Code Isn't Property; Therefore it can't Be stolen

[FAST6191]

Trouble is Magsor this is not really a piracy debate (at this point anyway)- the guy in question abused a position of trust (allegedly?) to take a bunch of code that the bank contracted (or hired people to) to develop* with the intention of providing them with a commercial advantage and/or do their job (something I will argue what most code that is ever written is done with the intention of doing and certainly what the vast majority of paid programmers do).
Before this ruling (and presumably the logic going into it with regards to the charges) was that doing as such (it is generally assumed if you have it you have the potential to do something and will be stung accordingly although actually doing something with the info tends to make for harsher sentences) would have left the bank at a disadvantage by potentially allowing someone else to use their methods (banks frequently employ some bloody clever people at serious cost to them to cook up schemes by which they can make some money or provide the services they need to provide) or know how things work and react accordingly (placing them at a competitive disadvantage by way of having their information that was illicitly obtained used against them**). Such acts introduce elements of industrial or possibly financial espionage and trade secrets as well as the more traditional/viable? charge of taking some information/code that did not belong to him which is what this ruling seems to largely deal with (although the espionage stuff seems to have been dismissed by way of the ruling as well).

For an example of a similar case (although without the sale of aspect) http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/04/09/intel_ex_engineer_spy_pleads_guilty/ and there are other ones involved the theft of information databases (were I to be employed by you and then upon leaving your employment I took your database of clients and associated numbers and you found out would I not end up in some form of court for wrongdoing?). Depending upon how the code works/was written it might even have incorporated elements of the examples I gave (code, data and UI is supposed to be separated but that is just an ideal not a requirement).

*there is also the related thing where companies will often get you to sign away anything you make, even for you, on their machines and sometimes they go further and extend that to anything you develop when you are working for them even on your own time/equipment.

** using internal memos and such leaked to you to move accordingly in financial markets is known as insider trading and tends to see you in front of the beak and financial regulators having to explain yourself.

Short version- this is not so clear cut as you make it seem.

 

[LightyKD]

Awesome, but this will surely open the floodgates of more piracy debates.

 

[Blaze163]

Yay, now I don't feel guilty for spending this afternoon downloading films and games

 

[shakirmoledina]

this means encrypt your code.

 

[Qtis]

I don't see how people think this is good. Imagine what would happen if lets say Nintendo lost all rights to their code (ie. anyone could use it). SSB wouldn't be unique in any way. Mario Kart wouldn't be unique. Now off to Adobe/Microsoft/Sony/Square-Enix/Bethesda/whatever. If the work you've done on something is considered "free for all" since it's code, basically any design in the world could be "free for all" for the same reasons: it's just a drawing with a few measurements and tolerances. In the end the producer making high-end products (regardless of product type, be it games, software, elevators, houses, ships or planes) would be the one losing all the money on R&D while the low-end companies take all the profit with the already made designs..

Piracy is fine by me to some extent, but making commercial use of code free and legal regardless of ownership would basically make the whole world economy and copyright idea go bankrupt. In a way that no one wants.

Also espionage can be thought as transferring a document of any nature to a foreign country (in this case a company?). If this is made legal, the US can't prosecute anyone for espionage since it's legal to transfer code.. That's what makes most pictures come to existence

 

[Foxi4]

Now that's just a retarded ruling, code in any programming language is intellectual property - it's a system of meanings just like an actual language.

If we go by this definition of "code" then let's treat sentences in parole as functions in programming - according to all linguistics ever known to man, especially from a Structuralist stand-point, any written work is also not intellectual property because it's composed of words and words belong to nobody.

Stupid ruling is stupid, that's all I have to say.

 

[Rydian]

Now that's just a retarded ruling, code in any programming language is intellectual property

But it's not a good, therefore cannot be the target of theft.

See the whole Goods Versus Services debate for examples.
http://gbatemp.net/topic/322881-does-the-pre-owned-and-used-market-kill-the-gaming-industry/

 

[Zarcon]

I don't see how this really changes anything.

Theft and piracy have always been two separate crimes.
Piracy is not theft. Piracy is piracy.

If you were to copy a bunch or all of someone's code you'd be pirating their work essentially.

 

[Rydian]

I don't see how this really changes anything.

Most people aren't aware of the differences between intellectual property and a physical product, so the ruling seems odd to them.

 

[Foxi4]

Now that's just a retarded ruling, code in any programming language is intellectual property

But it's not a good, therefore cannot be the target of theft.

