a song is licensed by the musicians to record labels, how writers license their books to publishers etc.

Isn't the developer in this case more like the builder/engineer who takes an architect's vision and merely implements it?

In most large organisations the developers are not the UI designers and although their code may well be creative, they are not the ones behind the creative work as a whole.

Re: Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

We could spend years explaining to everyone what intellectual property is and what a law is and what a contract is.

The reality is people that don't get it never will. Do you download from TPB, at least admit it is stealing. It doesn't mean you should stop.

IP laws were originally designed to protect artists, inventors, innovation, and creativity.

These peoples only source of income, to live and feed their children was there artwork or inventions.

Put yourself in the situation. You have a software program you invented. You sell it and use the money to buy food and pay rent. Now someone copies it and sells it for a lower cost, maybe even claiming to be you (couterfiet).

You are fucked and your family will starve.

If only there were some laws to protect you.

Fast forward 20 years. Now you have employees. Because you grew and were able to compete, and became a corporation - does this mean you should not have those same rights not to get fucked over by theifs?

And this guy, even if he helped build windows - there is no way he could have done it all. If he did own it because he coded it, so does his fellow coworkers that helped. He stole from them too.

Re:Stealing?

[gnasher719]

In most large organisations the developers are not the UI designers and although their code may well be creative, they are not the ones behind the creative work as a whole.

That's a strange way of putting it. UI design is a full time job. Many software developers would be quite capable of creating good UI designs (and from what I see at times, an awful lot better than paid UI designers), but not in their spare time when they have a full time job writing code. Many UI designers just don't have the mental capacity to imagine how users will use or want to use their software and get from one step to another. They live in a dream world where users do exactly what the designer wants them to do, while software developers know that they don't.

Re:Stealing?

[gnasher719]

They don't have an obligation to make them larger. They have an obligation to *try* to make them as large as possible.

Actually, no. They have an obligation to do what the corporation was intended to do. Which may not involve making money at all. Now being successful and making money usually helps you doing all kinds of things, so is probably a good way to achieve whatever you want to achieve, but nothing says that making profits has to be the purpose of any corporation.

And then there's the example of Apple, who became the most profitable company outside the oil industry without ever having the goal of making profits. While companies that tried to improve profits every quarter are sinking exactly because of that.

Re:Stealing?

[drinkypoo]

Does the work created by the software dev still completely belong to the employer for a few thousand dollars because of a few words written in the employment contract?

No. It belongs to the employer due to a variety of laws, including the ones that this programmer is accused of breaking. If he doesn't want to write code for Microsoft, he shouldn't take their paycheck and then write code they specifically asked him to do, which in the modern world results in the employer owning the code (absent any other agreements.)

Most of software is written by developers with little contribution from the employer and therefore should be licensed to the employer the same way a song is licensed by the musicians to record labels

If programmers were treated as poorly as recording artists then we wouldn't have software. Well, not commercial software. Too bad you know nothing of the recording industry. Granted, it's possible to not get screwed by working with an indie label. But is Microsoft equivalent to that? Well, no. No it isn't. It's one of the great evils of the computing world, and everyone knows that.

Zero. Sympathy.

Re:Stealing?

[RobertLTux]

the difference is minor and trivial.

lets say i stole your laptop then jumped on a motorcycle and sped off later i hit something and pancake on the street your (former) laptop stays with the bike and gets blown up with the bike. Im not going to get arrested for destroying your laptop im going to get arrested for STEALING your laptop (assuming i do not spend the next couple days bleeding out).

Re:Stealing?

[EndlessNameless]

> They have an obligation to do what the corporation was intended to do.

And when a corporation is founded as a commercial entity, its express purpose is profit. The corporate charter may espouse numerous other principles, but a commercial business is legally a profit-generating endeavor---everything else is window dressing.

Henry Ford wanted to lower the price of automobiles and employ more workers in order to bring the benefits of industrialization to all people in exchange for lower profits---and the court told him he could not.

In the US, the board of directors has a fiduciary duty to its shareholders. That duty is ensuring profit, either through dividends or stock valuations. They have no conflicting fiduciary duties to the general public or human welfare.

> Which may not involve making money at all.

I laughed out loud. If we're talking about publicly-traded corporations in the US---and in the case of Microsoft, we are---you are absolutely wrong.

Re:Stealing?

[gnupun]

Isn't the developer in this case more like the builder/engineer who takes an architect's vision and merely implements it?

Close, but no cigar. While I'm no civil engineer, most buildings are not all that different, other than the appearance (UI). So if you have tens of thousands of homes/buildings in a city, the engineer/architect solve roughly the same set of problems in designing all those buildings. Those tens of thousands of buildings can be reduced to a few dozen types of buildings (here, a type is similar to a C++ class). So the job of creating a new building in the city would be to mainly tweak a previously designed template to obtain the final blueprint.

In summary, the building construction often requires solving the same set of problems over and over again -- a job of skill but not much creativity/invention. That's not true of software... if enough people need a problem solved it will be implemented in just a handful of libraries and not repeated thousands of times like in construction.

In a software analogy to construction, a software developer designs and builds an automated or a semi-automated robot that can construct a certain type of building. If the owner of this robot paid just the usual fixed salary that engineers are paid, the owner would profit tremendously and unfairly. For eg., It costs the robot owner 50 man years to build the robot. But once it's built, it only takes 3 man years to maintain it or build a new one. Now the robot owner charges 15% less per building than human builders and captures 50% of the market. It's a big win for the employer (robot owner whose profits multiple times more than human builders) and his customers (cheaper building). The robot owner is going to make tens of thousands of times more money than his R&D cost for the coming decades. The civil engineers and architects will continue to make money by repeatedly creating new variations of their building templates. However, the software home construction guys will soon be out of a job unless they can improve the robot some more because the compensation structure sucks -- it doesn't pay for repeating the same task over and over again like most other professions.

In summary, the engineers should get paid a royalty for every building built by their robot. Most employees get paid to repeat the same task over and over -- barbers, bus drivers, musicians playing the same set of songs, cooks, shopkeepers etc. The creative people like software devs, authors, music composers, painters, movie makers, food recipe makers etc. can't repeat the exact same thing over and over again. This class of workers should be compensated by royalty, not fixed salary.

Re:Stealing?

[kimvette]

> And when a corporation is founded as a commercial entity, its express purpose is profit.

You are DEAD WRONG.

Go to your state's archives and look up the number of corporations which are created each month (you will be amazed at how many!), with many of them being for example music and movie label companies which are intended to actually LOSE money, acting as tax shelters for the shareholding companies and/or individuals. There are also many corporations set up solely as protective entities (holding companies for properties, etc.), registered as "commercial entities" and yet, they are not, really. They are more often than not liability-limiting creations rather than profit generation entities.

Many corporations are actually created to introduce a net loss in the world of accounting, or to simply limit the liability of incurring financial losses. Also, there are certain relationship types which neocons consider DoublePlusUnGood (for exmple: polygamy/plural marriage, or in some jurisdictions, gay marriages) which are worked around by the "partners" (spouses) creating a legal fiction to act as a holding company, an entity to provide group health benefits, own shared belongings, handle wills, and so on.

