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With the CFAA, it's actual entirely possible that the person who wrote the code is entirely at fault if their intent was that multiple people run malicious code

With the CFAA, it's actual entirely possible that the person who wrote the code is entirely at fault if their intent was that multiple people run malicious code. Courts aren't black and white and take intent and amount of damage into account. There's no hard and fast "number" on how many people makes a DDOS. In fact, the service (site) doesn't even need to be hampered to be considered a DOS. Just having HR have to filter through tens of thousands of bogus applications can be considered a DOS.

ziddoap 5y ago
In the context of the CFAA, I think you can make just about any activity on a computer be deemed illegal. Which is why I think these cases are worth discussing, and we should have the discussions with the intent of improving what the CFAA is and does, because it's grossly outdated. Personally, I believe that if a few thousand striking workers decided to manually fill out job applications as fast as they could, as opposed to walking a picket line, that should potentially considered a valid form of protest. If the job-application-taking website fails or slows down or HR gets a headache, so be it. That's sort of the point of union workers protesting - cause headaches so their voices will hopefully be heard. And at that point, what is the difference between a few thousand people manually submitting applications or using code to submit them at a pace which they manually could anyways?
- colejohnson66 5y ago
  Again: intent. If your intent is to harm/sabotage the company, it's beyond a protest.
  - ziddoap 5y ago
    What do you think the intent of a strike is? Is holding up every car that enters or leaves the work premise not considered an intent to harm the operations of the company? Is resfuing to do your job, slowing the overall production of the company, not considered harmful to the company? What is the intent of the striking worker who airs their grievences on signs and media? Striking, by nature, has the intent of causing grief/headache/slowed business/etc., in order to make demands heard.
  - scollet 5y ago
    I'm protesting Kellogg brands by boycotting them. My intent here is 100% to harm the company by hurting their bottom line.

ziddoap 5y ago

In the context of the CFAA, I think you can make just about any activity on a computer be deemed illegal. Which is why I think these cases are worth discussing, and we should have the discussions with the intent of improving what the CFAA is and does, because it's grossly outdated. Personally, I believe that if a few thousand striking workers decided to manually fill out job applications as fast as they could, as opposed to walking a picket line, that should potentially considered a valid form of protest. If the job-application-taking website fails or slows down or HR gets a headache, so be it. That's sort of the point of union workers protesting - cause headaches so their voices will hopefully be heard. And at that point, what is the difference between a few thousand people manually submitting applications or using code to submit them at a pace which they manually could anyways?

colejohnson66 5y ago
Again: intent. If your intent is to harm/sabotage the company, it's beyond a protest.
- ziddoap 5y ago
  What do you think the intent of a strike is? Is holding up every car that enters or leaves the work premise not considered an intent to harm the operations of the company? Is resfuing to do your job, slowing the overall production of the company, not considered harmful to the company? What is the intent of the striking worker who airs their grievences on signs and media? Striking, by nature, has the intent of causing grief/headache/slowed business/etc., in order to make demands heard.
- scollet 5y ago
  I'm protesting Kellogg brands by boycotting them. My intent here is 100% to harm the company by hurting their bottom line.