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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."'"
... the fact that you can do this with a telephone is pretty scary.
Just recently I saw a massive police overreaction (closing off a block of downtown DC in front of a university hospital, complete with police abusing citizens) just because some student left her backpack lying around. If this is all it takes to provoke this sort of reaction, and if a few phone calls can get someone "swatted", then why the hell does al-Qaeda bother with bombings and flying planes into things? Send over a few sleeper cells with nondescript bags and boxes and watch the panic fly.
This is pretty damn analogous to an allergic reaction: "ack, a piece of peanut antigen! FETCH ALL THE CYTOKINES, BOYS, THIS MEANS WAR!"
There is no 'but'.
The next time someone calls with the exact same wording, and they don't respond appropriately.....you'll be calling for their heads to roll.
Yes, I get that the police have too any toys they need to use. But wtf are they supposed to do? Send Officer Snuffy with a single bullet in his pocket every time?
Because this is what Slashdot has become.
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.
On one hand, glad the little fucker got caught. on the other, also glad he was Canadian. Had he been in the US, he'd probably get a life sentence.
16 year old kids do really incredibly dumb anti social stuff, problems arise with something as easy to pull off as this -- and the supposed anonymity of the internet. How many of you remember winnuke (circa 1996)? Nowadays nuking someone would have been met with a knock on the door, and being hauled away in cuffs.
(NOT defending swatting. more criticizing penalties for teenagers in the US. At 16 you're a moron -- you have some inkling of the consequences but you don't really *get* it.)
the one time you don't react, someone will die and there will be a huge investigation and people being fired with no pension benefits
No one is saying "don't react", they are saying "react appropriately". You put together a well thought out response plan BEFORE the event, then follow it. Such a response plan should not call for busting down the doors with guns blazing on the strength of a single anonymous phone call. Not following the plan is what should result in disciplinary actions.
If you think the poor and ignorant cause harm, you should see what the wealthy and powerful do. Coming from Old Money (great-grandparent a wealthy business owner and profligate gambler, grandparent a member of all the right/wrong clubs, parents in senior civil service, £30k/year private school, &c.), I was surrounded by destructive idiots with obscene wealth who were there on anything but their own merits.
I'm all in favour of personal responsibility, but that means considering the complete chain and gamut of consequences of your actions, not merely what flows immediately from your behaviour. Those who use a snapshot of any complex system to derive a solution do a disservice to their brain.
why he needs to be tried on trial as an adult when he is not an adult? he got to vote and buy booze yet? no, then why treat him as an adult - to scare others who by law and common reason aren't yet intelligent enough to be scared by such laws anyways??
anyhow, HOW FUCKING EASY WAS IT TO ORDER A SWAT HIT ? ? they did any fact checking before bursting in? any investigations? did they even fucking change their routines to prevent people from ordering swat hits on random places at will??? like what the fuck, easier to order a bunch of guys to come over with loaded guns than to order pizza?
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
The odds of someone being shot or killed or dying of a heart attack when the SWAT team pounds down their door are about 2-4%. The odds of someone being shot or killed or dying of a heart attack when the police don't SWAT their door is much lower. Therefore, SWATting someone is equivalent to a 2-4% attempt of a murder.
At the minimum, that could be prosecuted as a felonious assault with intent to cause grievous bodily injury. Since some of the people who die in SWAT raids are occasionally the cops, this could even be considered an assault on a police officer.
A good prosecutor could stuff this little turd in a very dark cell for a couple of decades, and the world would be much better off as a result.
John
anyhow, HOW FUCKING EASY WAS IT TO ORDER A SWAT HIT ? ? they did any fact checking before bursting in? any investigations? did they even fucking change their routines to prevent people from ordering swat hits on random places at will??? like what the fuck, easier to order a bunch of guys to come over with loaded guns than to order pizza?
The militarization of police forces is making criminals of us all. Think you have the right to be secure in your home? Think again.
http://www.cato.org/publications/white-paper/overkill-rise-paramilitary-police-raids-america
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/opinions/wp/2014/02/04/scenes-from-a-militarized-america-iowa-family-terrorized/
http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21599349-americas-police-have-become-too-militarised-cops-or-soldiers
They shoot first (only your dog if you're lucky) and ask questions maybe later, maybe. As Chief Wiggum told us years ago, the police are powerless to help you, not punish you.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)