See the whole Goods Versus Services debate for examples.
http://gbatemp.net/t...aming-industry/

A poem is not a Good either then - it can be reprinted or even spoken - it has no physical form, thus it cannot be stolen either, yet it is protected by copyright.

It's not the code itself that should be protected but the train of thought of the programmer who created it - it's a sort of an artistic vision, even if it's locked within the confines of coding rules, like a sonet is in its structure.

 

[Rydian]

A poem is not a Good either then - it can be reprinted or even spoken - it has no physical form, thus it cannot be stolen either, yet it is protected by copyright.

What does this have to do with the ruling?

The ruling is about theft, copyright law doesn't come into play.

 

[kirlac]

It doesn't really change anything. Piracy is still illegal. You will not be able to pirate with this excuse because once the code is compiled, what you pirate is then an application/game whatever.
The biggest thing it could change is one person using another persons code in theirs without permission, and anyone who gives someone who would do that access to closed-source code isn't exactly smart. Open-source of course is a non issue. I'm sure patents still exist on code though am I right? So certain algorithms and stuff could be protected through that.

 

[Foxi4]

A poem is not a Good either then - it can be reprinted or even spoken - it has no physical form, thus it cannot be stolen either, yet it is protected by copyright.

What does this have to do with the ruling?

The ruling is about theft, copyright law doesn't come into play.

Infringing a copyright by using someone else's intellectual property is a form of theft - theft of intellectual property.

 

[Rydian]

Infringing a copyright by using someone else's intellectual property is a form of theft - theft of intellectual property.

Read the earlier responses, your misunderstanding was covered.

This does not meet the definition of theft, which includes deprivation of the original.

It is still wrong, it's just not "theft". As in, the term "theft", the definition, in a legal meaning.

 

[Foxi4]

Infringing a copyright by using someone else's intellectual property is a form of theft - theft of intellectual property.

Read the earlier responses, your misunderstanding was covered.

This does not meet the definition of theft, which includes deprivation of the original.

It is still wrong, it's just not "theft". As in, the term "theft", the definition, in a legal meaning.

The legal definition of "theft" may be different from country to country, and while I am not accustomed with the U.S definition, around here infringing copyrights and theft are the exact same thing. Things that are not material may be stolen and copying the original without the knowledge of the creator and using it in your own ventures is basically theft of a concept/technique or even concepts as abstract as "work" or "time spent" while creating a given piece. Don't ask me why - that's actually how it works.

 

[Rydian]

This thread is about a case in the US though, and in the US "theft" includes loss of the original.

 

[Just Another Gamer]

Well it kinda makes sense to me since the original wasn't actually stolen but copied so its not technically theft.

 

[Foxi4]

In the U.S., plenary regulation of theft exists only at the state level, in the sense that most thefts by default will be prosecuted by the state in which the theft occurred. The federal government has criminalized certain narrow categories of theft which directly affect federal agencies or interstate commerce.

(...)

Sometimes the federal anti-theft-of-government-property law 18 U.S.C. § 640 is used to prosecute cases where the Espionage Act would otherwise be involved; the theory being that by retaining sensitive information, the defendant has taken a 'thing of value' from the government. For examples, see the Amerasia case and United States v. Bradley Manning. ~Wikipedia, will read some more on the subject from other sources as it does interest me

Seeing that laws regarding theft are regulated on a State level, fortunatelly this will not be used to establish a precedence, at least not throughout the whole states.

I'd also like to point out the second part - retaining sensitive information may be considered "taking a thing of value", the article mentions only the government, but what about corporate espionage due to which for example code is stolen? Code is pretty damn sensitive information if you ask me, this *could* apply aswell and I sincerely hope that the law will be shaped in that direction after this "incident".

 

[Rydian]

Is killing theft because you're "stealing a life"?

Careful not to think too far.

 

[Foxi4]

Is killing theft because you're "stealing a life"?

Careful not to think too far.

In a metaphorical sense...

Seriously though, murder has a different, specific definition in the system, "borrowing code without knowledge or permission of the victim" does not, apparently... Thus you can go either of two ways - attach an existing label or create a new one.

Corporate espionage and theft of trade secrets is not a last week's invention - it's been around for as long as manufacture existed. That said, it is hard not to consider code a trade secret. It is valuable information - its creation requires a lot of money, time and work force. No ordinary work force either - highly trained and professional programmers, intellectuals. Of course there is damage done, call it however you want - "theft" or "ratatata" but acknowledge it as criminal activity. If the law is lacking a proper definition for a crime then said crime needs to be defined.