Hacker Trashes U.S. Army PCs; Faces 70 Years

[m3kt3k]

He may have gotten a job offer and foolishly turned it down. Had a friend that hacked into a collage and they found him. He was given two choices. Trial or parttime Admin. He chose admin.

 

[tricky trees]

I bet most of the $700,000 dollars was spent on the pretty illustration to go into the classified file so Mr Bush could understand and follow the story.

 

[fudgeboy]

HAHA! if the US army had half a brain they would lock him in a laboratory and get him to help develop their security!
not saying that what he did was right, they COULD treat it like jail and not pay him or anything. but they should defiantly try to learn from the kid

 

[oicw]

The big question is, did he uncover the secret files showing where they keep the shot-down Marsian UFOs?

 

[magicandy]

There are no UFO files. It's all just a stupid ****ing distraction for the masses that are bored with their lives and need something ridiculous to keep their minds on instead of asking the many crucial questions people should be asking our government.

 

[xrodney]

Seriously us security is just joke. It much harder get acces or stole something from half the companies in the world then from US government or military. There are thousands reports about that each year.
And fringing down whole military network with 2000+ PCs lmao.
That would mean hack to each of them and do something like format drive on all of them. Anything else should be matter of minutes or at worst hours to fix. Ofcourse this would require actually hire some really good system admins and have good tuned monitoring in place.
Remember last year faulty network card bring down whole network for one of US government agencies, imho should take less then hour to find and solve issue.

 

[neiroatopelcc]

Just because you can locate and possibly abuse security flaws doesn't mean that you can effectively fix them as well. He's just a petty criminal really. If he'd brought my company's network down for 24 hours I doubt he'd even get jail time, but then again we're not as dependant on computers as any nations standing army.

 

[derek2006]

I say we should make an example out of him and give him a very harsh punishment and let the public know. Then secretly hire him while everyone thinks he got life or something.

 

[mrcheesle]

Wow, so many ignorant comments from people that have no clue of US military procedures or resources. Believe me, when they estimate that $700K worth of damage was done that might have been an understatement. If HQ servers get shutdown, it can restrict access to some very critical information that is needed for quick decision making around the globe 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Information such as intel reports that could have possibly saved lives, how much money do you think that is worth? The man may be gifted, but you can't say that he didn't know what he was doing was illegal.

 

[jeroman]

There have been several cases such as this in the past. Most of the time the estimated damage is greatly exaggerated. Most hackers do it as a challenge, not maliciously, and the term hacker used to be imbued with some sort of honour until crims started embezzling money, etc... Seriously, how could a simple trawl for info cause all those PCs to crash!? It would be counterproductive. They won't hire him because he isn't a US national. They ironically trusted Hussein more than they trust the British. And yes, their own intel and security services do this. But they are a group. In a world of Transnationals and "National Security" it is individuals who suffer.

 

[Regected]

Wow, so many people commenting without a real knowledge of what this guy did or didn't do. His $700,000 damages was from deleting the wrong log file while covering his tracks. He didn't shut any servers down nor harm any equipment. The bulk of the damages cost is from trying to figure out to what he gained access. He gained access to the network with a dialing bot with a range of known numbers for the base which housed the network. The terminal he gained access to should have been removed from the network years before this incident since it had minimal security and no firewall. He simply brute forced his way in once he had the direct phone number.

He went back several times because each time he gained information, it opened more questions. He got caught when he went back a final time to get evidence of what he found. Who knows where this story would be if he succeeded in gaining the evidence he was seeking.

 

[rambo117]

US government norton firewall protection

 

[Parrdacc]

Hacking into any government computer system should be punished. I actually think hackers are the only necessary evil I have ever come across. Without them we would not really know just insecure and how crappy some of these networks, programs, and OS's are. Do I agree with everything they do, talking real hackers here? No, of course not, but they do serve a purpose and I do believe the majority of real hackers are satisfying their curiosity and the challenge, even if it is wrong. This is not giving them an excuse mind you, please do not take it that way. Most of the time when a dollar amount is applied to show damages, it is not a physical damage but the time taken out to fix how a hacker got in in the first place and the dollar amount is usually overblown.

Should he be punished? Yes. The likelihood, and I hope it happens for McKinnon, is he will serve jail time and be fined quite a bit, however after a while in prison the U.S. or even the UK will come to him and offer him job.

As for whoever said hacking should = death. What? Please! That is going way to far imo. As already stated when murders and child molesters and several other types of crime and criminals get only jail time and then, in some cases, released their is no reason to sentence a hacker to death. Evidently whoever said that does not believe in second chances, or at least cannot determine with good sense when and who should get a second chance. Too bad, just remember everyone makes mistakes, just hope whoever said this does not screw up cause if he has to answer to someone with that mentality, you are so up a creek and if that happens, I hope you don't go "I just made a mistake." It would be hypocritical.

 

[FrustratedRhino]

Welcome to the real world kids, crimes have consequences. I don't care if he is autistic, parapelegic or just shy, get over it, you committed a crime, DEAL WITH IT. MAN UP, GO TO JAIL, IN AMERICA!

Hackers that think they should get hired for doing criminal activity should be hung publically on national tv. I know "White Hats" exist, but the notion that they should get hired in lieu of punishment seems just retarded. Should a speeder become a highway cop in lieu of a ticket next? Or how about a man that robs a bank becoming a teller? Get real people he should go to prison and hopefully he dies there.

 

[Parrdacc]

"Get real people he should go to prison and hopefully he dies there."

"Hacking government computers, especially from another country, should = death imo."

Extremism at its best. I guess all those government employees and private companies and firms that have contracts with the governments that do the same thing, breaking into government computers, should be put to death or die in prison too. Oh, wait its okay for them to do it, even to their own citizens because they are paid to do it or its sanctioned by the government. Yet with all these people trained and working for various governments, this lone hacker did it without any "formal training". I say YES punish him, but to put him to death or to even wish it is not right. Redirect his skills and show him another way in which to use them. It is not the skills that make a person bad but the way in which they are used.

 

[grieve]

Give him a job?
WOW you guys have some twisted morals sometimes.

In my mind, hacking a Government PC is severe… He didn’t hack into JC Penny’s computer here… He hacked into the systems which govern your country.

I for one would make an example of him. If you give him a job everyone and there damn dog would start trying to hack into US gov computers cause at worst, they’ll get a JOB!

WOW wake up.

 

[jwl3]

Toss his hide in jail. Any attack on US Gov't defense computers is a direct attack on the US. China and Russia have proxy computer terrorists constantly testing our defenses. Of course those scum countries won't extradite their own to face trial here.

 

[bustapr]

This man is from now on, MY HERO. He hacked into the most efficient online security systems in the world and got away with it. Come on, the man didnt thrash any computers, he just hacked THE PENTAGON and many other places of the US government to check on UFOs. whats just as amazing is that he did it out of curiosity, so no months oof planning with a terrorist group. But the coolest part is that he hacked the pentagon( which , in case of a war US vs UK, UK would ve won because of this hero.).

 

[grieve]

[citation][nom]bustapr[/nom]This man is from now on, MY HERO. He hacked into the most efficient online security systems in the world and got away with it.[/citation]
UMMM... he got cought, hense this thread.

 

[grieve]

WHAY CANT I MAKE CORRECTIONS!!!!!

**hence.**