[Accepted] Fraud and Theft

[MO_oNyMan]

Quiet some time ago there was an update on regulations introducing a new reg called Fraud. Which basically covered the theft of money. The exact wording of Fraud, Grand Theft and Petty Theft can be found in the spoilers below

i220 - Fraud

 

i220 - Fraud - To steal or use deliberate deception in order to obtain credits from someone. Applies to amounts greater than 500 credits.

For lesser amounts, see i102 - Petty Theft.

For items of equivalent value, see i215 - Grand Theft.

15 minutes and/or demotion - 30 minutes and immediate suspension

 

 

i102 - Petty Theft

 

i102 - Petty Theft - To take items from areas one does not have access to, or to take items belonging to others or the station as a whole. Includes theft of credits up to 500cr. For higher amounts see i220 - Fraud

3 minutes, returning of stolen item to the owner or department. - Up to 10 minutes and/or demotion. - 150 credits

 

 

i215 - Grand Theft

 

i215 - Grand Theft - To steal items that are dangerous, of a high value, or a sensitive nature.

15 minutes, confiscation of stolen items - Suspension, tracking implant and holding until Transfer

 

 

There are several problems with this regulation. First of all i think i haven't seen it applied once since its implementation. Besides that, the sudden distinction between credits and items of equivalent worth, the fact there is no such distinction for yellow infractions and the meaning of the words "fraud" and "theft" (fraud generally means tricking someone into giving you something. Including regular theft in it and making it only applicable to money is weird and disorienting) makes it overall confusing. And finally the regulation that doesn't serve its purpose just crowds the list of regs which is a bad thing.

I don't really understand why the regulation was implemented in the first place (i can see a couple of reasons but for none of them implementation of Fraud as a separate regulation is the optimal solution). So I would suggest getting rid of i220 merging it with Petty Theft and Grand Theft for the sake of clarity and simplicity. Here's an updated version of i102 and i215 (presuming i220 is removed)

i102 - Petty Theft

 

i102 - Petty Theft - To steal or use deliberate deception in order to obtain up to 500 credits or items of equivalent collective worth from areas one does not have access to, or belonging to others or the station as a whole.

3 minutes, returning of stolen item to the owner or department. - Up to 10 minutes and/or demotion. - 150 credits

 

 

i215 - Grand Theft

 

i215 - Grand Theft - To steal or use deliberate deception in order to obtain 500 or more credits or items of equivalent collective worth or that are dangerous, of a high value, or a sensitive nature.

15 minutes, confiscation of stolen items and/or demotion - Suspension, tracking implant and holding until Transfer

 

[Scheveningen]

Defrauding is deliberately fooling someone into giving you their money if they didn't explicitly consent to the reason the money handoff is being used for. It's criminal deception intended for financial gain, but fraud is not defined as forcibly taking someone's property, such as the two cases of theft are. It is a far different intent than from petty theft or grand theft.

[MO_oNyMan]

Defrauding is deliberately fooling someone into giving you their money if they didn't explicitly consent to the reason the money handoff is being used for. It's criminal deception intended for financial gain, but fraud is not defined as forcibly taking someone's property, such as the two cases of theft are. It is a far different intent than from petty theft or grand theft.

 

It should be like this but it's not. Description of Fraud indicates that pretty clearly by using the word "steal" along with "use deliberate deception to obtain" and suggesting to switch the charge for theft when it comes to stealing items not money. That being said I wouldn't be opposed to changing the wording of Fraud to indicate that it's used to punish only cases of tricking someone into giving you something (be it money or items) but I think that having a separate regulation for it is somewhat excessive and covering it with theft is a beter option.

[K0NFL1QT]

I had an IC conversation with a CCIA agent a few days ago, regarding Fraud and when it could be applied. We came to the conclusion that in the case of a roboticist selling prosthetics for personal profit, when they're using NT owned materials and machines, the character would be commiting fraud. Ergo, selling anything on the station for personal profit is likely chargable as fraud. Not that this doesn't exclude selling items for the profit of station department accounts, only for sales of NT owned property with the credits going to your personal account; the deception implicit to qualify this as fraud is that you claim to have the right to sell corporate property that in fact does not belong to you, thus you have no right to sell it or to claim the profit from that sale.

[Synnono]

I don't really understand why the regulation was implemented in the first place

 

Fraud was introduced back in November 2017 as a way to address credit amounts greater than 500cr being stolen from people. It had been observed by a staff member that, technically, someone could get away with a yellow infraction for running off with someone's entire bank account. Since Grand Theft is meant to cover high-risk items that are mechanically important to a round, and Petty Theft is meant to cover less valuable items and smaller amounts of money, Fraud addressed a gap in enforcement at the time it was introduced. That it hasn't been used much compared to the much-older theft regulations isn't necessarily a valid reason to get rid of it. Its scope is narrower than both others because it targets a specific gap.

I'd be happy to talk the definitions and semantics over with the team, but those things aside, is there a gameplay issue you see being addressed as a result of your proposed changes?

[MO_oNyMan]

Is there a gameplay issue you see being addressed as a result of your proposed changes?

 

Gameplay-wise sure we can adapt to a questionable wording and assume that fraud in terms of regulations means getting money illegally. However the confusion of its wording unnecessarily creates a bump on the curve of understanding regulations (which both seasoned officers and newcomers already have some troubles with). So cleaning up the regs and making them as intuitive as possible would benefit the crew in terms of shortening the integration time into security operations and decreasing the leeway that can be used to argue about the wording and intended meaning of the regulation.

[Synnono]

If the suggestion is simply to clean up the wording, we can roll that into our next clump of regulations issues to look at. Right now we might move toward standardizing "theft" of both money and items across all three levels of severity, but we will see where that discussion takes us when we talk gameplay with other staff teams.

Since this is on our radar now, I'll be archiving this thread in the accepted subforum.