
Is This Justice? Charging an Eighth Grader with a Felony for “Hacking” - CapitalistCartr
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/justice-charging-eight-grader-felony-hacking
======
ColinWright
Lengthy discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9362307](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9362307)

Other submissions:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9356172](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9356172)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9362307](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9362307)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9368317](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9368317)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9376847](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9376847)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9393700](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9393700)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9395514](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9395514)

------
balabaster
"Who knows what this teenager might have done"

So you're going to charge teenagers with crimes based on "what they might have
done" now? A bit minority report, don't ya think? This statement standing
alone is a huge concern for civil liberties. Arresting someone and charging
them for one crime based on your opinion of "what they might have done" seems
remarkably heavy handed.

But who knows what this kid is like, perhaps he was a little hellion making
this teacher's life a nightmare [was the teacher gay? homophobic? I don't know
the back story here] and this was just the straw that broke the camels back?
Eventually we all snap when pushed and kids know how to push your buttons
better than anyone. Perhaps he needed be kept in check and have his boundaries
enforced to reset his notion of what is and isn't acceptable conduct. But
equally... a felony for a [hopefully harmless] prank that is common practice
in I.T. environments around the world, that's a bit weak.

At least he's only a kid and it'll be sealed on his 18th birthday. However,
it'll be attached to his school record and follow him around like a bad smell
until he leaves academia. So I guess he'll learn his lesson... all be it a
bitter consequence to what amounted to something largely harmless.

~~~
pyre
> "Who knows what this teenager might have done"

> So you're going to charge teenagers with crimes based on "what they might
> have done" now? A bit minority report, don't ya think?

They are throwing the book at him for a crime that he has admitted to
committed (unauthorized access of a computer system). This a crime regardless
of "what he may have done." The fact that no one is stopping to say, "Let's
rethink this guys," is an indictment the police / prosecutors involved in this
case.

This is a bit like charging a child with Breaking & Entering because he snuck
into his friend's house through a window to play a prank on him, and the cops
"aren't sure what he really did while in the house."

Edit: Fixed formatting

~~~
kazinator
Well, not quite; it is like charging a child with breaking & entering because
snuck into his _teacher 's_ house through a window to play a prank.

Can you pause to examine why you think it's necessary to substitute "friend"
for "teacher" in your analogy to make it work for you?

Presumably, "friend's house" is a place where you've been before (possibly
even overnight), where all the household members know where you are and where
you are generally welcome.

~~~
pyre
I chose "friend's house" because the analogy doesn't really account for the
ease with which it is to "break and enter" into a computer system if you just
watched someone type their password. Maybe you could say that he "broke into"
a teacher's house through an open window?

I make this distinction because destruction of property could be an issue with
a physical break-in (via the _act_ of breaking in).

~~~
kazinator
Yes, entering a home through an open window or unlocked door counts as
"burglary", a.k.a. "break and enter".

The offense is an abstraction that doesn't require physically damaging any
security mechanism.

By your reasoning, picking a lock or guessing a combination couldn't be
breaking in because you didn't literally break anything.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Actually the definition includes "with criminal intent". Without that, there's
no crime.

~~~
kazinator
That aspect seems to be state-dependent in the US, according to:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_and_Entering#United_St...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_and_Entering#United_States)

In New York, the intent is not required. However, ironically with regard to
this case, it is that way in Florida.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Hm. I followed that link, and didn't read anything about intent not being
required. What did I miss?

------
meric
"Even though some might say this is just a teenage prank, who knows what this
teenager might have done..."

Who knows what students in cooking class holding butcher knives might do?

Who knows what police might do when entering people's houses. Shoot dogs that
bark. Who knows what the dog might do? [https://news.vice.com/article/san-
diego-police-shoot-mans-se...](https://news.vice.com/article/san-diego-police-
shoot-mans-service-dog-dead-after-responding-to-domestic-violence-call)

Who knows what police might do when chasing down a homeless person. Shoot them
forty-six times. Who knows what an homeless might do?
[http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/footage-
sho...](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/footage-shows-
homeless-black-man-milton-hall-being-shot-at-46-times-by-police-in-the-
us-9826453.html)

Who knows what police might do when they see your children pranking each other
in Walmart with a fake gun? Shoot them. [http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/cops-
shoot-and-kill-man-holding-t...](http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/cops-shoot-and-
kill-man-holding-toy-gun-walmart)

~~~
dragontamer
I don't like what this Florida Police Officer is doing.

