Examining The Outrageous Aaron Swartz Indictment For Computer Fraud

I'm the author of that. It's dated, though to my knowledge none of the issues there have yet been resolved, and the trial is scheduled for February 2013. Seth Finkelstein noted < http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/archives/001476.html > that a new indictment has been filed, though it is not, at least in my brief skimming, substantially different, it just fills out the details.

There is a much bigger issue in this case, one that comes up surprisingly often: criminal prosecution for "exceeding authorized access." Should we prosecute people who use online services in violation of their Terms of Service? Of employees who, without installing malicious software, snoop around their networks for stuff they shouldn't be seeing? Is any of that worthy of criminal penalties?

Slightly dated, but interesting look at the JSTOR case against Swartz from someone who appears to understand the laws in play.