United States v. Morris

Robert Morris (defendant), a Cornell graduate student with an authorized account for Cornell's computers, created a virus intended to expose weaknesses in network security and released it via a disguised MIT computer to obscure its true origin; the virus spread far faster than he expected, crashing numerous computers nationwide, and his attempt to anonymously broadcast a fix failed because the network had become too clogged. Because the infected computers, including Cornell's own systems, were federal-interest computers, the government sued Morris under the federal computer-fraud statute, and he argued his conduct only exceeded, rather than entirely lacked, authorization.