The Supreme Court has released its first and ONLY opinion of the day in Van Buren v. U.S. No blockbusters today! supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf…
Fascinating (and unprecedented) breakdown: Opinion by Barrett, joined by Kavanaugh, Gorsuch, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan. Dissent by Thomas, joined by Roberts and Alito. supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf… 
SCOTUS holds that an individual “exceeds authorized access” under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act when he accesses a computer with authorization but then obtains information located in particular areas of the computer that are off-limits to him. This is the @OrinKerr bat signal.
In my non-expert view, this is a good decision. Barrett puts real limits on the scope of the CFAA, an alarmingly broad (and outdated) criminal law. Hopefully this will forestall a lot of dubious federal prosecutions for minor computer-related crimes. supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf…
I would wager that the Trump judges sided with the liberals because they're relatively young, understand computers decently well, and recognize that the government's preferred reading of the CFAA would criminalize a stunning range of conduct unworthy of federal prosecution.
This is a good question. As the senior-most justice in the majority, Breyer got to assign this opinion, and he gave it to Barrett. Has he ever assigned a majority opinion before?
https://twitter.com/GOPSucks4/status/1400454854158417922
Kinda funny that the federal government set up a very complicated sting operation to nail the defendant in this case, successfully caught him in the act, secured a guilty verdict, then watched as courts overturned his conviction under two different laws. supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf…
OK @AdamSFeldman confirms that Van Buren v. U.S. marks the first time Breyer has assigned a majority opinion. And he assigned it to Barrett! supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf…
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