[nknighthb]

I haven't seen the indictment, but I assume he's been charged under one or more provisions of 18 USC Ch. 37[1], otherwise known as the Espionage Act of 1917, which covers things like "Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information".

Dictionaries are not the final arbiter of criminal law.

[1]http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/part-I/chapter-37

Edit: Criminal complaint here: http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/NEWS/A_U.S.%20new...

As I expected, there are two Espionage Act charges, specifically:

18 USC 793(d) Unauthorized Communication of National Defense Information

18 USC 798(a)(3) Willful Communication of Classified Communications Intelligence Information to an Unauthorized Person

[wavefunction]

"losing defense information"

Funny how none of the defense contractors that were hacked by the Chinese had to face these charges. Some rules for some, other rules for the rest of us.

[nknighthb]

Try reading the actual statute. I even linked to it. It requires gross negligence. Making wild assumptions does nothing to help our cause.

[wavefunction]

I guess I would consider exposing our next-generation fighter plans to the Internet gross negligence. That's all I'm saying.

[nknighthb]

You can consider whatever you want to be gross negligence. The legal system, on the other hand, would look to things like the exact circumstances, the reasons things were done as they were, and whether and to what degree the relevant actions deviated from relevant rules, regulations, and standard practices in similar situations.

And unless you have all of that information, you can't possibly make that judgement.

[wavefunction]

Like I said, it's just my opinion dude, so don't get all worked up. And if you're not getting worked up, my apologies, but that's how your replies seem to me.

For instance, it seems like common sense or widely accepted practice that sensitive materials should be stored on machines that should be air-gapped, and common knowledge informs legal decisions about what is gross negligence or not.

For instance:

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Gross+negligen...

"If one has borrowed or contracted to take care of another's property, then gross negligence is the failure to actively take the care one would of his/her own property."

Obviously this is open to interpretation and maybe the contractors responsible leave their own private affairs open willy-nilly to the world, but I would suppose they shouldn't have security clearance then...

[nknighthb]

How are you proposing that tens of thousands of people around the globe working together on multi-billion-dollar projects perform their jobs effectively if all the information is stored on isolated machines?