What part of Judge is unclear?
Why do you take the world of an associate from 'Oslwang law firm' over my word?  Because she wrote a blog entry?  Because she is saying what you want to hear?  Where are his words and not people interpreting them the way they want and do note that both your quotes use the words 'effectively' and 'in effect'.  Why the weasel words if what the judge said was so clear?

But you're still making the same mistake; you're trying to use plain usage of the words to extrapolate their legal meaning.  With out reading the ruling (does England not post them online for some reason?) you don't know the scope of what the judgment was saying.
Perhaps his ruling was limited only to the requirements of property with regards to prosecution under the Computer Misuse Act.


Edit: And more to the point... HE STILL WASN'T CHARGED WITH THEFT!

Why would it matter?  As long as he offers you the same value of the bitcoins in cash....
Really if you're worried about such an occurrence just tack in something that if the other party wishes to settle the debt in USD rather than bitcoin a 10% conversion fee will be added or some such.

It does when you can't point to any.  Sodomy laws for example... yah no one -really- enforces them anymore (and would probably be thrown out if they tried) but there is plenty of cases that one can point to that it is in fact illegal to do so.
You can't do that with digital item theft.  The best I was able to find is one case of domain name theft that might have set some applicable law... but the guy pled out and there was no appeals so it didn't actually set any precedent.



First off I don't know the rest of the world's law so I'm sticking with American.

Secondly you can't just posted news links and go AHH HA got you.
I said charged and convicted... the cops are not law experts and can arrest you for whatever they want to.  What the prosecutor charges someone with and more importantly what the judge actually rules on is what really matters.  That's what you need to see.  Not some reporter or street cop saying 'sounds like theft'

Thirdly even that link you posted I can show the profound misunderstanding surrounding your use of the word theft.
Lets take a look at some of the details.

Wow what a great sound bite!... hmm but wait.. it doesn't say what is actual crime was does it?  Stolen property.. yah yah what ever

TO GOOGLE!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/04/zynga-poker-chips-hacker-pleads-guilty_n_818288.html
"Charged with violating the Computer Misuse Act, Mitchell issued his guilty plea to Exeter Crown Court's Judge Philip Wassall, who said that Mitchell could face years behind bars for the theft"

http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/view/15706/hacker-steals-virtual-poker-chips-from-online-gaming-firm/
"At Exeter Crown Court, Ashley Mitchell pleaded guilty to five charges brought under the UK's Computer Misuse Act and the Proceeds from Crime Act"

http://socialtimes.com/want-to-steal-from-zynga-think-again-poker-thief-caught_b41057
"Ashley Mitchell, the infamous Zynga Poker hacker, plead guilty last week to multiple charges under the Computer Misuse Act and the Proceeds of Crime Act for stealing online poker chips in large amounts. However, according to sources, further information has come forth from a late witness."

Hmmm telling isn't it?  And I don't even know anything about British law but the fact he wasn't charged with theft but charged with computer crimes says something.

Link?  I see quite a few apprently legitimate links (I say legitimate because one normally doesn't charge for trojans) where did the bad copy come from?

What the heck are you going on about?
If someone hacks your game account and deletes your avatar is it murder?  No but it's still illegal because hacking is illegal.

Taking someone's bitcoins may superficially match the common usage of the word stealing, but almost no court has taken that postion and I've tried to provide clear legal reasons why.  That however doesn't negates the fact it is still a crime to do so.

Stealing bitcoins is not a crime....  but there is no way to 'steal' them without committing a crime.
IE you're not commiting theft when you take someone's bitcoins; you're commiting unauthorized computer access, you'd probably run afoul of some idenity theft laws, maybe get nailed on fraud?  Not sure would take some research.
But theft it's not.

The fundamental problem with calling it theft is you've equated bitcoins with 'real stuff' and when you've done that with out careful court rulings and defined laws you open up the door to all sorts of zany antics.

