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As a real-world analogue: you can indeed be guilty of trespassing on someone's property even if you don't have to jump over any fences or pick any locks to get

As a real-world analogue: you can indeed be guilty of trespassing on someone's property even if you don't have to jump over any fences or pick any locks to get there. In some places, they don't even have to have a "no trespassing" sign. Simply being present on someone else's property without an invitation from them is illegal, and no, an open door does not count as an invitation.

LyndsySimon 7y ago
You generally can’t be charged with trespass unless you refuse to leave when told to do so. An open door to a home is different, but unfenced property is 100% not trespass until you refuse to leave.
- txcwpalpha 7y ago
  That's not true at all. If you are aware that the property you are accessing is not meant for your use, you can be charged with trespassing regardless of if you have specifically been asked to leave or not. It's even possible to be guilty of trespass even if you weren't aware that you weren't allowed on the land. This is negligent trespassing.
  - admax88q 7y ago
    Negligence only applies I'm situations where a reasonable person should have known. You're only able to be charged with trespassing whilst being unaware if you were to so ridiculously unaware of your surroundings that any reasonable person in the same situation _would_ have known that they were trespassing. If a public park blends into somebodies private lawn you can't be charged with tresspassing for stepping over the line.
- jcranmer 7y ago
  Trespass in criminal law usually requires notice that trespassing is prohibited, but this is usually satisfied by posting a "no trespassing" sign in a prominent area. For example, my state's law (emphasis added): > Whoever, without right enters or remains in or upon the dwelling house, buildings, boats or improved or enclosed land, wharf, or pier of another, or enters or remains in a school bus, as defined in section 1 of chapter 90, after having been forbidden so to do by the person who has lawful control of said premises, whether directly or by notice posted thereon, ... The federal version of trespass (which I think applies to Indian reservations) considers merely fencing off the area to be sufficient notice that trespassing is prohibited.
codedokode 7y ago
this is bad comparison because when scraping a site, you don't cross any borders, you just send and receive information. You can compare this to a phone call or to talking to someone.
- txcwpalpha 7y ago
  A website or server is property, just like land is. Accessing it is no different than accessing any other piece of property. Opening a website is, for all intents and purposes, the same as crossing a border. To take it a step further, the information on said website is also personal property, and accessing the information without permission is also trespassing. Specifically, this is called trespass to chattels [1] (trespass is most usually legally defined as trespass to person, trespass to land, and trespass to chattels). Even more specifically, this is the actual part of the CFAA that's being debated: computer trespass gets its roots from trespass to chattels. [2] 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels#In_the_electronic_age https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels#In_the_el...
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - admax88q 7y ago
    Lol really? I'm not "on" your site when I browse there. I asked your server to send me some data and it did so. Its real life equivalent to social engineering. Its so far not illegal for me to ask you things and for you to disclose them to me even if you weren't supposed to. I'm allowed to lie to you even to persuade you to tell me things.
    - txcwpalpha 7y ago
      You didn't "ask my server". You used a tool to extract data from my server. It's more akin to you standing just outside my property border and using a fishing pole to pull fish from a pond that is inside my property border. You're still trespassing even if your two feet aren't physically on my land. The common legal argument (see the second link in my above comment) is that accessing a web server actually does constitute being "on" the server because you are sending signals to my server in order to interact with it, and this satisfies the "physical contact" part of trespassing. From Wikipedia: > The courts that imported this common law doctrine into the digital world reasoned that electrical signals traveling across networks and through proprietary servers may constitute the contact necessary to support a trespass claim. >Its real life equivalent to social engineering. Its so far not illegal for me to ask you things and for you to disclose them to me even if you weren't supposed to. I'm allowed to lie to you even to persuade you to tell me things. This absolutely would be illegal and I'm not sure why you think otherwise. Misrepresenting yourself in order for me to reveal to you private information is fraud and is illegal in pretty much every jurisdiction I can think of.
mr_toad 7y ago
> an open door does not count as an invitation. But if you have a someone living there who lets anyone in if they ask, it would be pretty hard to argue they are trespassing. A user agent must ask for every page with an http request. If the server responds with 200 OK, it’s pretty hard to argue that it isn’t letting (or even inviting) you in.
- dodobirdlord 7y ago
  This doesn't cover you if you lied to get the invitation. If a robots.txt file denies some but not all user agents, setting your user agent to indicate that your request originates from a source it does not originate from is clearly a circumvention of an access control.

