Two Europeans Indicted In US For 2003 DDOS Attacks 93
narramissic writes "In a continuation of the first successful U.S. investigation ever into DDOS attacks, Axel Gembe, 25, of Germany and Lee Graham Walker, 24, of England were indicted Thursday by a grand jury in Los Angeles, California, on one count of conspiracy and one count of intentionally damaging a computer system. The two men were allegedly hired by Jay R. Echouafni, owner of Orbit Communication, a Massachusetts-based company that sold home satellite systems, to carry out DDOS attacks against two of Orbit's competitors."
Criminal Minds (Score:5, Insightful)
It takes a genius to hire a couple of people to do your dirty work. It takes even greater genius to accept money to damage computer systems, from a complete stranger who would never rat you out.
Re:Tax Dollars (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a criminal investigation. If Company A vandalizes Company B, do you expect Company B to "bring their own evidence to court"?
sigh (Score:5, Insightful)
and all they had to do was post a made-up "home satellite" article to slashdot.
Extradition from the UK to US (Score:3, Insightful)
The interesting part (Score:5, Insightful)
While I think it's a good thing that international cyber-vandalism (or whatever you want to call it) is being investigated in regular courts (instead of some super-world thingy), I think the most interesting part is the charges against Lee Graham Walker. According to the article, his crime was using IRC to chat with Gembe about the botnet's code. Now, I'm not a legal expert or even legal savvy, but that sounds like a charge that would easily apply to a lot of geeks who IM with geeks short on ethics. I don't think it's being misused in this case, but it does sound like a pretty wide net.
Re:Revoke (Score:1, Insightful)
It's Massachusetts. The penalty for running over and killing someone while driving drunk is to become a state senator. The penalty for severe security lapses that allow terrorists to kill 3000 people is - well, nothing.
Besides, given that they think that blinking cartoon characters made out of LEDs are bombs, I doubt anyone in power in that state is smart enough to understand what a DDOS attack is. Even MIT's management decided LEDs were bombs when the state police almost shot one of their students for wearing a shirt with LEDs on it.
Re:Extradition from the UK to US (Score:2, Insightful)
Watch me.
We should never have signed up to such a wide-ranging treaty (a fact which has become abundantly clear recently) - I expect our government to frustrate the process of complying with the treaty as much as possible whilst simultaneously working to get out of it.
The French justice system is a damn-sight more civilised than the US one.
Re:Criminal Minds (Score:1, Insightful)
Might want to learn to read English, bud. The man who hired them was primarily being investigated, that lead to the 'foreigners'. Those darn Americans!
Re:The interesting part (Score:3, Insightful)
It's quite clearly misuse. Any IRC recording by the investigation entitiy would result in inadmissable evidence, at least under the US constitution. Since the "criminals" (as everyone likes calling them) are not US citizens, they aren't covered by the constitution.
More importantly, a botnet could be used for any number of things. Depending on the actual conversation, Gembe may not have revealed his use, or lied saying it was to test a network he administered.
Re:The interesting part (Score:2, Insightful)
Just because the defendants are not US citizens does not mean that Constitutional protections don't apply. The Constitution does not talk about the rights of citizens, but the rights of people. If US law is going to be applied to someone, then the entirety of US law, including the Constitution and its Supremacy Clause, apply.
So you are wrong. They are covered by the Constitution.
Re:Extradition from the UK to US (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Criminal Minds (Score:4, Insightful)
Why has this been modded flamebait? it seems like a valid point to me and also to most legal systems (including the US). The person who commissioned a crime to be committed is surely just as guilty as the people who committed it?
All three of them should be tried together and face the same penalty.