back to article British LulzSec hackers hear jail doors slam shut for years

Three British members of the notorious LulzSec hacktivist crew and a hacker affiliate were sentenced today for a series of attacks against targets including Sony, News International, the CIA and the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency. The youngest of the four accused avoided jail with a suspended sentence while the other three …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Cleary (aka Viral) admitted hacking into systems at the Pentagon. He has been indicted in the US and faces possible extradition proceedings. Davis has also been indicted in the US."

    Where they will be charged with embarrassing the US Government by showing just how weak their IT Security is.

    1. fawlty
      Facepalm

      exactly

      and they'll get 30 years each. Who's doing it for the lulz now?

      1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
        Happy

        Re: fawlty: exactly

        "and they'll get 30 years each....." Even better, as soon as they're on US soil, I expect the US companies involved will hit them for damages claims. In US courts they'll go down BIG TIME! Even if these ID10T5 ever get out of prison they will spend the rest of their lives scraping a living trying to pay off their debts. Now that's the lulz!

        1. Rattus Rattus

          Re: fawlty: exactly

          These kids were idiots, yes. But slavering like that over the thought of their lives being destroyed by massive fines and jail sentences? Matt Bryant, you are a miserable, disgusting excuse for a human being, and I am ashamed to be of the same species as you.

          1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
            Happy

            Re: Rattus Rattus Re: fawlty: exactly

            Everyone's entitled to their opinion, and just watch me laugh at yours whilst I go on my way, untroubled by your shrieking froth. Oh look - one of your convicted e-crim "heros" turned out to be a child pr0n collector, doesn't that mean you and the rest of the sheeple should be screaming at him? Didn't the Anonyputzs say they were going to attack such types? LOL, now that must give them (and you) a dilemma!

            1. Rattus Rattus

              Re: Rattus Rattus fawlty: exactly

              I don't give a shit about the kids themselves. What I object to is the delight you take in their ruined lives. Regardless of what they have done, the point I am making is that you, Matt, are an asshole.

              And have a slow clap for trotting out the "child porn" card. Well done. The term has been watered down so much by governments world wide casting ever-greater nets, that my first assumption would be that he probably had a picture of some forty year old actress wearing a school uniform.

              1. david wilson

                @Rattus Rattus

                >>"And have a slow clap for trotting out the "child porn" card. Well done. The term has been watered down so much by governments world wide casting ever-greater nets, that my first assumption would be that he probably had a picture of some forty year old actress wearing a school uniform."

                So your first assumption is that it's more than 50% likely that someone convicted of possession of child pornography was actually innocent of any criminal offence?

                And you think it's a good idea to share that first assumption in a case where rather more detail was easily available (even to people who had read this very thread before you decided to offer everyone the benefit of your opinion)?

                While there are arguments which could be made about the reach of the current law, that's not what you're talking about - you're saying that even given the current extent of the law, you reckon that most of the people convicted under it didn't even break it.

                What evidence do you base that on?

              2. Matt Bryant Silver badge
                FAIL

                Re: Brattus Brattus Re: Rattus Rattus fawlty: exactly

                All I can say you just carry on bleating whatever childish justifications and delusions help you make it through the day. There are very tight legal definitions of child porn in the UK courts, and any attempt to pass off anything milder would have been seized on by their legal team and trumpeted as "evidence" of a setup. I would suggest you go buy a clue as you seem incapable of developing one yourself, but I suspect even the haul of Bitcoins AVunit has run off with wouldn't be enough for the extensive neurosurgery your case requires. Enjoy!

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: fawlty: exactly

            These men knowingly caused damage and stole property so they deserve punishment, same as anyone else. Being extradited to the US is an occupational hazard of criminals so tough, they should have thought of it before they committed crimes. If someone breaks into my house i wont be lenient on them, will you? I'd expect the rozzers and CPS to deal with them. Having said that, there should be some leniency for first offence and only punishment where direct damage was done.

