US Wants UK Hacker To Pay To Fix Holes He Exposed

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday September 22, 2009 @05:50AM from the on-second-thought-make-it-a-kryptonite dept.

bossanovalithium writes "Gary McKinnon, whose tribulations we have followed for several years now, is the UK hacker trying to escape extradition to the US. It appears he is expected to foot the bill for the US Government patching holes his breaching uncovered — to the tune of $700,000. It's not really the norm for someone to pay for exploits to be patched — damages fixed, yes, but this is a very different thing." The article paraphrases Eugene Spafford as saying that the victim of a cybercrime should not take the blame. "If someone broke a door to rob a store, he said, it was usual to charge them the cost of the door." Isn't the McKinnon case more like charging him to buy the lock that had been missing when he walked in?

4 of 403 comments (clear)

Re:If he's a hacker... by Anonymous Coward · 2009-09-22 05:54 · Score: 3, Funny

dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda
Fixed! At least the holes aren't there anymore.
Re:Well, I've learned MY lesson! by Dog-Cow · 2009-09-22 06:08 · Score: 5, Funny

Gary did scan another country (other than his own).
Suit time! by Runaway1956 · 2009-09-22 07:14 · Score: 5, Funny

You'll be hearing from our lawyers soon. The crashes involving our automobiles were entirely due to operator error. There is nothing wrong with our braking system!!
Danny Ubanti
President and CEO
Ubanti Motor Company Inc Ltd

--
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Re:If he's a hacker... by Culture20 · 2009-09-22 15:04 · Score: 3, Funny

If the Ubanti Motor Company* sells a car with defective brakes
*Fake name to keep fanboys from mismodding
That's dangerously close to Ubuntu, friend. Maybe you should leave.