Arrested For Using Wireless Internet

Originally posted by Boondock78
well, i'm no lawyer but i always thought it was a pretty damn solid defence....intent to commit a crime or not....

don't matter

Ir would be a mitigating factor in sentencing, but if you commit an offence, whether you intended too or not is not going to get you off.

As defcon said, murder and manslaughter are defined by intent. Also, if you hit a person on the pavement because you lost control of your car, often you will still be up in court for causing Death by Dangerous driving, unless a mechanical failure is the cause. Things such as that. Otherwise, people will just claim they didin't know something was illegal and get off all the time, wouldn't they?

"Sorry officer.. I didn't realise having a ton of cannabis in my truck was illegal. I do apologise"

"Ah, that's ok then. Just put it in the bin and be on your way!"

Murder is a different issue, someone dies then a whole investigation needs to be launched, it's a totally different scale.

In the case of WiFi, if someone accidentally and automatically logs on to a network without knowing he's breaking the law I don't think he should be arrested. Maybe someone could tell him that he's in the wrong and advise him to disconnect, but arresting him is going a bit far.

Stealing internet wireless service is not a victimless crime.

1) The more machines connected to your router the less bandwidth the owner actually has.

2) When logged on to the internet via a wireless router you could get peadophiles downloading child porn, people engaging in fraudulent actions. These things would be traceable to the IP address of the router, not the computer, which could get the owner of the router in trouble.

Also some people are not that technicaly gifted and dont realise that you can and should encrypt the connection so I think it is right if people use someone else's connection they should get some form of punishment. I wouldnt like to be paying for my neighbour to get on the net!!

This is a really iffy situation to me.

I know plenty of people who own laptops with wireless cards that wouldent even know if their computer is connected to their wireless network or someone elses. I know that when I log into my network at my house there is atleast three open wireless networks available to me. If the general public is confronted with a list of available wireless networks, I bet most of the time they cant even identify their own unless they are the one that set it up.

I'll say it again

IGNORANCE IS NO DEFENCE

You may get a more lenient treatment from the Authorities because your stupid, but it still doesn't absolve you of the crime in the first place.

I agree. Ignornance is no defense. So anyone who owns a wireless network that does not properly secure it should be the ones at fault as well. If you dont want people to go somewhere, you put up a fence. People who have wireless networks and dont bother to secure it in my opinion are just as much at fault as the people who unknowingly access it.
If someone leaves their network open, they know full well that there is the possibility of people leeching off their network.

You don't have to put up a fence to stop people trespassing. The act of someone being on your land, whether you had a fence or not, is their fault entirely. Maybe you don't want a fence. Your not obliged by law to put one up, but you are obliged by law not to trespass.

Other people know that by accessing something that isn't theirs is wrong.

Granted, people should secure their networks simply for their own protection. Had this guy been a bit more savvy, he could have gained all sorts of info off this computer and cloned the persons ID. Then the world is his oyster.

But that still shouldn't be an excuse for someone to take advantage of another's stupidity.

It is my understanding (I could be wrong) that the reason for wireless access points and routers broadcasting their network ID inthe first place is so ANYONE in the area knows the ID of that router if they want to connect to it, this is how wireless hotspots are able to let the common people use their connection. The whole point of having a wireless router broadcasting your ID is to let other people who dont know your ID to connect to your network.

I feel it is the manufacturers who should provide a disclaimer on the box for the general public that lets them know their router CAN and WILL BE accessed if they choose not to follow a very basic, and standard procedure to disallow that.

Although, after reading the post about 1/5 Americans dont know where our country is located on a map, im quite dubious to entertain the idea that the population is able to follow such simple directions.

Originally posted by RedGolem
As I understood it the man just logged on to an unsecured Internet connection. I do that all the time when I am traveling or out to lunch. Note Book computers will often log on automatically. I do not think this should be a crime. Although it has been compared to steeling cable television.

That's like saying, "if you leave your house unlocked, you deserve to get robbed." Well, not quite.

It's illegal because it's stealing bandwidth. If I'm downloading a file, and someone connects to my router and starts doing the same, my file will download more slowly.

Plus, this can be used by criminals to attack web sites anonymously, so that it appears that the person whose wireless connection got hacked did the illegal activity.

I regularly see people parked in the lay-by opposite my house steeling my wireless connection and I have approached several of them and they leave promptly.

I have contacted my wireless provider and they gave me an encryption code yet I still see people outside and I watch through the window as I unplug my router and there connection fails, so they can obviously still steel mine.

