

Court Says Privacy Case Can Proceed vs. Google - 001sky
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/11/technology/court-says-privacy-case-can-proceed-vs-google.html

======
magicalist
discussed earlier today as well:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6362221](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6362221)

As I said there, what's worrying here is that the decision hinges on "readily
accessible to the general public". While this was just a refusal to dismiss
and there may be more to come, the problem is that this is just a small step
away from being able to criminalize any access of an open wifi hotspot. No
slope required, slippery or otherwise. All you need is a DA that feels
justified in prosecuting someone but without an obvious tool to do so, and
here one is.

Better to criminalize what you _do_ with that access, but that wouldn't fall
under the Wiretap Act as written, so wouldn't come up from this motion to
dismiss.

~~~
001sky
_what 's worrying here is that the decision hinges on "readily accessible to
the general public"_

This is a bizzare comment. The reporting here articulates the court's thinking
in slightly more detail than the earlier piece:

 _the court didn 't think much of Google’s argument that unencrypted data sent
over a Wi-Fi network is “readily accessible to the general public” because
both the hardware and software needed to intercept and decode the data are
widely available.

People can easily buy technology to log every keystroke on someone’s computer,
the court noted, but that did not make those keystrokes “readily accessible to
the general public.”_

Using technology to snoop on people behind closed doors in their own homes, is
using technology to pierce the veil of "what is readily available to the
general public". Basically, if you have to use a fancy gizmo to make it
accessible, even if the gizmo is available to the public, it does not make all
information retreivable with that gizmo public by default. Which seems like
fairly common sense.

[NB: That doesn't make google guilty of anything. It just means that their
arguments to date have missed the mark in getting the suit thrown out without
further hearing]

~~~
magicalist
> _This is a bizzare comment. The reporting here articulates the court 's
> thinking in slightly more detail than the earlier piece_

I was not basing my statements on the nytimes piece, I was basing them on the
opinion itself, which is embedded in the wired story:

[http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2013/09/10/11...](http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2013/09/10/11-17483.pdf)

Much of the opinion does focus on if wifi should be considered "radio
communication"

The problem is that in accessing any open wireless access point you are
"piercing the veil" whether you intend to or not. That's how IEEE 802 networks
work: you get all the packets, you just drop the ones not meant for you.

I would argue that switching the hardware you're already using in every
computer that talks to a LAN or WLAN to promiscuous mode is not at all
analogous to installing a keylogger. But even if you don't switch modes, it
still will only take an ambitious DA to argue that whether you intended to or
not, you were capturing all packets when you connected to that business's wifi
hotspot, which is another broken law to add to your list of charges.

------
Mindless2112
You know, of all the things to be worried about regarding Google and privacy,
capturing publicly-broadcast wireless-network packets is not really high on my
list.

------
o0-0o
Good. They need to be stopped dead in their tracks.

~~~
hahainternet
They were, 3 years ago, when they outed this issue themselves and submitted
their code to a third party for review.

------
001sky
_The court made clear that federal privacy law applies to residential Wi-Fi
networks,” he said. “Users should be protected when a company tries to capture
private data that travels between their laptops and their printer in their
home.”

The ruling, written by Judge Jay Bybee, took sharp issue with Google’s
contention that data transmitted over a Wi-Fi network was not protected by
federal wiretapping laws because it was an electronic “radio communication.”

“In common parlance, watching a television show does not entail ‘radio
communication,’ ” Judge Bybee wrote. “Nor does sending an e-mail or viewing a
bank statement while connected to a Wi-Fi network.”_

~~~
kdragon
But.. but.. it _is_ radio communication! Using radio waves! If scientific
facts not define what is legally considered 'radio communication', by what
arbitrary rules is this defined?

So when a google engineering team stores unwanted, unencrypted radio
communication by accident (and is entirely open about it) the courts seem so
eager to throw the book? But when the U.S Government coerces telecom companies
to aid in massive unconstitutional wiretapping on a global scale, congress is
willing to step in and grant retroactive legal immunity to all parties?

Am I taking crazy pills??

~~~
001sky
_If scientific facts not define what is legally considered 'radio
communication', by what arbitrary rules is this defined?_

Not to point out the obvious, but laws are written using legal definintions.
And those are made by the legislature and the Judiciary. The NSA (and I'm not
here to defend them) at least has a prima-facie need to see certain types of
protected speech under limited (court ordered, direct national threat)
circumstances. Google is a merely a business, with no public policy need to
creep around the neighborhood. That being said, this decisino is merely
putting the issue to a trial/jury. Nobody has said google is guilty. But they
are not so innocent, or so in the right, with repsect to how the law is
apparently written/interpreted, than they can dismiss the claims of
impropriety as "baseless, without merit" &tc.

 _...The unanimous, 35-page decision by a three-judge panel found little merit
in Google’s legal maneuverings, stating at one critical point that the company
was basically inventing meanings in an effort to declare its actions legal_

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javajosh
The real story: There's a chance that each and every one of us might get $10k
from Google!

Don't bury the lead.

~~~
jrockway
I believe that it's the lawyers that get $10k, and we get a gift certificate
for a free ice cream cone. At least that's how every other class action
lawsuit I've seen has gone.

~~~
x0x0
nonono

the lawyers get $10k _for each of us_

we get an expiring in one year coupon for a free ice cream cone with purchase
of $20

~~~
jrockway
Yes. That's why they automatically put you in the class if you don't reply to
that postcard they sent to your address three moves ago.

