Sharing Your Netflix Password Is Now A Federal Crime

Megalith

Megalith

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Giving out your password is now a crime prosecutable under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). The decision, made by the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, makes anyone who shares passwords for services like Netflix and HBOGo into “unwitting federal criminals.”

Nosal’s conviction under CFAA hinged on a clause that criminalizes anyone who “knowingly and with intent to defraud, accesses a protected computer without authorization”. Though CFAA is often understood to be an anti-hacking law, that clause in particular has been applied to many cases that fall far short of actual systems tampering. CFAA has, for instance, been used to prosecute violation of Terms of Service agreements (which are themselves a contested practice).
 
Sweet. You should have to pay 2x also if you watch with both eyes.
 
It's just laughable what these fucking idiots that are supposed to be in charge just keep coming up from off the tops of their rather empty skulls, geez. If I give such a password to an account I'm paying for to another person I honestly can't comprehend how they can see that as that person not therefore being authorized to use the account but whatever. It won't stop the practice.

I guess this means every time a Mother or Father who signs up for Netflix or some similar service and then provides the login information including said password to their family members - who are pretty much expecting to be able to make use of such services since they're being paid for - is now automagically a felon themselves, eh?

Fat chance prosecuting that, idiots.
 
Who needs comedy writers any more when this kind of crap writes itself?
 
This is to protect against fraud and abuse, this hardly covers just Netflix.
 
There's nothing on netflix anyway. And once again paying customers get treated like criminals.

Crap like this is why I just use a vpn to make it look like I'm in a country that doesn't have retarded ip/copyright laws and just download everything.
 
Trimlock said:
This is to protect against fraud and abuse, this hardly covers just Netflix.
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"Fraud" and "Abuse" are as gray of a word as they come for legal eagles. All it would take is for someone unable to login as they have too many streams going, complain to netflix, find out their cousin's sisters brother is using their account that they gave their password to, netflix locks them down, files a report, ole cousin bill is now a felon for streaming Iron Chef on his TV.
 
Bigdady92 said:
"Fraud" and "Abuse" are as gray of a word as they come for legal eagles. All it would take is for someone unable to login as they have too many streams going, complain to netflix, find out their cousin's sisters brother is using their account that they gave their password to, netflix locks them down, files a report, ole cousin bill is now a felon for streaming Iron Chef on his TV.
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That's not exactly how this works. This wouldn't go to court until someone is caught selling their log in to people outside of their account as Netflix already allows multiple log ins for one account. If someone gave out your PW to more people Netflix will just change your PW for you.
 
Maybe my Internets are broken, but that is not what the article says at all.

The article is about a guy who "stole" an login account to access information that he clearly was not supposed to have.

With Netflix I pay for a device limit. It doesn't matter who is using the device, only that that certain number of devices is not exceeded at any 1 time. Would a jury honestly believe that the person on the credit card for the Netflix account is expected to watch 4 devices at once under normal viewing activity?

People also need to be reminded that we, the citizens, do not have to abide by these laws. We can, through jury nullification, flatly reject these arbitrary laws. It is on a case by case basis, which is what balances out it's power, but we do have the right to say that while a law was broken no criminal activity was done. Jury nullificationt is so powerful of a tool that some people have been arrested for even bringing it up.
 
When did the CFAA get created? Did we really need another AA? MPAA, RIAA, and now CFAA?

Anyway, good luck policing sharing of passwords. That's going to be a big waste of money.
 
If the government catches you sharing your Netflix password in violation of the CFAA all you have to do is hire James Comey.

Oh wait, my bad. That's only for the elite tier. The common man's balls must be brought to heel. Carry on.
 
gxp500 said:
I didn't share my netflix password, I was hacked.
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I didn't share my netflix password, I simply had it written on a post-it note next to my computer and my cousin, sister, sister's boyfriend, uncle, etc etc just stole it, I'm the victim!!!! :D
 
westrock2000 said:
Maybe my Internets are broken, but that is not what the article says at all.

The article is about a guy who "stole" an login account to access information that he clearly was not supposed to have.

With Netflix I pay for a device limit. It doesn't matter who is using the device, only that that certain number of devices is not exceeded at any 1 time. Would a jury honestly believe that the person on the credit card for the Netflix account is expected to watch 4 devices at once under normal viewing activity?

People also need to be reminded that we, the citizens, do not have to abide by these laws. We can, through jury nullification, flatly reject these arbitrary laws. It is on a case by case basis, which is what balances out it's power, but we do have the right to say that while a law was broken no criminal activity was done. Jury nullificationt is so powerful of a tool that some people have been arrested for even bringing it up.
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You sir have far too much faith in the average Joe on street who couldn't figure out how to dodge jury duty that week.
 
westrock2000 said:
Maybe my Internets are broken, but that is not what the article says at all.

