Hacker McKinnon To Be Extradited To US

Vainglorious Coward writes "When UK hacker and Asperger's sufferer Gray McKinnon lost the judicial review of his case it seemed likely that he would be extradited to the US to face charges of hacking almost a hundred systems causing $700,000 worth of damage. Today the UK home secretary rejected his last-ditch attempt to avoid extradition adding that 'his extradition to the United States must proceed forthwith.' McKinnon's relatives are expressing concerns for his health, with his lawyer going so far as to claim that extradition would make the 43-year-old's death 'virtually certain.'"

Comments

Good grief!

[Frosty Piss]

...and Asperger's sufferer...

This has NOTHING to do with this issue.

Re:Good grief!

[Ethanol-fueled]

Losers believe that having Asperger's Syndrome excuses all forms of social retardation, attention whoring and shitty self-absorbed bullshit, while also allowing them to lay claim to its supposed symptom of "higher than average levels of intelligence".

For these reasons, Aspers has greatly outstripped ADHD as the chic diagnosis of choice for pretty much every group of fucktards on the internet. It is no wonder then that all people with Assburgers are fugly.

Posting Dramatica articles is usually lame, but they're spot-on with that. Here's another famous Assperger's fuckup.

Re:Good grief!

[Ethanol-fueled]

Though I think the Asperger's defense is simply the latest fad for justifying bratty sociopathic behavior which was enabled and tolerated, I firmly believe that it is wrong to extradite him. He was looking for UFO's, for fuck's sake, and I don't see why the Brits couldn't just fine him up the wazoo and make him work for free while on house-arrest. They guy's a nut, but he's not dangerous.

And to say that if he "sold the information then lives could have been lost" is alarmist bullshit. Even military with mandatory OPSEC briefings and security clearances wouldn't believe that garbage (now, if we were at full-scale war with China or Russia then it'd be a different story altogether -- and c'mon, even the ACTA is being obscured on the grounds of "national security"). It's clear that they guy never intended to give our sekrits to terr'rists. The pentagon's just pissy that some nutcase exposed a goatse-esque security hole and now we want to make an example of him. Our government is behaving like a bunch of vengeful, steroid-addled, UFC-watching goons. Extradition is overkill in this particular case.

The aspie and the American government are in a cute little contest to see who can out-douche the other. I'm going to laugh if the aspie fights this and wins it.

$700,000

[leathered]

That figure is the alleged cost of upgrading the security of these systems after the attack, not the result of any 'damage' that he may have caused. I'm not in any way condoning what he has done and Asperger's is no excuse but the desktops that he accessed were often Internet facing with blank or weak administrator passwords, seems to me like there should be some sysadmins on trial with him for gross negligence.

My analogy (no car sorry) would be that it's like a robbed bank having to spend $700,000 on a vault after realising that keeping the money in wooden boxes in the back yard is inadequate.

Re:Good grief! - Bend Over!

[gnasher719]

He didn't "break in to a highly sensitive military computer network". He leaned against the door and found it opened. If he actually got into any sensitive areas, then the ones that belong into court are the incompetent idiots who couldn't even keep an amateur with two much time on his hands out of their networks.

Re:Good grief! - Bend Over!

[zblack_eagle]

Sorry, it's more like someone going into people's homes while they're out if they left a door unlocked. It's trespass, it's an invasion of privacy, but there are no grounds for claiming that the person caused massive damage just by entering or leaving a note on the table. And if it's a business, bank or government building, whoever was responsible for security should get in more trouble for the intrusion than the person who committed an act of trespass.

Re:Good grief! - Bend Over!

[strikethree]

"He tried to quench that 'thirst' by breaking in to a highly sensitive military computer network directly or indirectly depended on by many people in harms way every day. Sounds a hell of a lot like it SHOULD fall under terrorism laws."

Holy batcaves Batman. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot! Let's start with a definition of Terrorism:

terrorism - The calculated use of violence (or the threat of violence) against civilians in order to attain goals that are political or religious.

or, how about Terrorist:

terrorist - a radical who employs terror as a political weapon; usually organizes with other terrorists in small cells.

Now, please explain exactly how what he did is in ANY way associated with terrorism. No really. Some morons are modding you up as interesting and you are not even close to the mark here.

strike