Re: Bernstein ruling meets the virus law

[Steve Reid <steve@edmweb.com>]

>      Several other countries have very similiar laws.  However, I had 
> heard a somewhat unproven rumor that a U.S. state had actually made the 
> writing of programs with malicious purposes illegal.  Basically meaning 
> that if you write a virus you have committed a crime.  Like I said 
> though, this was just a statement in a message so I can't vouch for the 
> accuracy.

Hmm... "malicious purposes".... How would they determine that? Some
viruses are clearly designed to be destructive, but some do nothing but
replicate. Then there are viruses and worms (like RTM's) that crash
systems, but may or may not have been designed to do that. Then there are
trojan horses, which look useful, but are designed to crash your
machine... Then there are programs that are designed to be useful, but
have bugs that will cause your machine to crash. 

Things are only black and white in lawmaker's dreams. :-/


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