The Day Leo Traynor Confronted His Troll

McGruber writes "Dublin-based writer Leo Traynor has written a piece about confronting the troll who drove him off Twitter, hacked his Facebook, and abused and terrified his family. Quoting: 'I blocked the account and reported it as spam. The following week it happened again in an identical manner. A new follower, I followed back, received a string of abusive DMs, blocked and reported for spam. Two or three times a week. Sometimes two or three times a day. An almost daily cycle of blocking and reporting and intense verbal abuse. ... Then one day something happened that truly frightened me. I don't scare easily but this was vile. I received a parcel at my home address. Nothing unusual there – I get lots of post. I ripped it open and there was a Tupperware lunchbox inside full of ashes. There was a note included, saying, "Say hello to your relatives from Auschwitz." I was physically sick. ... In July I was approached by a friend who's basically an IT genius, and he offered some help. He said that he could trace the hackers and trolls for me using perfectly legal technology, which would lead to their IP addresses. I said yes. Then I baited them – I was deliberately more provocative toward them than ever I'd been before.'"

Comments

Trolling?

[steppedleader]

Compared to the typical trolling found on the internet, this seems a bit more like harassment or stalking, no?

Re:Trolling?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm disappointed that the author didn't press charges. This kid is probably a sociopath. When he stalks and hurts other people in the future the police won't have the evidence they need of past cases. Sociopaths don't learn how to stop hurting people, they just learn not to get caught the next time.

Re:Trolling?

[jamesh]

I'm disappointed that the author didn't press charges. This kid is probably a sociopath. When he stalks and hurts other people in the future the police won't have the evidence they need of past cases. Sociopaths don't learn how to stop hurting people, they just learn not to get caught the next time.

Or he's a messed up kid who didn't have a clue that his actions were hurting someone.

If it was me being stalked I'd be demanding that the kid doesn't go near a computer for 6 months (or until he's legally an adult) and that he has a curfew at night so he can't just be off at a mates place doing the same thing. It should give him a chance to catch up on Jewish/German history and have some appreciation for what he's ranting and raving about.

I think he should be given another chance, but only one. I'm not sure what it's like in the country where Leo Traynor resides but people have gone to jail over here for less.

Re:Trolling?

[bloodhawk]

yep it isn't actually trolling at all. It seems nowadays any bad or obnoxious behaviour gets labeled with troll, I guess this is what happens when people try to use a catchy term without actually understanding what it means.

Re:Trolling?

[TheRaven64]

No, that's insulting. Good trolling seems to be a dying art these days. A good troll post says something that sounds plausible, and encourages responses. During the thread, it becomes less and less reasonable, but the aim is to make the other person say something unreasonable first or to make them waste a large amount of effort replying. If you want to see a good troll, read some of the threads started by roman_mir.

Re:Trolling?

[TheRaven64]

Sociopaths don't learn how to stop hurting people, they just learn not to get caught the next time.

That's not true. A sociopath merely lacks empathy - they may be aware that they are hurting someone, but they don't understand why that's a bad thing. Placed in an incentive system where hurting people is penalised and provides no advantages, they'll do what's best for them and stop.

Re:Trolling?

[Quiet_Desperation]

I agree with the AC. The extent of what the evil little miseryshit did proves it was not just a game to him. I'd wager his show of tears was just that- a show. His brain is miswired. There's a whole section that simply isn't working. Coulseling won't acomplish a damn thing, but he'll be able to make it look like it did.

Sociopaths are the most manipulative people in the world. It's why the alphas go into politics. They thrive there. They are one of the three types of people in this world that you never EVER trust along with junkies and Party loyalist ideologues.

Re:Trolling?

[hairyfeet]

Yes but sadly we see more and more of this, sick little maladjusted fucks that decide for whatever reason YOU are the cause of some problem in their lives or the world would be better off without you and will go VERY stalkerish on you.

In fact as someone who recently had to deal with something not as sick, but creepy and weird where some asshole was hacking into a nice former customer of mine. this guy is soooo fucking bland I can't imagine how he could do anything but bore someone to death but this little prick would take over his computer and wipe his files, trash the OS, even pop up a box calling him filthy names. I have to thank the slashdot community for when i put up a list of what i had done trying to stop this guy with no luck you guys pointed out things I had not thought to check and thanks to you I was able to stop him, so thanks guys.

