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Botnet Spammer Gets Just 18 Months For Being Odd

Posted by samzenpus on from the people-are-strange dept.

itwbennett writes "Thirty-three-year old Scottsman Matthew Anderson was sentenced this week to 18 months in prison for orchestrating a malicious Trojan campaign in 2006. The reason for his relatively light sentence? He apparently wasn't seeking to maximize profit like any normal, red-blooded hacker. Also, his timing was good. His arrest in June 2006 predated by a matter of months the Police and Justice Act, which would likely have resulted in a harsher sentence. By comparison, David Kernell, who snooped in Sarah Palin's email, got a year in prison."

8 of 83 comments (clear)

  1. 18 months light "by comparison?" by Rashkae · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How long does a year last in your world?

    1. Re:18 months light "by comparison?" by mikaelwbergene · · Score: 5, Insightful

      From TFA: "Anderson will be up for parole after half his sentence has been served and faces punishment other than a £5,000 ($8,000) fine. By comparison, the US youth who hacked the email account of Sarah Palin in 2008 recently received a year in an open prison for much less serious hacking of a small amount of private data from one person." They're not simply comparing the time, but the punishment based on severity of said crime. One figures out Sarah Palins email using simple methods and gets a full year. The other orchestrates a malicious botnet attack and only gets a little longer at a year and a half. In that sense, he is being punished quite lightly.

    2. Re:18 months light "by comparison?" by Yvanhoe · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Would the second one be legal for a journalist ?

      --
      The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
  2. Welcome to planet Earth by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Thirty-three-year old Scottsman Matthew Anderson was sentenced this week to 18 months in prison for orchestrating a malicious Trojan campaign in 2006.... By comparison, David Kernell, who snooped in Sarah Palin's email, got a year in prison.

    Matthew Anderson and David Kernell live, committed their offences and were tried in different countries to one another. Why on earth would you expect their sentences to be comparable?

    Next.. libel laws in England harsher than in the US! Owners of internet gambling sites that are lawful in other countries face imprisonment in US! Producing the same drug can get you anywhere from a governement contract to a stern warning to imprisonment to execution depending on which country you pick. Hello, welcome to the world.

  3. For God's sake by colinRTM · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's spelled 'Scotsman', not 'Scottsman'.

    A little proof-reading wouldn't go amiss.

  4. Re:Anderson's not weird. He's you by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I suppose we all forget how many people went to jail even back then. I knew at least a half-dozen, personally. PS did people use the word 'phracker'? I don't seem to remember that one. You sure you didn't just invent it?

    --
    Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
  5. Re:Anderson's not weird. He's you by YrWrstNtmr · · Score: 4, Insightful

    However, let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater. His heart is in the right place. What he needs is better guidance.

    Shweet jumped up jebus.
    His heart was not in the right place. He ran a botnet distributing malware. Malware for data theft. Surveillance on people using infected PCs. Infected by him. He knew precisely what he was doing.
    But yes...lets glorify the poor, misunderstood dude working in his mom's living room.
    'neato stuff' indeed. YGBSM. You know...there are ways to learn how to do that without abusing innocent civilians.

    "Crossed the line" is an understatement. And this gets modded up, or recommended for a job.

  6. That's because many on Slashdot are strange by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 4, Insightful

    They have this view that, when it comes to computers, if they CAN do something, as in it is technically possible for them to do it, that makes it ok to do and means it ought to be legal. Breaking in to a system that has a weak password or lacks a security fix is fine in their view because that person is "stupid" and "deserves it". Of course none of them would be ok with someone breaking in to their house, even though like basically everyone they live in houses with known security vulnerabilities.

    Hence why they are ok with a guy like this. They are ok with someone who breaks in to others' systems and abuses them because their ego says that only stupid people can be victims and the victims deserve it.

    It is a sadly common view on this site.