Profit is not the only reason one might wish to incorporate.

Re:Stealing?

[TsuruchiBrian]

Actually, no. They have an obligation to do what the corporation was intended to do.

Maybe you should try reading my whole post. If you did you might have gotten to the part where I said:

This is because the executives in a company are the employees of the shareholders, and presumably the shareholders hired the executives under under a contract that mandates the executives would do the job they were hired for, which undoubtedly includes maximizing profits.

Making profit is not a goal of Apple? So they are using wage slave in underdeveloped countries in order to maximize what exactly? Suicides?

While companies that tried to improve profits every quarter are sinking exactly because of that.

I don't know why you equate "maximizing profit" with "maximizing profit every quarter". Nor do I understand why you seem to be equating Apple "Not trying to maximize profit every quarter" with Apple "never had the goal of making profits".

Re:Stealing?

[TsuruchiBrian]

1. maximizing profits != making a profit. It can also mean minimizing losses (minimizing negative profit).

2. You are allowed to fail at maximizing profits. (i.e. you are allowed to suck) You are however responsible for upholding your end of a contract with your employer saying you will try to maximize profits.

3. Even in the examples you cite for when corporations may wish to lose money for some reason that undoubtedly involves exploiting some kind of tax loophole, the greater purpose is to maximize profits overall (i.e. the point of exploiting a tax loophole).

Re: Stealing?

[dave420]

You are conflating copyright infringement (downloading from TPB) with commercial copyright infringement (selling copies). Don't. It makes you look ridiculous. Stealing is depriving others of their property. Copying something deprives no-one of their property. Downloading from TPB is as much stealing as looking at someone is kidnap.

Re:Stealing?

[david_thornley]

Look up work-for-hire. My employer is legally considered the author of all the software I write on the clock. (Whether they have any right to software I write on my own time, with my own tools, is determined by the employment agreement and the country or (US) state I work in.)

Re: Stealing?

[lonOtter]

We could spend years explaining to everyone what intellectual property is

The term "intellectual property" is a propaganda term meant to group unrelated things together, and falsely equate them to property.

Do you download from TPB, at least admit it is stealing.

Why would I admit that? Why don't you admit that it's not stealing? You do realize that even the law itself doesn't say it's stealing, right? And it's not as if you can't get completely legal things as TPB, so merely downloading from TPB means nothing. The word "stealing" is highly inappropriate; you're just confusing people who don't understand copyright even further.

Put yourself in the situation. You have a software program you invented. You sell it and use the money to buy food and pay rent. Now someone copies it and sells it for a lower cost, maybe even claiming to be you (couterfiet).

Potential profit was never yours to begin with, as it's not something you can truly have. Since you promote copyright and its ilk, you must be anti-free market. Funny how you talk about poor artists and such, but all you people really want is to control others through censorship, and to control what they do with their own equipment.

Who modded this nonsensical propaganda up?

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as I know, copying something doesn't remove the original. So... nice try with your pointless analogy.

I'm not even sure that that whole Bitcoin affair is an example of theft. Probably something else.

Re:Stealing?

[lonOtter]

the difference is minor and trivial.

No, it isn't. It's what makes the difference between being correct and being fuckin' wrong.

And anyone who thinks they should be entitled to exclusivity of such things is a moron.

Re:Stealing?

[rev0lt]

the same way a song is licensed by the musicians to record labels

You're hilarious, really. Most big labels do it the other way around - musicians are allowed performance licensing rights for their own work, while the work itself is property of the label.

Re:Stealing?

[Anonymous Coward]

You should learn some basic economics. Marginal cost is a huge factor in pricing something and software has a marginal cost approaching $0.00

That makes sense

[drinkypoo]

That makes sense. I mean, if you were driving down the road leaking botulism toxin or liposuction reclamation material, you'd get arrested...

Re:That makes sense

[Spense4Hire]

Yeah, bad enough Microsoft has inflicted this on the public; this guy thought it was a good idea to start beating us with it *early*.

Re:That makes sense

[dimeglio]

Are you saying he should counter sue Microsoft?

Re:That makes sense

[Lazere]

No, then he'd go to jail for endangering the public.

Re:That makes sense

[McGruber]

Maybe he was trying to be the Paul Revere of Software?

Re:That makes sense

[FearTheDonut]

If you were leaking Botulism Toxin, they'd never know it when you were driving down the road. BT is has an incredibly high potency at almost untraceable levels. Especially in real-time. And it would take some time for your acetylcholine receptors to get blocked. That being said, if I caught you driving down the road dripping liposuction reclamation material, I'd beat you senseless...

Re:That makes sense

[jkrise]

I'm surprised why Ballmer didn't report him and get him arrested; maybe this is the new Satya guy putting his stamp on company affairs?

Re:That makes sense

[drinkypoo]

If you were leaking Botulism Toxin, they'd never know it when you were driving down the road. [...] That being said, if I caught you driving down the road dripping liposuction reclamation material, I'd beat you senseless...

Hyperbole: Now packaged in small, bite-sized pieces, for those who have trouble chewing.

Re:That makes sense

[symbolset]

That was my reaction to the headline. Was he charged with crimes against humanity?

Re:That makes sense

[geeper]

or liposuction reclamation material

Mmmm...it's lunchtime - can I get some fries with that?

Re:That makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

what do you think they were fried in?

Which is it?

[Dan East]

Summary says he released early builds, then it says he leaked "Windows 8 code". Code and builds aren't the same thing. So which was it?

Re:Which is it?

[McWilde]

Not really. The early build is probably a lot like the release build that came after. You might see some bugs that were later fixed, but I wouldn't think it comprises any company secret. The code on the other hand is secret. And the early code will also be a lot like later code, so you could now roll your own Windows 8 from this code (if you did your own bug fixing as well).

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why? Words have meanings for a reason. People like you are why words become useless because specific terms get used for something completely different.

Re:Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think it's a dumb question. Releasing a build is simple theft. Releasing the code is probably has some civil consequences. As a programmer, I would readily admit that releasing code is far worse than releasing an early build. Releasing code is releasing a customer's trade secrets which is their bread and butter.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not really. There are degrees, you know. Leaking a build is not anywhere near the same thing as leaking the source.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

wtf? being interested in the details is not being pedantic

Re:Which is it?

[danknight48]

Stop being pedantic. It doesn't matter if the terms are interchanged or not, the underlying principle is still the same.

Source Code and Compiled Code are every so slightly not the same.
Considering the impact and difference in both, lets at least get the correct information from these "stories".

On the funny side, this will be the 1st person to be arrested on the charge of "leaking shit" :)

Re:Which is it?

[Threni]

It matters if you're reporting A happened and actually it was B. Yes, in both cases something happened, and we can agree perhaps that they both fall into the "bad" category. But..so what? How does that make the story more accurate?

Oh, and "period".

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

What are you talking about? We want to know if the Windows 8 source code has been leaked. That's a pretty damn important question.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just one correction - internal builds are typically debug builds.
They usually carry a lot more debugging information and happily give detailed reports about what's happening on under the hood. All to help developers figure out what's going on.

