Wardriving is Legal. Legal opinions.

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=585867

I've been attacked by the cellular hacks on these newsgroups because I
dare logon to open wifi systems and get my email, etc., instead of paying
the jerk cellular phone companies $70/month for slow, spotty service all
hobbled up with "you can't do that" legal jargon to prevent you from
using bandwidth.

According to many law schools and the courts (see the various papers from
this website), what thousands of people are doing with programs like
Network Stumbler to find open systems driving around are perfectly legal
and NOT theft, as the cellular hacks have tried to make it to preserve
company profits. It's just not true.

From the paper marked "Stanford Law School", MIT even has a course setup
to improve your techniques!
"Moreover, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung declared the movement a
“national sport” in the United States, and also noted that the practice
is quickly moving to Europe. Recently, a how-to wireless-hacking course
has been offered at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT), promising to teach students how to perform wardriving techniques
and how to use “cool wireless tools for [their] tinkering pleasure.”

Screw cellular ripoffs and their denial of services....(c;

Get Net Stumbler from:
http://www.stumbler.net
When you see W4CSC on it, help yourself to my hotspot. It's running
400mw to a 9db omnidirectional antenna up 55'. Range is about 1.5 miles
to a Pringle's can antenna. Got a hotspot? SHARE IT!

Larry
--
http://www.spp.gov/
The end of the USA and its Constitution....RIP

---

› See More: Wardriving is Legal. Legal opinions.

On 2007-06-11, Larry <[email protected]> wrote:

> http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=585867
>
> I've been attacked by the cellular hacks on these newsgroups because I
> dare logon to open wifi systems and get my email, etc., instead of paying
> the jerk cellular phone companies $70/month for slow, spotty service all
> hobbled up with "you can't do that" legal jargon to prevent you from
> using bandwidth.

It's not about cellular at all. If you use an open wifi system, you are
using a system that someone else pays for, generally without any compensation
to them. Now, if they INTENTIONALLY leave it open, there is no legal issue.
The real question is what happens when it is unknowingly left open.

The article cites FCC commish Powell as saying that people who want to
leave their systems open should be allowed to do so. I certainly can't
argue with that, although I won't leave my access point unprotected;
anyone wanting to cause trouble could do so without my knowledge, and
I'd be liable for the damages. But those who don't mind the risk certainly
should be encouraged to share.

I also agree with Powell that most if not all of the bad things that can
be done with open wifi are already covered by existing law enforcement
policies.

However, the article goes on to say that "the criminality of wardriving
remains to be tested in the courts."

I think I have to agree that wardriving itself probably isn't illegal. It's
interesting, because if you leave your house or car unlocked accidentally
and someone steals stuff out of the house or takes the car, they have
unquestionably broken the law. The article you cited indicates that there is
no such clear rule against the simple detection of open networks.

Thank you for posting that link!

Larry wrote:
> http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=585867
>
> I've been attacked by the cellular hacks on these newsgroups because I
> dare logon to open wifi systems and get my email, etc., instead of paying
> the jerk cellular phone companies $70/month for slow, spotty service all
> hobbled up with "you can't do that" legal jargon to prevent you from
> using bandwidth.
>
> According to many law schools and the courts (see the various papers from
> this website), what thousands of people are doing with programs like
> Network Stumbler to find open systems driving around are perfectly legal
> and NOT theft, as the cellular hacks have tried to make it to preserve
> company profits. It's just not true.
>
> From the paper marked "Stanford Law School", MIT even has a course setup
> to improve your techniques!
> "Moreover, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung declared the movement a
> “national sport” in the United States, and also noted that the practice
> is quickly moving to Europe. Recently, a how-to wireless-hacking course
> has been offered at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology
> (MIT), promising to teach students how to perform wardriving techniques
> and how to use “cool wireless tools for [their] tinkering pleasure.”
>
> Screw cellular ripoffs and their denial of services....(c;
>
> Get Net Stumbler from:
> http://www.stumbler.net
> When you see W4CSC on it, help yourself to my hotspot. It's running
> 400mw to a 9db omnidirectional antenna up 55'. Range is about 1.5 miles
> to a Pringle's can antenna. Got a hotspot? SHARE IT!
>
> Larry

Some people fail to realize that *whatever* someone spews onto the ISM
band (the only spectrum worth mention at this point for data is 915, 2.4
and 5.15-5.825) falls under the same use restriction as CB radio.
Anyone can transmit, anyone can recieve - now, breaking into an
*encrypted* network, no matter how pathetic of encryption (yep, even
WEP56) is illegal but *NOT* due to the RF use, but the actual encryption
breaking itself (DMCA covers this)

There is etiquette issues of course, like don't hog up all of someone's
bandwidth.

