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Florida Teen Charged With Felony Hacking For Changing Desktop Wallpaper

Posted by Soulskill on from the climate-of-fear dept.

colinneagle writes: A 14-year-old middle school student in Holiday, Florida, was arrested this week and charged with "an offense against a computer system and unauthorized access," which is a felony. The student reportedly used an administrator password to log into a teacher's computer and change the background image to a photo of two men kissing.

The student also revealed his secrets after he was caught – the password was the teacher's last name, and the teacher had typed it in in full view of the students. The student said many other students used these administrators' passwords (their teachers' last names) so they can screen-share and video chat with other students. The student was briefly held in a nearby detention center, and the county Sheriff warned that other teenagers caught doing the same thing will "face the same consequences."

27 of 629 comments (clear)

  1. Must example set of him by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Twart future terrorists in their tracks must.

    1. Re:Must example set of him by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Especially because he put GAY GUYS on the computer, the horrors. If he had changed the wallpaper to a cat picture this would not have happened I guarantee it.

    2. Re: Must example set of him by weilawei · · Score: 5, Funny

      Retarded, justice system is. For you that fixed.

    3. Re: Must example set of him by C0R1D4N · · Score: 5, Informative

      In the defense of our continent sized nation, Florida is the laughing stock of America.

    4. Re: Must example set of him by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Justice system is retarded.

      This kid's parents aren't too bright either. Parents have a responsibility to ensure that their kids understand their legal and constitutional rights. I have a teenage daughter, and I have taught her that if she is questioned by the police, she should say exactly four words:
      1. I
      2. want
      3. my
      4. parents.
      Then she should say NOTHING else, until I am there. The police have no right to interrogate a kid without a parent or guardian present. I also made sure my kids watched this video: Never talk to the police. The kid is TFA is in trouble because he mouthed off, and made the authorities look stupid.

  2. thank God they didn't have computers.... by OutOnARock · · Score: 5, Insightful

    when I was a kid

    the things I might have done....

    picking the mimeograph of the test out of the trash if its in public isn't even a criminal offense...

    1. Re:thank God they didn't have computers.... by sasquatch989 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Yes, but if you leave your door unlocked and slightly ajar does give me the right to put a pic of two dudes kissing in your foyer

    2. Re:thank God they didn't have computers.... by Shakrai · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I don't think this should be a felony, but just because I leave my front door unlocked and slightly ajar doesn't give you permission to enter it.

      It shouldn't even be a criminal charge. It may be a crime by the letter of the law, but c'mon, this couldn't be handled in-house?! A moronic stunt like this calls for in-school suspension with a few extra and tedious academic assignments. I can't decide what's more pathetic, the fact that the school couldn't handle this internally or the fact that law enforcement took the "case."

      Coming soon, the 2015 remake of The Breakfast Club; it begins with all four kids in handcuffs, charged with felonies for their misadventures, and ends with the parents bankrupted by legal fees while the kids lose any hope of becoming productive members of society.

      --
      I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
      We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
    3. Re:thank God they didn't have computers.... by im_thatoneguy · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I actually had this happen to me in 7th grade. Another student realized that we could use a password cracking program (I think windows would save pw files) to crack local user account passwords. First of all this is back in the days when windows 95 had horrific security such as storing user account passwords in a file that any user could access. :P And what would happen is that when you logged into Novell windows would often then prompt you for a local user account as well. And almost everybody would type in their their regular username and password to each machine. Well the other student cracked the schools system administrator's password and it was surprise surprise his first name plus like 123.

      So for the first time in known history at our school, we finally had several administrators who actually could manage the computers. We changed the desktop resolution from like 640x480 up to a "modern" 1024x768 on all of the machines. We were able to fix teacher machines which weren't working. The "system administrator" at our school's solution to everything was just format and re-install. Which is probably cost-effective for him but not ideal for teachers who would have to reinstall all of their software.

