Gary McKinnon suicidal following U.S. bullying

reply to post by Laurauk


Sure he probably should be tried there, honestly I wish he was so the news over there was putting up with it rather than here, but the fact of the matter is he is being tried in the US because the UK government agreed to extradite him. Imagine if I committed the same act against the UK government but from a nation that would not extradite and had absolutely no laws on the books regarding computer crime, would you not then want me to stand trial in your nation rather than being permitted to roam free because of a loophole like that, which can very easily happen with legal precedents and such.

reply to post by v3_exceed


While I agree on the technical information you provided lets be real here, government systems unless advertised for public use are not for joe schmoe to be traipsing around in. Someone claiming that their personal web server is suddenly private is a far cry different than a government network which is assumed private unless otherwise noted.

My hope is that once all this is said and done there will be more attention to computer crime law and perhaps a push for an awareness campaign, because few folks really understand and grasp it and that leads us to these long winded threads.

reply to post by Helig


G'morning,

When you are trolling IP's looking for whatever, there are no indications of who the computer might be owned by. IE: my computer was being attacked by a person with the notepad virus. So I went into their system to, 1( stop the attack, 2) find out who it was. I found it was a lawyers system who was infected and then I called that lawyer to explain what their system was doing. One other example I have is when my system was being attacked, I browsed the other persons machine, installed their printer and then sent them a message explaining how I felt about them. It is only after your into the computer that you can determine ownership.

Another example, back in the day, most mail servers would relay mail for anyone. It was just a courtesy that we did to keep the network robust. today, no one would be dumb enough to keep an open relay for long.

Now it's true IP assignments can be researched these days, and you can tell that its a DOD, or NASA block or whatever but at the time, I doubt Gary would have had the initiative or the tools.

I just can't stand the whole "Burn him" group when we are supposed to be here to deny ignorance, and uncover the secrets that have been with held back for so many years by the people we pay.

..Ex

Originally posted by StinkyFeet
reply to post by wx4caster

 

Principles my ass. This guy was just some stoner who decide to hack US government computers. He should go to jail just like anyone else who has been caught doing that.

Well if the U.S. government didn't want their computers hacked, they shouldn't have put them on the internet. In doing so they have made there secret info fair game to terrorists, free radicals, freedom fighters, or any computer nerd in his mother's basement.

Originally posted by Helig

As for the claims of no damage being done ask an IT director to give you a quote for how many man-hours it would take (and the pay rate for those people) to completely restore every computer on their network. Its not a fast process and can quite easily rack up a lot of OT for the people who have to fix the situation.

Lol - on retrospect I agree with this.... taking into account it will probably be the same 'IT experts' who let these machines be WIDE open in the first place, then yes - it probably would costs thousands. For someone that does not have a clue then it would take ages! Take into account their pay rate and whoooo - there go the tax dollars!

reply to post by Helig


You certainly know that is not true, there was a extradtion put into the US Government with regards, to the inquiry to the friednly fire incident in iraq, the US Government refused to extradite those invovled to face qustioning from prosecutors invovled, you might claim it was under different circumtances, but it just goes to show the US Gov have some cheek to ask for extradition of this dude, after they themselves went back on the agreement.

reply to post by TheNetherlands

exactly We should have the right to that information, I don't consider the man a criminal

More than likely he is getting a job in the CIA and will never seen prison time.

A man like this is an asset to them.

However I can hardly see why since he didn't hack anything, he entered an open computer system, the question is; is the blank password a password and did he hack the system by guessing it was blank?

This could also be entrapment.

reply to post by GrOuNd_ZeRo


I doubt that Mr McKinnon has kept his hand in and would have much to offer these days.

He's just a pawn in a pi**ing match.

I've been telling people for years that government...especially government prosecutors will use their knowledge of the system to stress their targets to the point of causing illness and death, or to the point where they take their own lives.

This is not reasonable punishment. The entire process is punishment from start to finish and prosecutors know this, so they maximize the impact to their victims, and when it's over, they still want blood for a sentence.

I know there are people that society needs to be protected from. We are not talking about the bank robbers, home invaders, drive by shooters, bar room shooters, gangsta's etc. here.

We are talking about a guy who found a door left wide open that took him into a government server. So what? He did the morons a favor by exposing their incompetence. They should have interviewed him and hired him as a consultant, because the guy did not mean any harm, did not do any harm, and is not the criminal type.

The real criminals are those who continually cause Gary McKinnon and others this kind of prolonged stress over useless charges that are not in the public interest.

If they want to send a message to other so called hackers(I don't believe is was a hacker job...since the door was wide open) then all they need to do is tell them what the price will be....they don't have to make an example out of someone to the point of killing them with stress.

We live in a very sick world where people are so hung up on the physical that they cannot see the reality of the harm inflicted on others through mental and emotional torture(stress).

Stress....a deadly and silent killer. Watch out for it.

Cops, prosecutors, and other agents could be firing stress your way next, and when you die from stress related illness, who's going to think it was murder?

Deliberately using governmental powers and one's knowledge of the system to inflict mental suffering and punishment on another human being should be a crime.

In most cases, it was mental cruelty that led a person to a life of crime, so why feed the problem with more of what created the criminal in the first place?

There is not a doctor in the world that won't acknowledge that upwards of 75% of illness is due to stress. Is the gov. secretly using stress to kill off people it doesn't have a clue how to deal with?

