alt Hacker NewsDifferent scenario but it reminds me of when Missouri prosecuted a reporter who found that teacher's SSN numbers were exposed in the HTML of a webpage
> "Parson described the journalist as a “perpetrator” who “took the records of at least three educators, decoded the HTML source code, and viewed the Social Security number of those specific educators” in an “attempt to steal personal information and harm Missourians.”"
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That didn't actually happen. The governor threatened to prosecute, and ordered the police to produce a report on their investigation into the matter. The police complied producing a report saying the person the governor wanted to prosecute did nothing wrong.
Isn't html copyrightable and thus it is a publication? (And thus exposed by the author). Or am I in the wrong ballpark here?
Reminds me of a German developer that got prosecuted because he opened an EXE file with notepad and found a hardcoded database password there: https://www.heise.de/en/news/Modern-Solution-Convicted-IT-ex...
>The password to this database was stored unencrypted in an executable file of the middleware product and was the same for all Modern Solution customers
>Modern Solution then reported the security researcher to the police, who searched his home and confiscated his work equipment
>The programmer has thus been sentenced to a fine of 3,000 euros and must bear the costs of the proceedings