Mckinnon (not as lucky as wikileaks?)

i remember reading a post about mckinnon, who was a brittish man who hacked into the pentagon, a few years back

ats thread

other related news site detailing (link in ats post outdated)

you can find more news reports on the story also if you never heard of this...
so anyways to sum it up, he beleived by hacking into the government database of the US he could find proof of UFos or aliens or the like

She said his motivation for hacking was to try to prove the existence of UFOs and expose the poor security of U.S. government systems. Many of the systems had easy-to-guess passwords, she said.

i even think i read somewhere that he claimed to even see a picture of a UFO during his hacking time? i don't know, not really relevant to this thread anyway, but anyways

McKinnon - known online as "Solo" - allegedly accessed 97 U.S. government computers, stole passwords, deleted files and shut down military computer networks, crashing 300 computers at Earle Naval Weapons Station in Colts Neck, N.J., shortly after 9/11.

His lawyer, Karen Todner, said he could face 70 years in U.S. jails and would contest the extradition.

"The treatment of other British nationals under the American judicial system inspires little confidence," she told reporters. She said his motivation for hacking was to try to prove the existence of UFOs and expose the poor security of U.S. government systems. Many of the systems had easy-to-guess passwords, she said.

so now he's doing the time for the crime, this man will never touch a keyboard again

recently wikileaks did something simliar, they are a website bent on revealing government coverups of ' ill behavior ' (in my words) i'm sure you've heard about them...

wikileaks

my question is, why hasn't this happened to wikileaks? why are they not arrested, what's the difference?

mckinnon was claimed to cause 700,000 bucks in damage to the US, perhaps wikileaks didn't cause any damage and wasn't worth pursueing like mckinnon was?

just something that crossed my mind, i am interested to hear what else could be said on that note

another theory of mine is that wikileaks is, perhaps, too expansive

mckinnon was one person, maybe wikileaks is too big, or too large on the internet or well known and a dismantle of wikileaks would be enough evidence as to it's authenticity,

a contrast to jailing a single person, and describing him as 'dressing like his star david bowie'

the latter is easy to accomplish with most public opinion leaning towards, "i don't know what he saw, but it doesn't matter, he's crazy and doing jail time for it"

but, again, if wikileaks was jailed or as seriously pursued, it probably would help their credibility, maybe.

Maybe WikiLeaks has an agenda?

I am semi doubting that though because I have read up on the creator and he seems like a guy not interested in forming a facade.

The internet is far too anonymous IMO to really be trusting anyone any further than you can throw them though.

McKinnon... was calling telephone numbers in the exchange for nasa. Each time the modem would connect he would see if you could connect... he could not... until he hit a machine that had THE DEFAULT ADMIN PASSWORD.


The "caused 700k of damage" is fanciful rubbish, likely an estimate of how much the Government CONTRACT AWARD was going to be to have all computers at NASA examined by a moron whose job was to set the Admin password for windows xp....

The image he saw materializing on his screen was of a huge orbiting ufo structure of some kind, or maybe it was a close up of the kids playing frizebee...

McKinnon deserves a Congressional Medal of Honor for finding such an extraordinary lack of security.

This case was pursued this way because the Federal government is insecure and had more to gain by scaring you from even trying and doesn't want people finding out what a bunch of bozos they actually are.

They also do not want the details in my posting to propagate.. only the PR spin in the OP.

And re Wikileaks

The real threats to American security are the wars themselves; may we never live to see our benevolence reciprocated.

Link to Thank You WikiLeaks



[edit on 12-4-2010 by seataka]

reply to post by seataka

my question is, why hasn't this happened to wikileaks? why are they not arrested, what's the difference?

Because Mckinnon was committing a direct crime, and he knew it. Wiki-leaks works to expose crime and corruption, however, Mckinnon claims to have been doing the same thing...but as I said, the difference is, wiki-leaks don't commit outright crimes to achieve their goal.

mckinnon was claimed to cause 700,000 bucks in damage to the US, perhaps wikileaks didn't cause any damage and wasn't worth pursueing like mckinnon was?

Mckinnon was claimed to have caused a lot of damage, but at no time was the US Government obligated to prove this, or provide evidence of it. The man was quietly hacking into US Government computers for years undetected...he wasn't causing damage, only seeking information...now the US Government is making sure he can never do it again...and are probably using this to send out a message to anyone else who thinks of trying...

EDIT: You could also ask whether what he did was a crime, since he didn't actually break into anywhere, and merely found open doors...is it illegal to walk into an open house, is that trespassing? I guess he probably downloaded a fair bit of sensitive information...so he walked into an open house, but he did steal from it...but then we must ask whether the information he was seeking is really the property of all of us, and we all have a right to access it?

I guess in the end, we don't decide his fate...only TPTB can do that...whether he is guilty of a crime or not he will be punished for challenging their system...

[edit on 12/4/10 by CHA0S]

I think Mckinnon best bet is just do a runner! I'm pretty sure everyone involved wants this to just go away, I'm sure the US Navy doesn't want it coming out in court about there So called space Navy.