Production builds on the other hands all debugging info is stripped down and it's handed to the user as a black box - input something, get result, don't poke under the hood.

True this is a breach of contract, but still calling this "leaking code and company secrets" feels like stretching it a bit.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

So, according to you, releasing all the CAD drawings and engineering specs for, say, the Mercedes C and handing Geely a Mercedes C off the factory floor are exactly the same thing, no difference at all?

They're both illegal. One represents Geely getting to drive around in a nice car, instead of a Merrie 300. The other represents Geely basically crushing any possible Chinese sales of the Mercedes C.

I hope the difference in the level of damage done is clear now with the typical slashdot car analogy having been given. And thus you understand why someone would like to know which one actually happened. :P

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Early builds" refers to the specific stage of development of what he allegedly "stole and leaked". "Code" might refer either to the source code used in the build, or object code produced by the build.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Relax. I think he was simply commenting on the poor journalism.

Re:Which is it?

[vux984]

So, if the story had been ex-Sears employee leaks Windows NT builds in 2016... well... close enough, right?

The underlying principle is the same even if the facts ... well... aren't.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Both are illegal. Both may have caused damage to the Microsoft Corporation. But the two things are neither equally damaging, nor therefore "equally illegal." The illegal release of a build is nowhere near as damaging as the source code itself.

Beating up a random stranger on the street and sending him to the hospital is illegal and damaging. But shooting that same person with an AK-47 and landing him in the morgue is much more damage done, and will land the perpetrator in jail much longer (if he is expected to ever come out of jail alive, to begin with).

So, yes, the distinction is important alright.

Re:Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Unauthorized releasing of a build is theft!

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

taking your companies source code and giving it to someone and taking your companies compiled code and giving it to someone is both wrong (and wrong for the same reason. giving something you do not have the right to give)

You "kind of code" argument is irrelevant to that point, as indeed, a wrongdoing was done either way.

But thats not to say it is not interresting or relevevant if you dig deeper or if you discuss what the punishment should be.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

but I wouldn't think...
 
Mod parent up as informative. McWilde clearly doesn't think.

Re:Which is it?

[DrGamez]

I'm not sure how people can willingly mix up the differences between software and actual physical goods.
The guy took something he wasn't supposed to, gave it to someone he wasn't supposed to.

Stop being pedantic and trying to proclaim that nothing was lost because it was just software. It's these asinine comments and willful ignorance that leads to things like the current state of software patents.

Re:Which is it?

[TechnoJoe]

He stole Windows 8 code, but nothing of value was lost.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who modded this idiot Insightful?

We divide actions into narrowly-defined categories because some violations are worse than others. If we have a precise word for this man did wrong, we can (A) prefer the precise word over the general category and (B) use the right word in the first place.

Arguing that some all wrongness is simply wrong... well, it's cute but a little vapid.

Re:Which is it?

[omtinez]

God help you trying to build that code, at Microsoft we have an entire set of teams dedicated to building Windows :)

Re:Which is it?

[david_thornley]

My theory is that Microsoft is afraid somebody will take it and build a Windows 8 with a good UI.

Re:Which is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

But nothing was lost. Early builds of Windows don't replace final builds of windows. When the final build comes out, no one will use the earlier builds anymore. They will either buy a copy or not buy a copy, irregardless of if they have an early build or not.

Disgruntled Current/Former Employee Leaker

[rmdingler]

I am not surprised these stories don't show up more often.

Many prefer to keep these leaks in house, lest current disgruntled employees get the -itis.

In the form of a question, Alex, "Which former Microsoft employee is not up for a Snowden award?"

Re:Disgruntled Current/Former Employee Leaker

[ShanghaiBill]

Many prefer to keep these leaks in house, lest current disgruntled employees get the -itis.

Microsoft publicized this to demonstrate to the world that there is someone that actually wanted Windows 8.

Re:Disgruntled Current/Former Employee Leaker

[Lumpy]

Most people who leak things are smart enough to keep their mouth shut and NOT tell anyone who they are. This idiot was trying for glory and "street cred".

If you want to leak something you cover your ass and leak it in a way that is as untraceable as you can get. MSFT employee leaking windows 10.1? you go to a starbucks in a different town that you never visit and upload it to a dead drop. I suggest using a secure CD or thumb drive based OS like linux to do it as well so you can change the mac address easily so in case that starbucks has a high end security logging router, wear sunglasses and a baseball cap, maybe a fake beard.

The problem is all the ones you hear of are from people trying to get credit for it or to build a reputation for some wierd technomancer novel they think life is. Manning was a dipshit bragging about it trying to get himself some strange, Mitnick bragged about EVERYTHING, etc...

Re:Disgruntled Current/Former Employee Leaker

[Anonymous Coward]

Except for the reason MS still uses (or used, it's been a while...) Source Depot for their big projects.

Every copy checked out from the depot of the Windows/Office source code is given hidden tags in multiple places. So in the case of such a leak, they know exactly which developer checked out the code, when, and onto which machine.

Re:Disgruntled Current/Former Employee Leaker

[Anonymous Coward]

That is so easy to scrub it's not funny. hell it takes less than 10 minutes of perl scripting to scrub those "hidden tags" Source Depot's watermarking is actually easy to defeat.

Re:Disgruntled Current/Former Employee Leaker

[Anonymous Coward]

lol

Companies used to stick prices that were used on the back end as hidden fields in HTML.

This is about the same thing.

He should have changed it to point to Ballmer

Torrent?

[Anonymous Coward]

Subject says it all. Where's the torrent of the internal system? :)

GENIUS

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's USE hotmail to leak Microsoft code.

The irony of his new job title Product Management for Security

Stack and yank strikes again

[benjfowler]

So how's that working out for you, Microsoft?

Leaking Windows 8?

[Anonymous Coward]

Win8 needed more leaking so that Microsoft could have learned how awful it is before trying to sell it. They could have added the start button in the very beginning for those of us not "charmed & tiled".

Apple vs Tree?

[tomxor]

It's not pedantic there's a huge difference... take your ignorance and leave.

Re:Apple vs Tree?

[iggymanz]

so you buy into the farce that information can be "owned". that of course is nonsense, this employee proved it.

Re:Apple vs Tree?

[Anonymous Coward]

How about this. You work on a piece of software, I'll take the code in whatever form I feel and give it to a big company who will make billions off it, leaving you with squat.

That would be fine with you, right?

If you take the code, no - not fine.

If you take a build, yes - fine!

I think you illustrated your oppositions point here quite clearly. Build and code are quite different. The ramifications of having source code access are so much more damaging.

Re:Apple vs Tree?

[Collective 0-0009]

How about this. You work on a piece of software, I'll take the code in whatever form I feel and give it to a big company who will make billions off it, leaving you with squat. That would be fine with you, right?

Depends if you took a line of code, or the whole thing. Or if you just took an exe. Now you see the difference? No, of course not.