There are some issues with running (and using!) a hotspot, like CALEA
compliance, privacy, security, that one should keep in mind. One should
not assume the hotspot they're connected to is any more legitimate than
their non-authorized use of it. You *could* catch the cooties! For a
humorous example see
http://www.ex-parrot.com/~pete/upside-down-ternet.html but this should
serve as a warning. Someone *could* infect files downloaded through
their hotspot just as easily as one can blur pictures...

I'm guessing you've got either the SR2 or Senao 8602+ cards since you're
at 400mW. If you want something thats a bit more exciting you might
want to check out the Ubiquiti SR9. I find them to work amazingly well
on 5 mhz channel bandwidth under Mikrotik RouterOS. 900 mhz breaks
through foliage in a surprising sort of way. I've seen 4mbit @ 6 miles
with some foliage in the way, 7 dBi omni (top of 150' tower) to another
7 dBi omni (top of car) - with more optimal conditions it should work
well over 10 miles.

BS

Steve Sobol <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> But those who don't mind the risk certainly
> should be encouraged to share.
>

What risk, specifically? I can cut anyone off I don't want using it,
individually. I've had no problem, ever, with abuse. On top of the
enlisted barracks at the air force base, you'll find 3 Pringle's can
antennas pointed at my hotspot. They don't have broadband in the peon
barracks. I'm doin' my part for the troops!...(c;

I see no risk at all. As a matter of fact, if anyone can get to your
system to connect with the internet, you're fairly bust free when the
govt snoops "catch you"....

"Sir. Isn't it a fact that your IP connected to this kiddie porn website
in Bangledesh, as recorded by our illegal wiretap?"

"I don't know. Hundreds of people use my wifi link all the time. I
don't know or care what they do as long as they don't attack me or
another user. I don't track every webpage they look at or the whole
internet would be shut down all over!", I exclaim, innocently.

I'm no more responsible than Comcrap or Verizon. I'm just a pipe to
them....and that stands up just fine in court....no intent!

Larry
--
http://www.spp.gov/
The end of the USA and its Constitution....RIP

"[email protected]" <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> I'm guessing you've got either the SR2 or Senao 8602+ cards since
you're
> at 400mW. If you want something thats a bit more exciting you might
> want to check out the Ubiquiti SR9. I find them to work amazingly well
> on 5 mhz channel bandwidth under Mikrotik RouterOS. 900 mhz breaks
> through foliage in a surprising sort of way. I've seen 4mbit @ 6 miles
> with some foliage in the way, 7 dBi omni (top of 150' tower) to another
> 7 dBi omni (top of car) - with more optimal conditions it should work
> well over 10 miles.
>
>

Senao, but the idea is to to provide STANDARD 2400 Mhz wifi to my, or
anyone else in range's laptop, which isn't on 900 Mhz. The router is in
an inverted plastic bucket up in a tree with the high gain antenna on top
of the bucket to make the coax really short. Ethernet provides both
bandwidth and DC to run it from my 2KW UPS in the shack. Two 330AH golf
cart batteries in series provide UPS power until I crank the diesel
genset. Knology Cable has a natural gas powered UPS driving all the
cable equipment in each node with interconnecting fiber. Telephone
providers, the whole system is independently powered....pretty nice.

Part of the reason you don't have much trouble being a hotspot in a
normal residential area (not a high-rise hacker haven) is the limited
range it covers. My magmount antenna on the car gets 5 open and 7
secured routers from the front yard on net stumbler, not including mine.
Hardly anyone even cares its there. It's not like you're providing 25
mile coverage over the data ghettos.

Larry
--
http://www.spp.gov/
The end of the USA and its Constitution....RIP

Per Larry:
>I see no risk at all. As a matter of fact, if anyone can get to your
>system to connect with the internet, you're fairly bust free when the
>govt snoops "catch you"....

The downside that somebody mentioned to me - which I have no way
of evaluating - was somebody using the connection to upload spam,
and getting your account cancelled by the provider because of
that.
--
PeteCresswell

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...m-his-car.html

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060622-7111.html

http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story...-8559268c.html

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20070226/004000.shtml

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/07/04/St...a_new_br.shtml

There are many more....