But what we old greybeards think of when we think of the word troll and what we are seeing now? Two totally different things. Hell I had one last year that followed me around the net for a solid year, making piles of accounts everywhere I went. For what purpose? just so he could post a response to everything I said with the sentence "Die you fat fucker DIE!". That's it, just that sentence over and over and over, across dozens of websites. While it never phased me, when you think about how much work he had to do, searching the web for every place he could possibly find where I was, spending a good 15 minutes or more making fake accounts...just for that sentence.

We are seeing more and more sick puppies out there, personally i think its just what happens when one of Gabe's fuckwads loses touch with anything other than the little bubble they create for themselves on the web. I'm sure if a shrink got a hold of this nutbag he would believe that he was actually the moral one here, that Traynor had somehow "insulted" him, dared to enter the space HE owned, or some other bullshit that to HIM would be perfectly rational, just as the cockbag that trashed a couple of years worth of data on a nice bland nobody's PC probably felt it was somehow "justified". Which just goes to show how truly warped and twisted those without a firm grasp of reality can get when they live in cyberspace.

Re:Trolling?

[Fjandr]

The problem with the idea that the tears were for show was that it was deliberately kept from him that they knew he was the perpetrator. He confessed without being confronted with evidence linking him to it, or even the slightest hint that they suspected he was the perpetrator. At least that's the picture presented by the article.

Re:Trolling?

[Registered Coward v2]

No, that's insulting. Good trolling seems to be a dying art these days. A good troll post says something that sounds plausible, and encourages responses. During the thread, it becomes less and less reasonable, but the aim is to make the other person say something unreasonable first or to make them waste a large amount of effort replying. If you want to see a good troll, read some of the threads started by roman_mir.

True, a good troll had that ring of plausibility that it triggered teh "Huh? I must respond to this..." reflex before the responder sat down and thought it through. For example:

While Star Trek (Star Wars / Firefly / Battlestar Galactica - pick one) tried to stay true to science as much as is possible in a science fiction world where faster than light travel is the norm; they missed one big thing -> everytime a shuttle craft passed the Enterprise it cast a shadow. In a vacuum; everyone knows you don't have shadows in a vacuum.

Of course, posting that in a Star Trek (or Mensa) group is like shooting fish in a barrel..

Trolling isn't flaming (any idiot can flame); but unfortunately trolling has lost its original meaning much as hacker has. Nor is simply disagreeing and laying out your position; though many people are willing to yell "Troll" when they can't defend their position. AFU, in the old usenet days, was a great example of the art of trolling; unfortunately since the decline of usenet and the onset of eternal September it's a different world.

Re:Trolling?

[steppedleader]

Nah, roman_mir is just a libertarian type... I like having a few of those around. Don't necessarily agree on a lot of the economic stuff, but it's nice to have someone complaining about the lack of respect for civil liberties among the mainstream parties.

Committed establishment Republican types? Now, there's a mystery. I've completely lost the ability to tell them apart from trolls.

Re:Trolling?

[flyingfsck]

Yes absolutely. A good beating will modify the behaviour of anyone dramatically. If it is a true sociopath, you just have to beat more agressively. Medieval crowd control methods as practised by the Catholic Church and Vlad the Impaler, still work just as efficiently today, as it did back then.

Re:Trolling?

[hairyfeet]

Hell name a SINGLE Internet word we old greybeards came up with that hasn't been butchered all to hell by folks that don't get it had a specific meaning, just one. Troll, shill, virus, its all lost its original meanings because too many who don't have a clue what they meant use them wrong constantly. That's why I don't even say words like trojan or virus anymore but just tell them "You got a bug" because as far as the public is concerned everything is a virus, and everyone that does something bad on the net is a troll. its just lost its meaning.

Re:Trolling?

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with the idea that the tears were for show was that it was deliberately kept from him that they knew he was the perpetrator. He confessed without being confronted with evidence linking him to it, or even the slightest hint that they suspected he was the perpetrator. At least that's the picture presented by the article.

Bullshit. If a cop had you in a room and started talking about the details to a crime you committed and you 'spontaneously' confessed, you can hardly say that you didn't realize you were a suspect. This man who barely knew the kid suddenly visited him and then started showing him the details of his crime. Yet you still think the kid didn't realize that he was a suspect? Come on! The kid confessed because he figured it out and knew that manipulation was required to keep his freedom. That is all. It wasn't remorse. Sociopaths are more manipulative than you can imagine.

