Re: port scanning withing the US: legal?

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From: unruh@string.physics.ubc.ca (Bill Unruh)
Date: 24 Oct 2002 23:40:32 GMT

bray@iupui.edu (Bruce D. Ray) writes:

]In article <ap76ul$go5$1@helios.herts.ac.uk>, i.h.gregory@herts.ac.uk wrote:

]> norm wrote:
]>
]> >Why do people not think of computers as private property
]> >not to be trespassed upon?
]>
]> I guess the main argument is:
]>
]> When someone *voluntarily* decides to connect their computer (private
]> property) to the Internet they are effectively making it a part of
]> the Internet (public property). It is like agreeing to be assimilated.

]1. To call the internet "public property" is like calling
] a cable TV system, or a telephone system "public property".
] None of these is "public property". They are neither
] designed like nor managed like public parks, public
] roadways, or public sidewalks. They may all be utilities
] available to the public, but that does not make them
] "public property".

Bad analogy. A phone call is a point to point call. You have to take
special measures to listen in on a call. Your analogy would be "is demon
dialing illegal?" The answer in general is no, although some places have
passed special laws to deal specifically with demon dialing.

]2. To claim that connecting to the internet effectively
] makes one's computer a part of the internet is like
] claiming that connecting one's TV to a cable TV service
] effectively makes one's TV part of the cable TV service.

A TV is a one way device. It accepts signals and does not produce them.
It is not clear what it would mean to say that one's TV is part of the
cable TV services. What would you imagine someone could do if they
decided the answer to your question is yes.

] Ownership and control of one's TV is not transferred to
] a cable TV service by connecting one's TV to it. Nor
] does connecting one's computer to the internet transfer
] legal ownership or control to anyone else on the internet.

It clearly would not give them the right to walk into your house to
switch on or off the TV. What else could they do?

]> Of course there are counter-arguments but there is no definitive answer,
]> particularly when you consider that the concept of private property
]> itself is not beyond the bounds of rational debate.

]What is not beyond debate, although seemingly ignored by
]those who wish to debate trespass on systems on the internet,
]is the nature of systems on the internet. Increasing numbers
]of systems on the internet are medical instrument control
]systems connected to the internet for the purposes of instrument
]maintenance and calibration by the manufacturer, and of
]transfer of raw data on patients to examining and treating
]physicians. While these systems are aggressively hardened,
]firewalled, and protected,and data connections to these
]systems are encrypted, it is not possible to guarantee that
]they cannot be broken into. Anyone who wishes to argue that
]such systems should not be connected to the internet is free
]to do so, provided that he either justify nearly doubling
]the costs of MRIs, CAT scans, PET scans, gamma ray treatments,
]and a whole host of other patient monitoring methods and medical
]laboratory tests, in order to pay for manual shuffling of the
]data, for the extra service visits needed, and for the materials
]need for manual system updates, or justify returning the practice
]of medicine essentially to where it was at the end of the
]1970's.

Now, what is it that you are asking here? You are saying that because
they are connected to sensitive equipment port scanning, which will we
assume do no damage at all, should be illegal? Clearly there exist laws
which would make the use of those instrucments to damage patients etc
illegal, but that was not the issue. Ie, this looks like a red herring
to me.

]As long as various people insist that they have some intrinsic
]right to meddle at will or whim with computers other than their
]own the function of which they do not necessarily know, people's
]medical treatment, medical records, and very lives are threatened.
]This is not some fantasy. This is not alarmism. This is merely
]the way modern medical instruments are designed.

I guess they had better be designed better.

]> Then of course there is the differnce between legal/illegal and
]> right/wrong.

Yes, not everything that you consider wrong should be illegal.

]Most of the world agrees that murder is always wrong and
]always illegal. Wouldn't deliberate actions known to place
]others' lives in danger at least come close to murder?

Probably. And current laws cover that case. But that was not what was
being discussed.

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