One night an unfortunate cyber thief found himself on the wrong side of me after I had spent the evening in my local bar celebrating a friends birthday, in fact the same friend had to drag me away from the thief's diminishing vehicle and in to my house, yet there were no allegations made against me, so I presume the guy knew he shouldn’t have been there doing what he was doing.

xS_Gx

Your wireless provider? Huh?

All you have to do is actually configure your router.

Well, I happen to know people who deliberately cruise around my city looking for unsecure networks, connect to them and download many illegal things such as pornography, pirated software and games. this is a crime and those who commit it should be arrested as it is theft.

Regular users who aren't tech savvy never get the chance to encrypt their wireless network during the easy set up process, at least when it comes to D-Link. You have to manually set up encryption and it isn't something the regular user can do, so you cannot fault the person who left his door unlocked to be just as guilty as the man who walked in and commited a crime.

Originally posted by metro
Regular users who aren't tech savvy never get the chance to encrypt their wireless network during the easy set up process, at least when it comes to D-Link. You have to manually set up encryption and it isn't something the regular user can do, so you cannot fault the person who left his door unlocked to be just as guilty as the man who walked in and commited a crime.

Actually, it's quite easy. Read the manual for two minutes and it'll tell you how.

Chances are you can get to the configuration screen by typing 192.168.1.1... into your web browser.

Originally posted by Johnmike
Chances are you can get to the configuration screen by typing 192.168.1.1... into your web browser.

Scary thing is, most people don't change the passwords for the router, even if they do enable encryption.

You have a good chance of hacking someones router by typing "Admin" for the username and "admin" for the password.

Originally posted by stumason
Scary thing is, most people don't change the passwords for the router, even if they do enable encryption.

You have a good chance of hacking someones router by typing "Admin" for the username and "admin" for the password.

But if it's set not to allow wireless access to any old computer, they can't connect to the router to type in the password.

Originally posted by stumason
I'll say it again

IGNORANCE IS NO DEFENCE

You make a very good point. And since terrorists and pedophiles are the people we hate/fear most shouldn't people lock down their wireless routers to stop these criminals, not doing so should make one and accessory to the crime. Should it not?

Vas

reply to post by Vasilis Azoth


I agree with what you said. The technology is there so every one who has a router can encrypt it. If it is not encrypted it should be considered public domain.
Many cities are getting wired for public access to Internet so I am hoping it will go that way when it gets to the courts.

Originally posted by stumason
Other people know that by accessing something that isn't theirs is wrong.

The point i've been making is that a lot of people DON'T know they're doing anything wrong. And yes you can talk about ignorance but it works both ways. People are stupid enough not to encrypt their internet connections, and people are stupid enough not to know how to turn their auto-connector off.

The thing that gets me is, if the man was arrested, then surely that means the admin of the network knew he was logged on right? So if he knows how to view the list of users on his network then he's obviously NOT tech-ignorant and he should know how to encrypt it.

This guy is sitting there in his house watching for people to log onto his network so he can bust them, but he doesn't once think "oh maybe i'll just stick a password on". That's pretty sad.

Originally posted by Johnmike
That's like saying, "if you leave your house unlocked, you deserve to get robbed." Well, not quite.

Er no it's not. If you leave your house unlocked, innocent people don't automatically fall into your house and rob it without realising what they're doing.

Plus, this can be used by criminals to attack web sites anonymously, so that it appears that the person whose wireless connection got hacked did the illegal activity.

Well that's why people should set up their networks properly. If they leave their network open to be used as a weapon then it's partly their fault if it gets used as a weapon. It's like in America where you can own guns, you don't leave your gun lying round on your porch because someone could take it and kill someone and you would get the blame. That's why you keep your gun under lock and key, and it's the same reason you keep your network under lock and key.

Looks like it is illegal to rip bandwidth in the U.S. while in the wild.

Man arrested for ripping internet

Originally posted by malganis
The thing that gets me is, if the man was arrested, then surely that means the admin of the network knew he was logged on right? So if he knows how to view the list of users on his network then he's obviously NOT tech-ignorant and he should know how to encrypt it.

This guy is sitting there in his house watching for people to log onto his network so he can bust them, but he doesn't once think "oh maybe i'll just stick a password on". That's pretty sad.

Thing that gets me is people commenting on a story that they obviously didn't read....

A 39-year-old man was arrested yesterday after he was spotted tapping away at his laptop while perched on a wall outside a home in Chiswick, west London, by two police community support officers.

The officers believed he was using the owner's unsecured wireless broadband connection without permission and he was arrested on suspicion of stealing the connection. He was taken to Chiswick police station and bailed until October pending further inquiries.

[edit on 27/8/07 by stumason]