But focusing on a single poorly _spoken sentence_ is absurd. I understand that
police sheriffs are politicians, so this is generally considered "fair game"
in American Politics. But this is an obviously bad, off-the-cuff remark that
Chris Nocco shouldn't have said.

But the amount of focus that has been given to this absurd statement is
ridiculous. It is a demonstration of our short-attention span and love of
"gotcha" catchphrases that are destroying American Politics.

Lets do this rationally. Lets start by looking for a _written_ official
statement from this Officer before making fun of his views.

\---------------------------

Here's a better quote from this officer.

"I think, unfortunately, when the story's being told in other (publications),
they're not talking about the fact that he committed this crime previously,"
Nocco said Monday. "We enforce the law. And if we don't enforce the law,
nobody else will."

Knowing that this guy is a repeat offender changes the calculus significantly.
I think everyone can get a free pass once. The 2nd pass, maybe the officer is
just showing the kid that he really has the power to prosecute him (without
necessarily going forward with the intent on actually doing so).

The kid's lawyer likely contacted the eff / press to make the officer back off
a bit. In the end, the kid is going to get off with a slap on the wrist and a
bit of disdain for the officers of this country.

~~~
balabaster
See, that's fair enough. He'd done it before and deserves to receive some
penalty for his actions to show him that there are consequences for your
actions and you need to consider the consequences before you commit the crime.
But there is a generally accepted (and somewhat sane) process in academia.

\- Warning from the teacher & perhaps a letter/call home to the parents

\- Sent to the principal & perhaps another letter/call home to the parents,
warning of suspension

\- Suspension

\- Expulsion

\- Police (& perhaps juvenile detention based on the crime)

Kids are kids... Grade 8 is what? 13, 14 years old? I'm not saying that being
a kid automatically gives you a walk, but kids make dumb decisions every day.
Lord knows plenty of adults do too, but for kids that goes double. They don't
have the smarts, foresight or experience to make good decisions yet, so they
need to be taught. Hopefully the kid does get a slap on the wrist and
hopefully he realizes that he got lucky and breathes a sigh of relief rather
than taking the lesson that he can do what he wants and with the right lawyer
he can get away with murder. Because who knows what he'll do if he learns a
lesson like that... probably become the CEO of a bank or oil conglomerate or
something.

~~~
dragontamer
The kid was _already_ suspended in October.

Which means the order that is going on right now is...

\- Warning from Teacher

\- Sent to the principal

\- 3-day Suspension <\--- Happened in October

\- Police + 10-day Suspension

\- Expulsion

Which frankly, doesn't sound that "unjust" to me at all.

~~~
mordocai
Police scaring the kid sounds fine, but a felony? Using a well-known password
in a place with terrible security to do a mostly harmless prank results in a
felony? That isn't justice.

~~~
dragontamer
"He'll likely be granted pretrial intervention by a judge, sheriff's detective
Anthony Bossone said."

They aren't planning to put the felony on his record. They're gonna drop it
pre-trial.

------
dantheman
No this is not justice, this and every other zero tolerance policy removes
discretion and reasonableness from justice. It's a way not to be held
accountable for your actions - It's a variation of "just following orders"

~~~
HarryHirsch
This isn't following orders, it's much much worse. All the "zero tolerance"
nonsense has been instituted because of a widespread perception of corruption
- when there was discretion the popular kids used to get let off lightly, and
the unpopular ones would have the book thrown at them. That doesn't look
anything like justice or equitable, can't have that.

Nowadays, with zero-tolerance, do you really think the book is thrown at
everyone? You'd think anything the "good kids" do is completely swept under
the rug. The fact that the fellow who put up the dick pics on the teacher's
computer was suspended last year for a few days confirms the theory.

------
stegosaurus
The basic issue here is that computer crime laws are terminally broken.

What would be the punishment had the teenager placed a magazine on his
teacher's desk?

This is an identical scenario, but with computers. The 'access' argument is
bunk. He could have opened drawers on the desk, he could have photocopied
everything in those drawers. But he did not.

The same problems crop up all over. Copyright infringement carrying harsher
punishment than actual theft of a physical object, for example.

------
hurin
The most amazing thing is that no one along the chain of escalation this must
have passed (e.g. the teacher, the vice principal, the superintendent, the
officer that arrived for the call, the sheriff, the prosecutor) - took a
minute to stop and think:

 _" wait is this really the right way to go about handling this?"_

~~~
ColinWright
Rarely is that done - everyone in the chain thinks _" It's probably not
serious, but I'd better pass it up to the next level just in case."_ No one is
willing to take that responsibility for making the decision, so it gets
escalated.

