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LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

arstechnica.com

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Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#51

Post by freehunter »

dsacco wrote: post #28
jalfresi wrote: post #13

If you post it on a public network, it is defacto, public. If you don't want it scraped, take it down, or put it behind a login. If the user provides the login to a scraper, then the scraper has permission.

That's a pretty literalist, one-size fits all approach to policy. I don't think it's a good framework to use for applying ethics considerations. If I can walk near a pool, should I also be able to run? Is running anything more than faster walking? If I'm allowed to be around the pool walking with my entry ID, should I also be allowed to place my ID on a little motorized car and make it dart around the pool really fas…

The pool has the right to kick you out, same as any website. The pool cannot call the police and charge you with a felony for misusing their resources.

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#52

Post by Spivak »

hashkb wrote: post #45
aphexbr wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The bike example is a very poor analogy - the data isn't removed from LinkedIn, it's merely copied. It doesn't matter how many times the site is scraped, the data is unchanged and still available. A better analogy would be me taking a photo of the bike while walking past. It shouldn't matter how many times you tell me to stop, if it's on public property you can't really stop me from taking the photo. If you have an i…

What if I paint the bike artfully, put a copyright notice on it, and you sell the photos you took?

Standard IANAL.

That would be copyright infringement because photographing a copyrighted work is considered reproducing the work under the law.

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#53

Post by JohnStrange »

dsacco wrote: post #10

I'm following this story with a lot of interest. I've done (and still do!) a lot of data crawling/scraping. In the past I've worked on so-called "alternative data" collection and analysis for financial forecasting. Without going into too much detail, a lot of hedge funds have teams constantly searching for kernels of data that can contribute some kind of signal for market movements. This data can come in the form of…

> Outside of finance I am familiar with many tech companies which (openly or otherwise), kickstarted what are now widely known enterprises through cleverly crawling or scraping massive amounts of data.

Google comes to my mind. I'm only partly joking, as it seems to me that the line between search engine web crawling and other forms of web scraping is very thin.

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#54

Post by wastedhours »

aphexbr wrote: post #41
wastedhours wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the risk of bringing out the "you wouldn't download a handbag" brigade - you could make the argument that just because I leave my bike unlocked on the street doesn't give you a right to ride it off. Even if you go for "forgiveness rather than permission", if you ride it a second time after I've told you I don't want you riding it, then you're in the wrong. Obviously, there are philosophical arguments to be made ab…

The bike example is a very poor analogy - the data isn't removed from LinkedIn, it's merely copied. It doesn't matter how many times the site is scraped, the data is unchanged and still available. A better analogy would be me taking a photo of the bike while walking past. It shouldn't matter how many times you tell me to stop, if it's on public property you can't really stop me from taking the photo. If you have an i…

Ok, if I left the prototype for a new bike on the pavement, and you came along and 3D printed an exact replica. Sure, the original still exists, but you just violated trademark/registered design laws because it was there. It's not the same as a photo because a photo of a bike doesn't give you the same value as the actual bike, whereas scraping the content of a webpage does give you the same value.

Perhaps my analogy wasn't great, but the grey area is around going to LinkedIn's server (whether or not this is "public" or their property they allow you access to is another philosophical question, though in the eyes of the law it appears it's the latter), deliberately extracting value from it, and then getting annoyed when you're asked not to.

Inherently it seems as though it's the old question of whether a server is public, or private but accessible (like those POPs [0] there was a thread on recently).

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privately_owned_public_space

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#55

Post by jlebrech »

TomSawyer wrote: post #4

A few weeks ago I was looking up public profiles on LinkedIn and I noticed what I interpreted to be some network-side fingerprinting of some kind. The first couple profiles came up, but from that point I was only served a sign up page. It didn't matter if I changed browsers or spawned new incognito sessions.

you can only view a few profiles at a time, and changing to incognito window will do the same.

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#56

Post by [deleted] »

hellbanner wrote: post #34
dsacco wrote: post #10

I'm following this story with a lot of interest. I've done (and still do!) a lot of data crawling/scraping. In the past I've worked on so-called "alternative data" collection and analysis for financial forecasting. Without going into too much detail, a lot of hedge funds have teams constantly searching for kernels of data that can contribute some kind of signal for market movements. This data can come in the form of…

"satellite imagery for oil tankers" - Interesting. If hedge funds floating drones above oil tankers, I'd guess they'd be accussed of corporate espionage / spying / invasion of privacy? Ok, so oil tankers are big and "in the clear". What if $TANKERCORP floats big parachute balloons above its tankers to imply "looking past these is unauthorized viewing"? Then if a HedgeFund gets a clever angle on a satellite photo.. is…

[deleted]

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#58

Post by dsacco »

type0 wrote: post #44
dsacco wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a pretty literalist, one-size fits all approach to policy. I don't think it's a good framework to use for applying ethics considerations. If I can walk near a pool, should I also be able to run? Is running anything more than faster walking? If I'm allowed to be around the pool walking with my entry ID, should I also be allowed to place my ID on a little motorized car and make it dart around the pool really fas…

> I don't think it's a good framework to use for applying ethics considerations. What does is it have to do with ethics? CFAA law does not apply here and that is what matters.

Ostensibly "ethical considerations" are a precursor to a law being ratified, and will also be used when a law is not sufficiently specified as to obviate the decision. If a party is not denying their activity in court, but rather claiming that it doesn't match existing laws, this would come into play.

But if you contest that or have an issue with the specific terminology I used, perhaps you'd prefer this terminology instead: "I don't think this is a good framework for interpreting the CFAA and establishing legal precedent."

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#59

Post by type0 »

aphexbr wrote: post #41
wastedhours wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the risk of bringing out the "you wouldn't download a handbag" brigade - you could make the argument that just because I leave my bike unlocked on the street doesn't give you a right to ride it off. Even if you go for "forgiveness rather than permission", if you ride it a second time after I've told you I don't want you riding it, then you're in the wrong. Obviously, there are philosophical arguments to be made ab…

The bike example is a very poor analogy - the data isn't removed from LinkedIn, it's merely copied. It doesn't matter how many times the site is scraped, the data is unchanged and still available. A better analogy would be me taking a photo of the bike while walking past. It shouldn't matter how many times you tell me to stop, if it's on public property you can't really stop me from taking the photo. If you have an i…

Not sure why you're being down-voted, the Web were designed to be public. If you want to prevent me from taking pictures of the exterior to your Cafeteria on the public street you'd have to build a wall / put it behind a login. But then don't complain that you are loosing customers because they can't see it or can not find information to your site through search engines.

Re: LinkedIn: It’s illegal to scrape our website without permission

#60

Post by dsacco »

freehunter wrote: post #51
dsacco wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a pretty literalist, one-size fits all approach to policy. I don't think it's a good framework to use for applying ethics considerations. If I can walk near a pool, should I also be able to run? Is running anything more than faster walking? If I'm allowed to be around the pool walking with my entry ID, should I also be allowed to place my ID on a little motorized car and make it dart around the pool really fas…

The pool has the right to kick you out, same as any website. The pool cannot call the police and charge you with a felony for misusing their resources.

Does the pool have any recourse if you proceed to bypass the ban? Do you have to re-enter to pool to bypass it, or does sending in confederates with their own badges to continue your work also bypassing the ban? How about sending in new motorized cars?

The analogy is starting to break down, but I think it's still instructive for the problem of applying a simple first principles approach.

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