There is nothing in the word “theft” that implies depriving someone of physical property.
Theft of private data deprives the owner of privacy. Theft of corporate secrets deprives the company of competitive advantage (and if not prosecuted, economy at large of incentives to innovate). IP theft deprives IP holder of ownership claim (and if not prosecuted, arts at large of incentives to create). Identity theft deprives the identity holder of whatever access to their identity provided to them. This can be continued infinitely.
These scenarios are not the same, and using “theft” for all of them is not precise. However, it is 2025 and in developed countries this sort of crime happens more often than basic theft of physical property, and the detriment from it is often much, much more severe than from basic theft of physical property. (I am sure I don’t need to explain how depriving IP owner of ownership claim can cost the original creator much more than depriving them of some single physical asset, both literally financially and in terms of psychological damage.) It’s therefore important to have a short, mainstream, easy to understand and non-legalese term for these scenarios.
Without any suitable mainstream term the word “theft” is a good enough intuitive approximation—if anything, it’s a bit too mild of a term.
> There is nothing in the word “theft” that implies depriving someone of physical property.
Of course there is. It's origin is the crime of taking of tangible property owned by someone else without consent. It did not apply to intangible property because it predates any concept of legally protected intellectual property that can be duplicated without loss.
Now, there was also the metaphorical use of theft for non-criminal / non-tangible things but poetic use of language shouldn't be confused with primary meanings. For example, "plagiarism" comes from the Latin for "kidnapping" coined playfully by a comic. It was never a crime or ever resembled actual kidnapping. If you call your poem "my baby" because of how precious it is to you, it doesn't become one. Badly editing your poem is not murder either yet you might complain in such dramatic terms.
You might want to argue something about metaphors and secondary meanings but we shouldn't consider the crime of kidnapping to mean reciting other's verses any more than a summer's day should mean temperate people. If we start taking metaphorical uses literally then you also have to start claiming silly things like most kidnapping being legal.
Only in later industrial society did the metaphor become less metaphorical in written law for criminal acts that emerged post-printing-press that were being called fraud, deception, infringement and piracy.
> deprives the owner of privacy
It's pretty metaphorical to describe such things as property that can be stolen.
With this latitude you can frame every injury as theft e.g. stabbing is the theft of good health, murder is theft of life, perjury is theft of a fair trial etc. You might choose to use such language because it's how we roll, but we also know that, as offences, they are not theft.
When an item cannot be traded or restored to the owner, is it property that can be owned and stolen or are concepts of injury, damage and destruction more legitimate?
When it comes to intellectual property, it's closer to contract law where citizens are compelled to abide by contracts the state issues and enforces. The movement of intangible theft from metaphor into law for breaching such a contract was popularised by the beneficiaries to rhetorically inflate an illusion of loss and justify severe sanctions for acts not considered unlawful for most of human history.
Theft (from Old English þeofð, cognate to thief) is the act of taking another person's property or services without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it
The word has become overloaded in recent decades to mean other things as well, but for over a thousand years theft has mean taking something from someone permanently
This is interesting, I definitely use "theft" colloquially for all these things.
For the digital assets, I mentally bucket copyright infringement and theft differently. For instance, if I copy someone's photography and sell it, that's copyright infringement (not theft). However, if I hacked into someones Google photos and sold the contents, I'd consider that theft (since there was no intent for the material to be available)
Granted, it's fair to disagree here, so I'm not adamantly against the definition that requires removing access or anything.
I think the above things are commonly considered theft. Totally fair to contend that the definition is wrong (and IMO that's a reasonable-minded contention), but I don't it's particularly double-think to bucket these digital "thefts" in the same category as physical thefts, either.
There is nothing in the word “theft” that implies depriving someone of physical property.
Theft of private data deprives the owner of privacy. Theft of corporate secrets deprives the company of competitive advantage (and if not prosecuted, economy at large of incentives to innovate). IP theft deprives IP holder of ownership claim (and if not prosecuted, arts at large of incentives to create). Identity theft deprives the identity holder of whatever access to their identity provided to them. This can be continued infinitely.
