Computer Misuse (Amendement) Bill

[Chris Leather]

Ian Jackson quotes:

>   (1) A person is guilty of an offence if without authorisation he
>       does any act -
>           (a) which causes; or
>           (b) which he intends to cause,
>       directly or indirectly, a degradation, failure, or other
>       impairment of function of a computerised system or any part
>       thereof.
>   (2) A person is guilty of the offence in subsection (1)(a) even if
>       the act was not intended to cause such an effect, provided that
>       a reasonable person could have anticipated that the act would
>       have caused such an effect.

In the unlikely event that this amendment becomes law, I'd be interested to
see the court battle between purchasers of 'copy-inhibited' audio CDs trying
to play them on PC CD drives (who could claim 'failure' of their PC under
this amendment), and the record companies...!

Moving back to the crypto angle - I reckon the forced disclosure of a
private key under an RIP Section 49 notice could be held to cause "directly
or indirectly, a degradation, failure, or other impairment of function of a
computerised system or any part thereof", and would be without the owner's
authorisation, especially if they weren't the recipient of the Section 49
notice.

Chris.