Denial of Service becomes new offence
THE UK government has invented the new crime of creating a denial of service attack and will be putting it on the lawbooks by autumn.
Currently coppers have relied on the Computer Misuse Act to stop people committing denial of service (DoS) attacks. However the law is 15 years old, which is a long time in computing, and many legal eagles think that it fails to cover DoS attacks properly.
Last November a teen was acquitted on charges of sending five million emails to his former employer, because the judge decided that no offence had been committed under the Act.
The new law says that all means of interference with a computer system are criminalised and it mentions Denial of Service attacks specifically.
All you have to do is impair the operation of any computer, to prevent or hinder access to any program or data held in any computer, or impair the operation of any program or data.
If a court finds you guilty, you could end up with ten years porridge, which is a long time for your average teen hacker. You can read all about the new law
here.
The INQuirer
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