    2. Shasta McNasty
      Big Brother

      Crime != Punishment

      Proving that the government isn't all-knowing and infallible is the most serious of all crimes.

      1. david wilson

        Re: Crime != Punishment

        One would have thought that any *vaguely* aware person would have realised by now that it's a pretty stupid idea to attack US government machines.

        1. Tapeador

          @ David WilsonRe: Crime != Punishment

          Agreed.

          Not just stupid because forbidden. Forbidden because wrong. What those advocating such attacks - indeed all of those attacks for which the lulzsec-ers were convicted - seem not to realise is the government isn't just some autonomous organisation. It *IS* the people. Agent, representative, protector, and personification.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Boffin

            @Tapeador

            I think you're confusing theory with the cold facts. Yes, in theory the government is 'us' and is basically paid to handle the chores which involve all of us (think cleaning up the city, road management, etc, etc).

            The reality however is different; the government as a whole has grown into a machinery of its own with very few connections into the community. As such it holds their own agenda's, doesn't always put the interest of the people above their own (a very good and global example is the ongoing lobbying done by politicians to try and get a spot somewhere in the European parliament) and in many cases even tries to undo itself from its own responsibilities (think about privatising "community services" (my own wording) such as water and electricity services).

            Don't take this message the wrong way; this isn't a justification to DDoS the living daylights out of them. I'm merely commenting on your vision of the government, that vision is in my personal opinion quite flawed to say the least.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            @ Tapeador

            Any chance you can lend me those rose-tinted spectacles you're viewing the world through and pass on a large helping of that unhealthy naivety that makes the world so simple for you?

            "government isn't just some autonomous organisation. It *IS* the people"

            Wow!

        2. h3

          Re: Crime != Punishment

          There is no way that any crime like this should get anything more than a slap on the wrist.

          It is depressing what these cases show :

          That society cares more about companies losing money by being incompetent and not settings up their systems well enough.

          Than child sex abuse stuff (Whilst the person in question is actually alive so it actually has a point. After the fact it is history and there is no point in it certainly not wasting police time with it).

          Or rape or robbery.

          That it is worse to steal from a company than and individual. (Take hosting a file vs breaking into someones house and stealing a cd).

          There is something fundamentally wrong with most societies.

          1. This post has been deleted by its author

          2. Zmodem

            Re: Crime != Punishment

            DDOS attacks do nothing but flood the server, if the server is flooded it can crash

            its nothing todo with security, most companies use the same website domains subdomains for windows WAN login network

            if you use all the 100/0 m/Gbs, all the office workers on their network are left crying because nothing works

            1. Zmodem

              Re: Crime != Punishment

              something like 1 of these somewhere or just some opensource program to manage your pipe and protocols

              http://www.etinc.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=88919

              and give your http public server 30mbs

          3. Anonymous Coward
            Thumb Up

            Re: Crime != Punishment

            h3: "There is something fundamentally wrong with most societies."

            Yes there is, and it is called greed. However, I completely disagree with you on your opinion about a slap on the wrist, but on the other hand I completely agree with you on the biased perspective of business over citizen.

            If I take your sentiment and zoom out a little, then maybe another evil is how legal punishment has been overly micro managed. There were days when stealing a horse, raping a woman, robbing a bank, committing arson, stealing cattle, committing murder and many others all saw the same possible end...public hanging. But today, how many ways can the prosecution go with deciding a punishment with any 1 of the above listed crimes? To me, there seems to be just too many ways to be punished for crimes that are, at their core, extremely similar.

            Now, about the article. Truthfully, I don't care what becomes of them, but the only thing I never liked about this whole story was how they got ratted out. Good lord, I hate rats! Sort of a indescribable personality trait of mine similar to why I'm heterosexual or why my favorite colour is blue. It might just be me, but I've always felt that the rat should always get a little somth'n extra for being, well...the rat.