Re:Trolling?

[Psychotria]

If you want to see a good troll, read some of the threads started by roman_mir.

Not only is good trolling rare, but no one even knows what trolling is anymore! Someone isn't trolling just because they say something you disagree with. I can say with certainty that although I disagree with roman_mir, there are people who genuinely have similar 'extremist' views.

I began to write a new comment saying pretty much the same thing as you. Since you've almost nailed it, I decided to reply to your comment instead. So, l will reiterate. Nobody knows what trolling is anymore! They don't. Being abusive is trolling. Saying something controversial isn't trolling. Trolling is leading the person to believe what you're saying or showing them, or leading them into a trap, and then, although not compulsory, making them look like a damn fool. This is quite distinct to saying something like "you're a gay horse". I dunno what a gay horse is, but let's pretend it's offensive. That example is an insult, not a troll at all. The media doesn't know what a "troll" is. They label people who bombard people with insults as trolls. The people who do that are not trolls. Trolls are much more subtle and often *funny*. Maybe it's going to end up like the hacker vs. cracker shit. It seems like the more mainstream things become the more our past is lost.

Re:Trolling?

[Psychotria]

I'd like to add that possibly satire is more align with trolling. A lot of The Onion articles are "trolls". To the initiated they illicit a response based on a falsehood. That's a troll.

Re:Trolling?

[jamesh]

I agree with the AC. The extent of what the evil little miseryshit did proves it was not just a game to him. I'd wager his show of tears was just that- a show. His brain is miswired. There's a whole section that simply isn't working. Coulseling won't acomplish a damn thing, but he'll be able to make it look like it did.

Sociopaths are the most manipulative people in the world. It's why the alphas go into politics. They thrive there. They are one of the three types of people in this world that you never EVER trust along with junkies and Party loyalist ideologues.

So what are you suggesting? If he as sociopathic as you suggest, then simply pressing charges won't change anything, so you'd have to lock him up to get him out of harms way. You couldn't lock him up forever of course (what court would do that?), so eventually he'd get out again. And if he wasn't really that messed up when he went in, he would be when he got out.

And I bet the tears weren't for show. Even if he is a sociopath and didn't care one way or the other how much pain he'd caused, he would still have been truly upset that he got caught.

Re:Trolling?

[smittyoneeach]

A dying art?
I do my part
Clean-shaven tradition:
A most healthy start.
Burma Shave

Re:Trolling?

[Psychotria]

This is a real troll. And a good one (even if it's not true):

http://www.bash.org/?244321

Re:Trolling?

[Zero__Kelvin]

Since you've almost nailed it, I'll just add one thing. Here on Slashdot we have a -1 Troll option and a -1 Flamebait option. Almost nobody here knows what either of those terms mean anymore, including right here on Slashdot. As an example, when someone is clearly making moronic statements that they actually believe, and one calls them a moron, that is neither a troll, nor is it flamebait. Wikipedia gets it completely wrong as well. Flamebait is much like trolling, where the poster says something ridiculous in order to bait people into flaming them. Ergo, if I call someone a moron when they have made it clear that they are either a moron or intending to be one, my response might be a follow up to flame bait (if the poster intended to get me to call him a moron), but is not itself flamebait. Now, I'd really like to see people read this, understand it, and start modding correctly, but let's face it: there are a lot of morons in the world ;-0

Re:Trolling?

[jcr]

Nobody knows what trolling is anymore!

Just like nobody seems to know what hacking is, either.

-jcr

Re:Trolling?

[Anonymous Coward]

With respect, I don't think roman_mir/udachny is a troll.

I thought he was, but then he started replying to some of my anti-libertarian bait threads.

Eventually he started rambling incoherently about how Stalin's goons killed his family, how evil I was, etc., descending into telling me that he would be in prison right now if I were closeby as he wouldn't be able to hold himself back. He also told me he now has a "personal interest" in me or something.

At that point I decided that either I'd out-trolled him and he didn't know what to do next, or that he really was a guy whose family had been killed by Stalin and who - as a result - decided that anything which wasn't his perceived diametric opposite must be pure evil. IOW, roman_mir/udachny is another example of someone with a harrowing childhood experience with X who quickly associates everything with X.