Do you think it would be the same if I took $100 from you, or emptied out your entire life savings? There are scales of bad. Littering is bad. But not as bad as dumping chemicals in a river. Or do you really think we should have the same punishment for littering and mega-corps dumping waste? "It doesn't matter what it was, it wasn't to be dumped in that place", right?

Re:Apple vs Tree?

[Anonymous Coward]

Slashdot, land of the pedants. Sigh.

Re:Apple vs Tree?

[gnick]

Well put. I actually have a copy of the entire source right here. Here's a piece:

e

All that's left is to fill in the blanks around it. Doesn't really pack the same wallop as seeing the entire source in context though, does it?

Re:Apple vs Tree?

[worf_mo]

GP never said it was right to take code in whatever form. Leaking a released build so that some "journalist" could publish a sensationalist headline and a few screenshots is one thing. No company can "make billions" off that. OTOH, leaking the source code of a proprietary OS could yield some money. Both ain't right (from a moral and a legal standpoint), but the distinction is important in order to assess the damage done.

To answer your question: If you give one of my software projects in binary form to a company I might be miffed. If you give them my source code rest assured I will be seriously pissed.

Re:Apple vs Tree?

[Lumpy]

Exactly, the whole thing is about punishing someone that dared to challenge a rich corporation.

If the Law was about being fair and just, he would be fined for 120% of what he gained from it, and court costs (Court, NOT overpaid lawyers)

but the law in the USA has nothing at all about being right and just. It's all about punishment and ruining peoples lives.

Should arrest that guy that *designed* Windows 8

[walterbyrd]

Another Microsoft injustice.

"...he was angry over a poor performance review."

[Air-conditioned cowh]

They told him he performed like Windows 8?

Crimes against humanity

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft should be arrested (or even better, taken out back and shot) for crimes against humanity for releasing the turd known as windows 8 into the world.

Re:Crimes against humanity

[nurb432]

While i agree it was terrible, no one at Microsoft forced you to use it. So people should be shot just for making something you personally dont approve of?

Ya. Gotcha.

Nothing this guy did....

[gestalt_n_pepper]

could possibly be as bad as what Microsoft's own management is doing to Microsoft every day.

This is not theft, it's conversion.

[nbritton]

This is ridiculous. He did not deprive the owner of their property, the elements of theft have not been met. This should have been handled as a conversion claim in civil court. What I think is criminal is the corporation using their power to influence the criminal justice system.

Re:This is not theft, it's conversion.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is ridiculous. He did not deprive the owner of their property, the elements of theft have not been met.

Idiots like you think the world is ridiculous because you are too stupid
and too lazy to understand how things the the law work.

You need to educate yourself and quit spewing nonsense.

The Microsoft employee stuck his hand in the meat grinder.
Injuries followed. There now, does that make it easy for your tiny little brain
to understand ?

Re:This is not theft, it's conversion.

[u38cg]

Doesn't say where in the world he was arrested. Legal codes are not all the same, especially European laws based on Roman codes.

The bigger issue in the story is the suggestion that Microsoft simply opened up his Hotmail account and read his email. That is a much bigger issue, to me.

Re:This is not theft, it's conversion.

[DrGamez]

So your defense is because he didn't steal literally every copy of the code/build ever produced ever, he can get off scot-free?

Or do you just have a woefully poor understanding of the term "work for hire"?

Re:This is not theft, it's conversion.

[drinkypoo]

This is ridiculous. He did not deprive the owner of their property

No, he deprived them of their right to control copying. And that's why he's been charged with violations of 18 USC Â 1832, "Theft of trade secrets" which basically applies to any unauthorized duplication (or theft) of any proprietary information.

But don't bother to look up the complaint, and the law, or anything. That would be too much effort.

Re:This is not theft, it's conversion.

[lonOtter]

No, he deprived them of their right to control copying.

That's a laughable "right," and it's also laughable that any country that claims to be free would try to restrict something that's akin to breathing in the information age. I don't recognize any such "right," even if the law does. Microsoft can get fucked.

Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

On Slashdot, we often talk about how ridiculous it is that software is covered by copyright AND patents, but no one addresses the fact that source code is also covered under trade secret law. This is a conflict of interest and shows how screwed up our intellectual property system is. The intent of copyright is that you get protection in return for making your works public. But in the case of source code, companies get all of the protections of copyright law on that code without being required to ever actually release the code to the public. That is made evident by this exact case.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not suggesting that every software development company should be forced to release its code, but I do think they should have to choose between receiving copyright protection by releasing the code or receive no copyright protection and keep the code guarded by trade secret. I can't think of any other industry that gets protection from both copyright and trade secret and I haven't heard anyone suggest why software should be made an exception.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[gnasher719]

On Slashdot, we often talk about how ridiculous it is that software is covered by copyright AND patents, but no one addresses the fact that source code is also covered under trade secret law. This is a conflict of interest and shows how screwed up our intellectual property system is. The intent of copyright is that you get protection in return for making your works public. But in the case of source code, companies get all of the protections of copyright law on that code without being required to ever actually release the code to the public. That is made evident by this exact case.

You are confusing patent law and copyright law. The intention of patent law is that you publish the invention and people can improve on it, in exchange for protection. The intention of copyright law is that you write things. There is nothing wrong with writing things and keeping them secret.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

You are confusing patent law and copyright law.

No I am not. Patents and copyright were BOTH set up for the purpose of encouraging people to release their work.

The intention of copyright law is that you write things.

No, the intention of copyright law is to encourage people to make their works available to the public by motivating the creator with the power of monetization. It's the ARTS in the constitutional clause "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts".

There is nothing wrong with writing things and keeping them secret.

Of course not. But if you want a monopoly on a body of work, you are supposed to actually release that work, not sit on it.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[DaMattster]

And technically, you aren't correct either. The patent is published to provide legal protection and remedy for the inventor. People cannot necessarily improve on it without violating the law. They can obtain licenses to use and improve on the original product but the patent holder gets compensated.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the ARTS in the constitutional clause "promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts".

No, actually, you've got that backwards. Copyright stems from the SCIENCE part, meaning "knowledge" and including fine arts (painting, literature). The "useful arts" are engineering, manufacturing, and inventions.

But if you want a monopoly on a body of work, you are supposed to actually release that work, not sit on it.

Copyrighted works need never be released to the public. One of those monopoly rights is the right to control distribution, up to and including refusing to distribute it while copyright is in effect. The answer's right in the name. Copy. Right. Right to copy. If you can obtain a copy with the permission of the owner, when copyright is over, then those rights are over, too. But if you keep a diary, you can claim a copyright in it while simultaneously refusing to let anyone read it. Even once the copyright ends, you STILL don't have to let anyone read it, but you no longer have copyright to help protect that interest.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Alien1024]

An "haute-cuisine" cook can make business by keeping their recipes secret. That falls under trade secret.

The same principle holds for source code.

And for other industries, too. Cars, aircraft, hardware... The blueprints, or the sets of steps necessary to build those things, can be trade secrets.

Nobody suggests they can't sell the resulting products while keeping those processes secret. The only reason it doesn't make sense to copyright a dish (I mean the edible dish, not the recipe) is because those things aren't information, you can't take one of them and make a copy just like you can with software.