        3. joe 4
          Stop

          Re: Crime != Punishment

          Yeah, here's a decent list of IPs and IP ranges that are best avoided whilst portscanning, LOIC'ing, DDOSing, etc...

          http://imgur.com/93P3sC2

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      You cannot be punished twice for the same crime here in the UK, but that won't stop their extradition to the US, they will need to seek political asylum in one of the many South American Embassy's.... Because there will be no protection here.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Actually, you can.

        Double Jeopardy was abolished to help with terrorism trials.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Weak Security

      It makes no difference if my front door has a simple lock or a more convoluted affair, but regardless anyone getting into my home and stealing my belongings is a thief.

      1. Anonymous Cowerd
        FAIL

        Re: Weak Security

        "It makes no difference if my front door has a simple lock or a more convoluted affair, but regardless anyone getting into my home and stealing my belongings is a thief."

        I hope that is of some comfort to you when the insurance doesn't pay out, because in their view, although he's a thief, you're an idiot.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Whoops !

    Don't drop the soap lads !

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Whoops !

      Its funny because it is rape!!

      And it would be happening to men!!

      I bet you'd laugh if they got HIV or hepatitis as a result!! Proportional punishment has no place in the sentencing of computer criminals, lol, amirite?

      Lucky there's no punishment for just being a horrible human being, eh?

      1. NomNomNom

        Re: Whoops !

        The 10 point rape humor scale

        10 - man rapes man in prison

        8 - man rapes man out of prison

        5 - woman rapes woman in prison

        0 - jimmy saville

        1. NomNomNom

          Re: Whoops !

          didn't say i agreed with the scale, just exposing the illogical reality of it all!

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Whoops ! @AC 15:02

        Ohh how wotton of me to have a little joke at someone else's misfortune.

        If you're daft enough to poke a sleeping dragon with a pointy stick, don't go complaining when it wakes up and just leaves a pair of smouldering shoes after it's finished burning you to a crisp.

        PS WTF is amirite ? Some new brand of floor polish or mineral that I am unfamiliar with ?

        1. Sir Runcible Spoon

          Re: Whoops ! @AC 15:02

          "amirite"

          I believe it's mentioned in Groundhog Day.

        2. Steven Roper
          Flame

          Re: Whoops ! @AC 15:02

          "Ohh how wotton of me to have a little joke at someone else's misfortune."

          Ok, no problem mate, just make sure you laugh just as hard the next time someone cracks a joke about hide and seek champion of the year when some girl's violated corpse is found in a ditch with a broom handle shoved up her twat.

          It's not the humour that's the problem, it's the double standards in applying it.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Unbelievable

    These prison sentences are way too short and this is why cybercrime is rapidly growing in Blighty.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Unbelievable

      Too short? So some young teens and twenty somethings just got sentenced to between 2 and 2.5 years and you think that too short? Despite what the daily fail would like you to believe prison is not a nice place. The food is horrific, the cells are the size of a small flat toilet and you have to take a shit with a junkie in the room. These boys were arrogant and stupid and will have learned from this when they come out and hopefully go on to lead normal lives. These crimes were not "throw away the key and let them rot" crimes committed by serial criminals with tattoos of swastikas on their necks and dots on their arms signifying how many rapes they have committed or people they have murdered. The damages quoted by the organisations they attacked are vastly over inflated as is always the case and they are serving bird as we speak, long enough bird in my opinion.

      Each an every hour spent in prison for those who are not hardened crims is a living nightmare. They got their just deserts and the punishment was fair and not overly lenient.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Unbelievable

        Being young and stupid is not a defense. Anyway they were all adults at the time of the offenses apart from one. They did get off lightly and I say that as someone who has spent time in cells.

        Hopefully they were all banned from using computers for a long period of time.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Unbelievable

        You appear unaware of how the system works in 2013. They will (unless they seriously screw up) do a maximum of 50% of the sentence and unless they have previous convictions they'll be in an open prison within 3 months. If they do more than a year (any of them) I will be astounded as the prisons are overflowing now.