Of course, that itself could have been part of the troll. But mindless threatening abuse isn't trolling - it's mindless threatening abuse. Anyone with enough time can do it.

A more subtle conclusion would be that which, I believe, applies to many trolls: they are reflecting a good dose of their opinion, but know it's too irrational to be able to justify soundly, so instead they pretend to themselves that they're playing a game. Eventually they get so caught up in the game that they forget that they've been coming out with bullshit. I believe this is particularly true with the libertarianism/social Darwinism crap that's also popular in the mainstream media these days. Consider Fox News: after a few months working at that place, I am convinced that you entirely forget just how unscientific your journalism is. You've come in as a conservative possibly genuinely wanting to Expose Liberal Lies, and you come out as a conservative prepared to say absolutely anything as long as it seems to advance the Party Line.

tl;dr A Troll is someone with an unsound belief doggy-paddling in a slough of anti-intellectual culture.

Re:Trolling?

[1u3hr]

ell name a SINGLE Internet word we old greybeards came up with that hasn't been butchered all to hell by folks that don't get it had a specific meaning

Well, "net" lingo usually borrows and perverts vocabulary from other realms. "Troll" is a bit of wordplay on the net fishing method and the mythical monster. "Geek" used to be a guy who bit the head of chickens in a circus sideshow. You can't complain too much when the words receive wider usage and change their meanings again.

Re:Trolling?

[Charliemopps]

Agreed. I'm an argumentative person, and generally like to debate. I basically can't post in regular forums any longer, as forums have devolved into dens of like-minded individuals that do not want to have their view points challenged. Disagree and they're shouting troll and locking your posts in seconds.

Re:Trolling?

[fustakrakich]

No way... Dr.Bob,DC has him beat by a long shot. He's always very civil, and never insults anyone. In a Slashdot poll he would be number one. In fact, I wish they would do that poll.

Re:Trolling?

[Greyfox]

Shouldn't that be Myanmar Shave, now?

Re:Trolling?

[unkiereamus]

This kid is probably a sociopath....Sociopaths don't learn how to stop hurting people, they just learn not to get caught the next time.

Fun fact, per the DSM-IV Sociopathy, or actually Antisocial Personality Disorder, as it's now known, can't be diagnosed before age 18.

What that source material doesn't cite, and what 5 seconds of googlin failed to turn up, and thus would require too much effort for me to cite, is why.

Put simply, almost all kids profile as sociopaths. Look at the diagnostic criteria, I'm sure you'll see why.

Now, before anyone jumps up and says "But...but...he's 17, that's close enough to 18, right?", I'll point out that like any developmental milestone, that's just a guideline, there's always some play in development, plus or minus.

Now, having said that, it's entirely possible that this kid actually is a sociopath, personally it doesn't read like that to me, but I'm willing to be wrong.

Re:Trolling?

[hairyfeet]

Oh I'm with you there 110% Drinkypoo. When my sister was diagnosed with a terminal illness right after the birth of her second son and her husband decided 'that was too much for him" and bailed i was handed two adorable little boys under the age of two as my mother had to devote herself full time to taking care of my sister. I was lucky that mom had given me a great example so I sat there reading "Great sci-fi writers of the 70s" to them and when it came to electronics while my boys got to have all the electronic stuff they could possibly want, what with me being a geek (My sister was royally pissed that the oldest boy's first word wasn't "mama" but "MINE!" as I had snuck the controller out of his hand while he snoozed and replaced Barney Hide and Seek with Eternal Champions and he caught me) I never EVER used it as a babysitter, i used it as a learning tool.

I didn't just get educational games, I did things like took apart a hard drive and had a friend cut me a clear plastic top for it so they could see how the drive spun and wrote when they would hit save, showed them by putting their faces into DOOM levels how what you saw on the screen was controlled by loading files and scripts, I tore things apart and showed them how they work. This paid off later in life as the oldest now helps the others in his pre-med classes that don't have great computer skills and the youngest is becoming incredibly skilled with graphics.

But when I would pick them up from their friends houses or ask them how things were there....damn, just damn. Homes without a single book in them, not a single one which shocked the hell out of my boys which were reading Narnia and Harry Potter from when they were little, and parents that frankly never actually interacted with their kids! It was ALL TVs and consoles in their bedrooms and as long as they weren't "bugging" the parents whatever they did was fine. I didn't choose to have two babies dropped into my lap but the thought of just dumping two little kids in front of an idiot box and never interacting with them just horrifies me, talk about stunting their development!