Software is peculiar in the sense that both the "recipe" and the resulting product are information - but they are not the same information, and there's no reason both sets of information should receive the same treatment.

Now, what doesn't make sense is to patent one thing and try to keep the same thing a trade secret.

For full disclosure, I am firmly against software patents as they are conceived in many jurisdictions. Patents should be detailed and should include the best method known by the author to carry out the patented process - for software patents, this means they should include the source code.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

Copyrighted works need never be released to the public.

You're only proving my point. Copyright works currently do NOT need to be released despite the fact that the original intention of copyright law was to make sure the work WAS released.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

conflict of interest

That phrase does not mean what you think it does.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Hognoxious]

Copyright works currently do NOT need to be released despite the fact that the original intention of copyright law was to make sure the work WAS released.

No, that's patents. It's what the word means, as in patently obvious.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

You're only proving my point.

Sigh. No. You're just being too thick to see the difference. Copyright is there to provide a vehicle for making cheap copies available without losing total control. It's at heart a simple bargain to put an end to only wealthy people being able to acquire art and books by allowing limited reproduction.

Copyright works currently do NOT need to be released despite the fact that the original intention of copyright law was to make sure the work WAS released.

General public release has NEVER been a requirement for copyright. Any number of copyrighted works throughout history were sold only in limited numbers to limited populations. That's not new.

Copyright to software code works no differently. If you want to keep it secret, then you rely on trade secret and contractual nondisclosure requirements. If it leaks beyond that, then you have (and HAVE ALWAYS HAD) the right to prohibit further reproduction. Copyright works no other way. It's there specifically to prohibit loss of control over copying for the period of time where there is economic value to be extracted.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

And since Windows 8 is available to the public - I fail to see how your claim that the system is broken has any merit.

The compiled binaries are released to the public and they are covered under copyright law. The source code used to build those compiled binaries is also covered under copyright law (yet the source isn't usually released) AND it is simultaneously covered by trade secret.

Copyright has never required the creator to release the work products used in the creation, only the final work

But in this case, the copyright violation is on the work products used in the creation (the source code). Microsoft claims copyright on the Windows source and on the Windows binaries.

Further, that internal work products (like interim builds and unfinished releases) can be treated as confidential and trade secrets is a well established principle.

I'm not debating that they're considered trade secrets, my point is that they are covered under trade secret AND copyright at the same time which is highly unusual - I am not aware of any other work that gets both of those protections simultaneously. Throw in patents on top of it and you get a triple decker of IP madness.

Your belief that the system is broken is based on a fundamental cluelessness about how the system works.

Ah, Slashdot! Where everyone knows more than everyone else!

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

General public release has NEVER been a requirement for copyright.

You are correct, but for a long time it was required that you register the copyrighted work with the government. When the copyright expired on that work, the government could then release that work since it would fall under public domain.

Copyright to software code works no differently. If you want to keep it secret, then you rely on trade secret and contractual nondisclosure requirements. If it leaks beyond that, then you have (and HAVE ALWAYS HAD) the right to prohibit further reproduction.

I have always heard different. What has been told to me is that once the trade secret has been revealed, the cat is out of the bag and your legal options are extremely limited (beyond suing the shit out of the party that leaked the secret). This would be the perfect time for an IP lawyer to jump in and set us straight.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[gnasher719]

I have always heard different. What has been told to me is that once the trade secret has been revealed, the cat is out of the bag and your legal options are extremely limited (beyond suing the shit out of the party that leaked the secret). This would be the perfect time for an IP lawyer to jump in and set us straight.

It depends on whether the receiver was guilty in any way. If I bribe a Microsoft employee to give me some source code, then I'm not allowed to pass it on, it is still protected. If that Microsoft employee leaves a printout in a cafe by mistake, it's out of the bag.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[gnasher719]

And technically, you aren't correct either. The patent is published to provide legal protection and remedy for the inventor. People cannot necessarily improve on it without violating the law. They can obtain licenses to use and improve on the original product but the patent holder gets compensated.

Others can improve on the invention and patent the improved invention - quite possible that someone using it would need two patent licenses. And others can take the invention as inspiration to create a totally different invention. You might never have considered that solving problem X was possible, but once you saw the patent solving it using method A, you come up with unrelated method B.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

That sounds reasonable enough. However, in your example where the employee leaves a printout on a printer in a cafe, copyright law would forbid you from making or disseminating copies of that work while I don't believe trade secret would prevent you from doing whatever you wanted with it.

So in this case, a copy of the Windows source taken from a cafe printer would be useless (in the U.S.) while the recipe to Coca-Cola on a cafe printer could be a goldmine. Again, I'm not an IP lawyer - these are simply suppositions based on my slight-better-than-average knowledge of IP law.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

You are correct, but for a long time it was required that you register the copyrighted work with the government.

That's still not the same thing as public release. Depositing a copy with the Library of Congress (which may or may not even retain it) does nothing to address your articulated point, that you can choose not to share a copyrighted work with the public.

When the copyright expired on that work, the government could then release that work since it would fall under public domain.

But they never have and almost certainly never will. The Library's collections remain in the library. If you wanted to go there, manually duplicate millions of lines of decades-old code, and then redistribute it, that'd be your only option.

A return to registration requirements (prohibited under the 1886 Berne Convention) would not solve the issue you seem to have a problem with, which is the refusal of copyright holders to make articles generally available to the public during the copyright term.

I have always heard different. What has been told to me is that once the trade secret has been revealed, the cat is out of the bag and your legal options are extremely limited

Of course they're not. The "cat is out of the bag" only with regard to secrecy--you can't stop people from getting their hands on it at that point, and it's not effective to sue everyone, but if it's something you can read, then it's something copyrighted, and they can avail themselves of the full range of options available to them for your unlawful redistribution and reproduction of that. There's a whole debate right now around using copyright to clamp down on unfavorable photos/videos (sexting, embarassing news clips, whatever) and a need to recalibrate the balance of free speech and copyright protection.

This would be the perfect time for an IP lawyer to jump in and set us straight.

You're already talking to one.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[drinkypoo]

Copyright works currently do NOT need to be released despite the fact that the original intention of copyright law was to make sure the work WAS released.

No, that's patents. It's what the word means, as in patently obvious.

Too bad it's not patently obvious to you that the idea behind copyright was to encourage the dissemination of works. Before copyright, if someone copied your book and sold it, your only recourse was tears. So if you didn't want others to profit from your work, you'd limit the distribution. Copyright meant that publishing could flourish because you didn't have to go to the trouble of proofreading and editing and then get squashed by someone who could print books more cheaply.

Both patent law and copyright law were designed to encourage release and exchange of information.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

The Library's collections remain in the library. If you wanted to go there, manually duplicate millions of lines of decades-old code, and then redistribute it, that'd be your only option.

At least that provides some option. And if someone did that for code that entered the public domain, they would be free to disseminate it to anyone who wished to host it online.

A return to registration requirements (prohibited under the 1886 Berne Convention) would not solve the issue you seem to have a problem with, which is the refusal of copyright holders to make articles generally available to the public during the copyright term.

