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by matthewmacleod
4187 days ago
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What harm is there in viewing data? None. Yes there is – you've consumed other people's data without permission. Would the same apply to physical trespass in your mind? Is there any harm in entering an accidentally unlocked house and snooping around? There's nothing preventing you from doing so... I'd argue that it's wrong, and equivalent to consuming data which is obviously intended to be private. It's not like there's ambiguity about it's status. Which do you find is indefensible, seeking to consume data or consuming it Surely you can only consume data if you seek to do so? |
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Except you don't consume it, you view it. The data remains and is accessible at all times to others. If you don't use it you haven't consumed it in any way.
>Is there any harm in entering an accidentally unlocked house and snooping around? //
There is a lack of equivalence here IMO as personal space, such as in a dwelling place, is quite different from non-dwelling space. The case of viewing data (to me) is like a person walking across your farmland without permission; quite different to finding them in your bedroom. The lack of equivalence between physical and virtual spaces makes this analogy fundamentally flawed.
If it's addressable on the internet then it's not private: If you hide your diary under your bed, that's private. If you hide it under a bush in the park, that's not private.
>Surely you can only consume data if you seek to do so? //
I shouldn't have used "consume", as the data is not consumed but viewed (unless it's used in later actions that "consume" it somehow). That said, you can view data without seeking to view it; you can seek to view data without being able to view it. If in the OP the person had tried altering the account ID and they couldn't view data from their other account would they still be committing an indefensible wrong in your opinion?
Interestingly I was just on a site called PC Builder that had price data in INR (Rupee), switching to USD added a section to the URL and I, to see if I could use the site in GBP, went to the URL and altered it ... did I commit a crime in your opinion?