Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!uunet!decwrl!ogicse!qiclab!leonard
From: leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com (Leonard Erickson)
Newsgroups: comp.admin.policy
Subject: Re: Possibly nefarious users
Message-ID: <1991Jun25.061715.6095@qiclab.scn.rain.com>
Date: 25 Jun 91 06:17:15 GMT
References: <2D.-_.N@cs.widener.edu> <1991Jun6.214915.18946@athena.mit.edu> 	<1991Jun7.164102.672@progress.com> <ADRIANHO.91Jun7190303@barkley.berkeley.edu> <1991Jun10.052806.4214@qiclab.scn.rain.com> <1991Jun10.193515.21451@jato.jpl.nasa.gov>
Reply-To: 70465.203@compuserve.com
Organization: SCN Research/Qic Laboratories of Tigard, Oregon.
Lines: 32

dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov (Dave Hayes) writes:

<leonard@qiclab.scn.rain.com (Leonard Erickson) writes:

<>>IMHO, unless a "guest" account user is notified somehow (eg.
<>>/etc/motd) that "this account is _only_ for use by faculty in Uni. of
<>>X", you don't have a case against anyone outside the U. using the same
<>>account, since the scope of "legal use" was not made known to him/her.

<>No. The law is exactly the opposite. Unless *you* know that the account
<>is for general access, you do not have the right to use it. There are
<>legitmate reasons for having a "guest" account (with no password) on a 
<>system. But just as with an unlocked door, *you* are not the person
<>it was left unlocked for.

<Can you guys explain, then, the case where charges were dropped in an
<unauthorized entry prosecution because the system said: "Welcome to..."?

Sure. In *that* case they'd done the exact opposite. Rather than saying
"keep out" or not saying anything, they said "Come on in!".

BTW, I don't think a lot of that decision. But that *was* the logic.

This is why our "remote" login gives a "Only authorized users..."
message if an unauthorized ID tries to use it. If someone is using
an authorized ID without actually being that user, it's illegal
access anyway...

-- 
Leonard Erickson			leonard@qiclab.rain.com
personal:	CIS: [70524,2603]	70524.2603@compuserve.com
business:	CIS: [70376,1107]	76376.1107@compuserve.com