But there comes a time when shitty parents or not its time to grow the hell up and accept responsibility and at 17 I think the kid is old enough to know better. Its not like there isn't tons of horrific footage of the death camps all over the net, 5 minutes in Google would have shown him that wasn't something to be using like some sort of prank. Its time for him to man the fuck up and learn what he can and can't do or frankly this little shithead is gonna open his mouth to the wrong person in college and get his ass stomped.

Re:Trolling?

[houstonbofh]

Internet is the main form of communication for kids today and depriving someone of internet access will isolate them socially completely.

We used to call that "grounding" and somehow I survived it more than once. I know this may come as a shock, but punishment is supposed to be unpleasant.

Re:Trolling?

[LurkerXXX]

You can't blame the kid bro or judge him too harshly.

Yes I can. Everyone is responsible for their own actions. Not everyone in adverse situations turn into raging assholes. It's not an excuse.

So, let the opining begin...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

So, do we actually believe that a college-age man is sufficiently motivated to troll the same person, including offline, for weeks on end; but so obtuse that he doesn't realize such trolling's effects, or did TFA's author just get played by a sociopathic little fucker's crocodile tears?

I'm voting for #2, personally. Wholly anonymous mob pile-ons can easily enough sweep up ethically-unimpressive-but-basically-standard-issue people; and some damaged-but-mostly-harmless types actually seem willing to spend their time dumping copypasta on entire forums; but solitary, prolonged, systematic trolling of one target chosen for no reason? Kid is bad seed.

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[Doctor_Jest]

I tend to agree with that... how I read it is he was crying because he got caught, not because he realized his stalking was a bad idea. If he had kept it to online nonsense, you could write it off as a bored moron who needs a swift kick in the ass, but when he started the whole mailing of packages thing, well, now the fucker needs locked up, or at the very least institutionalized until they can figure out what the flying fuck is wrong with his brain.

I'm ambivalent to the whole Internet Fuckwad Syndrome, because it's nothing to get pissed about... but when it moves outside to the real world, well, that is when it needs to be prosecuted harshly. This isn't a Troll... this is a psychopath. It's like the word 'hacker'... non-techies have co-opted a word and changed its meaning. (Unlike 'cyberbullying'... which is a term coined by technophobes about trolling...) ...that's for another thread, though...

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[immaterial]

...well, now the fucker needs locked up, or at the very least institutionalized until they can figure out what the flying fuck is wrong with his brain.

Prison is going to do what for his mental health exactly? Then note that Leo Traynor's condition for not going to the police was that the parents put the kid in therapy.

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[Doctor_Jest]

It is assuming he is mentally ill. He could just be a fucking cocksucker who needs to be placed out of society before he kills someone. I am not qualified to know if he's in need of help or cornholed by a huge black guy named Thunderdick. But something needs to be done, or we'll all be reading about this asshat's killing spree with our Post Toasties.

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[chrismcb]

So, do we actually believe that a college-age man is sufficiently motivated to troll the same person, including offline, for weeks on end; but so obtuse that he doesn't realize such trolling's effects,

Yes

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[immaterial]

Yeah, we should lock this kid up with only criminals to socialize with, where he can (out of desire or necessity) join a neo-nazi prison gang who will reinforce all his fucked-up worldviews. And then a few years later we can throw him back into society and everything will be peachy-fucking-keen.

Not only is the philosophy you're touting far more damaging to society as a whole, your RAWR PUNISHMENT attitude isn't even supported by the victim in this case. Who is being served by throwing the kid in prison?

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[The Master Control P]

You really don't see what's wrong with a prison system that all but guarantees that anyone who isn't a cold, hardened criminal going in will be one coming out?

There are enough people who are naturally or are turned into habitual criminals without a "justice" system actively creating them.

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[Azghoul]

So you're in favor of either committing him to a mental ward against his will (read Thomas Szasz), killing a 17 y/o kid for being a dick, or having him suffer life-long physical and emotional injury due to prison rape. When the victim here says he wants to give the kid a chance.

And you're the sane, socially acceptable guy here?

Re:So, let the opining begin...

[Artifakt]

I really can't see how you can equate extremism with mental illness without coming to the conclusion we are already in the asylum and there are more of them than us.

