BarbadosComputer Misuse Act, illegal access
Computer Misuse Act, Cap. 124B, s. 4 (Illegal Access)
In force since .
A computer misuse rule binding public and private bodies.
- How the hook was established
- express
- What makes it apply
- User location
- Audit expectation
- none
What it requires
- Do not gain access to a computer system, cause a programme to execute, or copy, move, alter, or erase data, knowingly or recklessly and without lawful excuse or justification.
- Reading a public, unauthenticated page that the site operator has made generally available has not itself been held to violate this section, though the Act's text leaves the point unsettled.
These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text.
In the frameworks
- NIST AI RMF
- MAP 4.1Approaches for mapping AI technology and legal risks of its components – including the use of third-party data or software – are in place, followed, and documented, as are risks of infringement of a third party’s intellectual property or other rights.
Our reading of where this law's duties sit in each framework. It never says that running a control meets the law. How we read a framework against the law
If you get it wrong
Criminal exposureYes
Private right of actionNo
Criminal exposure note
A fine of $25,000 or imprisonment for a term of two years, or both, on conviction on indictment (s. 4(1)).
Penalty structure
Fine only; the same subsection also allows imprisonment of up to two years instead of or in addition to the fine.
- Rule
- Fixed only
- As of
- Currency
- BBD
- Fixed cap
- 25,000
What it makes you log
Logging duty
Section 4 makes it an offence to gain access to a computer system, cause a programme to be executed, or copy, move, alter or erase data, knowingly or recklessly and without lawful excuse or justification. It imposes no duty to create, keep, produce or review a log or record. The record-of-seized-data duty in Part III falls on the police and is not cited by this row. Section 2 applies the Act to acts done in Barbados, on a Barbadian ship or aircraft, or by a Barbadian national abroad; the first limb is read as a place-of-act hook, and the national limb has no value in the vocabulary.
- Kind
- None
- As of
What this law does
Section 4 prohibits a person, knowingly or recklessly and without lawful excuse or justification, from gaining access to the whole or any part of a computer system, causing a programme to be executed, using a programme to gain access to data, copying or moving data, or altering or erasing it. The offence carries a fine of $25,000 or imprisonment of up to two years, or both.
Section 3(2) separately defines access as unauthorised only where the person is not entitled to it, lacks permission, or exceeds the permission granted; because section 4 does not itself require defeating a security measure, whether a person reading a public, unauthenticated page (which the site operator has made generally available) acts without lawful excuse is an open textual question that no reported Barbadian decision has settled.
When LexLint raises it
When your app profile says your app crawls the web or trains models.
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