MIT Student Act Is Both Ethical And Unethical

405 Words2 Pages
Hacking in general is both illegal and unethical. By attempting to expose the MBTA of their susceptibility of the fare card, the students would have placed the MBTA in a position to lose profit. Thus, the students’ actions become illegal because of the possible decrease in their profit and hurting the overall system. MBTA could argue that the MIT students are in violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) which would make their actions illegal. From the MIT students perspective they could argue that preventing them from speaking was a violation of their Freedom of Speech. They could also claim that they unintentionally would be bringing harm to the company. Ethically, from the students’ perspective, their actions would be just