Yes, but there are times when it feels like that is exactly the case. I have an acquaintance (I'll call him Nutcase A) who has swung far into the Teaparty side of politics. Now I'm not claiming anybody else at the last rally he attended is particularly mentally ill, but this guy has, for just one example, gotten so down on some people for letting their kids watch PBS that he has explained to a group of us how all those European travel shows are fake because the Russians tore up those European countries so bad they don't really look like that. A couple of people present with me drew him out on this point, and he now apparently genuinely believes that World War 2 was the US against Russia, that Russia conquered Europe as far as Italy and France, making them all Socialists, held that territory until the 80s, and that those countries weren't freed until Reagan won the cold war. By him, the Germans were on our side during WW2 until the Commies overran them. The Berlin wall enclosed all of Commie Europe, up the Atlantic seacoast. It's like he listened to some Limbaugh and Coulter descriptions of Hitler being a leftist because the Nazis were National Socialists and took that argument to heart so sincerely that he had to re-write fifty years of history to be consistant with it.
            Oh, and Clifford the Big Red Dog is particularly a commie plot to indoctinate the youth of America. I know this guy passed at least a normal high school history class once, but it's like he's now rewritten it all in his mind, and everything he seems to believe is being filtered through an incredibly and increasingly warped version of right libertarian philosophy.
      What your comment made me think of is that his example has made me ask other people on the Tea Party side about their nutcases, and there's a strong tendency for those people to claim there aren't any people like that guy attending their rallys and speaking at their town halls. I know some of these people have met Nutcase A, and in a couple of cases, have heard him say at least something totally whackjob. I was there when those cases happened. Even if Nutcase A is 1 in 1,000 and there's a lot more reasonable people making up the bulk of the group, I'm finding it harder and harder to believe those other people are not in some weird state of denial, deliberately or delusionally pretending they don't have any Nutcase A's at all around. And, I'm wondering about what else they are in denial over. When somebody claiming affiliation with the American right says, for example, that they haven't seen any signs the dislike of president Obama is racially motivated, I wonder if they have just ignored hearing a dozen rants and a hundred racial slurs at their last meeting - wondering if they start out thinking in each incident that those people aren't really the core of their group, and five minutes later have turned it into "that didn't happen at all - we aren't like that, so I didn't hear what I heard.". When people appear to be standing right next to some ranting and raving 'crazy people', and swearing they didn't hear anything crazy, yes, you start figuring the whole group is part of the illness.

Traced his IP?

[Kindgott]

I bet they used a GUI interface using Visual Basic!

Re:Traced his IP?

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet they used a GUI interface using Visual Basic!

No! Everyone knows when you trace an IP it does a 3D mapping google fly over with a little dot following a line from each location and then zooms in close to the final location showing a live video feed! I watch movies I know how computers work!

Re:First post

[jd2112]

God hates fags

Yes. Smoking can kill you.

Keywords

[Anonymous Coward]

Keywords in the original text:
"basically an IT genius,"
"hacked my facebook account"
"trace the hackers and trolls for me using perfectly legal technology, which would lead to their IP addresses."
"the abuse had emanated from three separate IP addresses in different corners of Ireland."
"The third location was a friend's house."

so, you can know the house location of each poster on twitter ? - troll-

Re:Keywords

[wordsnyc]

There are a lot of people arguing that this whole story is a fable; the IT guy the author presents to defend his account is a feckless bullshitter. Basically it's a case of two guys who don't know that they don't know the technical difficulties in what they claim to have done. The whole thing is embarrassing and annoying.

Puhleese

[kiriath]

Sounds like a lifetime movie to me.

Safety first

[Kohath]

This is why content delivery systems need to be licensed by governments. This wouldn't have happened if Twitter were prohibited because it's unlicensed.

It's a safety issue. Just like the license you need before you can drive your own car. Just like the license you need to be a barber. Or the permit that those kids should have gotten before the cops shut down their lemonade stand. Or the license that that guy in North Carolina needs to publish dietary advice on his blog. Or the law license that Elizabeth Warren doesn't need because she's one of the special people.

Leo Traynor should be ashamed for having an unlicensed conversation with his Troll. Is he a certified criminal counselor? He should have gotten the authorities involved, because they should always be involved. In everything.

Re:Safety first

[demonlapin]

Ergo, GP post is a good example of an actual troll.

Re:At what point...

