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The Computer Misuse Act 1990 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, introduced partly in response to the decision in ''R v Gold & Schifreen'' (1988) 1 AC 1063 (see below). Critics of the bill complained that it was introduced hastily and was poorly thought out. Intention, they said, was often difficult to prove, and that the bill inadequately differentiated "joyriding" hackers like Gold and Schifreen from serious computer criminals. The Act has nonetheless become a model from which several other countries, including Canada and the Republic of Ireland, have drawn inspiration when subsequently drafting their own information security laws, as it is seen "as a robust and flexible piece of legislation in terms of dealing with cybercrime”.〔IISS Global Perspectives – Power in Cyberspace. Q&A with Nigel Inkster, Director, Transnational Threats and Political Risk, IISS. 18 January 2011.〕 ==''R v Gold & Schifreen''== Robert Schifreen and Stephen Gold, using conventional home computers and modems in late 1984 and early 1985, gained unauthorised access to British Telecom's Prestel interactive viewdata service. While at a trade show, Schifreen by doing what latterly became known as shoulder surfing, had observed the password of a Prestel engineer: the username was 22222222 and the password was 1234. This later gave rise to subsequent accusations that BT had not taken security seriously. Armed with this information, the pair explored the system, even gaining access to the personal message box of Prince Philip. Prestel installed monitors on the suspect accounts and passed information thus obtained to the police. The pair were charged under section 1 of the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981 with defrauding BT by manufacturing a "false instrument", namely the internal condition of BT's equipment after it had processed Gold's eavesdropped password. Tried at Southwark Crown Court, they were convicted on specimen charges (five against Schifreen, four against Gold) and fined, respectively, £750 and £600. Although the fines imposed were modest, they elected to appeal to the Criminal Division of the Court of Appeal. Their counsel cited the lack of evidence showing the two had attempted to obtain material gain from their exploits, and claimed the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act had been misapplied to their conduct. They were acquitted by the Lord Justice Lane, but the prosecution appealed to the House of Lords. In 1988, the Lords upheld the acquittal.〔HL 21 April 1988, () AC 1063 summary at ()〕 Lord Justice Brandon said: :We have accordingly come to the conclusion that the language of the Act was not intended to apply to the situation which was shown to exist in this case. The submissions at the close of the prosecution case should have succeeded. It is a conclusion which we reach without regret. The Procrustean attempt〔Here Lord Brandon alludes to the classical myth of Procrustes, who would stretch his victims (or cut off their legs) in order to fit a bed for which they were ill suited.〕 to force these facts into the language of an Act not designed to fit them produced grave difficulties for both judge and jury which we would not wish to see repeated. The appellants' conduct amounted in essence, as already stated, to dishonestly gaining access to the relevant Prestel data bank by a trick. That is not a criminal offence. If it is thought desirable to make it so, that is a matter for the legislature rather than the courts. The Law Lords' ruling led many legal scholars to believe that hacking was not unlawful as the law then stood. The English Law Commission (ELC) and its counterpart in Scotland both considered the matter. The Scottish Law Commission (SLC) concluded that intrusion was adequately covered in Scotland under the common law related to deception, but the ELC believed a new law was necessary. Since the case, both defendants have written extensively about IT matters. Gold, who detailed the entire case at some length in the ''Hacker's Handbook'', has presented at conferences alongside the arresting officers in the case. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Computer Misuse Act 1990」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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