So I’ve been having a talk with a follower of the Free Gary movement on twitter, and clearly there are either an idiot or drank too much Kool Aid. During my conversation with dandelion101 on twitter this person made some really stupid arguments to support Gary McKinnon in fighting his punishment for hacking into the US Military’s computer system causing massive damage.
This person claims that because there was weak security on the military computer that they are in effect authorizing access to the computer system. This is the same type of argument that if I leave my door unlocked you can walk in and eat my food. It just does not make any damn sense. But it gets worse.
This person claims that hacking a goverment computer system is not extraditable. It is infact extraditable by a signed treaty between the United States and the UK.
Then when they run out of arguments they start with the really stupid crap.
@aspieweb And anyway, if you know anything about autism, you’ll know how heterogeneous it is.
[...] you think you’re entitled to a view. Sad.
@aspieweb Clearly you do not know what hacking is. ‘Playing with semantics’ is a baby-argument. You lose.
So lets see what a hacker is defined as: a hacker is a person who breaks into computers and computer networks, either for profit or motivated by the challenge.
Clearly you loose. May I suggest Mountain Dew rather then Kool Aid, its much tastier.
You can follow AspieWeb on twitter as well.
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Once again, you are making up arguments that no FreeGary supporters have ever made.
I pointed out that there was ZERO security on any of the machines that Gary McKinnon accessed (not ‘weak’ security, NO security AT ALL!), simply because you were saying he had ‘hacked’ into these top-secret computers. He hadn’t, and they weren’t.
Feel free to actually refer to the law, and you will see that what Gary McKinnon actually did was not an extraditable offence. Hence why we don’t want him extradited.
You may also like to note that the allegation of ‘massive damage’ has been shown in court to be utterly false. He didn’t cause ANY damage. The sums quoted by prosecutors don’t actually refer to any damage caused (there’s no evidence of damage anyway), but to the cost of installing the basic security that the US military were in fact legally obliged to have had on their machines in the first place. All that has been acknowledged by both the judge and the prosecution. Without the damage, his actions were not extraditable.
I think it’s very sad that you are so keen to rush to judgement on a matter you are plainly so ignorant about.
Humm… several points.
Your definition of ‘Hacker’ seems as lax as an NT trolls definition of ‘Autistic’. Hackers have a spectrum.. The people who did this: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/1999/r2d2.html are hackers too.
Technically McKinnon is actually a cracker, a better definition would be ‘script kiddie’ since he did have to take specific steps to access the systems, but used well known exploits, scripts, that he discovered in public forums.
Once in, he was able to move between systems without any hacking skills necessary, he could just log in and browse these ‘top secret’ networks as if he was a local user. While there he claims he saw many other suspicious users, and got hints on where to look from them.
Bad yes… but benign. In your analogy he just looked around and maybe took a photo, your food never got touched, your precious possessions were not stolen.
For that he has now been more than adequately punished. I assure you he is very sorry and wont do it again.
Now… the meat of this; Extradition.
- please check up on this before replying, google for ‘UK/US extradition treaties’.
In the ‘Bad old days’ the US would have had to prove a case to answer in the UK before he was extradited. They certainly would have extradited him if the charges were ‘right’ and possible punishments proportionate. A charge of treason or Military espionage would not have got him deported since he was obviously engaged in neither. One of Criminal Damage might have succeeded depending on the amounts claimed and their reasonableness. In any case a UK court would have made the final decision and a lot of horse trading would have gone on in this sort of case. He would hot have been extradited to a US ‘Team America’/'Our Military is the Biggest’ lynch mob. oops, sorry, I mean court.
Then some sociopath took out the WTC and a bunch of Mirror image sociopaths seized the day to get their brand of ‘obey us or suffer’ legislation passed. End result; a new extradition treaty where the US is assumed to have a flawless legal system (sniggers) and can just demand extradition on National Security grounds with no reciprocity from the US, it’s very one-sided, and stinks.
First victim; some bankers, they had big pockets, influential friends, and fought back, so the snivelling cowards who thought this up moved their sights; second victim; guess who..
Gary is a victim/pawn in a ‘my willie is bigger than yours’ wonkfest between a bunch of sociopath idiots; militaristic hard men, lawyers, politicians and their Team America fanbois.
I am very proud that he has fought them every inch of the way..
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