They are just smoking dope if they think he will be executed.
If he is extradited to the US, the DOJ is probably going to cut him a deal and then the DOD will employ him. He’s going to spend the rest of his life hacking european computers from the US and enjoying a nice GS-level paycheck.
Nope, he won’t be executed. Although I’ll bet he’ll get a tough time if he ends up in a US prison.
A deal with the DoD to work for them may sound like a joke to some, but…
Chinese Military Intelligence certainly thought about approaching Matt Bevan with a deal after his case of hacking Wright-Patterson in the 90s was dropped. That went nowhere, however.
And as a result of the publicity that came from Matt’s trial, he set up his own successful company called Tiger Security, which companies and corporations could hire to see if he could penetrate their computer systems.
Then, if he could get in, he would prepare a full report for the company telling them how to beef up their security and where the problems were in their system that allowed him to get in.
Nick, irregardless of the rights and wrongs of Gary Mckinnon’s behaviour, it seems to me the main reason for these legal proceedings, as exemplified by the accompanying shrill tone the prosecutors’ve adapted in the media, is the simple fact the military of the world’s only remaining superpower was badly shown up.
Around the same time Donny Rumsfeld was proclaiming how the world was about to be put into a state of “shock and awe” at the vision of the US military unleashing its ‘incomparable’ technological might on Sadam’s Iraq, Gary was repeatedly and effortlessly strolling in and out the front door of the computer system the whole thing was powered by - at will.
If nothing else, all the shrieking from the rafters over Gary serves to divert attention away from this fact: while Gary was ‘browsing’ the ‘UFO section’ others with possibly more malign intent were probably doing much worse.
It also distracts the American public from asking itself who gave - and who received - god knows how many billion dollars for a security system that catastrophically failed one of its primary functions?
What the Donny Rumsfeld and co types of this world never seem to grasp is something fully understood by the likes of Hannibal: the bigger the ‘elephant’, the smaller the ‘mouse’ needed to deal with it.
Yes, that’s the thing: McKinnon was daft to think he could get away with doing that. But…I have no doubt that he will be used a scapegoat to deter others.
Some may say “so what?” Fair enough. But the fact is that the punishment should strictly fit the extent of the crime. The extent of the punishment should not be based on an agenda that involves using him to deter others.
And, as I have said before, I will be interested to see if the US Govt actually presents PROOF that McKinnon damaged systems. Or, as with Matt Bevan, will they say that he damaged systems, but then not show the evidence to the judge? And then (as with the UK judge in the Bevan case) if the US judge insists on seeing the evidence, will they hastily drop the charges? Of course, in McKinnon’s case they may have that proof and may present it. Right now, we just don’t know.
Despite what people might think of Matt Bevan’s actions, the actions of the Government was highly strange given that they wanted the book thrown at him; yet dropped all charges when required to show any actual evidence of this.
Scotland Yard - towards the end of the Bevan situation - were heartily sick of it all too and realised that Bevan was just (at the time of the offence) a 16 year old kid hacking from his mom and dad’s house and not some spy. He even had to provide details of his bank accounts back to the age of 10 or something! Of course, there were no direct payments of thousands of pounds found from the Kremlin or Peking.
What I have found surprising and interesting since I’ve been following the hackers (this goes back to about 97 for me in terms of following hacking activities) is the sheer number of government employees who have been hacked and where their passwords for their home computers (or where they may do work outside of their governemnt work) is the same password as that which governs their classified government work!
That’s something Matt Bevan commented to me on: how you could find someone’s password on a less secure system and then see if it could be used to access a more secure, official site that they worked on. It worked.
I’m amazed at this. For all the sites and blogs I have, I have different passwords for every single one. Yet, this apparently escaped the minds of the people at Wright-Pat.
I just wished the US Justice Dept. were as adamant in prosecuting all hackers who are costing consumers worldwide some $1.5 trillion dollars annually($55 billion in the US alone). Face it folks, we’re living in the wild west of the cyberworld right now. GM broke the law each time he hacked into anyone computer much less the govt’s. He’s a celebrity right now but what if he’s broke in and stole people’s identities or personal info from those computers instead of some alleged ufo files.
Apr 05 2007 
April 5th, 2007 at 10:58 pm
They are just smoking dope if they think he will be executed.
If he is extradited to the US, the DOJ is probably going to cut him a deal and then the DOD will employ him. He’s going to spend the rest of his life hacking european computers from the US and enjoying a nice GS-level paycheck.