Gee...ya think if the gov. started treating people fairly that is might reduce stress and save a whole pile of healthcare costs?

Stress is truly the governments new murder weapon, and prosecutors like the one's after Mckinnon are it's chief administrators.

Disclaimer: Just my opinion.



[edit on 11/10/09 by John Matrix]

IT always seem to me that the US is so hypocrite........

I can remember an article in an newspaper in the Netherlands about our war tribunal in the Hague. The US made clear that if an American citizen would stand trial in the Netherhlands, they had the right to come and get this citizen if they wanted (if necessary with force).

If you make such a statements

The US government wants to bring democracy to other countries and take it out of their own country.

Come on, breaking into Nasa is a criminal action...., but 70 years....
And did he really break in?? as the NASA is ridiculing his findings????

Originally posted by Helig

As for the claims of no damage being done ask an IT director to give you a quote for how many man-hours it would take (and the pay rate for those people) to completely restore every computer on their network. Its not a fast process and can quite easily rack up a lot of OT for the people who have to fix the situation.

Heh...ok, I will bite...since I have been in charge of many a networks.

step 1, change admin passwords on all servers (dependingly approximately 5 minutes max per server)
step 2, required password change for all users in database upon logging in, lock out accounts not accessed after X amount of days..this is purely for security purposes in case this guy changed passwords or whatnot
step 3, goto lunch


I think there is a bigger crime here..why does it take our government 350k to change a admin password and put a expire life on domain passwords.

Nobody is saying he didnt do a crime (well, nobody with a brain), what is being said is that this price is absurd for the damages..like taking a shower and getting a 58 thousand dollar water bill for a 10 minute shower...it should raise an eyebrow..someone is adding a few extra zeros to the end.

Should he goto court? sure..and he should get a slap on the wrist overall..he caused no damage, he leaked no info (unless your going to believe in the UFO stuff he spouts, in which case, that undeniably proves the government is a rogue government here and we need to topple them asap) and he is not a threat to our national security.
1 year max, and that is even pushing it...I would say 6 months followed by a year probation, to be served in the UK

The government wants this to seem like a big deal to the computer illiterate. They desperately need reasons that can lead them to control over the internet. It's one of the last places people can truly be free, next they'll want control over all domestic ISPs so that they can implement their own proxy that requires all data you receive to pass through their servers first. Right now if they wanted to watch you they would most likely have to go through alot of bs and have a good reason for it in the first place, later they will be caching ever bit of data that reaches your hard drive.

reply to post by TheNetherlands


actually NASA IS a goverment agency. he hacked nasa.gov...well computers connected to the same network..

the reason he is being extradited is that if he ws tried in the uk it would have to be made public everything he accesed. wich could give away too much info. making both NASA and the US goverment very bad.

Maybe NASA and our Government should have had better security? You know just a thought... I mean all the tax dollars being spent on security you think they would have put passwords on their Admin accounts, but whatever.

So what if he hacked into NASA and other Government agency computers? It's not like he sabotaged them or attacked them in anyway. He went in for a peek. Whoopty freakidy do.

Ponder this, if our Government can do this to us, why can't we do it to them? What gives them the right?

Originally posted by Skeptical Ed
reply to post by ufo reality

 

Let's keep our heads when dealing with this person! He committed a crime and he has to pay for it. The dealing between nations has nothing to do with the basic crime. He is a criminal.

No. No. No. Secrets are for criminals. McKinnon is a hero, period.

reply to post by Qwenn


Qwenn,

I agree. I am new here, and I've been very surprised to find so many folks like DoomsdayRex that seem to be apologists for the establishment. I think they represent an old and perishing paradigm. Their views USED to be commonplace and worthy of serious consideration. But the reality that they so passionately support and defend is fading away, and proving itself to be a hoax and an illusion. Maybe they have yet to realize this and subconsciously they are yearning to awaken, and that's why they find themselves here at ATS.

We can no longer give the benefit of the doubt to these bureaucratic institutions that have been repeatedly exposed as liars and frauds. The burden of proof now lies in their hands. And might I say, THEIR extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence.

[edit on 11-10-2009 by optigon]

[edit on 11-10-2009 by optigon]

Originally posted by StinkyFeet
This guy has pulled out all the stops to get sympathy from people, so he won't have to face his just desserts. He pulls out the sympathy card more than Jessie Jackson and Rev. Al Sharpton pull out the race card.

If he didn't want his butt tossed in prison maybe he shouldn't have been haking our computers. DUH!

I don't exactly see the US going after the PLA, Russian and Mossad hackers do we?

Originally posted by converge
But McKinnon didn't just log in "blank admin password" systems. Here's his actual DOJ indictment file, which curiously enough posts the IP addresses of the alleged machines McKinnon hacked.

Surely, if the systems had such weak security whatever information was on them couldn't have been worth protecting in the first place. One would at least assume that operational systems containing any sort of important data had some sort of card authentication combined with one time passwords in the form of RSA keys or similar. That is pretty standard even at ordinary corporations and banks these days.

What makes all of you believe gary actually saw what he said he did? Why didnt he take a screenshot or save anything? What is he a idiot? He has no proof whatsoever he saw what he said he did. He was just some stoner sitting around getting loaded screwing around on the net.

Some people are so guillable. He says he saw something so yall call him a freedom fighter lol. He has provided no proof whatsoever.

Considering the $350k figure, how many Pentagon sysadmins does it take to change a password?