LyndsySimon 7y ago

You generally can’t be charged with trespass unless you refuse to leave when told to do so. An open door to a home is different, but unfenced property is 100% not trespass until you refuse to leave.

txcwpalpha 7y ago
That's not true at all. If you are aware that the property you are accessing is not meant for your use, you can be charged with trespassing regardless of if you have specifically been asked to leave or not. It's even possible to be guilty of trespass even if you weren't aware that you weren't allowed on the land. This is negligent trespassing.
- admax88q 7y ago
  Negligence only applies I'm situations where a reasonable person should have known. You're only able to be charged with trespassing whilst being unaware if you were to so ridiculously unaware of your surroundings that any reasonable person in the same situation _would_ have known that they were trespassing. If a public park blends into somebodies private lawn you can't be charged with tresspassing for stepping over the line.
jcranmer 7y ago
Trespass in criminal law usually requires notice that trespassing is prohibited, but this is usually satisfied by posting a "no trespassing" sign in a prominent area. For example, my state's law (emphasis added): > Whoever, without right enters or remains in or upon the dwelling house, buildings, boats or improved or enclosed land, wharf, or pier of another, or enters or remains in a school bus, as defined in section 1 of chapter 90, after having been forbidden so to do by the person who has lawful control of said premises, whether directly or by notice posted thereon, ... The federal version of trespass (which I think applies to Indian reservations) considers merely fencing off the area to be sufficient notice that trespassing is prohibited.

codedokode 7y ago

this is bad comparison because when scraping a site, you don't cross any borders, you just send and receive information. You can compare this to a phone call or to talking to someone.

txcwpalpha 7y ago
A website or server is property, just like land is. Accessing it is no different than accessing any other piece of property. Opening a website is, for all intents and purposes, the same as crossing a border. To take it a step further, the information on said website is also personal property, and accessing the information without permission is also trespassing. Specifically, this is called trespass to chattels [1] (trespass is most usually legally defined as trespass to person, trespass to land, and trespass to chattels). Even more specifically, this is the actual part of the CFAA that's being debated: computer trespass gets its roots from trespass to chattels. [2] 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels#In_the_electronic_age https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trespass_to_chattels#In_the_el...
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- admax88q 7y ago
  Lol really? I'm not "on" your site when I browse there. I asked your server to send me some data and it did so. Its real life equivalent to social engineering. Its so far not illegal for me to ask you things and for you to disclose them to me even if you weren't supposed to. I'm allowed to lie to you even to persuade you to tell me things.
  - txcwpalpha 7y ago
    You didn't "ask my server". You used a tool to extract data from my server. It's more akin to you standing just outside my property border and using a fishing pole to pull fish from a pond that is inside my property border. You're still trespassing even if your two feet aren't physically on my land. The common legal argument (see the second link in my above comment) is that accessing a web server actually does constitute being "on" the server because you are sending signals to my server in order to interact with it, and this satisfies the "physical contact" part of trespassing. From Wikipedia: > The courts that imported this common law doctrine into the digital world reasoned that electrical signals traveling across networks and through proprietary servers may constitute the contact necessary to support a trespass claim. >Its real life equivalent to social engineering. Its so far not illegal for me to ask you things and for you to disclose them to me even if you weren't supposed to. I'm allowed to lie to you even to persuade you to tell me things. This absolutely would be illegal and I'm not sure why you think otherwise. Misrepresenting yourself in order for me to reveal to you private information is fraud and is illegal in pretty much every jurisdiction I can think of.

mr_toad 7y ago

> an open door does not count as an invitation. But if you have a someone living there who lets anyone in if they ask, it would be pretty hard to argue they are trespassing. A user agent must ask for every page with an http request. If the server responds with 200 OK, it’s pretty hard to argue that it isn’t letting (or even inviting) you in.

dodobirdlord 7y ago
This doesn't cover you if you lied to get the invitation. If a robots.txt file denies some but not all user agents, setting your user agent to indicate that your request originates from a source it does not originate from is clearly a circumvention of an access control.