Some thing happened in the UK with the _" Twitter Joke Trial":_

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter_Joke_Trial](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter_Joke_Trial)

------
VikingCoder
"Ribbit."

At the start of my accounting class, we had to pass around a bootable floppy
disk that had the software on it. The teacher would talk to us about the day,
while we passed the disk, student to student.

"Ribbit."

Then, one day, the computers all started to make frog noises. Turns out,
someone put a TSR (Terminate and Stay Resident) program on the disk, and we
had all just run it on our computers.

"Ribbit ribbit!"

The frequency of the noises kept increasing, both as more computers came
online, and as the program increased the rate.

"Ribbit ribbit ribbit!"

Today, would the kid who did it be thrown in jail?

I think we need a lot more "Kids will be kids" and a lot less "Tough on crime"
with this stuff.

"Ribbit ribbit ribbit ribbit!"

------
sarciszewski
When I was in the 7th grade, I actually hacked a bunch of websites and never
got caught. It's been long enough now for the statute of limitations to shield
me from prosecution on this point, but I won't go into specifics.

I would like to caution people from implying that an eight grader is incapable
of causing havoc on a computer system. The old WinXP at.exe privilege
escalation vulnerability gave me SYSTEM access on every computer I visited at
school. One of my friends in high school, I recently learned, hacked the
domain controller and read the Principal's emails.

Schools are known for their terrible security. Mildly intelligent kids can and
will outsmart the system.

In high school, one of my close friends went to a trade school where
everything was locked down with a product called Deep Freeze which reset every
computer after hours to a snapshot of the OS. The teacher was kind of laid
back and said, "I don't care what you do, just don't break Deep Freeze." My
friend broke Deep Freeze so he could change the desktop for one student he
disliked to tubgirl every morning. Nothing ever happened to him. He was never
even reported for disciplinary action.

Then he put a piece of scotch tape on the bottom of another student's mouse,
as a prank, and got expelled for vandalism.

This case with the middle schooler reminds me of what happened to my friend: A
wholly inappropriate response to basic juvenile mischief.

It also reminds me of what happened to me: I was forced to pay over $9000 in
restitution to a security company that had been neglecting to do its job for
years, because I forced them to do their job for once. They called it
"damages".

This kid does not need to face a felony. Anyone with an ounce of human
compassion can see that.

~~~
coldpie
Breaking Deep Freeze was how I spent most of my time in computer classes in
high school. I guess I should consider myself lucky that I'm now I'm a
productive member of society instead of rotting in a prison.

~~~
sarciszewski
So too is my friend. I think the majority of people who would have hacked the
planet in their youth become productive members of society in absence of law
enforcement intervention.

At least, based on the people I know. :)

------
throwaway9324
I've always thought that the biggest unfairness in US computer law is that
you're judged for what you could have done and not what you did. I think it's
largely because those who made these laws where told how dangerous computers
are and they couldn't imagine, as a factor of their age, why anyone would do
something like this out of curiosity. So you ended up with every computer
system being protected and a derogation of freedom at a scale unimaginable in
the physical world. The double standard of course becomes very apparent when
there's no equal punishment for the keeper of the computer system if a third-
party has their data compromised as a result of mismanagement.

------
rayiner
Obviously the prosecution of this kid is ridiculous.

That said, I don't get all the victim-blaming around hacking. One of the basic
bits of consensus in our justice system is that victims don't have an
obligation to make it difficult for criminals to perpetuate their crimes.
Whether the school's security here was weak or strong is irrelevant.

------
waterflame
1- accessing someone's computer is like accessing someone's home - checked 2-
unauthorized access of a computer system is a crime - checked 3- the kid
should be taught a lesson - checked

But... do u have to destroy his future for it? A 14 years old kid should drag
a fellony with him till he graduates from university, because he decided to
prank his teacher? That if he's allowed access to a university with such a
record.

