Computer Fraud

A bank clerk and an electronics expert are being prosecuted in China's biggest computer fraud case, the People's Daily said Friday. Bank computer operator Xie Wenzhong, 24, and technology company worker Li Qiusheng, 29, are accused of setting up a bank account in the name of a non-existent firm to obtain $205,000, the paper said.

Congress passed the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act in the early days of the Internet to crack down on malicious hackers, but federal prosecutors have stretched the law since then to apply to computer users who merely violated a website's terms of service. Now, the House Judiciary Committee is circulating a proposed update of the act that, instead of fixing its flaws, would enable prosecutors to threaten alleged violators with dramatically bigger penalties. That's a dangerous step that lawmakers shouldn't even consider in light of the well-documented misuses of the law. The 1986 act makes it a crime to gain access to information on a computer in an unauthorized way -- for example, by hacking through the passwords protecting a shopping website's server and copying the credit card numbers stored there.

Convicted computer hacker Kevin Mitnick and a man investigators say was his accomplice in a computer crime scheme were arraigned Monday on 25 counts of computer fraud and other charges stemming from a two-year "hacking spree." Mitnick and Lewis DePayne pleaded not guilty in federal court in Los Angeles to charges in a hacking scheme that allegedly stole millions of dollars in software from computer firms.

By now, Web users should know about Aaron Swartz, because it's getting hard not to hear about him. The 26-year-old computer prodigy helped develop RSS and Reddit; he was also a folk hero to the open Web movement, which argues for greater information accessibility. Yet the question "do you really know Aaron Swartz?" vexed even close friends after his Jan. 11 suicide in New York, and Swartz has since become one of the nation's most closely scrutinized figures. This week, the New Yorker joined a raft of other publications -- including the Los Angeles Times , Slate , New York magazine , Rolling Stone , and the Atlantic -- in examining his life and death.

Pinkerton Security & Investigation Services, the 141-year-old detective agency whose slogan is "the eye that never sleeps," was caught napping by an employee who embezzled more than $1 million from the firm. Marita Juse, 48, of Burbank, pleaded guilty to computer fraud this week in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. Between January, 1988, and December, 1990, Juse wired $1.1 million of Pinkerton funds to her own account and accounts of two fictitious companies.

Congress passed the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act in the early days of the Internet to crack down on malicious hackers, but federal prosecutors have stretched the law since then to apply to computer users who merely violated a website's terms of service. Now, the House Judiciary Committee is circulating a proposed update of the act that, instead of fixing its flaws, would enable prosecutors to threaten alleged violators with dramatically bigger penalties. That's a dangerous step that lawmakers shouldn't even consider in light of the well-documented misuses of the law. The 1986 act makes it a crime to gain access to information on a computer in an unauthorized way -- for example, by hacking through the passwords protecting a shopping website's server and copying the credit card numbers stored there.

By now, Web users should know about Aaron Swartz, because it's getting hard not to hear about him. The 26-year-old computer prodigy helped develop RSS and Reddit; he was also a folk hero to the open Web movement, which argues for greater information accessibility. Yet the question "do you really know Aaron Swartz?" vexed even close friends after his Jan. 11 suicide in New York, and Swartz has since become one of the nation's most closely scrutinized figures. This week, the New Yorker joined a raft of other publications -- including the Los Angeles Times , Slate , New York magazine , Rolling Stone , and the Atlantic -- in examining his life and death.

Aaron Swartz may change the Internet yet again, even in death, with the help of lawmakers who have expressed a fondness for breaking the law. At a Washington, D.C., memorial Monday night, members of Congress and loved ones gathered to remember Swartz, who committed suicide on Jan. 11 while facing years in prison for mass-downloading scholarly articles. Swartz had already reshaped the Web experiences of millions by co-creating Reddit and the information-distribution service RSS. By turns, speakers at the Cannon House Office Building compared Swartz to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Apple founder Steve Jobs, and 20th century British programmer Alan Turing -- with Swartz as yet another cybergenius whose ambitions carried him to the law's edge.

Aaron Swartz, who co-founded Reddit and became an Internet folk hero for fighting to make online content free to the public, committed suicide Friday. He was 26. Swartz hanged himself in his Brooklyn, N.Y., apartment, said a statement released by his family and his girlfriend. "Aaron's commitment to social justice was profound, and defined his life," the statement said. "He used his prodigious skills as a programmer and technologist not to enrich himself but to make the Internet and the world a fairer, better place.

Two former Cisco Systems Inc. accountants pleaded guilty to computer-fraud charges, admitting that they illegally transferred $7.8 million in company stock to their personal brokerage accounts, prosecutors said. Geoffrey Osowski, 30, and Wilson Tang, 35, face up to five years in prison for misusing Cisco's computer system to obtain more than 230,000 shares of stock in the largest maker of computer-networking equipment.

