wildercb/PrivacyTextBooks1.2 · Datasets at Hugging Face

text stringlengths 0 118
Ground Control had been infiltrated from a location occupied by executives
from Cardinals. The Cardinals launched an internal investigation. The
hacking was traced back to Correa, who had been promoted to scouting
director.
Correa was fired by the Cardinals. He was criminally charged under a
federal hacking statute, and he pled guilty. He was sentenced to prison for
nearly four years and ordered to pay restitution of $279,038.65. The Major
League Baseball Commissioner banned Correa permanently from baseball,
a sanction imposed only on a few others such as Pete Rose and players from
the 1919 scandal-ridden Chicago White Sox. The Cardinals were fined $2
million, and they had to forfeit their first two picks in the draft to the
Houston Astros.
“Hacking” Is Often Just Snooping
There are some who object to the word “hacking” to describe what
happened here. Hacking connotes high-tech wizardry, the stuff chronicled
in the movie War Games or regularly on TV where people can break into
any network by typing for 10 seconds on a keyboard.
The methods used by Correa to access the Astros’ system were not very
sophisticated. Correa used some old passwords he knew from when
Luhnow and others were working with the Cardinals. The passwords
weren’t changed when they went to the Astros. So, Correa wasn’t a tech
wiz, but he did know some of the ancient wisdom passed down through
generations of computer fraudsters: People often have poor password
practices. People select bad passwords, they put them on sticky notes near
their computers, and they often never change them. Correa guessed
correctly that Luhnow or the others didn’t bother to change the password
after they went from the Cardinals to the Astros.
Whether you call it “hacking” or not, the key thing for the law is that
someone is accessing a computer in ways that are not authorized. This
doesn’t need to occur through any kind of technological acumen.
The federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) imposes criminal
penalties when a person “intentionally accesses a computer without
authorization or exceeds authorized access, and thereby obtains . . .
information from any protected computer.”38 A protected computer is
defined very broadly—essentially, it includes any computer connected to
the Internet.
There are a variety of different types of crimes under the CFAA
depending upon the circumstances, but the foundation of all of them is
unauthorized access. And based on the facts reported, there was
unauthorized access. Even though the password was readily guessable—and
even though it appears the Cardinals already had the list of passwords in its
possession—the ease of access doesn’t matter. No matter how careless
Luhnow might have been with security, accessing his computer without
authorization is still a crime.
Many people have the misconception that computer crime is very
sophisticated, but often it isn’t. Hackers often break into a system through
con artistry—by tricking people into giving them their password. If you
read about the exploits of reformed hacker Kevin Mitnick, the inspiration
for the movie War Games, many of his techniques seem closer to the movie
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.
We don’t know for sure, but we are willing to bet that Correa didn’t
think of himself as a hacker. Hackers are often depicted in photos as
teenagers in hoodies or criminals in ninja suits. In movies and TV, hackers
are sophisticated techies who can break into the most secure systems with
just a few keystrokes. In heist movies, they can instantly pull up the
architectural plans to the building to be robbed. A few more keystrokes gets
them into the power grid.
But in real life, a large component of hacking isn’t high-tech. Correa
didn’t use technical wizardry to break into Ground Control. He just used a
password he knew. He was a snooper. But under the law, he was a hacker.
In the analog world, people do a lot of snooping. A person in the
bathroom at a friend’s house might peek into the medicine cabinet. A
spouse might peek at their partner’s diary or private papers that are sitting
out on the bed. People might put their ears against the door to listen in on a
conversation in the next room. These forms of non-digital snooping are not
punished very severely; many instances are not even punished at all by the
law.
But when it comes to digital snooping, it’s a different story. Snooping
into email accounts or other online accounts will violate state and federal
electronic surveillance statutes which penalize many intrusions as felonies
with steep prison terms.
The CFAA rightly punishes front-door snooping such as Correa’s. Other
forms of snooping, such as when employees of an organization look into
people’s records out of curiosity rather than as part of their job, are dealt
with by privacy laws such as HIPAA. It is still common for most people to
associate the front door with privacy and the back door with security.
Understanding that the front door is also essential to security is a necessary
step toward more robust security.
POOR PRIVACY LEADS TO POOR DATA SECURITY
Poor privacy will undermine even the best data security. Good privacy
practices involve having more than just the bare minimum of procedural
safeguards like getting consent or being transparent about data practices. To
have good privacy practices an organization must severely curb its data
appetite, collect only the data that is necessary and justified, delete data
when it is no longer needed, and avoid data processing that threatens
people’s rights, exposes people to an undue risk of harm, or leads to socially
detrimental effects.
Many organizations are looking for ways to try to hook everything up to
the Internet, to collect more personal data, to use it in more ways, to gather
it all together, and to keep it for longer, possibly forever. These are
problematic privacy practices, and they are a recipe for a security Titanic.
There are several ways that bad privacy can lead to bad security: (1) Weak
privacy controls can lead to improper access through the front door; (2)
Collecting and storing unnecessary data can make data breaches much
worse; (3) Poor privacy regulation can allow for more tools and practices
that compromise security; and (4) A lack of accountability over data can
increase the likelihood that the data will be lost, misplaced, or misused.
Weak Privacy Leads to Front-Door Breaches
On the Sunday morning of March 18, 2018, The Guardian published a
bombshell story: “Revealed: 50 million Facebook profiles harvested for

Ground Control had been infiltrated from a location occupied by executives

from Cardinals. The Cardinals launched an internal investigation. The

hacking was traced back to Correa, who had been promoted to scouting

director.

