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Maker of Kournikova Gets Wrist Slapped Too
shelflife writes: "This story
says 'It is the first time in history that the maker of a computer virus has been tried in the Netherlands -- indeed one of the few times it has been done in the world. Hypponen knows only of one conviction. A man was sentenced to 18 months in jail in the U.K. in the early 1990s. The man served 11 months, said Hypponen.' but that can't be true. What about Robert Morris? Anyway, the requested sentence is amazingly light -- 240 hours of civil service." The really interesting part is that this kid wasn't even a programmer. He just downloaded a kit. Shows how far this Virus Craze has gone in the last few years.
Interesting that he turned himself in - perhaps this does lend credence to the idea that he really didn't know what he was doing. Although, to be fair, if you download a worm creation kit, use it to create a worm, and then post it to Usenet, it seems unlikely that you wouldn't be aware of the potential consequences.
"A man was sentenced to 18 months in jail in the U.K. in the early 1990s. The man served 11 months, said Hypponen.' but that can't be true. What about Robert Morris?"
Not to take away from RTM, but what about Kevin Mitnick?
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Finally someone in a computer-related trial gets a semi-fair sentencing. I'm suprised he didn't get $4,000,000,000 worth of jail time for all the "damages" he caused.
Contrary to the US it is not common that people are compensated above Fl 50.000 (that's around $ 22.000) in the Netherlands.
If a waitress spill some coffee on in a restaurant the normal compensation is that the restaurant pays the bill of the dry cleaner.
Contrary to the US we at least have some common sense and it isn't done to sue somebody for a mistake (and it is almost impossible).
You will find that this is the case in most parts of Europe.