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Comment by beaglesss | Hacker News Reader

Depends. If no one currently cares, there is no significant structure or personnel or political change in the future several years, and they don't have any assets worth taking, and the government doesn't get any more desperate for assets to seize -- then they're out of the woods.

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I doubt asset seizure is what they'd be after. I was thinking more of the "make an example out of them" mentality as an attempt to prevent others from being curious. Government entities don't tend to do well with knowing the difference of malicious hacking and responsible disclosure. The infamous governor and the View Source is a fun one to trot out as exhibit A.

Both are definitely valid. I think saving face and cash grabs are the two fastest way to get in deep shit with the government.

don't even need to make an example... they probably have a warning/welcome pop up that says 'unauthorized access to this system will result in...' because the TSA lawyer is going to follow this simple train of thought - were the 'accused' authorized to access the system - gotcha!

Asset seizure is not because the government needs the money. It's because you need the money to pay for lawyers, legal experts, etc., and if your assets are seized, you can't - so you are much easier to pressure into making a quick guilty plea and get another successful prosecution added to the list. Of course, the whole process is the punishment as usual, but the asset seizure also plays an important coercive role there.

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