Though I'm aware in Assange's case they do have proof of intent, but I wonder if it sets bad precedent, or is a case where they just dug up some law which is practically never really enforced?
I'm not sure what the gray area is supposed to be here.
If I teach you lock picking skills as a fun hobby, that's clearly okay.
If I teach you lock picking skills knowing you aspire to be a house robber, that is grayish legally and wrong ethically.
But if I break into a specific bank vault for you to help you steal stuff, and we talked about stealing the stuff before I helped you, then I'm clearly involved in a criminal conspiracy.
Assange committed a crime, and if he played the same role in helping to empty your bank account you'd want these laws to exist.
The ethical question here is about whether that crime was ethically jusified. I.e., it's about civil disobedience, not about whether blatant conspiracy should be legal.
But for your bank account comparison to make sense Manning would've already have emptied your bank account before JA broke the law.
Picking someone else's door lock is legal if they ask you to.
Picking someone else's lock, if it's not actually in a door and isn't protecting anything, is not illegal, even if they don't ask you to or give permission. You're just picking up a lock and fiddling with it, there's no trespass.
Picking someone else's door lock to burgle their home is illegal.
Handing someone a lockpick so that they can burgle a home for you is illegal.