        That's not a comment on anything other than our judicial system BTW - personally I think the sentence handed down should be the sentence your serve unless you show exceptional remorse. It shouldn't be the case that sentences are automatically cut by half, that's just a farcical situation for us all.

        1. Matthew Anderson

          Re: Unbelievable

          Almost - They will be in open prison as soon as they are categorised as Cat D which can take anything up to 2 months, sooner if it is very high profile or if the prison needs additional space. The guy with 32 months to serve will be out after 11.5 months and for the 24 month sentence he will be out in 7.5 months.

          In the meantime they are in a Cat B prison on 23 hour lockdown unless they take on a job which can take several weeks to get. In a cell with a random crim 23 hours a day, farting, shitting and watching jeremy kyle. Not much fun.

          1. Law
            Pirate

            Re: Unbelievable

            "and watching jeremy kyle"

            Say it aint so!! Those poor bastards! Wait until the EU hear of this inhuman treatment of prisoners!!

        2. a cynic writes...

          Re: Unbelievable

          I'd be happy if they were at least up front about it. "You will serve 2 to 8 months, subject to behaviour" is easier to take than "you will serve 8 months" and then they're out after 2.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Unbelievable

      You have obviously never been in a prison.

      These guys are going in as young boys "doin it for the Lulz", that is definately not the way they are going to come out.

      Their crimes are not so serious, six months community work would have served for more that 2.5 years in jail.

      1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
        Stop

        Re; AC Re: Unbelievable

        "....young boys "doin it for the Lulz"...." Renting out a botnet of 100,000 compromised systems at £2500 a pop to any criminal that comes along gives a hint - at least to those of us with an upbringing that included right and wrong and a grounding in personal responsibility - that "the Lulz" is just apologist froth from those bitter losers that would excuse anything that involved hitting out at "the Man". A pathetic fail to grasp the realities of their criminal activities due to socipolitical blinkers.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Meh

          Re: Re; AC Unbelievable

          "A pathetic fail to grasp the realities of their criminal activities due to socipolitical blinkers."

          Very true, they were definitely not too clear on where the moral event horizon was, and jail should be the expected outcome. A bit like 'victim' Sony's casual mass-root kitting of 5.7 million CD-buying customers' PCs a few years back. But then, those Sony managers who ordered one of the largest criminal hacks in history are of course quietly serving out their prison sentences aren't they? Oh... wait.

    3. Goldmember

      Re: Unbelievable

      When you consider the fact that you get between 4 and 5 years for manslaughter in Blighty (and I'm not talking death by dangerous driving; this is violent crime that goes bad.), these sentences are grossly disproportionate. They should all have received community service, or less than 6 month stints inside at best.

  4. nuked

    They'll be working for the state within the first half of their sentence.

    No question.

    1. Fibbles
      Facepalm

      Why because they know to launch a DDOS campaign? They couldn't even cover their tracks effectively...

      1. NomNomNom

        didn't you listen to the Judge fibbles?

        "They are at the cutting edge of a contemporary and emerging species of international criminal offending known as cyber crime"

        these kids might know a thing or two about these new fangled contraptions known as computers. We need them if we want to stop the Red Chinese putting a logic bomb through our backdoor.

        1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
          Facepalm

          Re: NomNomNom

          At one time the cutting edge of car crime was lobbing a brick through the window and yanking out the stereo, and I don't recall any of those "cutting edge criminals" being employed by the Police to prevent car crime. The real superduper cybercrims don't get caught.

  5. DrXym

    Got off lightly

    Given the cost to the businesses they attacked and the cost of investigating the attacks, these sentences amount to little more than a slap on the wrist. A person driving a bulldozer into the foyer of a single business, causing 1/10th of the damage would get a longer sentence than that.

    1. Fibbles

      Re: Got off lightly

      [Citation Needed]

      If that were true though I'd hazard a guess and say they'd get a longer sentence because of their disregard for other peoples' safety. Judges tend to frown upon the endangerment of life, even if it wasn't intentional.

