Teen Hacker to Serve Time

[Paul Howell]

At http://wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,38957,00.html

Teen Hacker to Serve Time 
Wired News Report 

1:15 p.m. Sep. 21, 2000 PDT 
A 16-year-old Miami boy known online as
"c0mrade" was sentenced Thursday to serve
jail time for breaking into Defense Department
computers, marking the first time an
underage hacker will have served time for a
computer offense. 

The teen, whose real name was not released,
admitted in U.S. District Court in Miami that
he was responsible for a series of attacks
between June and October 1999 that forced
a three-week shutdown of NASA computers
and intercepted thousands of email messages
within the Defense Department. 

"This case, which marks the first time a
juvenile hacker will serve time in a detention
facility, shows that we take computer
intrusion seriously and are working with our
law enforcement partners to aggressively
fight this problem," said Attorney General
Janet Reno. 

Prosecutors said that "c0mrade" downloaded
proprietary software from the Marshall Space
Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, in June
1999. The software supported the
International Space Station, including control
of its temperature and humidity. 

As a result, the government shut down NASA
computer systems the following month,
costing the agency $41,000. 

The teen also admitted that in August 1999
he broke into the military network used by
the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, an
arm of the Defense Department. There he
installed a backdoor on the server, grabbing
more than 3,300 email messages among
agency staff. 

In addition to serving time, "c0mrade" will
write formal letters of apology to NASA and
the Defense Department. 

John Russel, a DOJ spokesman, said that the
case is one of only a handful of successful
prosecutions against minors accused of
computer crimes. 

Russell said that "c0mrade" was accused of
violating the Computer Intrusions and Data
Theft Act, but because he is a minor was
charged with juvenile delinquency instead, a
common practice at the DOJ. 

"It's the same as any other crime," he said. 

But Daniel Macallair of the Center on Juvenile
and Criminal Justice said that punishment in
cases involving teenage hackers should be
evaluated on their facts. 

"It's a thrill-seeking thing and obviously
sometimes it's for monetary gain," Macallair
said. 

While he did not advocate sparing the judicial
rod where it is due, Macallair said that too
stringent a sentence can spoil the child. 

"These kids typically come from privileged
backgrounds," he said. "They're not violent
and so usually they're amenable to treatment
outside of a detention center." 

"If we can keep them out of a detention
center or a juvenile penitentiary all the
better."