Slashdot Mirror
Proposed Penalty For UK Hackers Who "Damage National Security": Life
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from The Guardian: Government plans that mean computer users deemed to have damaged national security, the economy or the environment will face a life sentence have been criticised by experts who warn that the new law could be used to target legitimate whistleblowers. The proposed legislation would mean that any British person deemed to have carried out an unauthorised act on a computer that resulted in damage to human welfare, the environment, the economy or national security in any country would face a possible life sentence. Last week the Joint Committee on Human Rights raised concerns about the proposals and the scope of such legislation.
Government plans that mean computer users deemed to have damaged national security, the economy or the environment will face a life sentence have been criticised by experts who warn that the new law could be used to target legitimate whistleblowers.
Could be? Come on - targeting whistleblowers is the point. It's not about damaging national security, the economy or the environment - it's about damaging somebody's political career.
Do you have ESP?
So Bankers that damage the world economy face no time in jail and no fines, but the whistle blower can get life?
Sounds about right for this messed up world.
Why would that act in and off itself even remotely warrant life in prison?
The problems are its not always getting a shell. What if you violate a websites TOS, is that an unauthorized act?
What does damage national security mean, If I post about how Minister X lied about Y 10 years ago does that erode society's faith in its officials and by extension "threaten national security"?
There are bright lines such as bypassing an authentication mechanism; deliberate insertion of abnormally structured data designed to alter application behavior (injection attacks); that could be defined in laws like this. Its very possible to write laws governing computer access that are both inclusive to allow interpretations to cover changing and new technology and still be specific enough a reasonable people can agree on if a specific act meets the criteria.
Groups like OWASP have done the work; we now have good working definitions and generic criteria for describing attacks and abuse. Its not '92 anymore where public network access was a new thing.
There are two reasons overly broad laws like this are being written both equally scary. 1) The people writing and enacting them remain profoundly ignorant of topics that pretty much effect every aspect of the economy today. 2) They want them overly broad because it makes for a nice blunt instrument to shutdown anything that threatens the status quo.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
So if your boss and your bosses bosses are acting in ways that you deem inapropriate and in violation of their duties to the citizens of the UK you're better off killling them now than exposing them. You might get off in just a few years.