Law / United States / West Virginia
West Virginia Computer Crime and Abuse Act
W. Va. Code §§ 61-3C-4, 61-3C-5
A citation is an address, not a summary. The first part names the law; what follows narrows it to the exact section, article or paragraph.
In force.
A computer misuse rule binding public and private bodies.
As of 6 September 2026.
What it requires
- Ordinary, non-deceptive automated access to a public West Virginia-connected page, performed without intent to obtain computer services without authorization and without a scheme to defraud, does not by itself fit either offense's elements.
- Do not knowingly, willfully, and without authorization access or cause to be accessed a computer or computer network with intent to obtain computer services; this is a misdemeanor punishable by a $200 to $1,000 fine, up to one year in county jail, or both.
- Do not knowingly and willfully access a computer, computer service, or computer network to execute a scheme to defraud or to obtain money, property, or services by fraudulent pretenses; this is a felony punishable by up to $10,000 and ten years, or both.
- Do not introduce ransomware into a computer, computer system, or computer network with intent to extort money or other consideration; this is a separate felony punishable by up to $100,000 and ten years, or both.
- This Act contains no clause preserving or displacing an ordinary contract or license governing your access to a West Virginia-connected computer service; terms-of-service enforcement is a separate track under ordinary contract law, untested here against scraping specifically.
- Anyone injured by a violation of this Act may sue in circuit court for compensatory damages, punitive damages, and injunctive relief.
If you get it wrong
Criminal exposureYes
Private right of actionYes
Criminal exposure note
Three criminal tiers: unauthorized access to computer services with intent to obtain them is a misdemeanor (fine $200 to $1,000, or up to one year in county jail, or both); computer fraud (defrauding, or obtaining money, property, or services by fraudulent pretenses) is a felony (fine up to $10,000, or up to ten years, or both); introducing ransomware with intent to extort is a separate felony (fine up to $100,000, or up to ten years, or both); and unauthorized access to data on a Legislature-owned computer is a felony (fine up to $5,000, or up to five years, or both).
What this law does
Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page.
Section 61-3C-5 makes it a misdemeanor, fined $200 to $1,000 or up to one year in county jail, for any person to knowingly, willfully, and without authorization access or cause to be accessed a computer or computer network with the intent to obtain computer services; ordinary, non-deceptive automated access to a public page performed without such intent does not fit this offense's elements.
Section 61-3C-4 separately makes computer fraud, accessing a computer to execute a scheme to defraud or to obtain money, property, or services by fraudulent pretenses, a felony punishable by up to $10,000 and ten years, and makes introducing ransomware with intent to extort a separate felony punishable by up to $100,000 and ten years; a third tier in the same section punishes knowing, willful, unauthorized access to data stored in a computer owned by the Legislature with a fine of up to $5,000 and up to five years.
Authorization is defined as the express or implied consent a person gives another to access their computer, network, program, software, system, password, identifying code, or personal identification number.
Section 61-3C-17 provides a defense where the defendant had reasonable grounds to believe they had authority to access, or could not reasonably have known they lacked it, but the article contains no clause preserving or displacing ordinary contract or license terms, unlike Virginia's equivalent statute.
Section 61-3C-16 gives any person injured by a violation of the article a civil cause of action in circuit court for compensatory damages, punitive damages, and injunctive relief, brought within five years of the last act constituting a violation or two years of its discovery, whichever is earlier.
The Act was originally enacted in 1989 (S.B. 92) and has been amended repeatedly since, most recently by H.B. 2017 in 2021; the code's own pages carry no separate commencement date for the current text of the sections cited here beyond noting the enacting and amending sessions.
When LexLint raises it
crawls_web
Read the law
official West Virginia Code text, West Virginia Legislature website (code.wvlegislature.gov)