Author Archives: Shawn E. Tuma

Check out the recent MyCase Blog featuring Shawn Tuma’s practice

Check out the recent MyCase Blog featuring my practice! > A MyCase Practice: Shawn Tuma | Dallas, Texas Technology and Business Attorney http://ow.ly/qmqAy

Video: How Does Calling Yourself a “Hacker” Impact Your Rights In Court?

This past week the blogosphere brought a great deal of attention to the case Battelle Energy Alliance, LLC v. Southfork Security, Inc., 2013 WL 5637747 (D. Idaho Oct. 15, 2013), by claiming it held that if you call yourself a “hacker” you could lose your 4th Amendment rights. My friend Michael @theprez98 (a veteran, white-hat hacker, and student …

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Combating Corporate Espionage Seminar – Prezi and a few thoughts

Today I had the honor of speaking at the Combating Corporate Espionage: Protecting Your Organization From “hackers, insiders & fraudster” seminar with Jarrett Kolthoff and David Major. Jarrett is the CEO of SpearTip Cyber Counterintelligence; he and I have worked together quite a bit so he first impressed me long ago with the depth of his …

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Presentation slides for Parenting Paper<less Conference on Digital Information Law Issues

Yesterday I had the wonderful opportunity to speak at the Parenting Paper<less – Technology and Single Parenting Conference 2013 and all I can say is the audience was amazing. I discussed the digital information law issues including social media law and intellectual property law (with a dose of contract law!). The audience was so engaged, so …

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Hacker Sentenced to 5 Months Under CFAA for Hacking SodaHead.com Accounts

A Kentucky man was convicted of violating the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act for hacking into specific accounts on the website sodahead.com and replacing purported racist and homophobic content with less offensive content. Michael Pullen was able to hack into the accounts by exploiting a software vulnerability. The man was sentenced to 5 months in …

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Loss and Damage Are Not Interchangeable Under CFAA–District Court Blows Right Past CFAA’s “Loss” Requirement in Sysco Corp. v. Katz

In denying a motion to dismiss a civil Computer Fraud and Abuse Act claim, a district court found that a departing employee’s purported cover-up of nefarious activity by deleting e-mails from his “sent” and “deleted items” folders on Plaintiffs’ computer system was sufficient to allege damage pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 1030(c)(4)(A)(i) which provision, however, does not address the issue …

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District Court Finds Breach of Contractual Limits on Access Violates the CFAA

TAKEAWAY: Businesses (and anyone else) that allow others to access to their computers should have contractual agreements with those persons that clearly specify the restrictions on their authorization to access and use the computers and data.  This is the lesson of United States v. Cave, 2013 WL 3766550 (D. Neb. July 16, 2013), a case in which …

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Yes, Case Law Says It Really Is A CFAA Violation To DDoS A Website

On October 3, 2013, a federal grand jury in Virginia indicted 13 members of Anonymous for conspiracy premised on underlying violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1030 (CFAA). Those indicted allegedly committed a DDoS attack (distributed denial of service) on certain websites. The indictment (download) has, yet again, stirred up …

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New #employment related #CFAA access case

New #employment related #CFAA access case: RoadLink Workforce Solutions, L.L.C. v. Malpass http://t.co/6iiAWLNwFn RT @CFAAdigest

YES, IT IS! > Is a “Like” Protected Speech? Is It Different Than Giving “The Finger”?

To answer the question I asked in a blog post about a year ago, “yes, it is”! The First Amendment does protect a Facebook “Like” as free speech. Earlier today, the United States Fourth Circuit held that a Facebook “Like” is protected speech under the First Amendment. The case is Bland v. Roberts, No. 12-1671 …

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