Hoaxer Behind 2,400 Fake Bomb Threats Caught After Gaming Site Breach (krebsonsecurity.com) 137
20-year-old Timothy Dalton Vaughn from Winston-Salem, N.C now faces 80 years in federal prison, reports KrebsOnSecurity.com:
Federal authorities this week arrested a North Carolina man who allegedly ran with a group of online hooligans that attacked Web sites (including this one), took requests on Twitter to call in bomb threats to thousands of schools, and tried to frame various online gaming sites as the culprits. In an ironic twist, the accused -- who had fairly well separated his real life identity from his online personas -- appears to have been caught after a gaming Web site he frequented got hacked...
[T]he real-life identity of HDGZero remained a mystery...as there was little publicly available information at the time connecting that moniker to anyone. That is, until early January 2019, when news broke that hackers had broken into the servers of computer game maker BlankMediaGames and made off with account details of some 7.6 million people who had signed up to play "Town of Salem," the company's browser-based role playing game. That stolen information has since been posted and resold in underground forums. A review of the leaked BlankMediaGames user database shows that in late 2018, someone who selected the username "hdgzero" signed up to play Town of Salem... The data also shows this person registered at the site using a Sprint mobile device with an Internet address that traced back to the Carolinas.
This week America's Justice Department released an indictment of Vaughn and co-conspirator George Duke-Cohan for spoofed bomb threat emails to more than 2,400 schools, according to Krebs, adding that the government also alleges the two reported a fake hijacking of an airline bound for the United States. "That flight, which had almost 300 passengers on board, was later quarantined for four hours in San Francisco pending a full security check."
The two now face charges of conspiracy and eight additional felony offenses, "including making threats to injure in interstate commerce and making interstate threats involving explosives."
[T]he real-life identity of HDGZero remained a mystery...as there was little publicly available information at the time connecting that moniker to anyone. That is, until early January 2019, when news broke that hackers had broken into the servers of computer game maker BlankMediaGames and made off with account details of some 7.6 million people who had signed up to play "Town of Salem," the company's browser-based role playing game. That stolen information has since been posted and resold in underground forums. A review of the leaked BlankMediaGames user database shows that in late 2018, someone who selected the username "hdgzero" signed up to play Town of Salem... The data also shows this person registered at the site using a Sprint mobile device with an Internet address that traced back to the Carolinas.
This week America's Justice Department released an indictment of Vaughn and co-conspirator George Duke-Cohan for spoofed bomb threat emails to more than 2,400 schools, according to Krebs, adding that the government also alleges the two reported a fake hijacking of an airline bound for the United States. "That flight, which had almost 300 passengers on board, was later quarantined for four hours in San Francisco pending a full security check."
The two now face charges of conspiracy and eight additional felony offenses, "including making threats to injure in interstate commerce and making interstate threats involving explosives."
Good investigation (Score:2)
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I am betting it was and I am sure they have other data spills. That is the real fear everyone should have, but remarkably no one realizes the issue here. Governments are using stolen data and obliviously in conjunction with the data they already. Given the telecommunications collision we already know they have that too. It is highly unlikely I am really an anonymous coward.
I consider the same thing whenever I post AC - "what is anonymous?" Hell, just browsing with protection and not posting, I consider this.
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He's just a step away (if he hasn't already) from SWATting someone, which can lead to all sorts of bad outcomes
Ten years taking it up the ass on a nightly basis sounds just about right, IMHO
The bad outcomes are from the jacked up glorified security guards who do criminally stupid shit like shooting from across a street at a residence.
Every civilized country has SWAT yet it's only America where SWATting calls turn into civilian fatalities.
Re: Eighty Years? (Score:1)
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(As an aside, why is it always "gamers"? I have deliberately excluded myself from that subculture for over a decade, but the stuff I see coming out of those pits today, indicate seriously damaged minds)
Over 50% of the American public plays video games...
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Every civilized country has SWAT yet it's only America where SWATting calls turn into civilian fatalities.
