2 ms·

They weren't accessing Facebook with their own account, they were accessing Facebook with their users' accounts.

dspillett 10y ago
At that point there is a significant chunk of law which may apply: if they can be seen, by the latter of the law, to be falsifying their identity (by using someone else's) to gain access to a resource, then there may be a case for them to be charged with fraud. Also, even though facebook themselves sometimes ask for the credentials to your other services (i.e. email accounts so they can scan for shared contacts), I bet their user agreements stipulate that your credentials for facebook should not be shared. I doubt they'd be stupid enough to punish their users for this, but is there some law that would be useful here for taking action against Power for encouraging users to breach their agreement with fb? NOTE: I'm not a lawyer so you'll need to check with one before relying on what I've just said to be correct!
- pc86 10y ago
  > if they can be seen, by the latter of the law, to be falsifying their identity (by using someone else's) to gain access to a resource, then there may be a case for them to be charged with fraud. You've just made quite a few APIs illegal.
  - dspillett 10y ago
    Where "impersonation" is part of the protocol no deception is involved, so this shouldn't affect such APIs. In fact in those cases it is not really impersonation, it is acting on behalf of, presumably by prior agreement (or similar by words that are a bit less anthropomorphic).
- riskable 10y ago
  Using someone's identity is only illegal if you do it without their knowledge/permission. Valets don't need to sign a power of attorney contract in order to use your keys to park your car. It's not really relevant to this case.
  - dpark 10y ago
    Car keys are not typically considered a form of identification. Also, the laws against identity theft do not always (ever?) reference the victim's knowledge. In California, if you impersonate someone and profit as a result, you are guilty of false impersonation. The law doesn't care if the person you're impersonating knows.

At that point there is a significant chunk of law which may apply: if they can be seen, by the latter of the law, to be falsifying their identity (by using someone else's) to gain access to a resource, then there may be a case for them to be charged with fraud. Also, even though facebook themselves sometimes ask for the credentials to your other services (i.e. email accounts so they can scan for shared contacts), I bet their user agreements stipulate that your credentials for facebook should not be shared. I doubt they'd be stupid enough to punish their users for this, but is there some law that would be useful here for taking action against Power for encouraging users to breach their agreement with fb? NOTE: I'm not a lawyer so you'll need to check with one before relying on what I've just said to be correct!

pc86 10y ago
> if they can be seen, by the latter of the law, to be falsifying their identity (by using someone else's) to gain access to a resource, then there may be a case for them to be charged with fraud. You've just made quite a few APIs illegal.
- dspillett 10y ago
  Where "impersonation" is part of the protocol no deception is involved, so this shouldn't affect such APIs. In fact in those cases it is not really impersonation, it is acting on behalf of, presumably by prior agreement (or similar by words that are a bit less anthropomorphic).
riskable 10y ago
Using someone's identity is only illegal if you do it without their knowledge/permission. Valets don't need to sign a power of attorney contract in order to use your keys to park your car. It's not really relevant to this case.
- dpark 10y ago
  Car keys are not typically considered a form of identification. Also, the laws against identity theft do not always (ever?) reference the victim's knowledge. In California, if you impersonate someone and profit as a result, you are guilty of false impersonation. The law doesn't care if the person you're impersonating knows.