Comment by mindslight
12 years ago
Perhaps these "other people" who don't want their property "interfered with" should not wantonly hook it up to a global communications network full of anonymous actors. In an ideal world the law would quickly change to match the reality of an unaccountable network, hacking itself would be legal, and only specific intended harm caused by it would be a crime.
The problem here stems from young being people more in touch with actual reality, as they haven't been beaten down by society to respect arbitrary social mores. So they take risks doing things that seemingly should have no consequence - like smoking marijuana or sending nonstandard signals over communication networks. And so a few unlucky ones get caught, and the best they can currently hope for is to have an institution that will go to bat and isolate them from the "real world" of public persecutors' scoreboards.
cool! would you be okay if someone hacked your computer and posted all of your e-mail to the public?
I'd clearly be upset, but that doesn't mean I'd pursue legal recourse. Not that I'd even have that available to me today, unless the perpetrator is unlucky and I'm a celebrity.
And none of what I said keeps vindictively publishing someone's semi-private information from being the specific crime in your example. My point is that the serious of the situation should depend on the intent and damage caused, as well as the actual victims (email account holder) feeling of wrongedness, rather than an immediate felony because witchcraft. For example if you get into a bar fight, there is a whole spectrum from getting temporarily kicked out, to assault charges, to second-degree murder, depending on what actually occurs. While getting into a scuffle is wrong, it doesn't and shouldn't lead to life-altering penalties.