"Larry" <[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected]...
> http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=585867
>
> I've been attacked by the cellular hacks on these newsgroups because I
> dare logon to open wifi systems and get my email, etc., instead of paying
> the jerk cellular phone companies $70/month for slow, spotty service all
> hobbled up with "you can't do that" legal jargon to prevent you from
> using bandwidth.
>
> According to many law schools and the courts (see the various papers from
> this website), what thousands of people are doing with programs like
> Network Stumbler to find open systems driving around are perfectly legal
> and NOT theft, as the cellular hacks have tried to make it to preserve
> company profits. It's just not true.
>
> From the paper marked "Stanford Law School", MIT even has a course setup
> to improve your techniques!
> "Moreover, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung declared the movement a
> “national sport” in the United States, and also noted that the practice
> is quickly moving to Europe. Recently, a how-to wireless-hacking course
> has been offered at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology
> (MIT), promising to teach students how to perform wardriving techniques
> and how to use “cool wireless tools for [their] tinkering pleasure.”
>
> Screw cellular ripoffs and their denial of services....(c;
>
> Get Net Stumbler from:
> http://www.stumbler.net
> When you see W4CSC on it, help yourself to my hotspot. It's running
> 400mw to a 9db omnidirectional antenna up 55'. Range is about 1.5 miles
> to a Pringle's can antenna. Got a hotspot? SHARE IT!
>
> Larry
> --
> http://www.spp.gov/
> The end of the USA and its Constitution....RIP
>

"Ness_net" <[email protected]> wrote in
news[email protected]:

> http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post...n-arrested-for
> -using-cafes-free-wifi-from-his-car.html

Can't wait to see the CONVICTION records, not just the news reports trying
to scare off the users. This Michigan state law will be interesting to
watch. I hope the defense team has at least the brains to call in the FCC,
who very jealously guard their RF turf in all state/local cases. RF is not
in the state's domain. It's Federal and always has been....

Time will tell.

Larry
--
http://www.spp.gov/
The end of the USA and its Constitution....RIP

"(PeteCresswell)" <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> The downside that somebody mentioned to me - which I have no way
> of evaluating - was somebody using the connection to upload spam,
> and getting your account cancelled by the provider because of
> that.
> --
> PeteCresswell
>
>

That would take forever on a cable modem...slow uploads on purpose.


Larry
--
http://www.spp.gov/
The end of the USA and its Constitution....RIP

Larry wrote:
> Steve Sobol <[email protected]> wrote in
> news:[email protected]:
>
>> But those who don't mind the risk certainly
>> should be encouraged to share.
>>
>
> What risk, specifically? I can cut anyone off I don't want using it,
> individually. I've had no problem, ever, with abuse. On top of the
> enlisted barracks at the air force base, you'll find 3 Pringle's can
> antennas pointed at my hotspot. They don't have broadband in the peon
> barracks. I'm doin' my part for the troops!...(c;
>
> I see no risk at all. As a matter of fact, if anyone can get to your
> system to connect with the internet, you're fairly bust free when the
> govt snoops "catch you"....
>
> "Sir. Isn't it a fact that your IP connected to this kiddie porn website
> in Bangledesh, as recorded by our illegal wiretap?"
>
> "I don't know. Hundreds of people use my wifi link all the time. I
> don't know or care what they do as long as they don't attack me or
> another user. I don't track every webpage they look at or the whole
> internet would be shut down all over!", I exclaim, innocently.
>
> I'm no more responsible than Comcrap or Verizon. I'm just a pipe to
> them....and that stands up just fine in court....no intent!
>
> Larry

CALEA doesn't quite agree with you.

The responsibility falls to the provider, which you become,
kinda/sorta... We'll see how the hand plays out in court.

BS

Larry wrote:
> "[email protected]" <[email protected]> wrote in
> news:[email protected]:
>
>> I'm guessing you've got either the SR2 or Senao 8602+ cards since
> you're
>> at 400mW. If you want something thats a bit more exciting you might
>> want to check out the Ubiquiti SR9. I find them to work amazingly well
>> on 5 mhz channel bandwidth under Mikrotik RouterOS. 900 mhz breaks
>> through foliage in a surprising sort of way. I've seen 4mbit @ 6 miles
>> with some foliage in the way, 7 dBi omni (top of 150' tower) to another
>> 7 dBi omni (top of car) - with more optimal conditions it should work
>> well over 10 miles.
>>
>>
>
> Senao, but the idea is to to provide STANDARD 2400 Mhz wifi to my, or
> anyone else in range's laptop, which isn't on 900 Mhz. The router is in
> an inverted plastic bucket up in a tree with the high gain antenna on top
> of the bucket to make the coax really short. Ethernet provides both
> bandwidth and DC to run it from my 2KW UPS in the shack. Two 330AH golf
> cart batteries in series provide UPS power until I crank the diesel
> genset. Knology Cable has a natural gas powered UPS driving all the
> cable equipment in each node with interconnecting fiber. Telephone
> providers, the whole system is independently powered....pretty nice.

