From: cwright@bdosyd.com.au
Date: Fri Jun 01 2007 - 18:48:34 EDT
They are offering a service, “stay and use our café, drink our coffee and the service is included as a part of the deal” so to say. This is – they are not offering the Internet connection to people who do not use the café.
If you find a power point do you think that you have the right to arbitrarily connect to it and use free electricity? Do you think that you have the right to arbitrarily connect a hose to a city water main and fill a water tanker for free? These are all the same principles. Why people think that the Internet, computers and networking are a special law all to their own I will never understand.
Basically, you need to have permission.
This is either explicit permission – a banner or other means categorically states that you can use the service. Or you need to have implied permission such as being a patron of the café in this example.
Accessing the property of another always requires some for of permission of it is a trespass. There may be defences to the act of trespass which stop you getting into trouble, but it is still a trespass. An example, you see a fire and a person in a house. You break down the door and run in to get the person. You have technically committed a trespass – but the circumstances are such that the need overrides the trespass. The same goes for computers. I do not however see many cases (and have thus far seen none) where a computer break-in could be justified.
To use the property of another – this includes computers, the Internet pipe etc – you need to have “license” to do so. License is a legal word or art. It means that you have a right to use something. By default, you do not have a right to use another’s property. To do this, it must be licensed for your use. In the case of the café, the right to use the wireless pipe is contingent on being a customer or patron of the café.
This is not anything new. The common law of license goes back in this form to the 16th Century. Statute just makes it easier to have the police understand the law. The simple thing is that you are doing something illegal any time you assume the rights of another without permission.
Regards,
Craig
>>>>Using free wireless is illegal but not if there is a
message saying public then it is not. Maybe I am not seeing the whole
picture but I believe the burden of notification is on the owner/access
point. This is the case in most states. Using the articles example of a
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