Slashdot Mirror
Death Penalty For Hackers?
EMIce writes "The New York Times Op-Ed page has a piece entitled Worse Than Death (Obnoxious but free registration required) that calls for harsher 'hacker' penalties as a deterrent, quoting one academic as recommending even well, the death penalty - as a deterrent for the likes of Sasser author Sven Jaschan. Let's face it, businesses are becoming more dependent on their computers but they continue to be a point of failure, and subsequently, frustration through lost profits. Perpetrated breakdowns are now pushing that aggravation towards an edge. The author suggests commuting the idea of a death sentence into a lifetime of servitude doing viral cleanup. What role should enforcement play in such cases and is this too harsh, even considering the billions in damage that is sometimes caused?"
because he costs companies millions in lost revenue, but CEO of company who commits fraud and loots the pension funds for billions gets nothing or maybe a few years in prison?
Yeah, we're looking at the right places for deterence.
Yes, lets kill hackers, but lets let more and more child molesters out of jail
priorites people
That punishment doesn't fit the crime. In many ways our justice system makes victims out of the perpetrators of crimes when the punishment is way out of proportion to the actual crime committed. When that happens, the justice system is perpetrating an injustice on the person found guilty in court.
I don't like how some people think that just because someone is obnoxious or causes minor damage (and let's face it, virus infestations are fairly minor compared to the gamut of actual crimes that people are let off the hook with much less punishment) that they should be put away for ever or even put to death. I think it reeks of a completely blown sense of proportion. Unfortunately, the voters who think this way are more prone to vote than people who are more sanely-minded.
Should the punishment for releasing a virus be tough? I don't think so. I think that it is a pretty benign "crime". It is crucial that we keep a sense of proportion when discussing the sentencing stage of justice.
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
I'd appreciate it if any death penalty advocates could please cite a published work (in a reputable journal) which clearly shows statistical evidence that the death penalty actually acts as a deterrant in the mind of would-be criminals.
As far as I can tell, it's just something that sounds really good. You know, "Criminals will be very scared of being killed for their actions, because normal people are very scared of being killed." From the little I know about the workings of the human mind, most sociopaths don't react to things the same way the rest of us do, and people who cause massive damage on an any scale - economic, physical, emotional - are sociopaths.
Anyway, I'd just appreciate some good evidence for the "deterrant" hypothesis. Then I'll start to believe it might be a good idea.
As a kid, I used to think the death penalty was a great idea.
At about age 16, we had a school debate on the subject. I was on the 'pro' death penalty side, but that debate sowed the inital small niggles of doubt.
By the time I was 18, I realised the death penalty was completely barbaric. If just one innocent person is executed, that's tantamount to state sponsored murder. That's not to mention that capital punishment doesn't seem to deter crime anyway - Texas is executing more people than ever.
One of the interesting things - if you have a debate with most pro-capital punishment people, they go awfully quiet when you ask them what would they do if they were falsely convicted of a capital crime. How would they feel as they were about to be gassed for a crime they didn't commit?
I'm glad the EU outlaws capital punishment - it's a concept that should have disappeared in the 19th century. As Ghandi said - an eye for an eye and soon the whole world would be blind.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
"shutdown"? Don't molly-coddle 'em.
# kill -9 1
Someone who can stick a price on human life, or argument for improving the economy by killing people deserves no respect from me.
This "journalist" did just that.
The article is pure flamebait. I don't even start telling about the collective responsibility of software makers and the lazy sysadmins. The sasser worm was like a polite burglar: if it found the front door open, it went in. If it found it closed, it went away. Well, newsflash dear analysts: until you start paying attention to security there always will be a guy who writes a crappy virus (95% of them is _crude_) which wreaks havoc only because users and vendors like Microsoft of ignoring security.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
If we punish with the death penalty those whose actions upset the lives of many many other people, and also cost lots and lots, then there is a long list of people who qualify. CEOs who rob pension funds, for example. Various politicians....
