Teen hacker 'accidentally' causes 911 attack | Hacker News Reader

Teen hacker 'accidentally' causes 911 attack

bbc.com

27 pointsJpoechill13 comments

I thought it was going to be something about 9/11

It's on purpose -- the BBC is becoming as bad a clickbait site as the dailywail.

Same here. Totally expected something about nine-eleven.

I'm confused, what exactly did the teen do that was wrong? This doesn't event seem that bad, hardly something to be arrested for, much less sent to prison over it! Besides, he said it was an accident and he's just a kid, it's absolutely ridiculous that people are getting so worked up over something like this.

seems like he just posed some javascript. stupid but he didn't attack anything himself.

Would that be a legal defense?

I mean if you wrote a tool to DOS 911 and distributed the link that would install/trigger it I would think you guilty of attacking 911 even if your computer was not involved.

I would be surprised if the courts consider the fact it was written in javascript or the distribution was twitter a factor.

I hope he is not sent to prison! I don't think it would benefit anyone. Doesn't sounds like he is in need of rehabilitation.

His defense will be that he never had criminal intention, that it was an unfortunate accident, that can be chalked up to inexperience and curiosity. That he didn't take measures to hide his identity and that he was attempting to report a security issue and that the version that dialed 911 is a very very stupid idea of a joke.

And the prosecution will argue that the very action of writing a piece of software that targets a critical infrastructure is proof of in itself of criminal intention.

It will be up to the judge, but hopefully he will be lenient.

This should serve as a warning for 2 things for you younger cats out there:

1. Learn how to disclose responsibly. Use proper channels for disclosing vulnerabilities and don't post exploits online like that (only after you have made contact, reported it and discussed a reasonable time table for patching or not at all). Or know the risk of full disclosure and go with that, but still never post a exploit like that online like that.

2. Any idea of a joke that involves the authorities should trigger a "Yeah, authorities are not well known for their sense of humor. They tend to not be amused" moment.

Edit: The attack against 911 was in the code itself and that argument won't stand a second in Court.

Be smart, stay safe, happy hacking!

Heaven forbid he gets a public defender who doesn't have the time to hear/understand the facts of his case because they're so swamped with other cases.

You just summed up most public defenders.

I hope he gets a real/competent lawyer.

seems analogous to criminal masterminding.

Facepalm.

Damn kids, they're all alike ...

Nice. http://phrack.org/issues/7/3.html

Was wondering how long it took for someone to catch that. :)

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