Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/19-783_k53l.pdf
Page Number: 35.0

Cite as:  593 U. S. ____ (2021) 

11 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

based constraints.  It did not naturally include other con-
straints, such as time and manner restrictions.  By replac-
ing the specific, limited term “purposes” with the broader, 
more general phrase “not entitled,” Congress gave force to
those other kinds of constraints.  Consider the previous ex-
ample of the employee who violates an instruction not to log 
in while in an unfriendly foreign country with insecure net-
works. The original text would not cover him, so long as he 
logged  in  for  a  proper  purpose  like  checking  work  e-mail. 
The newer text would cover him because his entitlement to 
obtain or alter data is context dependent.  His purpose is
innocent, but the time or manner of his use is not. 

III 
The  majority  ends  with  policy  arguments.    It  suggests
they  are  not  needed.    Ante,  at  17  (“ ‘extra  icing  on  a  cake 
already frosted’ ”).  Yet, it stresses them at length.  Ante, at 
17–20.  Regardless, the majority’s reliance on these policy 
arguments is in error. 

Concerned  about  criminalizing  a  “breathtaking  amount 
of commonplace computer activity,” the majority says that
the way people use computers today “underscores the im-
plausibility  of  the  Government’s  interpretation.”    Ante,  at 
17.  But  statutes  are  read  according  to  their  “ ‘ordinary 
meaning at the time Congress enacted the statute.’ ”  Wis-
consin  Central  Ltd.  v.  United  States,  585  U. S.  ___,  ___ 
(2018) (slip op., at 2) (ellipsis omitted).  The majority’s reli-
ance on modern-day uses of computers to determine what 
was plausible in the 1980s wrongly assumes that Congress
in 1984 was aware of how computers would be used in 2021. 
I also would not so readily assume that my interpretation
would automatically cover so much conduct.  Many provi-
sions  plausibly  narrow  the  statute’s  reach.    For  example, 
the statute includes the strict mens rea requirement that a
person must “intentionally . . . excee[d] authorized access.”
§1030(a)(2).  The statute thus might not apply if a person