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Grex > Agora35 > #28: Prosecution in the case of the Great M-net Crash | |
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krj
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Prosecution in the case of the Great M-net Crash
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Sep 26 15:14 UTC 2000 |
Continuing a news discussion from the previous Agora....
Proceedings get underway this week in the trial of the 17-year-old
who is accused by the State of Michigan of being the vandal who
broke into M-net in June and caused its Great Crash.
Over on M-net, Willard writes:
#247 Michael Smallwood (willard) Tue, Sep 26, 2000 (10:24):
I have been ordered to appear at 4133 Washtenaw Ave, which is the
courthouse up at Hogback and Washtenaw, at 1:00 pm tomorrow, 9/27.
I'm entering this in case anyone from Grex wants to attend.
((Please, let's try to stay on topic and not heckle the witnesses
in criminal proceedings, OK? ))
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| 145 responses total. |
jazz
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response 1 of 145:
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Sep 26 16:39 UTC 2000 |
Presumably he was subpoenaed by the defense.
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scott
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response 2 of 145:
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Sep 26 16:40 UTC 2000 |
I must admit I'm sorely tempted...
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willard
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response 3 of 145:
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Sep 26 20:12 UTC 2000 |
This should be fairly uneventful. Chances are I won't even be there.
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md
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response 4 of 145:
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Sep 26 20:18 UTC 2000 |
I'm planning to show up and listen in anyway.
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scg
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response 5 of 145:
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Sep 26 21:13 UTC 2000 |
If somebody could go and post a report, that would be nice.
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birdy
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response 6 of 145:
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Sep 26 21:16 UTC 2000 |
If you were subpoenaed you have to be there.
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tod
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response 7 of 145:
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Sep 26 21:48 UTC 2000 |
Then I have to be there.
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richard
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response 8 of 145:
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Sep 27 02:18 UTC 2000 |
you mean mnet asked the state to pursue charges against him? isnt this
a bit much? I mean he's a kid who played a prank, a bad prank, but wasnt
much of the problem mnet's lack of adequate security for its type of
system? I'd hate to see the courts clogged with cases of every kid who
hacks a suspect system. Doesnt a system like mnet have to accept hacking
as something thats going to happen-- Imean jaywalking is illegal but youi
dont routinely prosecute people who runin themiddle of the street, because
there'stoomuch of that and you cant preventit for the most part.
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richard
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response 9 of 145:
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Sep 27 03:25 UTC 2000 |
and when a system attempts to prosecute hackers, doesnt that just
draw the attention of other hackers who might look to now go after
mnet for being vindictive? if you want otherhackers to ignore you,isnt
it better to look the other way at somethinglikethis? Is making an
exampleofthis kidreally goingtobe a detterent?
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gull
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response 10 of 145:
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Sep 27 03:30 UTC 2000 |
"I'd hate to see the courts clogged with every case of a kid who smashes a
car window. I mean, isn't an occasional broken window something you expect
when you own a car?"
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bdh3
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response 11 of 145:
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Sep 27 03:51 UTC 2000 |
re#8&9: In the "Internet and Security" seminars that me and a cohort
member used to do those are exactly the sort of questions we asked the
participants to consider.
re#10: M-net is a computer system on the Internet not a car. There is
no window.
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birdy
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response 12 of 145:
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Sep 27 04:07 UTC 2000 |
Um, Richard..dumbass...it's against MICHIGAN LAW to hack a computer system
and crash it. Therefore, it belongs in court.
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richard
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response 13 of 145:
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Sep 27 04:20 UTC 2000 |
its probably againstmichigan law to jaywalk but you do that right? there
is not a rule that every law broken must be prosecuted. Unless thiskid
has terrible lawyers, he'sgoingto get off, its a waste of time and
willonly draw the attentionof the wrong people. you run an open
bbs likemnet, inviting anonymous users, you expect to gethacked
occassinally. Justlike if you own a fancy race car and run stock car
races, you expect people to run into you and make you crash occassinally.
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scg
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response 14 of 145:
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Sep 27 04:32 UTC 2000 |
Richard, does jay walking cause people to have to spend a month putting
something back together that shouldn't have been broken in the first place?
