The Document Liberation Front

Timothy Lee:

Many universities pay hefty subscription fees to provide their users unlimited access to archives like JSTOR. Most non-academics pay by the article. Swartz, who was a fellow at Harvard University in the fall of 2010, was apparently unhappy about this situation and so joined neighboring MIT's WiFi network as a guest and began rapidly downloading JSTOR documents. He reportedly got 4.8 million of them.

When JSTOR blocked his IP address, Swartz allegedly connected with a different IP address. When MIT then cut off his laptop from the network, Swartz allegedly changed his MAC address to allow him to regain access. Eventually, the government says that Swartz entered an MIT networking closet and plugged his laptop directly into the campus network.

The updated indictment describes the scene when Swartz returned to the closet a few days later to pick up his laptop: "Swartz held his bicycle helmet like a mask to shield his face, looking through ventilation holes in the helmet. Swartz then removed his computer equipment from the closet, put it in his backpack, and left, again masking his face with the bicycle helmet before peering through a crack in the double doors and cautiously stepping out."

Certainly there's no excuse for breaking into a private network closet and installing equipment without permission. But the government seems to have lost all sense of proportion here. And the apparent legal theory behind the government's case--that using a website in a manner that violates its terms of use constitutes felony computer hacking--could have serious unintended consequences.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at December 10, 2012 2:49 AM
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