Normally pogowasright ("privacy news from around the world") leave out the editorial comments, but this one had me fairly angry:
Let's see: the headmistress plugs her laptop containing the photos into the school's network and the boys are being treated as "hackers" and the photos as "stolen?" Placing the blame on the students when the teacher seemingly shared the files on a network -- however unknowingly -- does not seem quite fair to the students.
The story is a bit thin on facts, but it would appear that a schoolteacher plugged her laptop into her school's network, left filesharing on, some students found some photos of her in her underwear, and then shared them around. The students are being castigated with the label "hacker".
I'll agree: what the students did was not hacking. All they did was to poke through some (probably not even password-protected) fileshares.
But come on, the students shouldn't be blamed for poking where they're not supposed to be? To trot out the tired old house analogy, just because I've left my door unlocked doesn't mean people should feel free to come in and rummage through my stuff, take copies of my books, and so on. One might say that the students didn't know she hadn't shared the files on purpose, but one might also be an idiot.
Unless there's a sign on my door that says "come in and rummage through my stuff," I think society generally accepts that I made a mistake and people who go through the unlocked door are intruders and trespassers.
It's nice to see that blaming the victim is alive and well though. While it's irresponsible and foolish of her to have put those photos on her presumably school-issued laptop, that doesn't mean it should be open season on her embarassing pictures.