Does it cause other users of the crosswalk to not be able to use it for the
next month? This was not a victimless crime.
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steve
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response 15 of 145:
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Sep 27 04:32 UTC 2000 |
Richard, he destroyed, for at least a while an entire electronic
community. There were many people--likely a couple thousand--who
were not able to access the system for whatever reasons they used
M-Net (mail, chatting, conferencing, UNIX learning, etc) because of
this activity. It wasn't a small thing. Now, I'm not saying he
deserves jail time for this, but a nice swift HARD kick in the ass
isn't going to cause him to do more of this in the future, and it
may dawn upon him that what he did was Bad.
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twinkie
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response 16 of 145:
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Sep 27 04:34 UTC 2000 |
Richard...I realize you're a moron, but try and understand this analogy:
If a kid jaywalks (which is illegal), he's probably not going to get in
trouble.
If a kid jaywalks, and by doing so, makes the road unusable for a few months,
he'll probably get in trouble.
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twinkie
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response 17 of 145:
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Sep 27 04:35 UTC 2000 |
Steve and STeve slipped in.
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richard
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response 18 of 145:
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Sep 27 05:09 UTC 2000 |
mnet was down for much of that time becuase its security was inadequate
and staff chose tooverhaul it....surely this kid's lawyers will bring out
that mnet could have been broughtback onlinemuch sooner had staff not
electedto be quite conservative in its approach to fixing the problemand
had simply soughtthe most expeditious solution. Staff chose, didthey
not,to address longtermissues involving security, assuming that since this
happened, itmighthappen in the future. In that way,the kid did mnet a
favor.
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bdh3
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response 19 of 145:
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Sep 27 07:48 UTC 2000 |
And further, the 'upgrade' was of hardware. The 'security' is software.
The kid didn't actually break anything tangible (such as a window).
If m-net had not been negligent in not making sure well known security
flaws were not present (I am I think correctly assuming that the kid
broke in via some method that was already well published at the time the
event took place).
Re#18: I don't think you can argue that the kid did m-nut any favor but
as far as I read he didn't actually do any 'demolition'. He didn't do
anything particularly creative either as far as I know - unlike me when
I broke in years ago... "WANT COOKIE" ring a bell? And nobody made a
federal case of it either, meg 'bitch slapped' me cyberwise (without
knowing it was me even) -she sent various 'bad' VT100 escape sequences
before kicking me off and disabling each account. I would log back in
again on another ID and 'tel' her "That Hurt"...Ah, the good old days.
Nowdays, these days, I never ever 'am creative' if I find a system that
is 'vulnerable'. I rarely if ever scan a system unless there is a
billing number that I can charge it to. And as I did recently when I
wanted to compare the results from one 'scanner' to another and used
grex as a 'known secure' site and found what seemed to be a problem I
e-mailed the 'staff' - and chatted with steve who reassured me that grex
has pretty damn good security - like m-net should have had...
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mdw
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response 20 of 145:
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Sep 27 09:29 UTC 2000 |
I believe jaywalking is actually legal in Michigan. It is certainly
commonly practiced in Ann Arbor.
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birdy
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response 21 of 145:
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Sep 27 12:29 UTC 2000 |
Let me rephrase this: Richard, hacking a computer system is a Michigan FELONY.
Jaywalking is a tiny itty bitty misdemeanor (if anything). Let me say this
again for your benefit... FELONY.
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birdy
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response 22 of 145:
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Sep 27 12:30 UTC 2000 |
Oh, and to use your silly security analogy... Let's say a robber breaks into
my house and breaks a bunch of stuff while taking money and valuables. Does he
get off without punishment because our locks weren't strong enough and he broke
through a first-floor window? Duh...no. So why should this kid get away with
breaking a law simply because M-net's security was "bad"?
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jerryr
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response 23 of 145:
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Sep 27 14:11 UTC 2000 |
this miscreant also used mnut to break into and mess with computers at the
university of maryland. not exactly jay-walking.
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jp2
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response 24 of 145:
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Sep 27 14:46 UTC 2000 |
This response has been erased.
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