[Truekaiser]

Before or after he found him?
A sane person would of given the cops the information and let this be a legal issue. I would of done the same. Basically this kid crossed the line from harmless internet troll, to potential killer when he moved the trolling to the real world. that has consequences and it they ruin his life well it's his fault.

Something doesn't sound right

[93 Escort Wagon]

"I was deliberately more provocative toward them than ever I'd been before."

This sentence makes me think that, however vile the "troll" could have turned out to be, this wasn't an entirely black-versus-white situation. I suspect this guy was being a jerk back at anyone who was a jerk to him, and it escalated further than he thought it would.

Re:At what point...

[Anonymous Coward]

He did. And they were not helpful.

I was petrified.
They had my address.
I reported it to the authorities and hoped for the best.
Two days later I opened my front door and there was a bunch of dead flowers with my wife's old Twitter username on it. Then that night I recieved a DM. 'You'll get home some day & ur b**ches throat will be cut & ur son will be gone.'
I got on to the authorities again but, polite and sympathetic as they were, there didn't seem much that could be done.

Sort of surprising because I'm fairly certain the language of that threat rises to a criminal level with the threat of bodily harm and kidnapping, especially given that the person making the threat knows the address of the person they are threatening.

this is not trolling

[circletimessquare]

This is stalking

Its like calling arson vandalism

Identify the nature of the transgression correctly

Re:At what point...

[Anonymous Coward]

would of --> would have

please

Re:fable

[TaoPhoenix]

"There are a lot of people arguing that this whole story is a fable; the IT guy the author presents to defend his account is a feckless bullshitter. Basically it's a case of two guys who don't know that they don't know the technical difficulties in what they claim to have done. The whole thing is embarrassing and annoying."

Are we getting ... wait for it ... trolled? (Can I start a meme? Rick-Trolled?)

What's really out of whack is the sequence of events. So the cops can't find this guy, they're wringing their hands in helplessness. Along comes "An IT Genius" that traces the house by IP ... and the cops couldn't call any of their guys on the entire force to do that? However if the kid torrented a Song they would have found him pronto.

This is a simple case.

[xor.pt]

The author is just too naive, or cowardly to deliver his friend's son with legal action.
In the end the author tries to spin this little story as a 'I'm the bigger man' tale instead.
The author is at this point just enabling him, like his parents.
This is a 17 year old who's in college. He's a danger to himself and others, and any additional damage caused by him will also be in the author's head.
What did he learn from this? Cry when you get caugh, and your actions have no consequences.

How is it even difficult?

[Kohath]

Post a link for a guy to click on. He clicks on it. It goes to a page you publish on your server. You look in the server logs. You know his IP address. Then you can find his city and possibly his neighborhood from that. And you know his ISP.

After that it can become more difficult. But it's hardly impossible. If a friend at the guy's ISP will do you a favor (the troll in the story is local), or if you can simply guess the right answer and check it, it's easy again. If you can read someone's cookies with a cross-site scripting vulnerability or trick them into installing malware, it's not going to be too hard to find them.

Re:At what point...

[Anonymous Coward]

... In the UK you're not allowed to protect yourself either -- it undermines government authority.

While in essence what you say is true, in practice, you'll find that not all the police, judiciary and juries are 'on side' with that particular message.

Another thing, whilst I'm at it, the UK has three separate legal systems, one covering England/Wales, one covering Scotland, and lastly Northern Ireland. There may be UK wide laws, which are usually 'rubber stamped' by the Scottish and NI legal systems, but the implementation and interpretation of said laws depends on which legal jurisdiction of the UK you're in.

Having been told by a Chief Constable in Scotland that in the event of anyone breaking into my house, so long as it's within my property, I have the right to defend myself and my family, and if I fear for their or my life, then extreme actions are permissible, then I'd think it's safe to say that I do have a right to protect myself, the issue lies with how much force I use to do so and in what circumstances.

I've no idea what the legal position is in England/Wales, but having lived there for 15 years and having on at least one occasion been caught on 'surveillance' cameras 'defending myself' against a couple of muggers (one ran, I left the other U/S on the ground) and despite the incident being on camera/tape, and despite my good self being a somewhat easy individual to spot in a crowd the police never did anything about it.

