Obama Won't Intervene Over British Hacker McKinnon 268
CWmike writes "President Barack Obama said on Tuesday that he can't intervene in the long-running case of a British hacker charged with breaking into US military computers. Gary McKinnon's case came up during discussions with British Prime Minister David Cameron in Washington. The UK Home Office is reviewing whether McKinnon's medical condition is grounds to block his extradition to the US, which was approved in 2006. McKinnon has yet to stand trial in the US, where he was indicted by the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in 2002 for hacking into 97 military and NASA computers between February 2001 and March 2002. Obama said during a press conference with Cameron that by tradition US presidents do not get involved in extraditions or prosecutions. 'I trust that this will get resolved in a way that underscores the seriousness of the issue, but also underscores the fact that we work together and we can find an appropriate solution,' Obama said."
Scapegoat and Prestige? (Score:3, Interesting)
Then why (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:US wants to lock him up for point out our passw (Score:1, Interesting)
Correction: The US wants to try him in court for breaking US law.
He is being used as a political tool by UK politicians. The US is just doing things by the book.
Re:Asperger's (Score:5, Interesting)
You're mixing it up. Free Mitnick was about the 3 years of no due process. It didn't matter if he was guilty or not at that point--the law states that a lack of due process means you go free. The gov't didn't do that, but should have, hence the outcry of support.
Re:And yet... (Score:3, Interesting)
Identifying blank passwords as a problem makes him a lot more qualified than the people the feds have been hiring!
Re:Asperger's (Score:3, Interesting)
You're missing the point - Asperger's doesn't justify his crime, but it may make him unfit to stand trial, particularly if he is removed from his home and taken to a foreign nation he sees as hostile.
Re:Asperger's (Score:5, Interesting)
Citing Asperger's as a medical condition to prevent extradition is silly. Being socially deficient doesn't make you incapable of determining right and wrong, if in fact he really has the condition at all considering the ridiculous amount of self-diagnosis out there. Genuine Asperger's is a form of autism and deeply impacts your life.
As someone who works very closely with children diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, I can tell you that some of them are very incapable of determining right from wrong. Some of them are extremely violent, and will threaten to stab or kill the other children (these are kids in kindergarten, grade 1, grade 2). They don't understand why it is not acceptable to say and do these things.
I'm not saying that McKinnon should get away with what he did, because he shouldn't. But saying that his illness should not be taken into account is absurd and inhumane.
Re:Asperger's (Score:3, Interesting)
It does not appear that this guy is insane. He's just a moron. He should be tried, and if found guilty, the court should take his stupidity and intent into consideration when sentencing. Because he was an idiot rather than a spy or saboteur, he will likely get a light sentence.
Re:Asperger's (Score:2, Interesting)
As someone who was diagnosed by a professional(several in fact), I can confirm that as a kid I did not have a single clue regarding right or wrong except where it pertained to getting caught. Quite frankly it took till my early 20's before I really developed a moral code of my own.
Re:Asperger's (Score:4, Interesting)
Indeed, it's interesting that this is posted on the same day as the the Senate unanimously decides to prohibit libel tourism. The idea there was presumably that if you do something in one country, you act under that country's legal jurisdiction. Extradition would make sense if he could only be prosecuted in the US, however what he did is an offense under the UK's Computer Misuse Act and he could be appropriately punished under UK law. The only reason to demand an extradition was to inflict a much harsher punishment than the UK courts would be likely to hand down (probably less than the maximum five years).
Apples and turnips.
The idea under the libel tourism bit is to protect free speech in the America. This is a hacking case. The hacking activity is a crime in both places - and the crime itself took place in both palces. Computer Misuse was violated in UK. Hacking was committed inside the UK, but the target was in US jurisdiction.
From my POV, he should be prosecuted in UK under the terms of Computer Misuse Act and be appropriately punished (if found guilty) under UK law. Also, he should be he should be tried under US law for his crimes committed in US jurisdiction.
The dollar figure is BS - its not like he did damage to the hardware, programs, or data. But he did hack the system...and should be punished.
