[surfinguru]

This is in response to the thread that bounced around here a month or so back reagarding this issue. Quite a few of you felt that it was an "okay" thing to do if the owner didn't properly encrypt their signal. Regardless, it's still illegal.


Published: Friday 22 July 2005

A UK man has been fined £500 and sentenced to 12 months' conditional discharge for hijacking a wireless broadband connection.

On Wednesday, a jury at Isleworth court in London found Gregory Straszkiewicz, 24, guilty of dishonestly obtaining an electronic communications service and possessing equipment for fraudulent use of a communications service.

Straszkiewicz was prosecuted under sections 125 and 126 of the Communications Act 2003.

Police sources said Straszkiewicz was caught standing outside a building in a residential area holding a wireless-enabled laptop. The Crown Prosecution Service confirmed that Straszkiewicz was 'piggybacking' the wireless network that householders were using. He was reported to have attempted this several times before police arrested him.

The case is believed to be the first of its kind in the UK.

Last year, 21-year-old Brian Salcedo was sentenced to nine years in a US prison for siphoning credit card numbers over a wireless network from hardware store Lowes.

http://management.silicon.com/government/0,39024677,39150672,00.htm

Another case:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/07/07/wi.fi.theft.ap/

 

[rooftest]

It looks like if you do this without breaking any laws (stealing credit card #'s, etc.)
Then you're okay.

 

[Jayridesacove]

If you're stupid enough to get caught, you deserve to get arrested...there are easier ways to find a connection without having to sit in someone's driveway or stand close to their house.

 

[Changleen]

Yeah just frickin pay for it you frickin pikeys. Jeeze, you can afford a wireless laptop, but you feel the need to 'steal' a signal? It's not like ther's not a million and one regular hotspots in London.

 

[binary visions]

It looks like if you do this without breaking any laws (stealing credit card #'s, etc.)
Then you're okay.

That's not what it says. The second charge was for doing illegal stuff with the connection. The first charge was "dishonestly obtaining an electronic communications service."

I suppose they have to prove that you knew it wasn't a signal you were allowed to use. Probably easy in this case since the guy was chillin' in his vehicle outside the house. I'd imagine it'd be harder if you were in your own home.

 

[stinkyboy]

Yeah just frickin pay for it you frickin pikeys. Jeeze, you can afford a wireless laptop, but you feel the need to 'steal' a signal? It's not like ther's not a million and one regular hotspots in London.

That IS pretty retarded. "I think I'll walk around the city with my new laptop and try to steal some intraweb"

 

[hooples3]

I pay for my wireless service.. and I have been tempted to cancel it because my neighbor's signal is available in my house but id rather pay and have peace of mind

 

[Ciaran]

I pay for my wireless service.. and I have been tempted to cancel it because my neighbor's signal is available in my house but id rather pay and have peace of mind

Cancel yours and split the bill with your neighbor for his intarweb signal.

 

[luken8r]

I pay for my wireless service.. and I have been tempted to cancel it because my neighbor's signal is available in my house but id rather pay and have peace of mind

most, if not all, wireless routers allow you to broadcast to only certain NIC addresses, distance (restrict broadcast power), and the number clients connected. the router my buddy uses is invisible to anyone other than his desktop and two laptops. keep it and RTFM from your router, its easy

 

[robdamanii]

That IS pretty retarded. "I think I'll walk around the city with my new laptop and try to steal some intraweb"

But you could do so with a wireless enabled pocket PC or something similar.

 

[Polandspring88]

My neighbor used to tap into our wireless signal all the time. We do not know if it was on purporse or what, but a quick trip into the router settings enabled us to boot him and only allow computers on our networks to get net access.

 

[johnbryanpeters]

Sorry if this is a little like N8, but here are a few actual incidents and some FBI comments on the matter:

"Smith, who police said admitted to using Dinon's Wi-Fi, has been charged with unauthorized access to a computer network, a third-degree felony. A pretrial hearing is set for July 11."
http://www.sptimes.com/2005/07/04/State/Wi_Fi_cloaks_a_new_br.shtml

This article is one of several on the subject...
http://www.designnine.com/news/?q=node/423

"In July, a court in Isleworth convicted Straszkiewicz of using a laptop to access the Internet over unprotected residential wireless LANs on several occasions. He was fined $874 and got a 12-month conditional discharge."
http://www.pcworld.com/resource/article/0,aid,122153,pg,1,RSS,RSS,00.asp

...
FBI agent's cut:

To toss a federal investigative perspective into the mix, I offer the following.