Exactly, and that's why the penalties need to be severe.
SWAT teams here are loaded with trigger-happy nutjobs, so the risk is far greater than in other countries, hence the penalties have to be scaled up too.
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Yet, the penalties for a cop shooting someone seem to be as low as ever.
Start throwing cops in jail when they shoot someone without good reason, and hiding behind a car and shooting at someone on a porch without them shooting first is murder.
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> Start throwing cops in jail when they shoot someone...
Or maybe try training [chron.com] them before making them cops. Like they do in other countries [prospects.ac.uk].
21 weeks vs 2-3 years. What could possibly be wrong with that...
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Yes training, and in particular the right type of training is a big part though I'll note that here, the RCMP does 26 weeks and doesn't have the problems of America and city police, possibly due to less training, seem worse.
Really it is culture thing, America has always had this culture that included shooting, just look at their frontier justice.
Currently, it seems that in the States, well to quote the Wiki article on murder,
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The alternative being...
Re: Eighty Years? (Score:1)
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Re:Eighty Years? (Score:5, Insightful)
Clearly a horrible person, but life in prison?
He's clearly a psychopath and a danger to society, and should be locked up in a psychiatric institution until he is no longer poses a danger.
Many twenty year olds are horrible people but they usually grow up.
Yeah, but unfortunately . . . sometimes psychopaths are very good at convincing their psychologists that they have been "cured". Some folks like this never grow up.
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He's clearly a psychopath and a danger to society, and should be locked up in a psychiatric institution until he is no longer poses a danger.
Alas, instead of fixing those, we closed most of them. Now he'll go to prison for a while, get trained in more crime and incentivized to commit lots of it by how much harder it's going to be for him to find employment in the future, and then get released on parole long before his sentence is up.
Re: Eighty Years? (Score:2)
Is he? (Score:2)
What I'm saying is, he's not necessarily a psycho, he might just be an opportunist. i.e. this was a money making operation and he figured a relatively harmless one. Annoying as hell, but harmless. Now, we know that swat teams tend to show up to these kind of things and then shoot the place up. But if you haven't been reading
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Clearly a horrible person, but life in prison? Many twenty year olds are horrible people but they usually grow up. Maybe it's time to talk limiting incarceration; perhaps five to ten years, for most offenses lacking physical assault.
They committed crimes against individuals, corporations and society as a whole, and demonstrated a complete disregard for all three. People like this, along with identity thieves, should, "one by one, taken out behind the chemical sheds... and shot." (to misappropriate a quote)
Not sentenced (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: Eighty Years? (Score:2)
Why should it be up to one person? The mandatory min/max represent the will of the people (via their elected representatives in legislature).
Re:Eighty Years? (Score:4, Interesting)
Though it is unconstitutional, this is the sort of crime I think should be punishable by flogging. Say, one lash per human hour wasted--to be administered at medically-safe intervals over his lifetime at a lot less expense than imprisoning him.
2400 * 100 people inconvenienced for four hours a piece per incident (WAG) is almost a million man-hours wasted because of this guy. A year has just 8760 hours, so he took up 109 man-years of human activity.
This strikes me as both fair punishment and strong deterrence, but I won't be debating the point because I'm trying to finish A Clash of Kings this weekend.
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Though it is unconstitutional, this is the sort of crime I think should be punishable by flogging. Say, one lash per human hour wasted--to be administered at medically-safe intervals over his lifetime at a lot less expense than imprisoning him.
2400 * 100 people inconvenienced for four hours a piece per incident (WAG) is almost a million man-hours wasted because of this guy. A year has just 8760 hours, so he took up 109 man-years of human activity.
This strikes me as both fair punishment and strong deterrence, but I won't be debating the point because I'm trying to finish A Clash of Kings this weekend.
Yup that sounds about right, "here is my opinion stated as facts but I won't listen to proof against me"
In the US prison is claimed to be a deterrence, yet everyone placed in prison is a data point against such a claim.