      1. Tapeador

        Re: "endangerment of life"

        How is it not endangerment of life to divert to repairing vandalism, resources which would otherwise be spent on looking after the public?

        1. Juillen 1

          Re: "endangerment of life"

          How is it not endangerment of life to divert to repairing vandalism, resources which would otherwise be spent on looking after the public?

          I suspect the "would" would be "could" and the fact would be "wouldn't"..

          This is a real case of "your side, their side, and the truth". I'm suspecting the truth is in between all the polarised sides' viewpoints..

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Got off lightly

      Nonsense. Even the quoted "damage" cost was not more than the equivalent of a class 4 felony criminal damage to property, which in most jurisdictions results in a suspended sentence, community service, and repayment of the damage.

      1. DrXym

        Re: Got off lightly

        "Nonsense. Even the quoted "damage" cost was not more than the equivalent of a class 4 felony criminal damage to property,"

        Which article are you reading?

        One accused was making $2500 a month from running a botnet of 100,000 computers and charged with 6 offences. Please tell me how much it would cost to clean a botnet up? How much loss would you put on each of those PCs in terms of its degraded performance and denial of service to the people who owned them?

        How much total would you put on a rampant spree of attacks that went on for nearly two years, stealing information from various sites and the consequent harm both financially and reputationally to various companies?

        Just Sony alone claimed they lost $20 million which is not unreasonable given how long PSN was down, the loss of reputation, the loss of revenues and the theft of 24 million account details.

        Go do $100,000 aggravated property damage over and see what sentence you get. The simple fact is these people got off extremely lightly.

        1. Tom 38
          Stop

          Re: Got off lightly

          Just Sony alone claimed they lost $20 million which is not unreasonable given how long PSN was down, the loss of reputation, the loss of revenues and the theft of 24 million account details.

          LulzSec hacked Sony, which required Sony to bring down PSN, and fix PSN's codebase so that it was fit for purpose. What proportion of the $20m total cost are you assigning to Sony for being incompetent, and to LulzSec for exposing their incompetence in a criminal manner?

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Got off lightly

            Twat,

            The front door was open is no defense for burglary, any more than lax network security is a defense for hacking.

            it's still an offense in the UK thankfully, tho Merkin's seem to think an open door is their right to burgle

          2. DrXym

            Re: Got off lightly

            "LulzSec hacked Sony, which required Sony to bring down PSN, and fix PSN's codebase so that it was fit for purpose. What proportion of the $20m total cost are you assigning to Sony for being incompetent, and to LulzSec for exposing their incompetence in a criminal manner?"

            Oh I see Lulzsec were just doing them a favour! It all makes sense now.

            And if I kick in your door, smear faeces all over your bed and walls, and steal your home sex tapes and bank account records and release them on the web I'd be doing you a favour too for not having a stronger door. You'd thank me for it. Right?

            1. Tom 38

              Re: Got off lightly

              Oh I see Lulzsec were just doing them a favour! It all makes sense now.

              And if I kick in your door, smear faeces all over your bed and walls, and steal your home sex tapes and bank account records and release them on the web I'd be doing you a favour too for not having a stronger door. You'd thank me for it. Right?

              Er, no - that isn't what I said at all. Tone down the "Righteous of Romford", this isn't the Daily Mail.

              My point is that part of the "loss" to Sony is Sony having to do what they should have done in the first place. You can't attribute the totality of the costs to LulsZec, Sony are also to blame.

              Sony made the choice to ignore industry standards and just hashed passwords instead of hashing combined with a salt. It was this failure that meant that passwords were readily decipherable by use of rainbow tables.

              The $20m cost of the intrusion was largely related to having to provide ID theft monitoring services to all US users, which would not have been necessary had the appropriate measures already been taken.

              You can tell from Sony's actions that they are partly culpable. They have a duty of care to protect their users personal information using industry standards. They failed to do so, and so have had to pay for ID theft protection, credit card fraud monitoring and protection, and so on.

