Archived from groups: alt.internet.wireless (
More info?)
What you say is true as far as federal law is concerned. But federal law
does not prevent state law from being more restrictive.
Take a look at:
http://www.ncsl.org/programs/lis/CIP/surveillance.htm
14 states have privacy laws that specifically prohibit monitoring of cell
phones. Nevada prohibits unauthorized interception of "radio
communications", which is defined to to include "wireless methods".
According to http://www.privacyrights.org/fs/fs2-wire.htm, in California, it
is
"... illegal to intentionally record or maliciously intercept telephone
conversations without the consent of all parties. This includes cordless and
cellular calls. (California Penal Code 632.5-632.7) To violate the law, the
interception of your cordless or cellular phone conversations must be done
with malicious intent."
New York also prohibits recording (not interception) of cordless phone
calls:
"The New York law, unlike the federal law, prohibits unauthorized recording
of conversations over cordless phones even though users have no expectation
of privacy."
(http://www.nysba.org/Content/NavigationMenu/News/Legal_Handbook_for_NYS_Jou
rnalists/chapter19.pdf)
I mention these because they specifically include cordless phone calls,
which are unencrypted transmissions in an ISM band. Obviously, they are
written to let the unintentional eavesdropper off the hook. But they
establish that state law can and does prohibit what federal law does not.
You will almost certainly never be detected or caught if you merely monitor
other's transmissions (unless you post them to the net). But it would be
incorrect to imply that everyone has a free legal pass to eavesdrop at will,
merely because the transmissions are plaintext in an ISM band.
I'll grant that probably none of the existing state law has been used in
court in a wifi context, and there's no guarantee that it would hold up. But
state laws could be modified to include wifi specifically, if eavesdropping
comes to be perceived as a problem.
"Walter Roberson" <roberson@ibd.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca> wrote in message
news:c8qnrj$fpv$1@canopus.cc.umanitoba.ca...
> In article <cU3sc.27343$cz5.9231365@news4.srv.hcvlny.cv.net>,
> Michael D. Brooks <mikedb@panix.com> wrote:
> :Using another's wireless access would be considered theft of service by
the
> :entity proving he Internet service( Under USA laws).
>
> Not if you don't -transmit-. If you don't -transmit- then you fall
> under FCC regulations that say that anyone can listen to unencrypted
> data in the ISM band. I've posted citations and quotations in this
> newsgroup in the past: if its in an unlicensed band and its unencrypted
> then it does not qualify as a "protected" transmission.
>
> It would be difficult to argue that there had been any 'theft of service'
> of the provider for just snooping on unencrypted transmissions.
> What service was stolen? The ISP is probably not even the entity
> providing the wireless access: that's probably the consumer's own
addition.
>
> Now sending packets out, such that they traverse the ISP's equipment
> without authorization -- *that* would be theft of service.
> --
> "Mathematics? I speak it like a native." -- Spike Milligan
f it.
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