Ambiguities in US law for investigators

Theoretical debates about how best to address cybercrime have their place but, in the real world, companies and individuals are facing new harmful criminal activity that poses unique technical and investigatory challenges. There is nothing virtual about the real damage online crime can inflict offline to victims. At the same time, technology is inviting uses that may result in significant, though sometimes inadvertent, criminal and civil liability. The law is not always crystal clear about whether specific conduct is a crime and about which tools investigators may use to collect evidence identifying the scope of the criminal activity and the perpetrator. In this article, three stories based on real-life cases are described that highlight gaps in the law. At the risk of spoiling the suspense, let me make the moral of these stories plain at the outset: specific laws directed to specific problems are important, both as guidance to law enforcement on how investigations may be conducted, with appropriate safeguards for civil liberties and privacy, and to alert people where legal lines are drawn as a caution against crossing them. Does this require endless effort to update the laws to keep pace with technology? Yes, but the US Congress returns every year with the job of making new laws. Will the pace of legal changes always be behind technological developments? Yes, but in my view the correct pace is a ‘go slow’ one. By the time a proposal has gone through the legislative process, the problem it seeks to address