The Computer Misuse Act

The Law
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The Computer Misuse Act states the following levels:
1) Unauthorised access to computer material
2) Unauthorised access with intent to commit or facilitate commission of further offences
3) Unauthorised modification of computer material.



What is the Computer Misuse Act?
The Computer Misuse Act introduced by the government, made it illegal to gain unauthorised access to a computer's data and/or software and includes attempting to hack someone's computer, blackmailing or sending viruses.

Believe it or not, it is legal to create a virus and put it on your computer. It is legal to hack your own computer. However, if that virus (by accident) spreads to someone else's computer, you have broken the law.

There are three levels of severity if you do break the law.

In Detail
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1) In this category, a person commits an offence if he tries to access any program or data held in any computer without permission and he knows at the time that this is the case. The maximum penalty is six months in prison and a 5000 pound fine.
This category applies to people who are "just messing around","exploring the system","getting into the system just for the sake of it" and have no intention of doing anything to the programs or data once they have gained access.
It covers the act of guessing passwords to gain access to a system and have a look at the data that is stored. An authorised user of a system may be in breach of this category of the act if he accesses files in the system that have a higher level of access rights that he has been allocated. A student gaining access to a fellow student's area or breaking into the college administrative system is breaking this category of the Act. It is an offence even if no files are deleted or changed.

2) This category covers offenders who carry out unauthorised access with a more serious criminal intent. Persistent offences under section 1 are also included in this second category. Prosecution under this category can lead to a maximum of five years in prison.
Access may be made with an intention to carry out fraud.
For example, breaking into a personnel or medical system with the intention of finding out details about a person that could be used for blackmail falls into this category. Another example of an offence under section 2 would be breaking into a company's system with the intention of finding out secret financial information that could be used when carrying out stock market transactions. The information that could be used when carrying out stock market transactions. The information obtained in this way could be used by a rival company.
A further example of an offence in this category would be guessing or stealing a password, using it to access another person's on-line bank account and transferring their money to another account.

3) This third category concerns the alteration of data or programs within a computer system rather than simply viewing or using the data or program. This category includes the deliberate distribution of computer viruses. Prosecution under this category can lead to up to fives years in prison.
An offence could include deleting files.
However the deletion has to have been done deliberately and not just by mistake.
The program code could be changed. This could stop a program from running or cause it to act in an unexpected manner. This category also includes using a computer to damage other computers linked through a network even though the computer used to do the damage is not modified in any way.
Alternatively, data could be changed: the balance of a bank account could be altered, details of driving offences could be deleted.

Ever heard of 'Ddossing'? It is when you disconnect someone from their internet. This is illegal. If you disconnect the army from the internet, you'll probably find that you're in category 3. If you disconnect your friends internet for a laugh, it'll probably be a minimum sentence, level 1.

Any questions?

Ritchynator0.

 

I've seen people charged with 3rd degree identity theft for logging into a different user account at a school. I also saw someone arrested and put into cuffs for 'unauthorized use of a computer' because his Principal said he couldn't use the computers as a punishment for something he did and he was cought in the library doing homework.

 

He got handcuffed for doing his homework? Lol.

 

It was Unauthorized use of a computer... Have you ever heard of that? Not me until I saw that. Freakin ridiculous.

 

Well yeh I have >.>. That's what this guide is about . The Act was introduced not long ago.