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maalyex

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First, editorialized headlines are not allowed by site rules

Apologies. I suppose I should have known this, but I didn't (I've seen many such headline over the years).

But the ruling doesn't threaten to ambiguously target people who just change an IP to get around an ordinary IP ban.

If this ruling sticks, I can imagine that instead of blacklisting an IP, standard practice will be to return a web page saying "you are hereby notified...".

How do you legally notify someone if all you know is their IP? (serious question, IANAL)

From the article: "There was significantly more to the CFAA charges than that, to be clear, including circumventing a subsequent MAC address block and (most significantly) entering an MIT storage closet to install his computer directly. But changing IP addresses to get around IP address blocking was at least one of the possible grounds of unauthorized access."

Admittedly a sensationalistic headline on my part

The title of the linked article is "District Court Holds That Intentionally Circumventing IP Address Ban Is “Access Without Authorization” Under the CFAA".

Violating the CFAA is, of course, illegal. From the linked article: "During the debate over the Aaron Swartz case, one of the legal issues was whether Swartz had committed an unauthorized access under the CFAA when he changed his IP address to circumvent IP address blocking"

This particular ruling relates to Craigslist.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Fraud_and_Abuse_Act

Funny indeed! My favorite:

"I have mixed feelings about these cables. Yes, they have unprecedented clarity and range, but they are silver, which is chock full of small hadrons. If, like me, you are an audiophile particle physicist, you'll know that small hadrons degrade the transmission of audio signals by decohering individual notes, particularly quarter tones that have been reflected off of acoustic surfaces. Additionally, the quality of silences is tranquil, but not peaceful; Philip Glass's note-free "4'33" fails to achieve the the subtlety of a live performance."

http://www.amazon.com/review/RSXPVOGOCD14D/ref=cm_srch_res_r...