Law / United States / Wyoming
Crimes against computer users (bare without-authorization test)
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
- Do not access a Wyoming-connected computer, computer system, or computer network without authorization; this statute has no malicious-intent or deceptive-means gate, so a bare unauthorized access can fit its elements even without resulting damage or disruption.
- No Wyoming court has decided whether accessing an unauthenticated, public web page counts as access without authorization under this statute for a scraping fact pattern; treat that question as unsettled rather than resolved by analogy to a narrower peer-state statute.
- A violation committed with the intent to devise or execute a scheme or artifice to defraud or to obtain property carries a substantially higher penalty, up to ten years' imprisonment and a $10,000 fine, than an ordinary violation, up to three years and a $3,000 fine.
If you get it wrong
Criminal exposureYes
Criminal exposure note
A crime against computer users under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 6-3-504(a) is a felony punishable by imprisonment for not more than three years, a fine of not more than $3,000, or both, except that it is a felony punishable by imprisonment for not more than ten years, a fine of not more than $10,000, or both, where committed with the intention of devising or executing a scheme or artifice to defraud or to obtain property (§ 6-3-504(b)).
Penalty structure
Base tier for an ordinary violation of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 6-3-504(b)(i) (bare unauthorized access or denial of service). The same subsection raises the fine to $10,000, with imprisonment of up to ten years instead of three, where the crime is committed with the intention of devising or executing a scheme or artifice to defraud or to obtain property, § 6-3-504(b)(ii).
- Rule
- Fixed only
- As of
- 6 September 2026
- Currency
- USD
- Fixed cap
- 3,000
What it reaches
Obligation class
Access restriction
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 6-3-504(a) makes it a crime against computer users for any person, knowingly and without authorization, to access a computer, computer system, or computer network, or to deny computer system services to an authorized user of services owned by, under contract to, or operated for another.
The subsection carries no malicious-intent or intentionally-deceptive-means element in addition to lack of authorization, so an ordinary, non-deceptive automated access to a public, unauthenticated page can fit its bare elements on a plain reading, regardless of whether it disrupts anything.
Two sibling provisions in the same article require more than bare access: section 6-3-502 (crimes against intellectual property) reaches only data with a value of more than $750.00 that is a trade secret or otherwise confidential, and section 6-3-506 (computer trespass) requires intent to damage or cause a malfunction through malware or similar means; ordinary scraping of a public page fits neither.
When LexLint raises it
crawls_web
Read the law
official text, Wyoming Statutes Title 6, Wyoming Legislature (wyoleg.gov compressed statutes)