Jess
April 6th, 2007 at 9:41 am
Jess
Nope, he won’t be executed. Although I’ll bet he’ll get a tough time if he ends up in a US prison.
A deal with the DoD to work for them may sound like a joke to some, but…
Chinese Military Intelligence certainly thought about approaching Matt Bevan with a deal after his case of hacking Wright-Patterson in the 90s was dropped. That went nowhere, however.
And as a result of the publicity that came from Matt’s trial, he set up his own successful company called Tiger Security, which companies and corporations could hire to see if he could penetrate their computer systems.
Then, if he could get in, he would prepare a full report for the company telling them how to beef up their security and where the problems were in their system that allowed him to get in.
April 6th, 2007 at 12:32 pm
Nick, irregardless of the rights and wrongs of Gary Mckinnon’s behaviour, it seems to me the main reason for these legal proceedings, as exemplified by the accompanying shrill tone the prosecutors’ve adapted in the media, is the simple fact the military of the world’s only remaining superpower was badly shown up.
Around the same time Donny Rumsfeld was proclaiming how the world was about to be put into a state of “shock and awe” at the vision of the US military unleashing its ‘incomparable’ technological might on Sadam’s Iraq, Gary was repeatedly and effortlessly strolling in and out the front door of the computer system the whole thing was powered by - at will.
If nothing else, all the shrieking from the rafters over Gary serves to divert attention away from this fact: while Gary was ‘browsing’ the ‘UFO section’ others with possibly more malign intent were probably doing much worse.
It also distracts the American public from asking itself who gave - and who received - god knows how many billion dollars for a security system that catastrophically failed one of its primary functions?
What the Donny Rumsfeld and co types of this world never seem to grasp is something fully understood by the likes of Hannibal: the bigger the ‘elephant’, the smaller the ‘mouse’ needed to deal with it.
April 6th, 2007 at 1:22 pm
Alan:
Yes, that’s the thing: McKinnon was daft to think he could get away with doing that. But…I have no doubt that he will be used a scapegoat to deter others.
Some may say “so what?” Fair enough. But the fact is that the punishment should strictly fit the extent of the crime. The extent of the punishment should not be based on an agenda that involves using him to deter others.
And, as I have said before, I will be interested to see if the US Govt actually presents PROOF that McKinnon damaged systems. Or, as with Matt Bevan, will they say that he damaged systems, but then not show the evidence to the judge? And then (as with the UK judge in the Bevan case) if the US judge insists on seeing the evidence, will they hastily drop the charges? Of course, in McKinnon’s case they may have that proof and may present it. Right now, we just don’t know.
Despite what people might think of Matt Bevan’s actions, the actions of the Government was highly strange given that they wanted the book thrown at him; yet dropped all charges when required to show any actual evidence of this.
Scotland Yard - towards the end of the Bevan situation - were heartily sick of it all too and realised that Bevan was just (at the time of the offence) a 16 year old kid hacking from his mom and dad’s house and not some spy. He even had to provide details of his bank accounts back to the age of 10 or something! Of course, there were no direct payments of thousands of pounds found from the Kremlin or Peking.
What I have found surprising and interesting since I’ve been following the hackers (this goes back to about 97 for me in terms of following hacking activities) is the sheer number of government employees who have been hacked and where their passwords for their home computers (or where they may do work outside of their governemnt work) is the same password as that which governs their classified government work!
That’s something Matt Bevan commented to me on: how you could find someone’s password on a less secure system and then see if it could be used to access a more secure, official site that they worked on. It worked.
I’m amazed at this. For all the sites and blogs I have, I have different passwords for every single one. Yet, this apparently escaped the minds of the people at Wright-Pat.
Although I bet it doesn’t escape them today…
April 6th, 2007 at 8:27 pm
I just wished the US Justice Dept. were as adamant in prosecuting all hackers who are costing consumers worldwide some $1.5 trillion dollars annually($55 billion in the US alone). Face it folks, we’re living in the wild west of the cyberworld right now. GM broke the law each time he hacked into anyone computer much less the govt’s. He’s a celebrity right now but what if he’s broke in and stole people’s identities or personal info from those computers instead of some alleged ufo files.
April 6th, 2007 at 8:50 pm
Carlos
Yep, we don’t know the full extent of the activities of any of the hacker’s that are out there. That’s the worrying thing: who’s doing what and where.