MySpace Verdict: Lying on the Web Is a Crime

Lori Drew, a Missouri mom accused of creating a fake MySpace profile to torment her daughter's frenemy, was convicted in federal court this week of accessing a computer without authorization, a misdemeanor that carries up to a year in prison but is usually met with probation. She was acquitted of the felony charge of intentionally inflicting emotional distress.

Orin Kerr, one of Drew's lawyers, wrote on the Volokh Conspiracy that that this verdict essentially means the jury decided it is a federal crime to violate a website's terms of service.

This verdict probes an interesting area of law - one that is surely still developing - and it has raised objections from lawyers across the country. If lying about your identity online is a crime, aren't most of us guilty? From the NY Times:

“It will be interesting to see if issues of safety and security will eventually trump the hallmark ideology of free, largely anonymous or pseudonymous participation in cyberspace,” said Sameer Hinduja, a professor of criminology and criminal justice at Florida Atlantic University.

Andrew M. Grossman, senior legal policy analyst for the Heritage Foundation, said the possibility of being prosecuted for online misrepresentation, while remote, should worry users nonetheless.

“If this verdict stands,” Mr. Grossman said, “it means that every site on the Internet gets to define the criminal law. That’s a radical change. What used to be small-stakes contracts become high-stakes criminal prohibitions.”

More from Wired Magazine's Threat Level blog.