I thought law and punishment's roles are to reform and teach. ( _slapping
myself_... wake up!)

~~~
mapt
Until he graduates from university?

Universities often exclude felons (or at least, most felons) from admittance.
The negotiating position of the applicant is one of appealing their standard
policy of exclusion on special grounds, rather than competing with other
entrants.

------
k-mcgrady
This is absolutely crazy.

A common 'prank' in my high school was going around the computer labs changing
all of the desktop background or renaming folders/changing their icons to mess
with people. Immature: very. Criminal: obviously not.

I guess it's the password part that constitutes the hacking here but if the
password was widely known and therefore he didn't 'brute force' it via
guessing (it's unclear from the article) is it still hacking? I guess it
depends how he came into 'possession' of the password. If someone gives you a
key to their house and you use it I wouldn't classify it as breaking in, but
if they key it left outside the door and you use it to enter without
permission that would be.

Either way these are just technicalities and the fact that a school even got
law enforcement involved in this is utterly ridiculous.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
>Criminal: obviously not. //

vs.

>but if they [left a key] outside the door and you use it to enter without
permission that would be [breaking in]. //

Why is trespass itself not harm in the first case but is harmful in the
second? [Incidentally if you use a key you don't 'break in'].

As the law stands in UK I gather the first is a tort (unless you add in damage
or intimidation or something else) and the second is a crime (under the
Computer Misuse Act 1990).

They are similar. On discovering both there is a real cost involved, change
password/lock and in the first case pay for the time needed to sanitise,
revert any changes.

------
nske
Most comments focus on whether that should be illegal, what the legal
consequences should be, etc.

These deserve a big discussion, all right, but I think it should be a
different discussion. Because law should not be a replacement for
better/friendlier/flexible channels of conduct, rather than a last resort when
we do not think we have an other way to protect ourselves. I don't see how
this could have been the case with the teacher.

\- He could discipline the student in many different ways, using his own
authority

\- He could have treated the prank indifferently, thus showing that it failed
its purpose to impress him and provoke a reaction

\- He could silently take practical measures to protect the privacy of the
data on the laptop, which, in the very end, was all that mattered

Getting Justice involved is a real ass move imo.

------
Bahamut
I remember friends and I doing similar pranks while in high school ~15 years
ago - it annoyed the computer administrators, but it was generally regarded as
benign. We were considered some of the best behaved kids in the school
district too (didn't get in trouble, went to class, did our schoolwork, etc.)
- charging a kid a felony for this harmless act is ridiculous, there is no
reason to punish the kid for something like this period.

------
peterwwillis
When I was in school, the network administrator framed me for "slowing down
the Mac network" using "AOL punters and Visual Basic proggies", because I had
a personal website that linked to said Windows AOL tools. He got me kicked out
and had "hacking" put as the reason on my permanent record.

When I went to subsequent schools, they would hold me accountable for any
computer problems or suspicious activity as I had been "guilty of hacking" at
a prior school. My attempts to clean their systems of 0-day computer viruses
and fix broken proxy settings on browsers got me banned from the school's
libraries.

Teenagers _are not adults_ , and don't understand the monumentally irrational
fears and corrupt politics that drive adults - especially in academia. They
also have no way to defend themselves and are often victimized by adults, and
often have no idea that adults can literally throw the book at them for no
reason whatsoever (I certainly had no idea that kind of thing could/would
happen).

Hopefully somebody steps up and forces the government to do the humane thing
here and not fuck a poor kid's life over to gain political points and 'send a
message'.

------
skywhopper
Had this been the method of dealing with such pranks when I was in school, I
would have a very long rap sheet. Generally my teachers were fine with it
because they knew I had done it and they knew I could fix it. They often asked
me to troubleshoot computer problems for them anyway.

The worst reaction I ever elicited was when walked into my history teacher's
unlocked classroom during my study hall period and changed the DOS prompt on
her floppy-boot-only PS/2 model 25 to read "Please command me, oh benevolent
[teachername]!" rather than "A>".

Generally she was pretty even keeled about what I considered equivalent pranks
that didn't involve a computer, such as writing a silly message on the
whiteboard behind a drawn-down map or something. So I was very surprised when
she totally freaked out and all the teachers stopped letting students screw
around on their PCs during slow class periods. Oooops, no more _Scorched
Earth_ during Calculus...

------
vowelless
Forgive my ignorance about American law but what does "charging" mean in the
context of "justice" in America? Isn't charging just the act of acknowledging
the complaint of one of the parties involved? Is justice even relevant here?

Are the police allowed to act on charges and arrest individuals? Or is this
just a complaint?

