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Comment by nomass | Hacker News Reader

> 18 years is absolutely insane. Utterly, terrifyingly insane.

Why exactly are you terrified?

> That's more than murder gets in many countries. That's more than rape gets. That's more than terrorism gets.

Orange and Apples.

In my understanding Kevin Christopher Bollaert developed a business case where he invited people on a global scale to harm other people. Then in a second step he took advantage of the miserable situation of those victims.

Why do you and other people in this thread fail to see the highly destructive element of this crime? The problem is not just the quality of the crime, where victims experience severe violations of their privacy, it's also the potential quantitity because this business model is only successfull if a lot of people participate.

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Not them but...

> Why exactly are you terrified?

Because disproportionate punishment on one crime could result in disproportionate punishment on another. In particular with how the US has been fearmongering "cybercrime" recently, before we know it someone gets a 10+ year sentence for an SQL injection.

> That's more than murder gets in many countries.

>> Orange and Apples.

Indeed it is. So why is apples getting a similar punishment to orange? That's the problem, that they are orange and apples, but yet get punished the same. Where is the logic in that?

> Why do you and other people in this thread fail to see the highly destructive element of this crime?

That's a strawman. Nobody is arguing that he shouldn't have been jailed, nobody. Therefore there is no way you can claim that people think what he did isn't "highly destructive." They just don't think it is on the same "level" as murder, multiple rapes, or beating two people to within an inch of their lives.

You know what else was highly destructive? Wallstreet fraud. How many people lost their jobs? Lost their homes? Literally committed suicide? And how many of them went to jail for a single year let alone eighteen? None.

The legal system is corrupt and inconsistent. That's a genuine problem and one people are right to complain about.

> one crime

Since there were thousands of separate victims, I think that thinking of it as "one crime" doesn't really do it justice.

Then as a third step he profited from this harm, he extorted further payments from victims to stop being harmed, and proved his utterly lack of interest, care, remorse or empathy for anyone involved.

"For the lulz".

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