Court Ruling: Employees Commit a Crime Anytime a Work Computer is Used for Purposes That Violate Company’s Computer Use Policy

Appeals Court Heeds EFF’s Advice to Revisit Case That Makes Terms of Service Violations A Crime

In June, we filed an amicus brief urging the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to reconsider the troubling decision of a three judge panel in United States v. Nosal, which ruled that employees commit a crime anytime they use a work computer for purposes that violate a company’s computer use policy.

We’re happy to report that the entire Ninth Circuit listened to us, and agreed to rehear the case (PDF) the week of December 12. Over the years we’ve repeatedly criticized interpretations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) that allowed individuals to not only be sued civilly, but charged criminally, for violating a website’s terms of service, or company’s written computer use policy.          More