Same here, except the last mile's a T1 (soon fiber, from an entirely
different direction)... I assume the 330AH batteries are 12V/each,
which would keep a tower-load of our gear for about... hrm... 260
hours? Our towers are "pure DC", running telco-style, kept charged by
the local electric co-op via switching psus (90%+ eff). Eventually
we'll add solar...

> Part of the reason you don't have much trouble being a hotspot in a
> normal residential area (not a high-rise hacker haven) is the limited
> range it covers. My magmount antenna on the car gets 5 open and 7
> secured routers from the front yard on net stumbler, not including mine.
> Hardly anyone even cares its there. It's not like you're providing 25
> mile coverage over the data ghettos.

Yes and no. It all depends on topography and mounting height. Your
setup could easily make 50 miles with a 24 dBi parabolic, high power
radio, and low noise floor on the far end, with clear (including
Fresnel) LOS..

Luckily theres no legal requirement for you to know where the client is
physically located. The rest is covered by CALEA.

If your magnet mount's coax is smaller than RG58/LMR195 I find they lose
more signal than they gain. 10+ db difference between my cheapie "7
dBi" antenna, and my big lmr-195 wired magnet mount with a "5.5 dbi"
n-male antenna screwed into it... the 5.5 w/ good coax beats the 7 by
9-10 dB consistently.

I'm installing a 900->802.11a repeater unit on the truck tomorrow. If
nothing else it'll be fun to show off (my laptop has an a/b/g adapter)

BS

BS

["Followup-To:" header set to alt.cellular.verizon.]
On 2007-06-11, Larry <[email protected]> wrote:
> Steve Sobol <[email protected]> wrote in
> news:[email protected]:
>
>> But those who don't mind the risk certainly
>> should be encouraged to share.
>>
>
> What risk, specifically? I can cut anyone off I don't want using it

Yes. And if you're diligent and monitor who's using the wifi and how they're
using it, you can probably minimize the risk. Generally, out of my 24-hour
day, I am gone for at least twelve hours per day, and if I left my access
point open and someone decided to use my Internet connection to do something
illegal, it will be traced back to me and I will be held responsible. I can't
monitor my wifi to the point that I'd be comfortable sharing it with
strangers. Your situation, of course, might be different.

> I've had no problem, ever, with abuse.

Cool! As I pointed out, those who feel the risk of abuse is low enough
should be encouraged to share, and I'm glad you are sharing.

> I see no risk at all. As a matter of fact, if anyone can get to your
> system to connect with the internet, you're fairly bust free when the
> govt snoops "catch you"....
>
> "Sir. Isn't it a fact that your IP connected to this kiddie porn website
> in Bangledesh, as recorded by our illegal wiretap?"
>
> "I don't know. Hundreds of people use my wifi link all the time.

Do you really think that will be accepted as an excuse?

Contractually, Charter can throw me off the service if I spam/commit Denial of
Service attacks/break laws/etc. The agreement is between my wife and Charter,
since the account's in her name. She is responsible for what's done with the
cable account.

And if you really believe that you can use "I let random people use my
Internet connection, how was I supposed to know what they were doing" as an
excuse to law enforcement, I sincerely hope nothing ever does happen to you,
because I have a hard time believing they won't find you liable for *anything*.


> don't know or care what they do as long as they don't attack me or
> another user. I don't track every webpage they look at or the whole
> internet would be shut down all over!", I exclaim, innocently.
>
> I'm no more responsible than Comcrap or Verizon. I'm just a pipe to
> them....and that stands up just fine in court....no intent!

But any commercial Internet provider, in the case of criminal acts
committed using their service, does at least have logs of who used
their service. I'm not talking about specific browsing habits, I'm
talking about "IP address 1.2.3.4 was allocated to Larry in Camden,
South Carolina by our DHCP server from date and time X to date and
time Y." They can at least give a minimal amount of detail about
subscriber activity and will do so if served with a subpoena. Your
problem would be that you have nothing that proves anyone else was
using your wifi -- unless you have a device somewhere logging MAC
addresses and a few other pieces of key information -- so they'd
probably go after you.

Again, I'm not saying you should change the way you're set up, especially if
you don't have any abuse issues. I'm just saying your view of things may
deviate somewhat from reality.