The article is about a guy who "stole" an login account to access information that he clearly was not supposed to have.

With Netflix I pay for a device limit. It doesn't matter who is using the device, only that that certain number of devices is not exceeded at any 1 time. Would a jury honestly believe that the person on the credit card for the Netflix account is expected to watch 4 devices at once under normal viewing activity?

People also need to be reminded that we, the citizens, do not have to abide by these laws. We can, through jury nullification, flatly reject these arbitrary laws. It is on a case by case basis, which is what balances out it's power, but we do have the right to say that while a law was broken no criminal activity was done. Jury nullificationt is so powerful of a tool that some people have been arrested for even bringing it up.
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If you have 4 kids in one house and evryone has their own device. We have 4 in ours that are wired and everyone has their own profile on Netflix.

Are we gonna see Netflix change their policies from this ruling?
 
bloodhawke83 said:
If you have 4 kids in one house and evryone has their own device. We have 4 in ours that are wired and everyone has their own profile on Netflix.

Are we gonna see Netflix change their policies from this ruling?
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No, the ruling had nothing to do with this. The article just mentions a "what if" quoted towards the end. The article was about someone who was terminated from a job position and used someone else credentials to continue accessing a database.
 
But share hundreds of classified emails over an open email server housed in your basement while U.S. Sec of State, and NOTHING.
Really?
 
Appropriate if true.

I know a ton of people using friend's passwords for streaming video of all services.

I think Netflix, HBO Go, Comcast should just up the anty and cut off people suspected of this.
 
T_A said:
Sound like BS

also a reminder:
Netflix is cool with you sharing your account
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And that is part of the issue and it seems someone isn't fully seeing this.

“The majority does not provide, nor do I see, a workable line which separates the consensual password sharing in this case from the consensual password sharing of millions of legitimate account holders, which may also be contrary to the policies of system owners. There simply is no limiting principle in the majority’s world of lawful and unlawful password sharing,” he argued.
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I am trying to understand what this guy is saying cause on the surface it looks like doublespeak.

I am not sure how your user agreement with the system owners isn't "a workable line".

If NetFlix is OK with it and that is in their user agreement then I don't see password sharing for their service as a problem or violating the law. But I would think that if the owner disallows such password sharing then one would be committing fraud, through illegal access via password sharing.
 
This is silly. This ruling does not criminalize password sharing. The defendant was a former employee who was forming a competing company, and used the usernames and passwords of current employees to access his former employer's computers and download trade secrets. The opinion summarizes it neatly:

Put simply, we are asked to decide whether the “without authorization” prohibition of the CFAA extends to a former employee whose computer access credentials have been rescinded but who, disregarding the revocation, accesses the computer by other means.​

As for the interpretation that this extends to people sharing Netflix accounts, or smartphone passwords, or similar nonsense:

Nosal and various amici spin hypotheticals about the dire consequences of criminalizing password sharing. But these warnings miss the mark in this case. This appeal is not about password sharing. Nor is it about violating a company’s internal computer-use policies. The conduct at issue is that of Nosal and his co-conspirators, which is covered by the plain language of the statute. Nosal is charged with conspiring with former Korn/Ferry employees whose user accounts had been terminated, but who nonetheless accessed trade secrets in a proprietary database through the back door when the front door had been firmly closed. Nosal knowingly and with intent to defraud Korn/Ferry blatantly circumvented the affirmative revocation of his computer system access. This access falls squarely within the CFAA’s prohibition on access “without authorization,” and thus we affirm Nosal’s conviction for violations of § 1030(a)(4) of the CFAA.​
 
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Last I checked what this guy was doing is considered corporate espionage.
 
hity645 said:
Last I checked what this guy was doing is considered corporate espionage.
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I don't think there is a specific crime called corporate espionage. Instead I believe it's laws like the one's they broke that form the charges for this generic term. I suppose it's like Organized Crime, a big term that encompass many "enabling crimes" if you will.

Industrial espionage - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
"A family member watched a movie on his account" - Lock that fucker up!!!

"This Terrorist blew up a building" - I
TMBackstrom said:
But share hundreds of classified emails over an open email server housed in your basement while U.S. Sec of State, and NOTHING.
Really?
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Or vote to have all the new shiny gun laws you just voted in NOT apply to you personally. That's criminal right there.
 
Now just put 30 of them in a private prison together and turn their daily struggles for survival into a show. That's what Americans want to see!
 
Eff you Netflix! Just got the price increase notice from them. Been a member since the VERY beginning. Bastards. Taking the "we value you like Verizon does" approach. How long before they offer discounts for noobs while screwing the old timers?
 
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