And regarding the Asperger's crap - that is not an excuse.
Mad Parent Up! (Score:3, Interesting)
My mother is in a very similar situation as you, she teaches children with aspergers and autism. I grew around children of all ages 5-19 that had these issues. Some of them were much worse than others but many of them definitely didn't understand right and wrong, at least not in the way you and I do.
I don't know much about the merit's of this case but if what I understand is that he wasn't malicious and actually tried to help the admins out by leaving them notes on how to fix things then this is certainly an issue of not understanding that what he did was wrong and that he thought he was helping.
Re:Asperger's (Score:2, Interesting)
You break into a house in the US and you are in the US.
You host pirated movies in Sweden and you can ignore DMCA requests.
Look at it this way...
I sure as hell don't want to get extradited to Saudi Arabia and be executed for premarital sex when the act is only a misdemeanor in Mississippi where it was actually committed.
Extradition, in this case, most certainly does represent a very bad precedent.
One view (Score:3, Interesting)
[sarcasm] Of course, this has NOTHING to do with making the US military etc. look like a bunch of idiots when it comes to cyber security.
To make up for their embarrassment they wouldn't DREAM of taking it out on some dodgy hacker that made them look like n00bs. [sarcasm = off]
The US authorities are stamping their collective feet like self-entitled 3rd graders, trying desperately to deflect any criticism of their woeful security practices.
This whole affair may have something to do with a one-sided extradition treaty with the UK that meant that USA could just about say "we want that person to be extradited", with no prima facie case & the UK had little say in the matter.
However the same did not apply with the UK wanting US citizens extradited to the UK.Can we say "one law for the Americans & another for the rest of the world?
Naturally, this law was enacted under the stewardship of the well-known Bush poodle called Blair. Surprising, huh?
Re:Knee jerk. (Score:4, Interesting)
1. I was being lazy in my original comments and in review I don't find this case a good example to take a stand on. The ground is just too squishy.
Fair enough. If I had applied my perspective to the case and found a lot of merit to what he's claiming, I'd point that out as well.
The Gary McKinnon case serves several ends; it is a public display of what happens when one goes against the state. It is a means of justifying the further fortification of the internet. And it is a means to add another coat of smear to the idea of a UFO presence.
From my experience, I'd say the Feds are after two things with McKinnon. They want to make an example of him. And they're following what they know. The US Government generally hasn't been very good at groking infosec. But the Government exists on a foundation of Law. They really get that and are really eager to use that tool. When all you understand is the hammer, you use that on everything - nail or screw included.
I've been in infosec meetings where the technical details of a threat and mitigation are glossed over. Meanwhile, the room lights up when the FBI agent talks about a case they're preparing to prosecute and equipment they've compounded as evidence. I'm rather disgusted with all that since, as I noted earlier, I find that as a sign of failure not a sign of progress. But that's been the traditional environment.
I suppose it's possible that this also serves to smear the UFO culture in general. McKinnon certainly does nobody in that camp any favors and, IMHO, serious UFO researchers should be outspoken in distancing themselves from him.
I would direct you to Richard Dolan's efforts if you are interested in reading the state of the current understanding of the UFO issue.
Noted.
For your part, you have now implied several times that you work closely with NASA in some capacity and that you have some fairly high level access to security proceedings there. I'm not sure what to make of that. Are you not a bit worried to be discussing internal policy on Slashdot, especially in light of this story about computer security?
Keep in mind that NASA is not entirely a single entity. From the outside it looks like a big, monolithic agency. On the inside, it's more of a schizophrenic collection of Centers and Directorates with power and autonomy existing based on what budgets any given entity controls (although there's been more attempts at top-down control in recent years).
I'm fairly comfortable with what I've commented on. I don't comment on specific policy. I don't provide technical details. I don't discuss any depth of NASA system security posture. And I wasn't involved with McKinnon's case so I'd make a really poor target for his defense to subpoena in a bid to weaken the case against their client.
Reciprocality (Score:3, Interesting)