      We also had a little bit of fun, using remote desktop software on friends to trick them into thinking that Microsoft Word had a sentient chat bot that they had unlocked. Or moving a file around on their desktop when they were about to click on it so they would have to chase it around.

      Well the fun all came crashing down when the system administrator went on vacation and came back to notice that he had apparently "worked" throughout his vacation logging into various systems. My friend who initially cracked his password had been dumb enough to log in as himself, and then 2 seconds later as the admin, then back in as himself again. The admin perfectly sensibly went to the principle, who unfortunately though was 80 years old and completely clueless on technology. The admin filled the principle's heads with "felony hacking" and warned him that we could change our grades (We all had 4.0+ GPAs anyway so...) and also that we could change all of the accountant's books. Which might have been true but... which to me raised questions as to why the IT manager gave himself access to the entire school's accounting records. So the principle called us each in one by one. Told us (without a representative or parent) that we could either as 12 year olds consent to something like 80 hours of community service at the school over the next year or else they would press felony charges against us. We of course all started balling one by one and folded.

      After that the teachers would ask us to fix their computers because they but we just had to shrug our shoulders and say "sorry, the school says if we fix your computer we'll face felony charges." Needless to say the computers returned to their shitty unmaintained state. The principle apologized to us a couple years later and said he over-reacted.

    4. Re:thank God they didn't have computers.... by iMadeGhostzilla · · Score: 5, Interesting

      This case, the woman who got 20 years for (possibly inducing) miscarriage, the guy who built a fort from cardboard boxes in his yard for his kids and was told by the city to remove it, all in the last few days -- I think they call for this quote from Jack Tramiel (of Commodore) when he asked how he could not hate Germans after having been in Auschwitz:

      "You know," he once told me, "it's hard to believe it really happened. But it can happen again. In America. Americans like to make rules, and that scares me. If you have too many rules you get locked in a system. It's the system that says this one dies and that one doesn't, not the people. That's why I don't hate the German people. Individuals, yes. Rules, yes. But not all Germans." He shrugged. "They just obeyed the rules. But that's why we need more Commodores. We need more mavericks, just so the rules don't take over."

    5. Re:thank God they didn't have computers.... by weilawei · · Score: 5, Informative

      You don't define who's trespassing on your property when they have a customary reason to be there. You can't take the mailman to court for trespassing, you can't take the police to court for chasing a suspect through your house and out a window, and you can't take a registered solicitor to court for trespassing (provided they leave as soon as you ask). If the fire department shows up with a reported emergency, they can bust in and there's not shit you can do about it. Building inspector? Same deal. Health inspector? Yep.

      A registered solicitor leaving a flyer is NOT considered littering. You cannot win that in court. Ever try to get rid of Jehovah's Witnesses? They always leave shit. Good luck.

      You don't define it. Trespassing is defined by the law, which allows you to take certain actions to encourage a certain set of people to leave, but it does not automatically mean that anyone who sets foot on your property is trespassing just because you don't like it.

      TL;DR: The world is more nuanced than your "LALALALA FINGERS IN EARS" view of things.

  3. Insanity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Can we just give Florida back to Spain or something?

    1. Re:Insanity by OhSoLaMeow · · Score: 5, Funny

      And what state do you live in?

      Denial.

      --
      They can take my LifeAlert pendant when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
  4. Abusive authority breeds abusers, not obedience by Art+Popp · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The question every person in authority should be in the habit of asking is: "Am I using the least amount of my authority possible to accomplish my immediate goals?"

    To get a peace officer badge, A Clockwork Orange should be mandatory viewing with a discussion to follow, and an arrest for not understanding it. I think peace officers who don't understand the point of that movie are at least as likely to commit serious crimes as 8th graders who tamper with screen savers. I'm willing to be proven wrong.

    1. Re:Abusive authority breeds abusers, not obedience by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      There are people who have seen this pattern and are doing something about it:

      http://www.seattletimes.com/se...