Correa was fired by the Cardinals. He was criminally charged under a

federal hacking statute, and he pled guilty. He was sentenced to prison for

nearly four years and ordered to pay restitution of $279,038.65. The Major

League Baseball Commissioner banned Correa permanently from baseball,

a sanction imposed only on a few others such as Pete Rose and players from

the 1919 scandal-ridden Chicago White Sox. The Cardinals were fined $2

million, and they had to forfeit their first two picks in the draft to the

Houston Astros.

“Hacking” Is Often Just Snooping

There are some who object to the word “hacking” to describe what

happened here. Hacking connotes high-tech wizardry, the stuff chronicled

in the movie War Games or regularly on TV where people can break into

any network by typing for 10 seconds on a keyboard.

The methods used by Correa to access the Astros’ system were not very

sophisticated. Correa used some old passwords he knew from when

Luhnow and others were working with the Cardinals. The passwords

weren’t changed when they went to the Astros. So, Correa wasn’t a tech

wiz, but he did know some of the ancient wisdom passed down through

generations of computer fraudsters: People often have poor password

practices. People select bad passwords, they put them on sticky notes near

their computers, and they often never change them. Correa guessed

correctly that Luhnow or the others didn’t bother to change the password

after they went from the Cardinals to the Astros.

Whether you call it “hacking” or not, the key thing for the law is that

someone is accessing a computer in ways that are not authorized. This

doesn’t need to occur through any kind of technological acumen.

The federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) imposes criminal

penalties when a person “intentionally accesses a computer without

authorization or exceeds authorized access, and thereby obtains . . .

information from any protected computer.”38 A protected computer is

defined very broadly—essentially, it includes any computer connected to

the Internet.

There are a variety of different types of crimes under the CFAA

depending upon the circumstances, but the foundation of all of them is

unauthorized access. And based on the facts reported, there was

unauthorized access. Even though the password was readily guessable—and

even though it appears the Cardinals already had the list of passwords in its

possession—the ease of access doesn’t matter. No matter how careless

Luhnow might have been with security, accessing his computer without

authorization is still a crime.

Many people have the misconception that computer crime is very

sophisticated, but often it isn’t. Hackers often break into a system through

con artistry—by tricking people into giving them their password. If you

read about the exploits of reformed hacker Kevin Mitnick, the inspiration

for the movie War Games, many of his techniques seem closer to the movie

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.

We don’t know for sure, but we are willing to bet that Correa didn’t

think of himself as a hacker. Hackers are often depicted in photos as

teenagers in hoodies or criminals in ninja suits. In movies and TV, hackers

are sophisticated techies who can break into the most secure systems with

just a few keystrokes. In heist movies, they can instantly pull up the

architectural plans to the building to be robbed. A few more keystrokes gets

them into the power grid.

But in real life, a large component of hacking isn’t high-tech. Correa

didn’t use technical wizardry to break into Ground Control. He just used a

password he knew. He was a snooper. But under the law, he was a hacker.

In the analog world, people do a lot of snooping. A person in the

bathroom at a friend’s house might peek into the medicine cabinet. A

spouse might peek at their partner’s diary or private papers that are sitting

out on the bed. People might put their ears against the door to listen in on a

conversation in the next room. These forms of non-digital snooping are not

punished very severely; many instances are not even punished at all by the

law.

But when it comes to digital snooping, it’s a different story. Snooping

into email accounts or other online accounts will violate state and federal

electronic surveillance statutes which penalize many intrusions as felonies

with steep prison terms.

The CFAA rightly punishes front-door snooping such as Correa’s. Other

forms of snooping, such as when employees of an organization look into

people’s records out of curiosity rather than as part of their job, are dealt

with by privacy laws such as HIPAA. It is still common for most people to

associate the front door with privacy and the back door with security.

Understanding that the front door is also essential to security is a necessary

step toward more robust security.

POOR PRIVACY LEADS TO POOR DATA SECURITY

Poor privacy will undermine even the best data security. Good privacy

practices involve having more than just the bare minimum of procedural

safeguards like getting consent or being transparent about data practices. To

have good privacy practices an organization must severely curb its data

appetite, collect only the data that is necessary and justified, delete data

when it is no longer needed, and avoid data processing that threatens

people’s rights, exposes people to an undue risk of harm, or leads to socially

detrimental effects.

Many organizations are looking for ways to try to hook everything up to

the Internet, to collect more personal data, to use it in more ways, to gather

it all together, and to keep it for longer, possibly forever. These are

problematic privacy practices, and they are a recipe for a security Titanic.

There are several ways that bad privacy can lead to bad security: (1) Weak

privacy controls can lead to improper access through the front door; (2)

Collecting and storing unnecessary data can make data breaches much

worse; (3) Poor privacy regulation can allow for more tools and practices

that compromise security; and (4) A lack of accountability over data can

increase the likelihood that the data will be lost, misplaced, or misused.

Weak Privacy Leads to Front-Door Breaches

On the Sunday morning of March 18, 2018, The Guardian published a

bombshell story: “Revealed: 50 million Facebook profiles harvested for