It's not my world.  It's the real world.
I can't prove a negitive. 
You find me someone that is charged and convicted of stealing a purely digital item and then we can talk.  Bitcoin maybe 'new' but computers have been around for a while so if it really is theft you should be able to find a case for us to discuss.

Is that really the road you want to go down?  Because I can tell you right now breach of contract is not theft.

The quality of the comments are really going down hill....


As I've stated from my very first post
(and a few since then)
The question is not illegal vs illegal the question is theft vs some other crime.



Please go away I've already covered the money argument.

No.
Coupons represent money.  Money is real. 
Bitcoins represent bitcoins...  Bitcoins may be worth money but they represent nothing.

The closet thing to bitcoin is MMORPG gold.  In fact the only difference is the fact that MMORPGs use a server and bitcoin is over a P2P network.

Sigh...
Stealing bit coins while in New Jersey is illegal.   Not from.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jurisdiction
And seriously you post New Jersey VS Iran/Syria and want to talk about double standards??? -cough-

And stealing bitcoins is always illegal because it likely violates the laws on unauthorized access.


I'm the only one that's posted a law that might cover Bitcoin.

There are no goods... why is this so hard for you to understand?
If I log into your trading account and transfer stock out I've stolen STOCK.
If I log into account and sell off all your corn futures I've stolen CORN.  (technically no... but good enough for an example)

If I use your private key to transfer out some bitcoins what have I stolen?  Bitcoins?  THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS BITCOINS.
Bitcoins are just an agreement between all the participants in the network to trade imgenary units with each other.

If you can just call anything with value a good then eve online is filled with criminals yet no one has ever been arrested?

Why is it so important to you people that bitcoins be prosecuted as theft?
If it's so important to you get the laws changed.  You want an example of a law that would likely protect you?

Here let us read New Jersey's.

2C:20-1. Definitions.

  "Property" means anything of value, including real estate, tangible and intangible personal property, trade secrets, contract rights, choses in action and other interests in or claims to wealth, admission or transportation tickets, captured or domestic animals, food and drink, electric, gas, steam or other power, financial instruments, information, data, and computer software, in either human readable or computer readable form, copies or originals.

Sounds a little different doesn't it?

Bitcoins are probably considered propriety in New Jersey but many other places do not enumerate such specific rights.

Does a password have value?  A private key is a password and you can't steal a password.  If you could pastebin would be guilty of a billion counts of handling stolen property every time anonymous posted their latest password dump.

Of course it isn't inclusive... it doesn't list a great many types of financial derivatives
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derivative_(finance)
But they still protected.
It has to be similar to thing things on the list; IE you can't steal air for example no matter how much value you'd like to assign to it because it's like nothing else on the list.

No!
That's why people share them in their freaking sigs. It's an account number.  You can't steal someone's account number.
Absolutely not.  If they did I can generate a few 1000 address per second.  You want to buy some?
No?  That doesn't seem germane though...

Bitcoins aren't virtual goods...  They aren't goods at all.  It's simply a ledger of 'transactions'.  Bitcoins aren't a real thing they don't even represent a real thing.  There are no bitcoins on your computer there are no bitcoins anywhere.  Only the argeed upon rules of the 'game' allow bitcoins to exist.


Basiclly you have a file on your computer that says
5 to bob
6 from sue
1 to mack
4 from bob
3 to sue
and so on

And I log into your computer
and add
1000 to reyals

That's theft?  Because that's what you're saying.  I haven't taken anything I've simply created a frauduinty entry in a ledger of a system that is afford no special legal proection (which is why this would be a crime if you tried it with stocks)

If data representing nonreal things was afford these protections then it would open a huge can of worms...
Can someone be arrested for taking my stuff in EvE online even though it's allowed by the game?  No?
So then they could be arrested for taking stuff in WoW because it's not allowed there?  Yes?
Ok so if Dark Ages of Camelot crashes and deletes my items is Mythic liabel for destroying my property?
What if someone hacks WoW and deletes my items?  Does blizzard have to pay?  I mean the items were in their 'bank'.

