'Lulzsec hacker' latest to be arrested in US | Hacker News Reader

'Lulzsec hacker' latest to be arrested in US

bbc.co.uk

28 pointsanons201112 comments

15 years in prison for a simple SQL injection and publishing of data?

What else gets you 15 years in the UK? - Repeated rape of same victim over a course of time or rape involving multiple victims : 15 years custody - Rape accompanied by abduction: 11 - 17 years - Murder if aged 18 or over at date of offence: minimum term of 15 years

Right. Leaking data is punishable at the same level as rape and murder. Great country.

Two things:

1) As stated in the first sentence and the title, he's been arrested in the US which is where he'll face charges and up to 15 years in prison, not the UK. Just because it's reported on a UK website that doesn't mean it happened in the UK. Unlike some US news outlets, the BBC sometimes has a look at what's going on in the rest of the world.

2) What you're doing here is comparing the maximum possible sentence (15 years) with I have no idea what but I suspect specific sentences (possibly time served?) that may have been handed out for the crimes in question without listing any detail that might put that into context.

If the 15 years were a UK sentence the comparison would be that the maximum sentence for rape in the UK is life and the maximum sentence for murder in the UK is life (in both cases meaning 15 - 40 years (Scotland) or 15 - 35 years (the rest of the UK)).

While in reality this may not the the actual sentence or the time served, until we have a conviction and an actual sentence, these are the only valid comparisons we can make.

So, great country? Maybe not, but you make no good argument as to why not.

Ah, I stand corrected, indeed it does. Why in God's name would ANY Lulsec memeber EVER travel to the US after they attacked a big corporation is beyond me...

"He is also accused of using a proxy server to further avoid detection."

Accused seems like an odd word to use here. In UK and US jurisdictions the fact that you used a proxy to commit a crime does not make any difference to the scale of the crime does it?

I would hope not, but I suppose it would be similar to using a police scanner while evading.

It might be similar to the difference between burglary and aggravated burglary - the method used to commit the crime has a bearing on how seriously it is punished.

I imagine it could have some implications when discussing the level of pre-mediatation as well. For example, if you were doing the tech equivalent of a 'crime of passion', then having set up multiple layers of proxy servers will undo your 'spur of the moment' defense.

Maybe he wasn't authorized to access this proxy server. Or using a proxy to browse the web is considered illegal ? After all, in some countries it is forbidden to go in the street and wear a mask (France). Using a proxy can be considered the same :)

Then, sometimes, journalists use terms they shouldn't. Maybe that wasn't a "real" proxy (according to the definition of a proxy), but a simple "bounce" (a hacked box/server somewhere), in which case it is illegal (for example he hacks a-company.com, installs a socks server and tunnels his traffic to this socks server.)

The saddest thing about the lulzsec situation is that they are being burned at the proverbial stake for witchcraft while they seemed to be more interested in embarrassing and exposing the ridiculous state of security and security firms touting snake oil potions, lotions, and creams. Did lulzsec actually sell or cause damage with all the information they exposed publicly? (and please don't add any trite herpie-derpie about how posting it publicly makes them complicit or accessories in some form or fashion. It's a stupid and moot point that only exposes you as an idiot. As the article states and the government has been officially proclaiming, these were not sophisticated actions or attacks. They were the lowest of the low hanging fruit that was already so ripe it was starting to rot.

This is a clear and pathetic primitive case of the messengers being shot. Granted, they may have been a pretty shitty and annoying kind of messenger to the nationalist and apologist types, but they were messengers of a hidden danger. For as much as I don't necessarily agree with how those events transpired (to be as general as possible in describing the lulzsec-era in internet history). Our society does not provide an avenue for the creative and constructive exposure and notification of such issues. Many human societies, especially the American one is fundamentally incapable of adopting to the new realities that are forming. A rational and intelligent person would realize that, not only has our (American) society never been a very civilized and peaceful one, but it has gotten worse by significant magnitude over the last decade and the facade of peace and civility is starting to chip and wear thin as our dogmatic Constitutional framework becomes ever more weak with age and sabotage. There is ever growing institutional inertia to control, lock-down, monitor, hide, and penalize on trajectory of draconian levels. Civil society is showing strains and cracks and the destructive demons that civil society always has to be vigilant about restraining are pressing against their boundaries and straining their shackles.

Some may find the above exaggerated or flamboyant, but consider that there is not a single horrific period or action in human history that was a choice from one day to another and they all arise through creep...they ALL are creep; while the truly righteous are negligently satiated.

> As the article states and the government has been officially proclaiming, these were not sophisticated actions or attacks. They were the lowest of the low hanging fruit that was already so ripe it was starting to rot.

That doesn't excuse it. What they did was still illegal.

They aren't messengers. They're vandals running around tearing up houses who happen to leave their doors unlocked.

Except that these "houses" happen to be banks, which customers have entrusted with their assets (E-mails addresses, passwords, credit card details) to keep safe. Their doors should not be unlocked.

While I believe Lulzsec went too far in their actions, I'd say that they were trying to prove that these companies did not go far enough in their responsibility to keep their systems safe.

To continue the analogy above: The PSN-hack wasn't a bank robbery. It was a person walking into the vault, unarmed, loading everything into their vehicle of choice and leaving the scene. In other words, the bank did too little to keep the assets safe.

Is it social engineering by Sabu that lead to all the arrests?

SQL Injection is so old, it should count as an open door. That is, you keep your possessions in a room with the door open and nobody guarding it.

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