It doesn't have to be during the term of the copyright. But after the copyright expires and the work is supposed to enter the public domain, it would be nice to know that there will be a copy available somewhere. Part of the social contract in offering patents and copyrights to creators is that the public will be free to copy those works and the knowledge and culture will persist. Thanks to neverending extensions of copyright terms, it will likely be incredibly hard to get a copy of a work by the time it enters public domain.

but if it's something you can read, then it's something copyrighted

I thought that there were exemptions to things that can be copyrighted such as recipes. Is that true?

You're already talking to one.

And I appreciate your input and the possibility to learn about an important facet of modern society. While I have your attention, can you confirm that source code is in fact covered under trade secret AND copyright law or only one of those? Thanks.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't have to be during the term of the copyright. But after the copyright expires and the work is supposed to enter the public domain, it would be nice to know that there will be a copy available somewhere.

But that's not part of the bargain. The point of the public domain isn't to preserve works (hence the whole issue of "orphan works"), but rather just to permit those enduring cultural pieces to become part of the cultural fabric. It's not a problem from the perspective of the public domain if a minor work by a minor artist that never had popular interest vanishes forever. Preservation of relevance is the job of cultural memory. The job of the public domain is simply to prevent a non-creator (or an overzealous creator of works) from holding it hostage.

In other words, the work enters the public domain whether or not anyone was ever aware of its existence and whether or not there's any interest in it decades later. That something is part of the legal public domain does not mean and has never meant that it should be easy to find or that society has assumed the burden of archival preservation.

At least that provides some option. And if someone did that for code that entered the public domain, they would be free to disseminate it to anyone who wished to host it online.

Sure, but that still leaves the question of why the government should pay to store all those works for all those years. Anything that's valuable 100 years later will be relatively easy to find. If the only place a copy of a work exists is in a single copy in a dusty basement somewhere, then chances are it's not something anyone is looking for in the first place.

There are certainly minor exceptions to this--lost great works that were undiscovered during the author's life, but again, that's not really the purview of copyright.

I thought that there were exemptions to things that can be copyrighted such as recipes. Is that true?

Sure, but "secret recipe" is more marketing than reality.

can you confirm that source code is in fact covered under trade secret AND copyright law or only one of those? Thanks.

Either, neither, or both. Once written and committed to non-volatile memory (or paper), source code is automatically a copyrighted work (in the US and in virtually all other jurisdictions). The author can disclaim copyright and release straight to the public domain (or local equivalent--CC0 is a good tool for this). The author can also refuse to distribute it to anyone except as a trade secret. Trade secret protection is indefinite--it never expires, even if the copyright does. Even while the copyright is in effect, it doesn't actually matter, because until it's possessed by someone other than its author(s) for the first time, there's no possibility of infringement.

Only once the code becomes available to someone else who could potentially reproduce or redistribute it does copyright even matter. And as long as those "someones" are bound by trade secret/NDA/confidentiality and oblige, copyright still doesn't matter. When that code exits the sphere of trade secret/NDA/confidentiality, either by permission or by breach, that's the first time copyright status even matters.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[DerekLyons]

I'm not debating that they're considered trade secrets, my point is that they are covered under trade secret AND copyright at the same time which is highly unusual - I am not aware of any other work that gets both of those protections simultaneously.

Since you have failed to grasp the difference between work products and releases, it's unsurprising you think this is unusual.
 

Ah, Slashdot! Where everyone knows more than everyone else!

Trust me, knowing more than you is a bar so low as to be non existent for all practical purposes.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

I do realize that a work entering the public domain does not automatically mean that it has to, or even should, be made available. But with technology being what it is today, if we can develop a wayback machine, then why can't we do something to preserve cultural works? I guess I just feel that if everyone in society is giving up the freedom to copy certain works (as odd of a freedom as that may seem in the modern Western world), then we should get back as much as we can once that copyright expires. But that is clearly my opinion and obviously not a reflection of the current laws in place. In any event, I appreciate the info you have provided. Given my stance on intellectual property, I don't have too many civilized conversations with IP lawyers, so this was a nice change of pace and I was able to learn more details about the law, even if I don't necessarily agree with them.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

But with technology being what it is today, if we can develop a wayback machine [archive.org], then why can't we do something to preserve cultural works?

There's no reason we can't, but that's not the rationale behind the current laws and so blaming them for failing to achieve an outcome that wasn't intended in the first place doesn't make a lot of sense.

I guess I just feel that if everyone in society is giving up the freedom to copy certain works (as odd of a freedom as that may seem in the modern Western world), then we should get back as much as we can once that copyright expires.

I would take issue with the idea of "giving up" a freedom, since you cannot copy that which you can't access in the first place, and the copyright system makes a lot of content more widely available than it would otherwise be. Copyright does not prohibit anything. There's no bar to someone creating a work and releasing it freely to the world. The fantasy that people would be more free without copyright is willfully ignorant of reality.

The logical flaw in much of the community assumes that if not for copyright, they'd be able to access whatever they wanted and have no restrictions on what they could do with it. But there's no factual basis for that belief. The absence of copyright wouldn't dramatically alter the commercial landscape. To do that, you'd need to ban such restrictions rather than simply deleting the laws that codify them.

One thing that maybe I assumed you understood is the difference between published and unpublished works. Both are protected by copyright, and published works have to be deposited in the US, and while not all deposits are kept for the term of copyright, there's already more preservation happening than you might realize. It is completely in keeping with copyright, however, that unpublished works need not be disclosed or shared. If it's not shared, then you don't really have to worry about it, because it's a fundamental freedom of a creator to choose whether or not to share that creation with the greater world.

In any event, I appreciate the info you have provided. Given my stance on intellectual property, I don't have too many civilized conversations with IP lawyers, so this was a nice change of pace and I was able to learn more details about the law, even if I don't necessarily agree with them.

I firmly believe that understanding where the actual problems are is the only way to bringing sanity back to the equation. Extremists on both sides are maliciously deceptive, intentionally or not.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[organgtool]

I guess ultimately I just wish copyright worked more like patents. With patents, you must disclose details about the work in order to get protection as part of the social contract. If you don't want to divulge the details, then you stick with trade secrets. But copyright provides all of the protection with no required disclosure. While that may be perfectly legal under current law, I can't think of any reasonable justification for this difference. If you truly believe that your work is worthy of copyright protection, then you should be perfectly happy going through a brief registration process. The registration could be as simple as a microtransaction on a government-sponsored web site. Then, similar to patents, when the copyright expires, the registration site could act like a public domain distribution site. This is fairly analogous to how the USPTO web site currently works (besides the fact that patent registration isn't exactly brief). Yes, I know that this would violate the Berne Convention but I'm not arguing what the law is, I'm arguing what I believe it should be.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess ultimately I just wish copyright worked more like patents.

For the purposes of the issue you're struggling with, copyrights work exactly like patents. Copyright vests in a work; patent vests in an idea. You don't need to compel "disclosure" on a copyright because there's nothing to disclose: the work itself is the disclosure.

If you don't want to divulge the details, then you stick with trade secrets. But copyright provides all of the protection with no required disclosure.