            2. bexley

              Re: Got off lightly

              With the kiddie porn, was a he a pedophile or are we talking about some 4chan pictures?, i'm fairly sure that this lot are part of the 4chan crowd and one visit there will give you an idea of the sort of pictures that get posted for shock value, its not a CP den.

              Sounds like they threw a net out and trawled to try and beef up their case as much as they could.

              The prison sentences are shockingly long, regardless of how much time they might get off. Prisons have been around for an awful long time and we still have a problem with crime. It is reasonable, by now, to assume that prison is not a viable solution to crime.

              These boys need helping to become more responsible citizens not locking up. There are better ways to deal with this than prison.

              If one of them did turn out to be a pedophile though then I consider that the kind of thing that prisons are useful for, you cant cure or train somebody to not be a pedophile so locking them up seems the only way to deal with that particular problem at the moment.

              Lulzsec, if nothing else, helped to harden the internet, some companies are taking better care of our data now.

              1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
                FAIL

                Re: bexley Re: Got off lightly

                "With the kiddie porn, was a he a pedophile or are we talking about some 4chan pictures?...." COUGH* apologist * COUGH! Yeah, like everyone that visits 4chan keeps copies of the pics. Oh, wait - no I didn't, and not because I didn't find them "shocking" enought but because I'm not a paedophile.

                ".....Sounds like they threw a net out and trawled to try and beef up their case as much as they could....." Sounds like "they" didn't have to do much at all seeing as these prime-grade numpties got caught not only with a shed load of evidence of the crimes they committed, but also got thoroughly grassed up by their equally vacuous online buddy (who it turned out valued his real-life freedom more than protecting his e-chums). Maybe they should have invested more time in finding real friends offline.

                ".....These boys need helping to become more responsible citizens....Lulzsec, if nothing else, helped to harden the internet.....". Oh yes, 'cos they're just such sharp in-duh-viduals, right? Wrong! They did nothing new or inventive, they just used simple social engineering, known vulnerabilities and downloaded tools, just like the majority of the skiddies out there. They committed crimes and need to be punished, and then they need to be put on probation to make sure they have learned their lesson. And if they have not learned how to become responsible, productive citizens, and decide to return to their criminal ways, then I'm pretty sure they'll be caught and sent back to prison again, no matter how smart they, or you, think they are.

    3. Matt Bryant Silver badge
      Happy

      Re: DrXym: Got off lightly

      "..... these sentences amount to little more than a slap on the wrist...." Yes, but with luck it will give the US authorities just enough time to get their indictments in and the extradition requests sorted, then they can go rot in an US prison at the US taxpayers' expense.

  6. Tchou
    Pint

    What would be more....

    ... interesting would be an analysis of the various architectures & technologies attacked and how it coped with it.

    Real data from real life situation, not security marketing lies.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Let me get this straight.

    You can sell fake bomb detectors in what was effectively a £55million fraud and that directly result in the deaths of circa 300 people (if I remember the figures correctly) and get 10 years (barely one month per death, more like 2 weeks with time-off).

    If you hack and only cause monetary damage circa US$20million (£13million), you get just shy of 2-3 years (probably out in 1-1.5)?

    I'd not sure about anyone else, but those terms do not look proportionate to me.

    1. Irongut

      Re: Let me get this straight.

      10 years sentence for £55m fraud so roughtly £5.5m damage = 1 year sentence

      So £13m damage = 2 years 4 months

      By your own reasoning maths says it's pretty much proportionate.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Let me get this straight.

        So 300~ deaths don't matter?

        1. david wilson

          Re: Let me get this straight.

          How would you define 'proportionate'?

          If you were (even if only for the purposes of comparison) going to put a pretty high monetary value on a human life and aim for sentences linearly proportional to 'costs', then virtually any crime which didn't involve taking a life (apart from maybe the very largest fraud/theft cases) would end up with sentences so short they'd barely be worth handing out..