So, yes, we have a bunch of control freaks in power who'd love to regiment every microsecond of our lives (irrespective of what political party they're pretending to be this month), yes, we're not allowed to own guns the same way you Americans are, yes, these restrictions haven't done a damn thing to stop the increase in 'gun crime' in the UK (Fact: gun crime is on the rise, and it is now easier to get large calibre handguns on the 'black market' since the UK government banned the ownership of the things), but, please, please don't get hung up on the fact that we do not own firearms somehow equates to we're without the means of defending ourselves, and, despite the best efforts of the State and despite the picture the media paints, we are allowed to do so.
The laws are still policed and implemented by the more than occasional human being, a lot of incidents never get to the legal system in the first instance as the Police/CPS/Procurator Fiscals take one look at the evidence and won't present it, of those which do go, you only hear about the 'being prosecuted for self defence' cases that papers with a political agenda like the 'Daily Mail' want you to hear about, you'll never read about the people who are admonished/found 'not guilty' (unless it suits the paper 'politically').

Happened to me in high school.

[Chrontius]

Happened to me in high school.

I blocked at least a dozen AIM accounts a night for weeks (maybe months); I can be fortunate there was no "twitter" then, nor this "book of faces", and that smartphones were this exciting new thing Handspring was just introducing to the market that nobody could afford.

Then I got two unsolicited copies of the TSR novel "Death of the Dragon" in the mail - this may have been an error by a small book distributor I did business with, so I can't be sure -- but "Dragon" was part of the IM name I used at the time, and I could never be sure. I still have both copies, and I haven't read either. I don't actually think I even touched either after I put them on the bookshelf those years ago.

Then the fella proved himself grossly incompetent, and threatened to beat me to death. In a public library, where I "was", he was "behind" me. I was sitting at a desk, at home, with a baseball bat within arms' reach. I mocked him for the rest of the night, and then it ended. He failed. Epically. His confrontation... wasn't.

But I'm not in high school any more. I spent the next couple years reading books like "Shooting To Live" and "Kill or Get Killed". I took years of aikido, tae kwon do, and studied a few forms of swordplay for a few more years. I carry a gun, and enough ammo to get through the statistically average civilian-defense gunfight, and then a little more. Sometimes, more than one. I'm seriously considering building some ghetto-but-effective body armor. (Steel rifle plates went out of style because they're heavy and unconcealable, but they offer an awful lot of protection). I don't carry a gun because I expect to get in a fight; I carry because I don't expect to get in a fight. If I expected one, I'd simply send a SWAT team in my stead, and sip Starbucks in the mobile command center. (No police department takes documentable, documented conspiracy to commit murder lightly in this age of lawsuits!) I don't sit with my back to the door at restaurants any more, I know what phrases like "condition yellow" mean, and I look for the bulge of a poorly-concealed weapon now when someone walks into the gas station while I'm fueling up.

Fortunately, for the most part, I don't mind living like this. In practice, 98% of the time, it just means I can make unplanned trips to the gun range without going home for weapons. And - unlike most liberals - I know a secret: The shooting sports are fun. I hesitate to say it, but it's a blast to put 20 shots into a single hole not any bigger than a nickel; mastery for its own sake is one of the most rewarding things.

But somewhere, deep down, I know and cannot forget: I found this thing I enjoy because someone threatened to kill me in a public place, in front of witnesses, and get away with it. And other geeks may not get through it as well as I did. I may enjoy the trappings, but I wouldn't want to put anyone through the scary parts on the way to where I am today.

Let us not mistake this for an isolated incident; it is not. Let us not mistake it for something new; it is not. Let us not allow this to happen again; it should not.

Re:Happened to me in high school.

[phantomfive]

It's a little worrisome that you've bought into this self-defense thing so much that you are considering wearing body armor everywhere you go. Statistically speaking you will never see an average civilian gunfight. But in any case kevlar is cheap, you can get a real vest instead of some ghetto body armor. It will be better.

You have all been Trolled.

[Tastecicles]

Leo Traynor is a fiction. Apparently he has lived in no less than seventeen countries over the past eight years, including some of the most politically unstable regions on the planet; more that he has managed to stay still long enough to gain a DPhil in international politics (no school anywhere has any record of him), that he has worked for all three main parties in the UK as a press liaison officer (yet no mention of him in the Press, ever). That he has worked for both parties in the US as a Press liaison officer (ditto). His story is so full of holes you could drain chips with it.

Leo Traynor, you are a bullshitter.