~~~
tvanantwerp
Being charged with a crime is a formal accusation from the government, and you
will be arrested. You may then post bail as set by a judge, if they allow it,
and remain free for the duration of your trial. If you can't post bail, you
stay in jail through the trial. If found guilty, you go to prison.

~~~
watson
Based on the way you wrote this I get the understanding that the US system
differentiates between jail and prison? In that case what's the difference?

~~~
mapt
There are a lot of individual circumstances, but generally:

Prison is where people who are convicted of felonies (crimes worthy of >1 year
in custodial sentence) are sent. Jails are where people awaiting trial, or
convicted of misdemeanors (crimes worthy of <1 year in custodial sentence) are
sent.

------
graycat
So, the boy got into the teacher's computer. Hmm .... Time to send the cops
after all of the NSA, right? Or, since the NSA has shown all the world that no
computers are private, the boy didn't get into anything private and did
hundreds of millions of times less than the NSA has been doing for a long
time.

------
tickthokk
I was a sophomore in 99. I was suspended for 3 days for "hacking" our
keyboarding software. It was an old blue-screen'd DOS application. My friend
and I figured out that F10 (or something) created a new folder. I made at
least two, named "school grades" and "top porn stars" (Hey, I was a teenager).
My friend did the same on his, but I think his was just "school grades" and
"porn". They claimed that we were trying to alter our grades with those
folders. We were A/B students, so that didn't really pan out.

Getting in trouble for it wasn't really a deterrent, but then again, I wasn't
arrested. It probably would have stopped me from ever fiddling with a machine
if I had been.

~~~
Lawtonfogle
I was in high school some time after you. I guess the change had already taken
place because when I figured out how to get into the school's internal file
structure I decided the risk wasn't worth exploring. I already had to fight
the school admin to take an AP class as an underclassman (it is shameful that
this was something that had to be fought over).

------
gambiting
Question - when I was 15, I did an arp poisoning attack on our schools
network, redirecting all traffic through mine(borrowed) laptop. I've started
my own SSL server and redirected all traffic to and from Ebay through it,
decrypting it - I knew my IT teacher was on Ebay 99% of the time, so soon
enough I got his password. Then I went to him and explained what I have done -
he actually gave me a highest grade for the effort and was seriously
impressed(also muttered to himself that he shouldn't have accepted that
invalid SSL cert...).

What would have happened to me if I did this in US? Guantanamo?

------
alain94040
It's sad to see HN, one of the most educated communities online, fall for an
obviously link-bait article. If what you read makes you wonder how a multitude
of people could possibly behave in a moronic way, instead of grabbing your
pitch fork, ask yourself if there could be another side to the story (which
there seems to be, if you read a few decent comments in that thread).

As much as I love the EFF, they have changed their communication style a few
months ago, to the point where I find them no better than spam. Sad. I hope
they stop eventually and revert to being reliable and trustworthy again.

~~~
jasonsync
Both sides are spinning the story, but it does seem like the EFF is fighting
the good fight here:

"The computer in question also had encrypted 2014 FCAT questions stored on it"

Of course, this is not relevant as the files were not tampered with (also
mentioned in the article), however it trumps up the perceived seriousness of
the so-called "cybercrime". It's link-bait from the Sherrif's department.

"Green had previously received a three-day suspension for accessing the system
inappropriately."

More link bait as other students got in trouble as well. The students
frequently used the same administrative account to screen-share with their
friends. More alarming is that the school didn't do anything about this the
first time around. Eg. move the encrypted files to a different account /
network, or lock things down. But again, this had nothing to do with encrypted
files.

"Green was released on Wednesday from Land O'Lakes Detention Center into the
custody of his mother. He'll likely be granted pretrial intervention by a
judge, sheriff's detective Anthony Bossone said."

So they don't have a case (changing a desktop background is not gonna fly as a
cybercrime with a jury, no matter how many times you do it), or have decided
that they've wasted enough taxpayer dollars trying to scare future "hackers"
straight. It's ridiculous we're even talking about this - that it got this
far.

