[anonymouz]

I don't think any charges have ever been brought against Wikileaks. What they are doing seems 100% benign to me. The individual whistle-blowers that send information to them may get in trouble with the law, but Wikileaks itself only curates and distributes the information given to them.

On the other hand it is pretty clear that Aaron Schwarz did break the law, only the severity of the crimes is in dispute.

[analog]

He broke a website's TOS, it's not at all clear that he broke the law imo.

[anonymouz]

Don't get hung up on the JSTOR ToS. I think the more serious charges are the ones related to him obtaining access to MIT's network despite the fact that it was clear to him that he was not welcome, and circumventing measures that prevented him from connecting in the process.

Not exactly a capital offense, but an offense nonetheless.

[analog]

"despite the fact that it was clear to him that he was not welcome"

Well this is the bit that's unclear, MIT has an open network. Is changing your MAC address to stay on illegal? Another TOS violation in my opinion, either that or we're all guilty of federal offences.

[anonymouz]

Please, this has been rehashed hundreds of times here already: Just because they decide to be nice and have their network open by default to anyone does not mean they can't revoke someones authorization and kick him out if he does not behave well on their network.

Changing a MAC address by itself is not illegal. Doing so in order to gain access to a network which he is no longer authorized to access is. He was in an arms race, circumventing ever stronger countermeasures against him. He went much further than changing his MAC address, and he was obviously aware of the fact that he was no longer welcome.

[analog]

Changing a MAC address by itself is not illegal. Doing so in order to gain access to a network which he is no longer authorized to access is.

Sorry, but I disagree strongly with this. I don't believe it is illegal, and I certainly don't believe it should be. This would make criminals of anyone who used a throwaway email to access a web service a second time.

Whether or not it is illegal would ultimately be for a jury to decide.

[anonymouz]

Yes, it would be for a jury to decide. But a jury (or a judge) is perfectly capable of distinguishing between someone signing up to two Gmail accounts and someone gaining unauthorized access to a network by circumventing countermeasures taken specifically to prevent him from accessing said network.

Application of law is not a an execution of a script applied by a stupid robot: It does allow for intent and the bigger picture to be factoring in.

There are many reason to claim that Aaron's actions were rather harmless, and that, taking all factors into account, they do not warrant significant punishment. But claiming that he did not do anything illegal at all requires some serious twisting of the facts.