Copyright doesn't provide any meaningful "protection" if there's no disclosure. You can't (and don't need to) enforce a copyright without someone else having a copy first. What you're saying just doesn't make any sense. Yes, a copyright attaches to your notes on a legal pad at the moment they're written because doing so closes an important gap between writing something and having it appear on store shelves.

You're missing that the copyright bargain is driven primarily by commercial exploitation--it's all just semantics for works that are never published because the bargained-for rights of the public don't kick in until the public gets access to the work. If you write the Great American Novel but decide not to publish it, you technically still have a copyright, but you never materially benefit from it, so while it technically also enters the public domain eventually, the public never materially benefits, either. The fact that it once had copyright protection really doesn't mean anything, nor does its lack of preservation diminish the public domain, since it never entered the public consciousness in the first place. If you want to destroy the manuscript after shopping it around but before signing a publication agreement, do you not have the right to destroy it because one day it would become public domain?

While that may be perfectly legal under current law, I can't think of any reasonable justification for this difference.

What difference? I don't get your hangup. What does it matter if an unpublished work stays unpublished forever? What are you being denied if the work in question isn't part of the public consciousness to begin with? Why do you have an inherent right to force publication of someone else's creation? Why do you feel that your right to acquire content exceeds the creator's right of privacy and self-determination?

If you keep a diary, you have a copyright. Has the public supported you in some way to justify a demand that you preserve it and hand it over to them at some future date? If you turn that diary into a bestselling novel, then sure, the text of that novel will one day belong to everyone, but your source text was never shared and never needs to be. Is that wrong? If you made one photocopy of the diary and loaned it to an editor to help you while writing the book, does that mean the public should necessarily be able to force you to put it on a website forever simply because someone in the future might be interested in seeing the "source" of the novel?

If you truly believe that your work is worthy of copyright protection, then you should be perfectly happy going through a brief registration process.

Not having to demonstrate worth is fundamental to copyright protection. Registration barriers are effective primarily as a censorship tool and nothing more. We already have deposit requirements for published works. Deposit and registration are separate concepts, and you're talking about deposit.

The registration could be as simple as a microtransaction on a government-sponsored web site. Then, similar to patents, when the copyright expires, the registration site could act like a public domain distribution site.

But again, this is not a function of copyright and you've not provided any particular reason why copyright should be extended to do so. All copyright says is, "if

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

"The intent of copyright is that you get protection in return for making your works public"

No, the intent of copyright was to prohibit people to copy.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[Anonymous Coward]

Recipes can not be copyrighted. If you choose to keep it a secret and someone independently figures it out you are out of luck.

Re:Copyright or Trade Secret? Pick One

[vilanye]

Wrong, the intent is to encourage the creation of works and build a robust public domain.

Copyright is broke because the latter no longer exists in any real sense on works created in the last 100 years or so.

So who made the arrest?

[SpankiMonki]

Was it the Metro police?

They should be arrested for WRITING windows 8

[Anonymous Coward]

The program is a crime, but at least Ballmer lost his job.

Re:Should arrest that guy that *designed* Windows

[bobjr94]

Now, they can't give away full copies of Win 8. The #1 faq on HP support for my bosses new laptop I was working on 2 weeks was, can I downgrade my operating system on my laptop and install my own copy ?

Microsoft access his hotmail account?

[Anonymous Coward]

Did I read that correctly in the article that Microsoft accessed the blogger's hotmail account?

"After realizing that they were dealing with an authentic product, Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing Investigations tried to track him down and then looked through his Hotmail account where they found incriminating emails and chat logs"

Another reason not to use Hotmail if that is the case.

Re:Microsoft access his hotmail account?

[Anonymous Coward]

No matter where you store your mail, you store your mail there.

My point is that unless you host it yourself the admin can see the headers (metadata) and unless you encrypt your mail they can read it too. this is no diferent on hotmail, gmail, your ISP provided email, the one at a friends server, etc.

So; Another reason to run your own mail server and encrypt mails. because moving to another provider will not fix the underlying issue of the information being available to the server admin.

Re:Microsoft access his hotmail account?

[SmartAboutThings]

I submitted the piece. Yes, even that surprised me. I was expecting to hear the FBI "opened" the conversations for them, but it seems that have a "special team" for that

Re:Microsoft access his hotmail account?

[stiggle]

Microsoft own the server/service and the users agree to the Terms and Conditions of use.
These include the right to rummage through the emails, delete stuff at will and terminate the account, all without notice.
This with Microsoft complaining about Google using gmail information for targeting ads.

H-1B?

[McGruber]

From the article:

Alex Kibkalo, a former Microsoft employee has been arrested yesterday for stealing and leaking company secrets..... Kibkalo is a Russian national and has worked for Microsoft for seven years; he has joined 5nine Software in August 2013 as Director of Product Management for Security and Management products after quiting his job at Microsoft.

I wonder how he worked for MS for 7 years as H1-B Visas are supposed to be limited to 6 years.

Re:H-1B?

[Gothmolly]

You must be new to the workplace.

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

he isn't even a citizen? Send him back.

Re:H-1B?

[k8to]

Maybe he worked abroad at some point?

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

Given that the green card process often takes longer than 6 years, the H1-B visa can be extended beyond 6 years if a green card application is active.

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

so you're saying he was trying to get married to gain citizenship?

Re:H-1B?

[UnknowingFool]

Well if you read the article it says: "Kibkalo, a Russian national who worked there and in Lebanon for Microsoft . . ." So he spent some time in Seattle and some time in Lebannon.

Re:H-1B?

[DigitAl56K]

I wonder how he worked for MS for 7 years as H1-B Visas are supposed to be limited to 6 years.

Because you don't understand immigration law? He could have a greencard, making him a permanent resident but Russian national, or he could have applied for one, in which case he can continue to extend his visa until a determination is made on his application.

Re:H-1B?

[Mashiki]

Must have been the Microsoft, New Jersey or Washington, DC office.

Re:H-1B?

[cusco]

I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have been 7 years continuously, MS policies require breaks in employment at certain intervals for non-blue badges to create discontinuities. They got sued several years ago by multiple-year contractors wanting full FTE benefits, and the Washington state employment commission agreed that the contractors should be treated like full time employees. Now after working x-amount of time contractors are required to take off y-amount of time before starting a new contract.

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

So, was he the Russian that was leaking Windows 8 info that Paul Thurrot and Mary Jo Foley always mention?

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

Make your point or shut up.

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

How the fuck does this shit eating post get modded up when the answer is right in the fucking article that the shitstain McFaggot didn't read?
 
Captcha: Failing.
 
And fucking how!

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are dozens of ways he could be here, he could be here on an L-1, he could have a green card, he could have been made a permanent immigrant due to his knowledge and the reticence to allow that knowledge to return to Russia...

Now I'm not the be all end all of immigration law, but I've actually hired from overseas, and thinking that the only people you hire that way are H-1Bs is like thinking the only thing you can get on the vegetable isle is parsley.

