e-fraud, it was a simple skip-and-jump to what is formally
known as "access device fraud." Congress granted the Secret Service
the authority to investigate "access device fraud" under Title 18 of
the United States Code (U.S.C. Section 1029).

The term "access device" seems intuitively simple. It's some kind of
high-tech gizmo you use to get money with. It makes good sense to put
this sort of thing in the charge of counterfeiting and wire-fraud
experts.

However, in Section 1029, the term "access device" is very generously
defined. An access device is: "any card, plate, code, account number,
or other means of account access that can be used, alone or in
conjunction with another access device, to obtain money, goods,
services, or any other thing of value, or that can be used to initiate
a transfer of funds."

"Access device" can therefore be construed to include credit cards
themselves (a popular forgery item nowadays). It also includes credit
card account NUMBERS, those standards of the digital underground. The
same goes for telephone charge cards (an increasingly popular item with
telcos, who are tired of being robbed of pocket change by phone-booth
thieves). And also telephone access CODES, those OTHER standards of
the digital underground. (Stolen telephone codes may not "obtain
money," but they certainly do obtain valuable "services," which is
specifically forbidden by Section 1029.)

We can now see that Section 1029 already pits the United States Secret
Service directly against the digital underground, without any mention
at all of the word "computer."

Standard phreaking devices, like "blue boxes," used to steal phone
service from old-fashioned mechanical switches, are unquestionably
"counterfeit access devices." Thanks to Sec.1029, it is not only
illegal to USE counterfeit access devices, but it is even illegal to
BUILD them. "Producing," "designing" "duplicating" or "assembling"
blue boxes are all federal crimes today, and if you do this, the Secret
Service has been charged by Congress to come after you.

Automatic Teller Machines, which replicated all over America during the
1980s, are definitely "access devices," too, and an attempt to tamper
with their punch-in codes and plastic bank cards falls directly under
Sec. 1029.

Section 1029 is remarkably elastic. Suppose you find a computer
password in somebody's trash. That password might be a "code"--it's
certainly a "means of account access