In some middle eastern countries flogging is a standard and common sentence also claimed to be a deterrence, yet with the exact same problem that there are plenty of data points showing it isn't.
The person you were replying to was commenting on the extent of the sentence, not so much the type
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My GOT references was a lighthearted reference to the brutality of my modest proposal. More brutal than you comprehended since I was suggesting something like a million lashes over the guy's lifetime.
But leaving aside your poor reading comprehension and AC sanctimony, I'm not sure what your point was: Your observation that crimes are committed despite threatened punishment does not prove that punishment does not deter crime. And your parade of horribles doesn't address whether flogging would be more humane
Why stop there? (Score:2)
Torture isn't a slippery slope, It's the God damn K5. Once you start down that path you've devalued human life on such a fundamental level that anything is possible. Don't let rage blind you.
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Aside from the usual habit of the news mentioning the maximum possible sentence allowed by the statute as if it were likely, calling in fake bomb threats is a physical assault.
Personally, I wish there were some chance he would get 80 years. Might slow down all the other psychopaths.
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Personally, I wish there were some chance he would get 80 years. Might slow down all the other psychopaths.
Sadly, these assholes never stop to think it through so I'm not sure how much of a deterrent it would be.
They almost never go so far as to think "So I do this, and then what happens?"
I'd be fine with him getting 20 years in prison though. Maybe 30.
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Aside from the usual habit of the news mentioning the maximum possible sentence allowed by the statute as if it were likely, calling in fake bomb threats is a physical assault.
No, no it is not. It is arguably assault, since it threatens physical harm and there is clear intent, but it is not actually physical. It's more like a combination of assault and denial of service. Whatever you call it, though, it can have the result of costing lives. I'm not arguing against taking it seriously.
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When your victims are locked in an airplane for several hours against their will, it is a physical assault. By proxy, perhaps, but physical nonetheless.
In grownupland, actions have consequences.
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In grownupland, actions have consequences.
It's not necessary to make things up for there to be consequences. Assault is a crime. Also, those who are inconvenienced can sue for damages.
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Clearly a horrible person, but life in prison? Many twenty year olds are horrible people but they usually grow up.
Maybe it's time to talk limiting incarceration; perhaps five to ten years, for most offenses lacking physical assault.
Sounds harsh to me too, but on the other hand, some dickweasel just like him named Tyler Barriss got an innocent man (Andrew Finch) killed when he swatted someone. The SWAT team responded and shot Finch the moment he stepped outside. That could have been me or your or your son or father.
And yes, I most certainly DO blame the SWAT team too, but without a shitbag like Tyler Barriss starting the ball rolling, it never would have happened.
Maybe just 20 years in prison to serve as an object lesson to these littl
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Having no direct control over the SWAT team's policies and decisions you can't hold him accountable
What a load of bullshit.
Hey, if I poison your water supply and you drink it, you can't blame me! After all, YOU made the decision to drink it. I can't be held responsible for the water company not filtering out the poison!
And if I drive drunk and end up killing you or your wife, don't blame me! YOU made the decision to get on the road, you should have known that there are drunks out there.
And if I SWAT you and the SWAT team blows your head off, too bad! I have "no direct control over the SWAT team's policie
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Way beyond horrible (Score:2)
Something criminal you do every now and then makes you a bad person.
Something criminal that substantially affects other lives you do over 2000 times? That person will never change, they can no longer be trusted to be around others.
May he will be better... in 80 years or so. I feel like that's about the right amount of time to maybe institute some change, though sadly even if they got that much they would probably get out earlier.
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"Maybe it's time to talk limiting incarceration"
That *is* a limit. No one could possibly serve more than 80 years for the nine crimes charged. Furthermore, federal sentencing guidelines will also take into account prior criminal history, i.e. if they are young and have the possibility of growing up to act wiser in the future. Your proposal of five to ten years comes to 45 yo 90 years total for nine charges, which is pretty much what the current maximum sentence is.