On 2007-06-11, Larry <[email protected]> wrote:
> Steve Sobol <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> But those who don't mind the risk certainly
>> should be encouraged to share.
>
> What risk, specifically? I can cut anyone off I don't want using it,
> individually. I've had no problem, ever, with abuse. On top of the
> enlisted barracks at the air force base, you'll find 3 Pringle's can
> antennas pointed at my hotspot. They don't have broadband in the peon
> barracks. I'm doin' my part for the troops!...(c;
>
> I see no risk at all. As a matter of fact, if anyone can get to your
> system to connect with the internet, you're fairly bust free when the
> govt snoops "catch you"....
>
> "Sir. Isn't it a fact that your IP connected to this kiddie porn website
> in Bangledesh, as recorded by our illegal wiretap?"
>
> "I don't know. Hundreds of people use my wifi link all the time. I
> don't know or care what they do as long as they don't attack me or
> another user. I don't track every webpage they look at or the whole
> internet would be shut down all over!", I exclaim, innocently.
>
> I'm no more responsible than Comcrap or Verizon. I'm just a pipe to
> them....and that stands up just fine in court....no intent!

You are absolutely right that they won't (in theory, and probably
in practice) throw you in jail for something you didn't do just
because you pay the bill for the Internet connection it was done
from. It is individuals who commit crimes, not Internet connections.

The problem is that at the point you get to have the conversation you
imagine above the law enforcement officer will have in his possession
a warrant, justified by the observed usage of your connection, giving
him permission to search your property for evidence that you are the
individual who committed the crime, and he'll probably get to take your
computers, and backup disks, and your DVD collection, and anything else
which tickles his fancy, along with him for closer inspection after
he leaves.

Now if you did nothing wrong you'll come out okay. You'll eventually
get your stuff back. They might even apologize for bothering you.
On the other hand this will be long after someone has tromped through
your house looking at your stuff, and after the weeks or months it
takes for someone to get around to looking at your computers' disks
to see what they can find.

So I agree you have little or no risk of being convicted of something
you, personally, did not do, but you do bear the remote risk of being
inconvenienced while they determine that you did not do it. And there's
no guarantee of getting your disks back intact.

Note that I do run an open access point outside my house, or at
least I did until the power supply failed; I haven't replaced it yet. I
think the risk from this is quite small. On the other hand, I'm paranoid
enough about losing data I need from my computers (not only for this
reason but also from theft, or power problems, or something
more likely) that I already do automatic backups of everything I
care about to a computer outside my house. In the worst case I
could buy new equipment and be back to normal in a day or two.

Dennis Ferguson

Per Dennis Ferguson:
>Now if you did nothing wrong you'll come out okay. You'll eventually
>get your stuff back. They might even apologize for bothering you.
>On the other hand this will be long after someone has tromped through
>your house looking at your stuff, and after the weeks or months it
>takes for someone to get around to looking at your computers' disks
>to see what they can find.

I'd go further than that and say you have a pretty good chance of
incurring some pretty heavy losses - that's if you do a lot of
work on your home PC. Even with up-to-date offsite backup,
you'd be out-of-pocket for a replacement PC... and that offsite
backup is, almost by definition, going to be a day or two out of
date..... so you'd have lost all the work you did in the
preceding N days.
--
PeteCresswell

"Larry" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...ract_id=585867
>
> I've been attacked by the cellular hacks on these newsgroups because I
> dare logon to open wifi systems and get my email, etc., instead of paying
> the jerk cellular phone companies $70/month for slow, spotty service all
> hobbled up with "you can't do that" legal jargon to prevent you from
> using bandwidth.
>
> According to many law schools and the courts (see the various papers from
> this website), what thousands of people are doing with programs like
> Network Stumbler to find open systems driving around are perfectly legal
> and NOT theft, as the cellular hacks have tried to make it to preserve
> company profits. It's just not true.
>
> From the paper marked "Stanford Law School", MIT even has a course setup
> to improve your techniques!
> "Moreover, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung declared the movement a
> “national sport” in the United States, and also noted that the practice
> is quickly moving to Europe. Recently, a how-to wireless-hacking course
> has been offered at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology
> (MIT), promising to teach students how to perform wardriving techniques
> and how to use “cool wireless tools for [their] tinkering pleasure.”
>
> Screw cellular ripoffs and their denial of services....(c;
>
> Get Net Stumbler from:
> http://www.stumbler.net
> When you see W4CSC on it, help yourself to my hotspot. It's running
> 400mw to a 9db omnidirectional antenna up 55'. Range is about 1.5 miles
> to a Pringle's can antenna. Got a hotspot? SHARE IT!
>
> Larry
> --
> http://www.spp.gov/
> The end of the USA and its Constitution....RIP

In Sparta Michigan this is a felony. Did you know this?
>