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'Aaron's Law' Introduced To Curb Overzealous Prosecutions For Computer Crimes
SonicSpike writes: Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Ron Wyden (D-OR), and Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) introduced bipartisan legislation today to better target serious criminals and curb overzealous prosecutions for non-malicious computer and Internet offenses.
The legislation, inspired by the late Internet innovator and activist Aaron Swartz, who faced up to 35 years in prison for an act of civil disobedience, would reform the quarter-century old Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) to better reflect computer and internet activities in the digital age. Numerous and recent instances of heavy-handed prosecutions for non-malicious computer crimes have raised serious questions as to how the law treats violations of terms of service, employer agreements and website notices.
"Aaron’s Law would change the definition of 'access without authorization' in the CFAA so it more directly applies to malicious hacks such as sending fraudulent emails, injecting malware, installing viruses or overwhelming a website with traffic."
The legislation, inspired by the late Internet innovator and activist Aaron Swartz, who faced up to 35 years in prison for an act of civil disobedience, would reform the quarter-century old Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) to better reflect computer and internet activities in the digital age. Numerous and recent instances of heavy-handed prosecutions for non-malicious computer crimes have raised serious questions as to how the law treats violations of terms of service, employer agreements and website notices.
"Aaron’s Law would change the definition of 'access without authorization' in the CFAA so it more directly applies to malicious hacks such as sending fraudulent emails, injecting malware, installing viruses or overwhelming a website with traffic."
who faced up to 35 years in prison for an act of civil disobedience... he was offered a 6 month sentence if he would plead guilty. 35 years was the "street value" of his sentence. He killed himself rather than serve 6 months.
What and why he did it.
I am currently doing some research and I can't you how many times I run across a paper that would be perfect or to see that I buy it or I could "rent" it for $$$ for 48 hours. If the author got a piece of it, then I could possibly stomach it, but they don't. And when you have to read dozens of papers, it could easily cost you thousands of dollars to research something that you won't see a single dime in income.
I once met an author/professor who wrote a case study for the Harvard Business School. He says they don't get paid. Harvard has no problem charging big bucks for those things.
Aron had a real point about the absurd pricing of journals and academic papers.
You're a fucking moron. How does "access without authorization" warrant a 35 year sentence?
I can't believe that after all these years there are still people who believe that Swartz faced a 35 year sentence. He did not. The algorithm the DoJ uses to get a number to trumpet in a press release ignores the rules of sentencing, and in all but the simplest of cases gives a wildly inflated number. There are two main factors that the press release algorithm ignores.
First, there is a range of possible sentences for a given crime. Where a particular instance falls on that range depends on the severity of that instance. To get the maximum, you have to have done a lot of damage, be a repeat offender, and so on. The prosecutors in the indictment were not alleging the various factors necessary to push Swartz up to the high end on any of the counts.
For the press release, they do not consider this. So if a crime might result in 1 year for someone who caused under $5k damages, and 10 years for someone who caused over $100k in damages, they will count it as 10 years in the press release, even if they are only alleging that the defendant caused $1k damages.
Second, federal crimes are divided into groups, and when one particular act leads to multiple charges from the same group, you will only be sentenced for one crime from the group even if convicted for all of them.
In the press release, they just add up the maximum sentences for each charge, completely ignoring the grouping.
There are many factors that should be taken into account in sentencing. The risk of reoffending, difficulty of rehabilitation, the extent to which the sentence acts to dissuade others from carrying out the same crime. Satisfying the victim's desire for vengence is not one of these. Punishment for punishment's sake is not justice, however much it makes people feel better.
You are grossly misrepresenting the problem. The fact is that Schwartz was facing 13 federal felony counts in the indictment. That's nothing you can just wave off as a minor inconvenience.
Even if he had pleaded guilty and the prosecutor only sought a two year sentence overall, the sentencing would be at the discretion of the judge - the prosecutor can only recommend things. And judges have proven to a) be prone to displays of political show-offs of being "hard on crime" and b) have a poor understanding of the real severity of technology-related crimes. That means to a judge without tech understanding (which is most of them) a one year sentence pro federal felony served consecutively might seem lenient and 2-5 years pro felony might seem as a "good message to digital criminals"
Aaron Schwartz was facing a threat much more serious than you make it out to be
I can't believe that when you're charged with a crime with a 35 year sentence possible because of stacking, you think you're not facing up to 35 years in prison.
Did you fail at maths even to the level of recognising numbers being identical???
See the recent case of a judge sentencing teachers to over a decade in prison for helping students cheat at exams.
The internet existed in 1983, and was spreading quickly in 1986.
Yeah, in the sense that it exploded in usage from 0.01% to 0.04% of the American population. The Internet was not on anyone's radar outside of specific groups in the military, scientific, and academic communities.