Soon after Matthew Broderick starred in the 1983 movie
“WarGames,” Congress passed the precursor to what is known today
as the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). When initially
passed, this ominous-sounding statute was designed to criminally
punish individuals who misused computer technology to obtain
national security secrets or personal financial records or
hacked into government computers (à la Broderick’s character).
Today, this statute has been amended to protect against fraud
and related activities in connection with access devices and
computers, and to provide civil remedies. Put another way, the
CFAA is to computers what trespassing and burglary are to real
property. The CFAA sprouts up fairly often in trade secrets
cases. This likely stems from several roots. First, the CFAA
provides easy access to federal court. Second, as companies
often store their confidential data on computers, the CFAA
extends liability without having to actually prove that the data
or information misappropriated is confident