In an opinion piece for Wired, Ashkan Soltani discusses why the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) puts security and privacy researchers at risk and is also bad policy for consumers. Soltani recently joined an amicus brief filed by Stanford’s Center for Internet and Society articulating the risk the CFAA places on researchers. A CFAA violation depends on whether “an action allows a user to gain ‘access without authorization.’” The “scary part,” Soltani writes, “is when these actions involve everyday behaviors like clearing cookies, changing browser reporting, using VPNs and even protecting one’s mobile phone from being identified.”
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