As martyrs go, Aaron Swartz was an extraordinary example of the breed. A computer programming genius, he had helped develop the social networking site Reddit and became known as a leading advocate for easy and free information sharing on the Web. When Swartz committed suicide in January, while awaiting trial on federal computer hacking charges that could have landed him in prison for 35 years and cost him fines of $1 million, his death was seen...

Aaron Swartz may change the Internet yet again, even in death, with the help of lawmakers who have expressed a fondness for breaking the law. At a Washington, D.C., memorial Monday night, members of Congress and loved ones gathered to remember Swartz, who committed suicide on Jan. 11 while facing years in prison for mass-downloading scholarly articles. Swartz had already reshaped the Web experiences of millions by co-creating Reddit and the information-distribution service RSS. By turns, speakers at the Cannon House Office Building compared Swartz to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Apple founder Steve Jobs, and 20th century British programmer Alan Turing -- with Swartz as yet another cybergenius whose ambitions carried him to the law's edge.

Two of Congress' top watchdogs have asked the Justice Department to explain its prosecution of Aaron Swartz, a popular hacktivist who committed suicide Jan. 11. Swartz, 26, was facing the possibility of years in prison for downloading millions of academic articles from a pricey scholarly database, JSTOR, via the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's network. JSTOR declined to press charges, but U.S. attorneys went ahead with a prosecution anyway. After the cofounder of the social news site Reddit died, his family and girlfriend said the U.S. attorney's office in Boston had "hounded" Swartz to his death.

Aaron Swartz, who committed suicide last week at age 26, leaves behind quite a legacy for someone so young. He was an Internet activist dedicated to promoting the free flow of information online, which made him a hero to many. His most recent milestone was the launch of Demand Progress, a grass-roots lobbying group that helped defeat the Hollywood-backed anti-piracy bills known by the acronyms SOPA and PIPA. His eagerness to "liberate" information that others had locked behind pay walls,however, contributed to his undoing.

Aaron Swartz may be a galvanizing figure for Internet activists, but his exploits didn't exactly make him popular among copyright holders. In fact, the tributes to Swartz, who committed suicide last week while awaiting trial on computer fraud charges, have started drawing blowback from the defenders of strong copyrights, who argue that Swartz's efforts to "liberate" documents locked behind paywalls was nothing more than theft. A good example is an editorial in Friday's Wall Street Journal -- I'd link to it, but it's behind a paywall (insert your own snappy one-liner about irony or having the courage of one's convictions here)

As predicted, the suicide of Aaron Swartz , the widely admired hacktivist who helped create RSS and Reddit, has provoked at least one lawmaker to seek changes in the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act , or CFAA -- the law that federal prosecutors were using to try to send Swartz to prison. Enacted in 1986, the act bars "unauthorized access" to government and financial data or to "protected" computers used in or affecting interstate commerce (e.g., Web servers). Its broadest provision outlaws accessing "protected" computers without authorization and with intent to defraud, obtaining anything worth more than $5,000.

In the first prosecution under a new state cyber-stalking statute, a North Hollywood man has been charged with using the Internet in an attempt to set up the rape of a woman who had spurned his romantic advances. The case, which underscores the darker consequences of the Internet's power as a vast but largely anonymous medium, centers on the chilling account of a North Hollywood woman.

As martyrs go, Aaron Swartz was an extraordinary example of the breed. A computer programming genius, he had helped develop the social networking site Reddit and became known as a leading advocate for easy and free information sharing on the Web. When Swartz committed suicide in January, while awaiting trial on federal computer hacking charges that could have landed him in prison for 35 years and cost him fines of $1 million, his death was seen...

Federal prosecutors in Boston have dropped charges against Internet activist Aaron Swartz. Swartz, 26, was found dead Friday in his New York apartment. He apparently had hanged himself. Prosecutors filed the notice of dismissal on Monday. Swartz's family blamed his death on "prosecutorial overreach. " The U.S. attorney's office could not be reached for comment. Federal prosecutors alleged Swartz used MIT's computers to illegally access millions of academic articles through the JSTOR database, a subscription service for scholarly articles.

Aaron Swartz, who co-founded Reddit and became an Internet folk hero for fighting to make online content free to the public, committed suicide Friday. He was 26. Swartz hanged himself in his Brooklyn, N.Y., apartment, said a statement released by his family and his girlfriend. "Aaron's commitment to social justice was profound, and defined his life," the statement said. "He used his prodigious skills as a programmer and technologist not to enrich himself but to make the Internet and the world a fairer, better place.