Is Benzinga.com Just A Front for Plagiarists? [BUT SEE UPDATE]

For those interested in the case of my plagiarized op-ed, it seems to have jumped from the San Francisco Chronicle (where it was alleged to have been written by “Patrick Harvard,” a writer at Benzinga.com, but it has just been taken down) to Yahoo News and Forbes.com, where it is now allegedly written by Jason Raznick:

Should Lying About Your Age On The Internet Be A Felony?
By Jason Raznick | Forbes – 2 hrs 49 mins ago

In 1986, Congress drafted the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act to protect government computers from malicious hacking attacks. Since its enactment, this bill has been broadened every few years, and its reach now extends far beyond hacking.

Currently, this law criminalizes computer use that “exceeds authorized access” to any computer, but violating it is only a misdemeanor. The Senate Judiciary Committee, however, met today to discuss changing the violation from a misdemeanor to a felony.

Interestingly, Raznick appears to be an actual person: He is the President of Benzinga.com, and he appeared here on CNBC advocating how great his news and opinion site is.

I should add that I’m more amused and intrigued by this than annoyed or upset. I’m interesting in seeing an apparent fraud exposed, but I don’t feel particularly injured or offended that my op-ed has been plagiarized like this.

UPDATE: I’ve now spoken with a representative from Benzinga.com. Apparently “Patrick Harvard” is a new writer for Benzinga who is a “remote” writer, meaning that he writes in via e-mail and never appeared there, and he is also supervised by a “remote” supervisor, meaning that the supervisor was not local to the company, either. Today, after learning that “Patrick Harvard” had plagiarized the op-ed, Benzinga.com fired him and reprimanded his supervisor. The Yahoo News version that purports to be written by Benzinga CEO Jazon Raznick was picked up by Yahoo News from Forbes, where Benzinga can post content. According to Benzinga, they only have two accounts with Forbes so they regularly post items at Forbes that is not written by Raznick but appears under his name, which they claim Forbes knows and approves of. The SFGate and Forbes versions of the article have now been taken down.

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