Phantom Crime War Driving

CK - Washington.   Some German police take pride in nabbing laptop users found in public spaces--untethered to a LAN cable and suspected of accessing the Internet wirelessly. There is nothing inherently illegal about the wireless Internet but not every officer--and not only the police--understands that. The intern.de news service reports on the story involving the Paderborn police, discusses the law and finds the police action arbitrary, thus pointing to a need to educate the authorities. Paderborn is home to the Nixdorf Museum and used to be famous for its thriving computer industry run under the Nixdorf flagship that in its heyday employed some 26,000.