I think you've just stumbled across the crux of the government's position regarding PRISM. To provide a contrasting example: GCHQ tapped fiber-optic lines betw

I think you've just stumbled across the crux of the government's position regarding PRISM. To provide a contrasting example: GCHQ tapped fiber-optic lines between corporate datacenters. Those lines are not public and are therefore not supposed to be up for grabs; tapping them without the consent of their owners is an espionage activity. Attaching to an open network that fuzz-routes data and then cheating on the policies of that network that are intended to anonymize the requesters of the data is just good old-fashioned protocol circumvention. Definitely rude and demonstrative of a major practical weakness in tor, but probably not illegal. It doesn't sound like there was any law for SEI to break here (though I hadn't heard the suggestion that the CFAA might apply, which is an interesting legal angle to explore).