Lets be totally assine now.  What if I hack bitcointalk.org and change my post count to 10000 and yours to 1?  Did I steal posts from you? Because that's what you're saying. 


Bitcoin is to weird...  If bitcoin wants to be protected by theft statues then the law needs to be updated.  Right now though it's still protected by computer laws.

100% NO
'Money' only comes from the government.
Sticking with Florida
UNIFORM COMMERCIAL CODE: GENERAL PROVISIONS

671.201 General definitions.—Unless the context otherwise requires, words or phrases defined in this section, or in the additional definitions contained in other chapters of this code which apply to particular chapters or parts thereof, have the meanings stated. Subject to definitions contained in other chapters of this code which apply to particular chapters or parts thereof, the term:
.....
(24) “Money” means a medium of exchange currently authorized or adopted by a domestic or foreign government. The term includes a monetary unit of account established by an intergovernmental organization or by agreement between two or more countries.

It's a complete list of examples and none come close to bitcoin.

Maybe we can try Florida?
(14) “Intangible property” includes, by way of illustration and not limitation:
(a) Moneys, checks, drafts, deposits, interest, dividends, and income.
(b) Credit balances, customer overpayments, security deposits and other instruments as defined by chapter 679, refunds, unpaid wages, unused airline tickets, and unidentified remittances.
(c) Stocks, and other intangible ownership interests in business associations.
(d) Moneys deposited to redeem stocks, bonds, bearer bonds, original issue discount bonds, coupons, and other securities, or to make distributions.
(e) Amounts due and payable under the terms of insurance policies.
(f) Amounts distributable from a trust or custodial fund established under a plan to provide any health, welfare, pension, vacation, severance, retirement, death, stock purchase, profit sharing, employee savings, supplemental unemployment insurance, or similar benefit.

Still nothing that comes close to bitcoin.


Your problem is you don't seem to understand that your wallet.dat is not 'filled' with bitcoins.  It's just a big long number... it's the same as someone stealing your password.  Even you should be able to see that charging someone with stealing a password is absurd.  It's the actions you take with the stolen password that matter.
So you can't STEAL bitcoins.  You can only gain unauthorized access to the network and execute actions and that's covered under standard computer law.
The real legal question is it's easy to see how someone can gain unauthorized access to a big monolithic server with a password but it would be interesting to see how the law comes down on unauthorized access to a p2p network with a private crypto key....  That's where the real legal loophole might be.

Ok first off 641 is only for the governments money... so if you steal the fed's bitcoins 641 may come into play.

Theft is normally under the state's jursidiction

So here's Texas' take

(6) "Intangible personal property" means a claim, interest (other than an interest in tangible property), right, or other thing that has value but cannot be seen, felt, weighed, measured, or otherwise perceived by the senses, although its existence may be evidenced by a document. It includes a stock, bond, note or account receivable, franchise, license or permit, demand or time deposit, certificate of deposit, share account, share certificate account, share deposit account, insurance policy, annuity, pension, cause of action, contract, and goodwill.

Which one do you feel bitcoin falls under?

Failure to return an item is a civil matter in most cases because it's not the cops job to figure out the 'terms' of your agreement that led to the item not being returned.  Of course I know nothing of chinese law.

Anyway... I don't think you can really make a case for 'stealing' bitcoins since nothing has really been taken.  Now all sorts of laws aginst unauthorized access may come into play since your wallet.dat is like a cryptologic signature and using that to execute unauthorized transactions would almost certinly run afoul of such laws.

For example; loging into someones account and taking their sword in WoW probably won't get you arrested for taking the sword.  But you can be damn sure loging into their account is aginst the law.  Though I'm not sure how the ruling would come down on P2P network vs Servers...  that could be intresting to see.  But if the courts have ruled you can't even steal source code then I don't think they'd look fondly on the same argument for bitcoins.

Of course none of the above would prevent you from suing the ever living shit out of the person who took your bitcoins.

Not just meaningful... on any time scale... heat death of the universe would probably kick in before you'd just randomly find a collision. 

Yes I wasted 5 mins clicking through your posts what of it?