Charges And Pleas In Computer Crime Cases Involving Significant Cyber Attacks
justice.gov
justice.gov
Jha intentionally used his skills to inconvenience those around him and he was able to do a great deal of harm to the world at large. While technology makes us better suited to solve problems and help those less fortunate, it also amplifies an individual's ability to do harm.
Intentional malice aside, all of us have the ability to greatly effect the world around us. It is imperative that we consider the impact of our actions. While I was a student at Rutgers, there was no mandatory ethics class for computer science, nor do I remember a class on ethics for computer scientists being offered.
I know this sounds harsh but: I'm glad he has been charged with this law and I really really want this guy to be behind bars and think for a long time about what he did. Hopefully it will seriously discourage others from doing the same stuff he did.
On a slightly related note: I can't help but think how this dude could have had a highly successful career in computer security. But he chose to be a criminal. Why?
0) Recruit to a three-letter agency, putting talent to positive use under extra scrutiny and a short-leash.
1) "Throw away the key," squander his potential and make him a better criminal.
Hmm, which is better: repay society, generate taxes and give someone a second chance... or be "tough" on crime and let the cycle repeat again?
I just know that the FBI isn't so incompetent that they didn't already know who these guys were before Krebs wrote his article, enough people surrounding Mirai were already very familiar to them.
It's a great read.
I ask because the guy is only 21 and now a felon...
But agreed being a convicted hacker won’t prevent him from being employed. Even by the government...
For writing code. Not hacking, not exploiting systems or keylogging (someone else did that), not even intending his code to be used for these purposes. Just writing the code.
Federal prosecutors and judges are horrible, unfathomably evil people.
That's quite a misrepresentation of the situation: https://www.wired.com/2009/12/stephen-watt.
> Stephen Watt, a 25-year-old former Morgan Stanley software engineer, pleaded guilty last December to creating a custom sniffing program dubbed “blabla” that Gonzalez and other hackers used to siphon millions of credit and debit card numbers from TJX's network. The breach cost TJX $200 million, according to its 2009 SEC filing.
> Prosecutors never alleged that Watt received money for the software he wrote, or directly profited from the hacks. But they brandished more than 300 pages of chats the two friends exchanged that belied Watt's stated ignorance.
> As Gonzalez and his accomplices hacked target after target, he sent Watt links to news stories describing a tidal wave of debit fraud spreading around the world.
It's like saying "oh, I just made a timer circuit for my friend who I knew was blowing up buildings." Note: the $170 million isn't a "fine." It's restitution. Those are two different things. A fine is used to punish bad conduct. Restitution is used to make a victim whole. Conduct that isn't that "bad" can nonetheless result in huge restitution if it resulted in large damages to the victim. Don't do stuff that can result in huge damages if you don't want to be on the hook for them.
The law may be a little outdated, and yes more awareness is necessary. Until it’s changed though it is prudent to be careful about such things.
I'd say it's morally wrong not to do so. Part of moral governance is to protect people from bad guys.
However, there's still a plenty of nice places that don't ask too many questions.
I think he hacked the school for the lolz.I dont think he even thought it would be this serious when he did it, with feds and possibly jail time. He probably just wanted to see what he could do.
Even finding out about his involvement in Mirai today, it still doesnt change what I think about his character, or his ethics. Knowing this now, I think he'll become very successful very soon.
This isn't up for despute- although Paras originally denied involvement in the botnet this plea agreement and his confession prove that he is both a liar and a criminal.
He may end up being a successful person in the long wrong, but that doesn't make him an ethical person.
He's as responsible of taking down Dyn as Mikhail Kalashnikov is responsible for all the people killed by the ak-47. He simply open sourced a tool for other people to use however they like.
He took the plea to reduce the sentence and the legal expense.
- G.K. Chesterton
Your AK-47 claim also shows that you really don't know anything about this case and are just trying to justify why you still like your friend. They open sourced their botnet four days after they DDoSed Dyn and Krebs- it wasn't random people who used this software for the attack, it was their company that did so.