      I'm hoping the numbers prove that it can be expanded to the many other places where simply jailing the offender doesn't make the world a better place.

  5. I probably would've gotten the death penalty... by Dimwit · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hah. On the Windows 3.1 systems at my high school I would change the screensaver message to something like "FUCK THA POLICE" or whatever and then use the ATTRIB command to mark WIN.INI as read-only, meaning it was impossible to change the message back using the UI.

    --
    ...but it's being eaten...by some...Linux or something...
    1. Re:I probably would've gotten the death penalty... by rjforster · · Score: 5, Informative

      The Windows logo in the Flying Windows screensaver was from the Wingdings font. Using Wordpad you could edit the screensaver binary and change the character that gets displayed to another one from that font. So at various times in the Win3.1 era people around me were found to have flying smiley faces, flying skull and crossbones etc.

  6. Rare arguement for jury nullification by davidwr · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's rare that a jury should exercise "jury nullification" but cases like these, where the punishment does not fit the crime, are one of them.

    Acquitting a guilty person when the charge is over-the-top for the circumstances sends a loud message to prosecutors to dial-it-back to something sane the next time around.

    If there wasn't a history of other students doing the same thing, filing misdemeanor criminal charges in juvenile court with a pre-arranged deal where they charges would be dismissed and the arrest expunged within 1-2 years would not be inappropriate.

    Because there is such a history, even this is too much. This should have been handled as an internal disciplinary and/or re-training matter for the student and, in parallel, for the faculty so this kind of thing doesn't happen again.

    --
    Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
  7. Well, yeah... by jargonburn · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Obviously, he should have set it to a photo of two women kissing. Then the teacher wouldn't have been so mad!

  8. Felony hacking by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    More serious than misdemeanor manslaughter.

    1. Re:Felony hacking by SoCalChris · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Except with a felony conviction he'll automatically lose rights for life, and will have a much harder time getting a decent job once he's out of school.

  9. True Justice. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Finally, we are teaching our children that justice is truly blind. It cannot see that we are charging the child, a 14 year-old, with a felony that will last the rest of his life. Never mind any jobs that the kid may try to get in the future. He is now a felon and shall be treated as such.

    Seriously though. He is just a child. I believe in making sure it is shown that what he did was wrong, but treating him as a full blown felon? Disgraceful.

  10. Re:Ignorant people frighten easily by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I grew up and went to work for Microsoft. I hope this kid is as lucky.

    How can you be so callous -- this kid is just a kid!!!

  11. Tech illiteracy at its finest by mcfatboy93 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If you obviously don't understand what the kid did, they how do you expect people to believe that your judgment is fair?

    Its clear in this situation the kid is the only one who knows that a computer isn't a magic box with pretty lights.

    --
    Its not my fault, someone put a wall in my way.
  12. Wow ... by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Sometimes you have to look at how these laws are being applied, and fight back the overwhelming urge to slap the stupid from the people who pursue these charges. And it might take a lot of slapping.

    This is a high school prank, nothing more.

    Honestly, the people who are filing felony charges of complete morons.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  13. Re:The good old days by lister+king+of+smeg · · Score: 5, Funny

    I did this to a friend, on his Christmas computer. Him, his father and his Marine buddies all seriously contemplated killing me. They were utterly furious and I didn't return for a long time. Of course, the gentleman featured on the desktop were unclothed in addition, but aren't we all, in a sense? Good fun, indeed.

    Reminds me of a friend who was tired of his neighbor using his wifi so rather than putting a password on it, like a normal person, he instead used mac filtering to redirect all requests originating from unrecognized mac's to lemon party.

    --
    ---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
  14. Makes perfect sense. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Kids need to learn the consequences of embarrassing powerful people. That is one of the golden rules of modern society; thou shalt not embarrass thy superiors. Snowden forgot that, and this little punk forgot that.

    You respect your betters, or you get tossed in a cage. That's the law. Ingrain that into your kid's brains before puberty hits, or they will wind up in a cage too.