[AusNOG] Google creepier than Conroy?

[Chris Pollock]

>There are now many devices which allow a wireless network to be 
>broadcast without the wires (3G<->Wireless routers, or 3G enabled
>phones) which makes me wonder if these devices would be completely 
>exempt from any interception and open targets for anyone?
>Scary times ahead.
>
>- Andrew

Due to these "new" technologies that are only really finding their feet
in law now, there's a lot about the way that the old communications
networks were treated that just plain needs to be thrown out the window.
For example, the one I'm hearing most commonly in discussion off-list
about this issue is the old parallel that listening to unencrypted wifi
is the same for it being okay to just walk into someone's home if the
front door was unlocked.

IMO that's not a correct analogy, because you still have to -go into-
someone's house.  The more appropriate parallel would be if a Google
Street View car was driving around and someone had no curtains on their
front windows, and was standing around naked.  Is the Google Street View
driver (or the person who built the hardware/software to capture 360
degree photographs) guilty in the same way as someone standing on the
street intentionally snapping photos of the resident getting undressed?
I don't think so, and we're treating it like it's the same.

Because they didn't attempt to protect the view of their property that
was available from outside of it, they're making it possible for anyone
to accidentally or intentionally see inside.  If it's illegal to receive
wifi data from an unencryped AP, then as many people have said, it
becomes possible to break the law before even knowing you have.

It may become more legally tenuous if you're sitting in the bushes
fapping/leeching.  Were the cars going around hoping for someone to be
standing around naked in their front room?  The software performed
exactly the way it was supposed to, it just freaked a lot of people out.
Maybe people shouldn't stand around naked, and maybe this is a good
lesson as to why.

--
Chris Pollock
Technical & Install Manager
PIPE Networks Limited

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