          With the bomb detector scammer, at least some of the money he made should be confiscated, with an increased sentence if it seems like he's hiding anything, and if we're lucky, by the time he's up for release, one of the countries he sold fake goods to will be looking to extradite him for trial on some suitably serious charge.

  8. Graham Marsden
    Alert

    "jailed for terms ranging from 24 to 32 months"

    I bet they're hoping that, like Chris Huhne, they only end up serving a quarter of their sentences inside.

    Or aren't they posh/ rich/ well connected enough for that...?

    1. Matthew Anderson

      Re: "jailed for terms ranging from 24 to 32 months"

      It is not about being posh or rich enough, I cannot remember now exactly how it works but every prisoner serving under a certain length of time is eligible to apply for tag and in England has their sentences halved. So for an 18 month sentence you would service 4.5 months inside. Assuming you have been of good behavior of course. However over a certain length of time you do not just serve quarter, 18 months is the maximum you can receive and only serve quarter, the eligibility for tag with a sentence any higher than 18 months and less than 5 years increases. I think 4.5 month is the maximum one is allowed to be out on tag for.

  9. Mike Moyle

    What level...?

    Not that any prison is fun, but I'm assuming, since there was no violence nor threat of violence, that they'll be assigned to a minimum-security facility fir non-violent offenders. Even in these unenlightened United States we frequently keep the violent, likely-to-reoffend population separated from the ones that are most likely to be rehabilitated and successfully re-enter society. Surely the UK does the same...?

  10. Senior Ugli
    Coffee/keyboard

    Surely the main thing here is that these "kids" could do these sort of things, which shows the weakness in hi-tech security companies that you would normally not have to think twice about the quality of security?

    On the other hand, making £2,500 a month on a botnet is pretty impressive, imagine that much money at 21!

    I know they have to be punished, but at the same time they have obviously got a good functioning brain that could lead to a decent career, however because the companies who have been made fools of are embarrassed, that career will never happen

    1. david wilson

      Ignoring the illegality, I'm not sure to what extent 'having a good functioning brain' would square with 'risking a £2500/month income for the sake of taking part in a protest which was always unlikely to achieve much'.

      As long as there are people out there who are skilled, honest and not reckless, I'm not sure how much of a career should await someone who at best only ticks one of those boxes.

    2. Matt Bryant Silver badge
      Facepalm

      Re: Senior Ugli

      "....On the other hand, making £2,500 a month on a botnet is pretty impressive, imagine that much money at 21!...." Seriously? Do the maths - the six hits he was convicted of, each at £2500, even if he managed them in one year, equates to an annual income of £15k, which is about what a junior sysadmin gets in the UK. I have known plenty of coders on more than that at age 21.

      My uncle was a copper and would explain it to you the same way he explained to me why there never a shortage of losers ready to replace drug dealers he used to lock up. The problem is that losers are always looking for a shortcut to money, and they would look at that £2500 hit and fail to consider the risks involved. The money in drugs is even better, but the thing the losers fail to see is that there are very, very few drug dealers that live past forty, and they're usually the ones that got arrested and are in prison. There may be e-crims making big bucks, but they are getting caught and ending up with the type of criminal record that pretty much screws up their chances of working as anything other than first line PC support monkeys. But there will always be more ID10T5 that will think "Wow, £2500...."

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Senior Ugli

        My old man once told me that the true price of crime was always having to look over your shoulder.

  11. ItsNotMe
    Mushroom

    Oh...poor little Ryan Cleary the "Choir Boy"..........and Kiddie Porn Fan.

    "After the seizure of Cleary's computer and and subsequent recovery of deleted files, the hacker was charged with downloading and possessing indecent images of children following a second arrest on October 4, 2012.

    Under the U.K. COPINE scale — a measure of the severity of images the images in question were classified as child "erotica" and deliberate sexual posing. A total of 46 images contained children aged between six and 18 months, whereas others included children aged between ten and 15 years.

