Canadian Teen Arrested For Calling In 30+ Swattings, Bomb Threats

tsu doh nimh (609154) writes "A 16-year-old male from Ottawa, Canada has been arrested for allegedly making at least 30 fraudulent calls — including bomb threats and 'swattings' — to emergency services across North America over the past few months. Canadian media isn't identifying the youth because of laws that prevent the disclosure, but the alleged perpetrator was outed in a dox on Pastebin that was picked up by journalist Brian Krebs, who was twice the recipient of attempted swat raids at the hand of this kid. From the story: 'I told this user privately that targeting an investigative reporter maybe wasn't the brightest idea, and that he was likely to wind up in jail soon. But @ProbablyOnion was on a roll: That same day, he hung out his for-hire sign on Twitter, with the following message: "want someone swatted? Tweet me their name, address and I'll make it happen."'"

Comments

Re:Autoimmune disorder...

[pipedwho]

1. Pay phono
2. Voip over someone else's wifi
3. Someone else's phone while they're too drunk to notice an outgoing call
4. Hacked remote computer, then install and use Voip service
5. Stolen cell phone
6. Break into someone's house and use their land line phone
7. Burn phone
8. etc.

Re:First Swatting Victims Were Conservative Blogge

[Anonymous Coward]

It certainly dates back to the 1960's, when faking bomb threats from peaceful protesters was used to bring in police and National Guard against them. The Scientologists made an art form of it. Mary Sue Hubbard, L. Ron's wife was convicted for her involvement in "dead agenting" Paulette Cooper, which included faked bomb threats against the Israeli embassy, in order to discredit Paulette's book called "The Scandal of Scientology". And who can forget "The Maine", whose faked fraudulently advertised bomb destruction in 1898 was a vital trigger of the Spanish-American War?

Discrediting your opponents by making fraudulent bomb threats is an old, old political hobby.

Re:bleh.

[evilviper]

In a lot of cultures 16 year old are working and starting families. I'm not saying that's the preferred path, just that a 16 year old SHOULD be able to make adult decisions. The fact that they can't means that society is not raising them correctly.

No, the biology has been studied for decades. It's actually right around 25 that people emerge from their high-risk behavior and inability to weigh consequences, and start thinking straight. The traffic fatality statistics serve as a good proxy... There's a reason a huge number of 18-25 year-olds are killed in traffic accidents, and it's predominantly biological.