On the other hand, the nine charges cover 2
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Your proposal of five to ten years comes to 45 yo 90 years total for nine charges
Only if you run them consecutively instead of concurrently. What sort of backwards shithole of a nation would impose criminal sentences consecutively?
Re: Eighty Years? (Score:2)
The kangaroo courts, having long since abandoned any pretense of fairness or proportionality, now resort to power-drunk cruelty to terrorize the plebs into compliance. As each new dramatic overreach errodes what little legitimacy the kourts still enjoy, the next outrage of justice must be even more brutal. Such is the regrettable state of the Law in our once great republic.
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This guy regularly seriously abused a system designed to protect people, in a way he knew was hurting large groups of people every time he did it, and to top it off, he was doing it for personal gain.
That's not a bad childhood, that's just plain being an evil person. Sure, a person's circumstances and upbringing influences a person's development, but if they're still left with the ability to tell right from wrong (as the community they are a part of defines it), and they choose to be evil, that's just the
How little the authorities cared (Score:2)
Hopefully now that people are getting pinched for this shit, the rest of the idiots doing it will knock it off. That's almost certainly wishful thinking, but at least maybe it will die down for a while.
Jail is too good for this guy (Score:5, Interesting)
No Internet access for life.
Mandatory supervised work at a 911 center for life with no chance at advancement.
Re:Slavery? That's your solution? (Score:5, Insightful)
Forcing someone to work is illegal. You might want to ask a Black person about it.
Or anyone from any other cultural background, since slavery has been around in every culture, forever. If you're in the US, the only black person you can ask about contemporary slavery is someone who has escaped from the spots in the world that still practice it. Regardless... your point is meaningless. Being kidnapped by slave traders and then sold into a lifetime of slavery, or being born to those who have been, is NOT the same as choosing to commit a long series of crimes and having to suffer the consequences. Why are you pretending you don't get that?
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Being kidnapped by slave traders and then sold into a lifetime of slavery, or being born to those who have been, is NOT the same as choosing to commit a long series of crimes and having to suffer the consequences. Why are you pretending you don't get that?
Slavery is wrong no matter how you excuse it. It's wrong when convicts only get paid $2/day for working on fire crews, too. (used to be $1/day, they got a 100% raise! woo fucking hoo!)
Don't get me wrong, we have to stop people from committing crimes. But punishing people with slavery is a violation of their human rights. Either we believe in those and give them to everyone, or we don't, and we don't. Punishment only makes assholes feel better. What's needed is rehabilitation. Sometimes some punishment is pa
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Forcing someone to work is illegal.
Forcing somewhere to stay someplace is illegal also.
Oh wait, unless they have committed a crime and imprisonment is part of the sentence from the state.
Since the state defines law, they can also define exceptions.
Better idea (Score:2)
Re:Jail is too good for this guy (Score:4, Interesting)
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Mandatory supervised work at a 911 center for life with no chance at advancement.
I'll do you one better. Mandatory supervised work-release at a meat processing plant for life. If he gets an appendage chopped off, that's par for the course.
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Work for Amazon.
In the warehouse? That's even worse. and inhumane.
Or 175K a year in their new headquarters building, whenever they decide where to build it,
While possibly still punishment, probably would make the No Internet Access for Life part of the sentence difficult.
Re: And who were these mysterious "hackers"? (Score:2)
Yup. This story positively reeks of parallel construction. Most likely Twatter and his ISP handed over his surveillance records, then law enforcers made up an imaginative story about "teh haxors!!" to protect their collaborators.
SPH (Score:2)
Seek Professional Help.
chain chain chain... (Score:2)
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Well, it's possible it could be considered 'parallel construction' but I suspect they went back to the Game website and didn't just rely on a copy of a torrent.
TIMOTHY DALTON Vaughn? (Score:2)
Yep! No wonder the kid's such a sociopath...
It's a miracle the kid hasn't killed and dismembered (and not necessarily in that order) his parents yet.