What I dislike here is the double standard. Basically we have corporations _whining_ because they can't figure out how to hire the right folks to protect their networkers(or are too cheap to do so). On the other hand, we have CEO's of major corporations running places like Enron and Anderson that are essentially criminal organizations--and getting a complete slap on the wrist. Look at Ken Lay, the worldcom CEO, Milken. These folks all get the best justice money can buy-the type of service the average hacker just can't afford. The damage a crooked CEO can do at the helm of a major corporation makes what hackers do _pale_ by comparison. I don't see hackers leading the US into a pointless war in which thousands of young americans die or are permanently disabled to protect oil interests. I don't see hackers promoting products like thimerosal that may be causing permanent disability in children(or buying crooked politicians to get preferential legislation). I don't see hackers getting a corrupt president elected by vote fraud to refuse to enforce immigration law so corporations can make more money.
If the corporate and governmental leaders want rule of law-they had better start by holding themselves accountable. Is is the corporate and governmental leaders that have created this state where the law is not taken seriously because they have exempted themselves from it.
Dear hedgehog2097,
It looks like you've hacked our registration system.
See you in the death row.
Sincerely,
The New York Times
This Tierney guy says that his article is based on an article by Steven Landsburg, an Economics Professor at the University of Rochester.
The original article (by Landsburg himself) is a bit more detailed, and can be found on Slate here:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2101297/
not so anymore. not in the united states. the very nature of poverty has changed fundamentally.
I grew up in a welfare hotel in Harlem, here in New York. In the 90s, as a teen, I had a computer. So did a good number of my friends. Granted, most of us were in an accelerated academic program, so most of my friends were geeks, but we for the most part had computer systems.
Kids now in my old neighborhood definitely have computers, and penetration is significant as computers are cheap. Local community leaders have impressed on the population the importance of computer literacy and parents have followed suit.
And Harlem is as poor as a lot of places in this country.
More importantly, having a computer and an internet connection is immediate distraction from poverty. When I was a kid, and to this day, cable penetration was very high, especially given that we had the second lowest per capita income in the city. It's the same reason drugs flourish in poor communities. When you're poor, you pay a premium for distraction. Computers these days are a relatively cheap distraction.
and so you understand, I remember times when my computer was new and our refrigerator was empty. I can imagine it not being different now for some kids in Harlem and other poor places in the country.
un burrito me trampeó.
You know, on a global scale, how we define "poor" and "poverty" is kind of silly.
I have read that ~90% (seems high to me) of the world's population has never made a phone call. Probably a majority of people in the world have substandard food, water and shelter.
Yet in the western world, we define "poverty" as not being able to afford broad-band, or only having one game console, or only having basic cable.
Unless the parent(s)are total crack-heads, do any kids in the US REALLY go hungry? Call me a right wing fascist, but I find that hard to beleive. Food is cheap and plentiful here. You may not be able to afford steak, but most of the world lives on rice and beans, if they can get them.
We are SO spoiled.
a) give the person back his/her freedom back and
b) compensate this time-loss by other means, e.g. money.
In case of the death-penalty there... welll, there is just no way to undo that, now is there? One could think of compensating the relatives, but that won't do any good for the poor sucker who's just been fried/injected/shot/hanged/eaten by ants.
So what should hacking amount to? 7 years ago I was accused of hacking by a police officer because I told him I was programming on a Mud that was based in another state.
Hacking could easily be described as anyone who logged into another server with someone else's login/password. (Logging into NYT's web page with bugmenot) Deserves the Death Penalty? I think not.
So what DOES constitute a death-penalty hacking event? Something that causes a company 1 million dollars worth of lost profit? A life is worth that? Ok, how about 1 billion dollars, or a kazillion? Problem is, ****ALL**** companies, the RIAA, MPAA, and BSA have lied and and inflated their so-called losses by a gross amount. How can you put a life of a person in the hands of corporate greed?
There are OTHER things that need to be fixed first. I don't see how a multi-criminal rapist would get an easier sentence than a kid who altered a VB script that was already out there. I don't see how this whole article could even be considered when the crooks at Enron get off without the death penalty first. Truth is, the author is just pissed off his computer crashed one day I'm sure.
Why are there only 19 people folding@home for slashdot?