You trespass into someone else's access you have technically committed a federal felony. In reality, the totality of the circumstances is going to determine whether or not you are ever prosecuted.

For example, if you generally computer ignorant (read: average user), flip on your machine, find that you have suddenly "developed" wireless access and start to surf the net on your nifty new Dell laptop, checking your e-mail and what not, without doing anything damaging or malicious, you are not very likely to do any federal prison time.

The other side of that coin is a person like, say, anyone on this listserve, who finds themselves on someone else's wireless ISP and has themselves a grand time going hither and yon, is in a different boat and one that is dangerously close to the falls. That same person starts hacking and cracking under the same set of circumstances, and the illegal intrusion just became an additional federal charge that we are going to heap on you in order to swiftly correct your clearly anti-social and aberrant behavior.

As LT [xxx] mentioned earlier, going down this road is a bad idea. It puts the individual in a place where he/she might have to explain themselves (perhaps through a lawyer) in order to avoid jail time and a felony conviction. The open door is not altogether a bad analogy, in that such is absolutely NOT a legal invitation to trespass, nor is an unsecured wireless access. Such absolutely makes the victim less sympathetic, but at this point being stupid is not illegal while unlawful access (real or cyber) is.

From a prosecutive point of view, it makes it easier for us to say that the trespasser had evil intent when he/she accessed a given wireless network if that person had to overcome some kind of security protocol to do so. It shows intent via action and makes it easier to convey to a prosecutor, judge, and jury.
...
18 USC 1030 is the main statute that is at issue, and it is a rather convoluted one at that. It is a pretty heavy duty statute and directed at those committing serious crimes (you know, terrorism, extortion, that sort of thing). It is sort of the criminal staute version of Gary Kessler's book: fun to read if you are into that sort of thing, way too deep and esoteric if you are not.

I have spoken with the US Attorney's Office here in VT and the only potential fly in the ointment that I posted earlier is that, under the right circumstances, such intrusions could be only a federal misdemeanor. For example, just gaining unauthorized access falls in that arena. Still a crime, but just not as serious. However, once you have done that for "private gain" or with some kind of intent to defraud someone of value (i.e. the value of the internet service), you are headed down a road you really don't want to go down.

You may also get into trouble with federal wiretapping statutes (18 USC 2511 says you can't just jump into some else's phone service, you know, but it is mostly directed at content).

As I said earlier, the totality of the circumstances is going to play a big role in what eventually happens. The track record of the authorities here in VT, both state and federal, is one that (to my mind) is deeply steeped in common sense. If you as some hapless user, get cross-ways with the law inadvertently, nobody is going to come after you. If there is a real bad guy out there, doing stuff that they should not be doing, well, they probably need to be legally spanked and, in that regard, we are happy to help.

Public sites, those that are inviting free use, obviously are fine for use by all and sundry, as that is clearly their intent in the first place.

Roaming around simply LOCATING wireless access points probably won't get you in trouble. USING them, particuarly for nefarious purposes, is a different story.

I have also imposed on the US Attorney's office to try to get us a more definitive answer on statutes and case law from main Justice (read: DOJ), which I will pass on as soon as I get something to pass on.
...

This is from some Infragard conversations.

J

 

[Senôr Lopez]

I saw two sketchy guys on Friday night walking around town with a laptop out. I know for a fact they were trying to signal hijack. It's so easy to do because people don't take a few mins to configure their router properly!

 

[Reactor]

Hide your SSID's, lock the Mac addresses to devices you own, and add an encryption key. Unless someone is determined they won't be able to access your network.

 

[RaID]

well it is stealling

an anology
is it ok to use/take a bike that someone left outside because it is not locked?


unfortunately a lot of ppl and buisness dont know that you have to put security on your net connection. A good example of this, my dad runs a computer firm and was setting up wireless equiped laptop to his wireless network
only to find 4 other networks in the vicinity that were all unprotected

 

[blt2ride]

well it is stealling

an anology
is it ok to use/take a bike that someone left outside because it is not locked?


unfortunately a lot of ppl and buisness dont know that you have to put security on your net connection. A good example of this, my dad runs a computer firm and was setting up wireless equiped laptop to his wireless network
only to find 4 other networks in the vicinity that were all unprotected

Good point. When you think about it, it's not worth the risk. It's kind of like the old "black boxes" that people used to steal cable. A lot of people did it for a while--until the cable companies started to crack down.

 

[mack]

Bummer. Thats no fun.