    The defense team said that Cleary is not a "professional pervert" or sexually obsessed, but rather was obsessed with finding data and using his computer — a reason laid at the door of his client's Asperger's syndrome. "

    BULLSHIT!

    How convenient to hide behind an alledged disease. The little prick should be locked up, and the key thrown away for this alone.

    1. NomNomNom

      Re: Oh...poor little Ryan Cleary the "Choir Boy"..........and Kiddie Porn Fan.

      He did 6 months work experience at the BBC but it never went further than that. He never became a *professional* pervert.

  12. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
    Mushroom

    Having been

    infected with with a cheery trojan that went on to screw up every HTML file and every .exe file in my PC in a vain attempt to preserve itself(thank gawd steam just downloaded clean copies of its game .exe files each time instead of marking me out as a hacker and banning my account) and costing me time and money to get the windows partion scrubbed, with loss of data etc etc (praise the lord for the Linux partion where all my financial stuff lives)

    I can happily say the the guy who was making money out of his bot net should have his fingers cut off with a cheesegrater and have the sludge inserted in his rectum with a 12 gauge, before being welded up in a steel box then buried under 50 feet of concrete and subjected to a nuclear bomb.

    If he pleaded guilty of course...... not guilty and convicted.. well I'd get downright evil on him

  13. Polyp

    Bunch of kids giving the establishment the run around? Whatever next!

    Hire them.

  14. mark l 2 Silver badge

    Surely the prisons should be there to lock up people who are a danger to society such as violent criminals which i hardly see some DDOS script kiddies being. It will cost us tax payers 1000s to have them locked up while it would be better having them picking up litter in the parks on community service and paying a fine (perhaps by having to sell their computers to pay for it)

    It sounds like knee jerk sentencing again like what we had after the riots where people with no previous convictions would get 2 years for looting a bottle of wine

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Que?

    "This is not about young immature men messing about," prosecutor Sandip Patel told the court "[,] LulzSec saw themselves as latter-day pirates [motivated by] anarchic self-amusement"

    Yarr, there be no quarter for bilge sucking 'immature' lubbers amongst the hands on any jollyboat matey.

  16. bert_fe

    Que?

    My father told me one should always practice 'anarchic self-amusement' in private! Otherwise there will be consequences.

    Bert

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's all good

    I guess A$$nonymous ain't as anonymous as they thought they were. There crims are going to get a real education in prison. What goes around generally comes around sooner or later. I'll bet their arses will pucker when that prison cell door slams shut.

  18. Winkypop Silver badge
    Unhappy

    I'm sure gaol is awful in and of itself, but

    ...imagine going without internet access of any kind for the duration of your sentence.

    Now THAT would be punishment enough for me.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Much more sane punishments than...

    ...in the US of A. Pretty lame none the less. Any intelligent network opperator would promote attacking his/her network - free penetration testing. The Pentagon network opperator must have a massive ego not unlike the suits at Sony. What a bunch of cry babies.

    1. david wilson

      Re: Much more sane punishments than...

      >>"Any intelligent network opperator would promote attacking his/her network - free penetration testing."

      I'm not a security professional, but I'm guessing that professional penetration testing doesn't involve things like publishing personal details of innocent third parties who happen to have data on a system under test.

      If someone set upon you while walking down the street and punched the shit out of you and then tried to claim it was a 'free unrequested boxing lesson', I wonder what your response would be?

      Would you apologise for being largely to blame for not being 'handy' enough?

  20. RobHib
    Devil

    Little point if you're caught.

    Seems to me these guys need to hack how they've being hacked.

  21. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I thought they were all pretty much shopped to the Old Bill by someone in their own network, the Yank lad? No honour among thieves.

    And yeah, while I won't take any joy in a bunch of kids getting locked up, let's not pretend these were kids just messing around. A 100,000 node botnet that you're hiring out for criminal enterprises is a pretty serious undertaking and doesn't just 'happen'. He knew what he was doing, and he knew it was illegal, so I don't feel sorry for him in the slightest.

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