These scenarios are not the same, and using “theft” for all of them is not precise. However, it is 2025 and in developed countries this sort of crime happens more often than basic theft of physical property, and the detriment from it is often much, much more severe than from basic theft of physical property. (I am sure I don’t need to explain how depriving IP owner of ownership claim can cost the original creator much more than depriving them of some single physical asset, both literally financially and in terms of psychological damage.) It’s therefore important to have a short, mainstream, easy to understand and non-legalese term for these scenarios.
Without any suitable mainstream term the word “theft” is a good enough intuitive approximation—if anything, it’s a bit too mild of a term.
> There is nothing in the word “theft” that implies depriving someone of physical property.
Of course there is. It's origin is the crime of taking of tangible property owned by someone else without consent. It did not apply to intangible property because it predates any concept of legally protected intellectual property that can be duplicated without loss.
Now, there was also the metaphorical use of theft for non-criminal / non-tangible things but poetic use of language shouldn't be confused with primary meanings. For example, "plagiarism" comes from the Latin for "kidnapping" coined playfully by a comic. It was never a crime or ever resembled actual kidnapping. If you call your poem "my baby" because of how precious it is to you, it doesn't become one. Badly editing your poem is not murder either yet you might complain in such dramatic terms.
You might want to argue something about metaphors and secondary meanings but we shouldn't consider the crime of kidnapping to mean reciting other's verses any more than a summer's day should mean temperate people. If we start taking metaphorical uses literally then you also have to start claiming silly things like most kidnapping being legal.
Only in later industrial society did the metaphor become less metaphorical in written law for criminal acts that emerged post-printing-press that were being called fraud, deception, infringement and piracy.
> deprives the owner of privacy
It's pretty metaphorical to describe such things as property that can be stolen.
With this latitude you can frame every injury as theft e.g. stabbing is the theft of good health, murder is theft of life, perjury is theft of a fair trial etc. You might choose to use such language because it's how we roll, but we also know that, as offences, they are not theft.
When an item cannot be traded or restored to the owner, is it property that can be owned and stolen or are concepts of injury, damage and destruction more legitimate?
When it comes to intellectual property, it's closer to contract law where citizens are compelled to abide by contracts the state issues and enforces. The movement of intangible theft from metaphor into law for breaching such a contract was popularised by the beneficiaries to rhetorically inflate an illusion of loss and justify severe sanctions for acts not considered unlawful for most of human history.
Theft (from Old English þeofð, cognate to thief) is the act of taking another person's property or services without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it
The word has become overloaded in recent decades to mean other things as well, but for over a thousand years theft has mean taking something from someone permanently
Does it? There are loads of types of theft that don't remove the good or asset from the owner:
Identity theft, IP theft, theft of private digital assets (e.g. photos, writings, music)
Those are labels. Identity theft is more identity fraud. Theft of digital assets is copyright infringement.
This is interesting, I definitely use "theft" colloquially for all these things.
For the digital assets, I mentally bucket copyright infringement and theft differently. For instance, if I copy someone's photography and sell it, that's copyright infringement (not theft). However, if I hacked into someones Google photos and sold the contents, I'd consider that theft (since there was no intent for the material to be available)
Granted, it's fair to disagree here, so I'm not adamantly against the definition that requires removing access or anything.
Identity theft is someone else stealing money from the bank, and the bank telling you that's your problem now.
Identity theft in particular is a poor term because it shifts the blame from the verifier (the one who actually got things wrong) to the victim.
these are deliberate attempts to shift the overton window.
"lots of theft is not theft. Like for instance, all these things that are not theft"
... Lots of murder doesn't have a victim...
.... Lots of arson doesn't involve a fire...
... Lots of trespass involves not taking a single step from your work desk ..
... War is peace, peace is war...
I think the above things are commonly considered theft. Totally fair to contend that the definition is wrong (and IMO that's a reasonable-minded contention), but I don't it's particularly double-think to bucket these digital "thefts" in the same category as physical thefts, either.