The US Supreme Court on Thursday limited the scope of the 1986 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) in a ruling that found a former sergeant did not violate the law by misusing his access to a police database.
When he was a police officer in Georgia, Nathan Van Buren used his credentials to log into the computer in his patrol car to access a license plate database at the request of an acquaintance – who, unbeknownst to Van Buren, was participating in an FBI sting operation.
Van Buren provided the acquaintance with information from the database, and the FBI arrested Van Buren on the basis that the database search, done outside of the scope of his duties and contrary to department policy, violated the CFAA's "exceeds authorized access" clause of 18 U. S. C. §1030(a)( ..
Support the originator by clicking the read the rest link below.
