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Palin Email Snoop Found Guilty On 2 Charges
netbuzz writes "A federal jury in Knoxville today has convicted David Kernell, 22, of two charges — misdemeanor computer fraud and felony obstruction of justice — in connection with the 2008 episode where he accessed the personal Yahoo email account of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and then initiated a worldwide rummaging of its contents. The obstruction charge carries a maximum prison term of 20 years."
They also hung on the count of Identity Theft; The DA can retry that later if he so chooses.
I understand (and agree) that the guy should be punished for hacking this account, but how come nothing ever happend about Palin conducting official State business using her personal email account? Is it because the information was technically obtained illegaly? Or did something happen and I just missed it...?
Living With a Nerd
What did he do that qualifies as obstruction of justice?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
"He gained access to Twitter accounts by simply working out the answers to password reminder questions on targets' e-mail accounts, according to investigators. " Seriously, I hate those things. When it used to be allowed, I always just retyped my password into the answers for those security questions. It's always really easy stuff to socially engineer or, in the case of a public figure, look up on google... Did he figure out the name of Obama's first pet, where he went to school, his first job, his mother's maiden name, or what? All of those things have got to be fairly easy to work out.
If you're going to do this, at least become a telecom company first. When they pull this kind of shit, they get a pat on the back.
Two years only happens in extenuating circumstances (say, a woman kills her rapist after the fact; it's murder, but it's really hard to apply a tough sentence). Murder is rarely punished with a mere two years. That said, sentencing guidelines are fscked up, because it's always easier to appear "tough on crime" than it is to establish just guidelines.
$_ = "wftedskaebjgdpjgidbsmnjgcdwatb"; tr/a-z/oh, turtleneck Phrase Jar!/; print
You mean, people put honest answers in those fields??? [boggles]
Similar to the upcoming US election results
Things like this make me sad. Not just because I feel bad for the person, but also because frankly I don't want my taxes spent on keeping this man imprisoned for up to twenty years. Cost of imprisonment is on average 22,650 per year, at 20 years that's $453,000. In my opinion it's not worth that much to keep a man behind bars for guessing a password.
An Alaska judge has sided with former Gov. Sarah Palin in a lawsuit over e-mail, finding that state law doesn't forbid the use of private e-mail accounts to conduct state business.
Just because you want it to be illegal doesn't make it illegal; i.e. laws have to be passed by legislature first.
Why bother picking a lock when there's so many other easier ways to get into the average house? Breaking a window is trivial, drilling out a lock isn't hard, etc. To someone even mildly determined to get in, the average house lock is less of a issue than a weak password is for an email account.
While it's certainly smarter to have a strong password than a weak one, to say that having a weak password should mean that you take on some of the legal responsibility for a crime committed against you by someone else is ridiculous.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
From the article:
You can't retry a deadlocked kernel. The only way out is a hard reset.
are upheld in Court. Personal email really IS private, and people should be held accountable if they cross the line. Jail time sounds a bit extreme, given the youthful age of the accused, but I'm glad the legal precedents are being followed correctly.
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
I wonder if wiping your fingerprints after a robbery constitutes obstruction of justice?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
An Alaska judge has sided with former Gov. Sarah Palin in a lawsuit over e-mail, finding that state law doesn't forbid the use of private e-mail accounts to conduct state business.
By the way, that was from back in January. Didn't your copt of Palin Haters Weekly include that news? Gee, I wonder why not?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Except it wasn't the 'obvious password' which did them in, it was the lame drop-box security questions. Make it so all security questions are chosen when the account is created, and not selected from some stupid list, and your problem is solved.
Please answer your security question: "What country were you born in ?"
> "Kenya"
*ducks*
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
If there had been anything that could have even remotely made even the most shaky, thin case against Palin in the emails, you don't think it would have been the subject of a special Congressional committee and/or special prosecutor? You don't think that was *exactly* the intent behind the account cracking?
Actually, I was on ebaumsworld when the account was "hacked" and the first screenshots were posted and I can assure you it was done for the lulz and not some some diabolical political purpose.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.