Couldn't you just get on an unsecure wireless connection to DL warez and kiddy pr0n?

[BrunoPuntzJones]

There are so many places that give wireless access. McDonalds, colleges, coffee shops.

Seems like it'd be a lot safer to the people who were downloading movies, or for terrorists to make posts/plans

I live in a duplex and there is some 30 units here. Dunno who all has wireless, but there are some open connections out there. Anyone could connect to it and do their dirty work, and be virutally impossible to be caught.

What are the laws on this? Are people responsible for what passes through their wireless router? I mean it'd be easy to be downloading it yourself, but when you get questioned by the police, just say "oops, my router is unsecure! was someone else"

Offices downtown where you don't need any permissions to browse the interweb. Just park your car, leave a laptop running, download that new Harry Potter flick and go grab a cup of coffee. Come back in a half hour and drive home.

Am I missing something obvious?

 

[Looney]

Depends on what your connection speed is... if you're far away from the AP, then you're probably getting crappy speeds. But yeah, it's possible.

 

[Martin]

They do that.

I remember a while back reading an article where a guy was caught downloading kiddie porn using an unsecured wireless connection. The way he was caught though was that he was parked outside a house and was sitting there for a long time. A police car happened to be there, got suspicious and that's how they caught him.

If one is just a little careful, it would be impossible to get caught.

 

[Zenmervolt]

The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

 

[WhiteKnight]

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt
The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

It seems to me that unless they can prove that you are guilty of the dl then they've got nothing. Guilty until proven innocent? I don't think so.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: WhiteKnight

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt
The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

It seems to me that unless they can prove that you are guilty of the dl then they've got nothing. Guilty until proven innocent? I don't think so.

You're confusing the way things should be with reality.

 

[Looney]

Originally posted by: WhiteKnight

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt
The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

It seems to me that unless they can prove that you are guilty of the dl then they've got nothing. Guilty until proven innocent? I don't think so.

The problem is that these are not criminally charges that these downloaders are being charged with... these are simply threats by the RIAA or MPAA, and the only thing they can do is a civil suit... but most people get so scared that they don't even bother fighting it.

 

[Zenmervolt]

Originally posted by: WhiteKnight

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt
The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

It seems to me that unless they can prove that you are guilty of the dl then they've got nothing. Guilty until proven innocent? I don't think so.

Your connection was used. That's their proof. Just saying that someone _might have_ logged in is not a reasonable doubt. It's technically possible for someone to break in and use your internet connection even if you have a wired connection.

The company would never be able to make a lawsuit stick if they had to prove that nobody else had logged onto the network. Basically, they have sufficient proof that you downloaded the material since it came through your router/modem.

ZV

 

[her209]

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt
The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

Just show them your newbie wireless setup?

 

[PingSpike]

So, in conclusion, always download you movies from your neighbors network.

 

[TerryMathews]

Originally posted by: Hardcore

Originally posted by: WhiteKnight

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt
The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

It seems to me that unless they can prove that you are guilty of the dl then they've got nothing. Guilty until proven innocent? I don't think so.

The problem is that these are not criminally charges that these downloaders are being charged with... these are simply threats by the RIAA or MPAA, and the only thing they can do is a civil suit... but most people get so scared that they don't even bother fighting it.

Right, and in a civil suit, the burden isn't "no reasonable doubt", it's "more likely than not".

 

[MustISO]

They may be able to prove you downloaded the files but they can't prove you uncompressed them and burned them to disc.

 

[Kishan]

Originally posted by: Hardcore
Depends on what your connection speed is... if you're far away from the AP, then you're probably getting crappy speeds. But yeah, it's possible.

does that really matter? Router is always on.

 

[Aimster]

What happens if you go on a newsgroup server and some Ahole decides to upload his collection of kiddy porn there and you click on one not knowing what it is?

 

Um, they likely log MAC addresses connected to their network for this very purpose.

 

[SludgeFactory]

yeah I think you're screwed in a civil case, the lawsuit isn't going away regardless of what your excuse is, unless you have the actual pirate testifying that they sat outside your house and committed the infringing activity.

Whereas with the criminal prosecution, I believe they'll need some evidence of possession. Law enforcement will seize your computer and wade through all your other pr0n in search of kiddie porn that you didn't download. It's at a time like that that you really hope you don't have a collection of Scandanavian porn of dubious content...

 

[OulOat]

Originally posted by: Aimster
What happens if you go on a newsgroup server and some Ahole decides to upload his collection of kiddy porn there and you click on one not knowing what it is?

You're going to jaaaiiiilllll!!!!!

 

[Pepsi90919]

Originally posted by: jumpr
Um, they likely log MAC addresses connected to their network for this very purpose.

so spoof it.

 

[Looney]

Originally posted by: KPSHAH316

Originally posted by: Hardcore
Depends on what your connection speed is... if you're far away from the AP, then you're probably getting crappy speeds. But yeah, it's possible.

does that really matter? Router is always on.

Well it may take longer than what it takes to get a coffee.

 

[rahvin]

In a civil trial it might win you the case but you will spend $$ on the defense. In a criminal trial if you had no evidence on your computer equipment and all they had was the downloads they likely wouldn't even prosecute because without possestion you could make the defense that someone was using your connection and I doubt any jury in this land would convict you.

 

[SludgeFactory]

Originally posted by: Aimster
What happens if you go on a newsgroup server and some Ahole decides to upload his collection of kiddy porn there and you click on one not knowing what it is?

aha you got PWNED

From what I've read, it's possible to log downloads, but many providers don't, and nobody would keep the logs very long because of storage. Chances of a random mistake resulting in a problem for you are about nil.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: Hardcore

Originally posted by: KPSHAH316

Originally posted by: Hardcore
Depends on what your connection speed is... if you're far away from the AP, then you're probably getting crappy speeds. But yeah, it's possible.

does that really matter? Router is always on.

Well it may take longer than what it takes to get a coffee.

I don't have wireless...but the bottleneck is going to be the cable/dsl/whatever at around 1mbit/s and even a really poor connection to the AP should be able to get you that much anyway.

But still...probably not in the time it takes to get a cup of coffee at any rate. Unless you have an amazing connection to the downloading computer, which hardly ever happens in P2P in my experience.

 

[rh71]

why don't these free wireless access points limit you to port 80/443 ?

 

[biostud]

They are traps set up to catch terrorists, all these open spots are watched over by NSA.

*tinfoil on*

 

[notfred]

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt

Originally posted by: WhiteKnight

Originally posted by: Zenmervolt
The burden would be on you to prove that the downloading had been done by someone other than yourself. And good luck doing that.

ZV

It seems to me that unless they can prove that you are guilty of the dl then they've got nothing. Guilty until proven innocent? I don't think so.

Your connection was used. That's their proof. Just saying that someone _might have_ logged in is not a reasonable doubt. It's technically possible for someone to break in and use your internet connection even if you have a wired connection.

The company would never be able to make a lawsuit stick if they had to prove that nobody else had logged onto the network. Basically, they have sufficient proof that you downloaded the material since it came through your router/modem.

ZV

I could make anything i want go through your router/modem if I knew your IP address. It'd essentially be a ping flood, but instead of pings, I could send you kiddie porn. You can't prevent people from sending you data, you can just choose to ignore it.