Re:H-1B?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most likely they did what Apple did, work him as a slave on a L-1 at 60% then converted him to H-1 at 80% salary

There was not loss... at all...

[taikedz]

Indeed, by physical standards he stole nothing as the owner (licensor) of the software still has it.

Normally software theft can be counted in lost sales due to leakage...

.... and let's face it. Microsoft lost nothing from the leak itself.

Re:"...he was angry over a poor performance review

[Squidlips]

Given MS's management organizations and work teams, this is not surprising

Re:"...he was angry over a poor performance review

[Zaiff Urgulbunger]

They told him he performed like Windows 8?

The words they used were worse than Windows 8. That's what really stung! :D

Re:"...he was angry over a poor performance review

[Dareth]

He really didn't like having to wear the Window 8.1 "Start Menu" flair!

Whistle-blower?

[slapout]

Was he trying to warn the world how bad Windows 8 was?

Re:Whistle-blower?

[Raenex]

Come on, mods. This is either Insightful or Funny, not Interesting.

in other news

[Anonymous Coward]

linux also was leaked ot the blogger and no charges were filed.....

see the misuse yet of your tax money?

baby poop in french food

[Anonymous Coward]

...and chemicals that made rats go crazy at 17 times what wold drive the rats crazy, cheese that isnt even cheese......640 more examples of british food that is badly labeled or not properly labeled ....from a study of 900 foods

ya wonder why ukraine is in the news thats one reason and the other was the leak in britain these spies are storing kiddy pron

NOT A PEEP in any western media about it.....DISGUSTING

Re:"...he was angry over a poor performance review

[tomhath]

Yea, he swiped it.

Moral of the Story is....

[Shadowmist]

... When you get a poor performance review, it doesn't help your case to engage in activity which justifies it.

Re:Moral of the Story is....

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh god that type of behavior is so, so common though. You tell someone that what they're doing is unethical/irritating/counter-productive and what do they do? They keep doing it with increased intensity to show you just who it is here who's unethical/irritating/counter-productive.

Sounds familiar..

[nurb432]

So this guy took copies of classified ( proprietary ) code, then gave it to ( effectively ) the enemy ( the consumer ) and hes going to jail, not being given a Nobel prize?

How does that work, i thought we now supported this sort of act?

H-1B?

[DerekLyons]

I wonder how he worked for MS for 7 years as H1-B Visas are supposed to be limited to 6 years.

Nothing in the linked article says that all seven years were in the US. In fact, the second linked article specifically points out that that for some portion of the period he worked from Lebanon.

Even so, he could be a Microsoft employee for seven years without ever stepping foot in the US - Microsoft is an international company with branches and subsidiaries all over the world.

RELEASING WINDOWS 8 IS A CRIME!

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Prosecute Microsoft. ;-)

Re:RELEASING WINDOWS 8 IS A CRIME!

[UltraZelda64]

So true. On the Windows (8.1) side of my laptop, I can spend 10+ minutes doing attempted (failed) boots, forcing shutdowns when it stops responding during boot, and repeating the whole process before the OS finally decides to actually boot. Maybe if I'm unlucky I'll even get a "sorry, Windows has failed to boot" message, requiring--yep--another reboot. And that nightmare speaks nothing of the stupid Metro crap including Start Screen.

Not fun when I only need to reboot from the Linux side to get into Windows for five or ten minutes at the most. This problem has been known since about November last year, I've had it since I got my laptop and set it up in December, and there is *still* no fucking fix to this madness. Sure am glad I am on the Linux side the majority of the time, where everything is fast, nice and pleasant (and stable) in the i3 window manager.

Re:RELEASING WINDOWS 8 IS A CRIME!

[Anonymous Coward]

Why are you rebooting for things you need to do for 5-10 minutes? You are aware that Virtualbox is free, right?

Policy required him to get a bad review

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is no one addressing that issue? Jack Welch at GE created a system to screw over good employees, and really, no one on /. cares about people getting screwed? This is sad. If he had all good coworkers at his same level then his manager was required to lie and give him a bad review.

Performance reviews are BS ....

[Anonymous Coward]

"Kibkalo is said to have leaked the Windows 8 code in the middle of 2012 because he was angry over a poor performance review."
This is why I do not do performance reviews at our company. Performance reviews in the classic sense generate disgruntled employees that have full access to the business.
Instead, we categorize developers in 3 groups: can't live without; not the end of the world if he/she quits; good riddance.
For the first group, I basically pull my pants down and retain them at any cost - I need them more than they need me!
The second group get the standard 2-3% raise. If it's not enough - they can try their luck someplace else.
The third group get escorted out. We try hard not to have anybody fall in this category, but there is always the odd case.

If there is negative feedback, it is given on the spot and in context. The employee can use this as a learning experience and be a productive member of the team. Mistakes and negative feedback are learning opportunities - failure to learn from mistakes is what causes an employee to be sacked.

I just assumed that everyone who worked on Win8...

[Radical Moderate]

...got a poor performance review.

Re:MICROSOFT SAID IT...

[Anonymous Coward]

Sheeeesh. Tough crowd.

Trustworthy?

[pouar]

I'm guessing the word "Trustworthy" in "Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing Investigations" is a homonym.

Typical

[Anonymous Coward]

Typical dumb ass employee angry for personal and selfish reasons

The name of the crime is "Theft of trade secrets."

[Valdrax]

If you want to get technical, in the classic torts, you are correct that this is theft and not conversion. However, he's not being charged in a tort case. He's being charged for a violation of the Economic Espionage Act, and the relevant section is called "theft of trade secrets." (18 USC 1832)

So, you can either go informal, in which case "theft" is a reasonable, common word for taking someone else's stuff without their permission. Or you can go legalistic, in which case, the charge being applied to him is called "theft" as a matter of statutory law.

Either way, checkmate.

this may have flown over my head

[Anonymous Coward]

I think not! Most of software is written by developers with little contribution from the employer and therefore should be licensed to the employer the same way a song is licensed by the musicians to record labels, how writers license their books to publishers etc.

Musicians write the music, and it is "credited" to them, but they do not own the copyright. The Record Companies contracts are set-up to own the rights. The musicians involved have NO control over how or what the record company does.

If you have a 3 album deal, with RCA they own the work from those three albums, and any work that was done during that album deal. After that deal you, can choose to sign with another company, IE Sony, for another 3 album deal. The work you provided to RCA stays with them, you cannot release any previous music on ANY label, and RCA can do whatever they want with the rights, sell them, hold them, release unreleased material, release live albums, compilation albums, without permission from the band.

The band makes nothing from there albums, the money they receive from their deals are loans, they have to sell albums to pay that loan off, or that money is seized and the record company takes it back, their money comes from concerts/shows/merchandise. And they may have to pay the expenses.

I not understanding your assumptions? Your saying it is okay for these companies to OWN YOU. As long as you get a small percentage of the work you created? When you could go of on your own or get a deal that makes sure your well compensated for life, and beyond for something innovative! That made the company millions/billions..

Mavi Teknik Servis stanbul 0530 119 5 229

[Anonymous Coward]

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the offense seems akin

[Anonymous Coward]

to removing a towel covering a turd