The teens mother probably offers the most level heaved observation of the
situation:

"The teen's mother, Eileen Foster, said she understands her son did something
wrong, but doesn't think he needed to be arrested. Also, she said, it
shouldn't have been so easy for students to access the system."

~~~
alain94040
There is a good fight in that story somewhere, but my point is that you
shouldn't rush to judgment when you are hearing one clearly-biased side. There
was some great coverage on NPR recently of 'Publicly Shamed', very relevant:
[http://www.npr.org/2015/03/31/396413638/publicly-shamed-
who-...](http://www.npr.org/2015/03/31/396413638/publicly-shamed-who-needs-
the-pillory-when-weve-got-twitter)

Back to the story. What I'd really like to hear from the mother is what she
told her kid after he was suspended for 3 days. Anything along the lines of
"don't do it again?". This story just sounds like one of those cases where
you'd need to know all the players pretty well to understand what really
happened. I can't tell the difference between a teenager who just won't listen
and a teacher who can't take a joke and overreacts.

~~~
thieving_magpie
I really don't think we (the public) need to involve ourselves in her
parenting decisions. I just can't understand what argument you're making.

------
wes-k
Can't this student just text the prosecutors naked pictures of themselves and
get them charged as sex offenders?

Honestly I say if you're going to go down for some stupid law, might as well
abuse the stupid laws in your favor.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Can't this student just text the prosecutors naked pictures of themselves
> and get them charged as sex offenders?

No. Criminal charges aren't things that happen automatically based on external
facts (even if the proposed action includes facts which in some cases might be
parallel to those that have supported charges against the recipients), they
are things that human beings -- specifically, prosecutors -- initiate.

Doing the suggested act might result in criminal charges, but almost certainly
those would be additional charges for the student, not charges against the
prosecutors.

> Honestly I say if you're going to go down for some stupid law, might as well
> abuse the stupid laws in your favor.

The nature of criminal law is that there are a narrow category of people whose
active participation is required for any use/abuse of it, stupid or not.

------
upofadown
This strikes me more as extra judicial punishment. The stupid statements from
the Sheriff are because the people involved got caught at it. The charges will
undoubtedly be thrown out once the punishment is complete.

------
mcguire
" _Additionally, it has been reported that the school had terrible operational
security where weak passwords, teachers entering passwords in front of
students, and students regularly using teacher credentials, was prevalent._ "

Irrelevant. The only important question here is whether the consequences of a
felony match the crime committed. On the face of it, they do not, but there is
not enough information presented to evaluate that. (Would the EFF's answer
change if the student were part of a group committing long-term sexual
harassment? (Maybe not. I dunno.))

------
stegosaurus
The basic issue here is that computer crime laws are terminally broken.

What would be the punishment had the teenager placed a magazine on his
teacher's desk?

This is an identical scenario, but with computers. The 'access' argument is
bunk. He could have opened drawers on the desk, he could have photocopied
everything in those drawers. But he did not.

The same problems crop up all over. Copyright infringement carrying harsher
punishment than actual theft of a physical object, for example.

------
jeffmould
This case reminds me of a similar case that took place two years ago in
Florida in the county right next to where this incident took place. We have
removed "common sense" from society and replaced it with zero tolerance laws.

[http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/florida-teen-faces-felony-
charge...](http://www.msnbc.com/all-in/florida-teen-faces-felony-charges-
science)

------
skywhopper
Another way to look at this is as a reveal on just how shoddy IT security is
in our schools. I'm guessing that well-known password would have also gotten
the kid halfway or more to changing grades in the Student Information System.
This is an opportunity to improve policy and procedures to protect actually
sensitive data. They ought to be thanking the kid.

------
jebblue
They need to have a computer forensics investigator check the teacher's
computer. If there really is no evidence of tampering beyond prank level then
either that's all the student did or they knew how to cover their tracks; in
either case, no evidence should translate to leniency in the charge IMHO.

------
snarfy
We have trespass laws, but somehow when you trespass on someone's computer you
can get thrown in prison for decades. This attitude towards computer crime vs
any other crime will not change unless we the tech community do something
about.

Now back to my upvoting...

~~~
pbhjpbhj
>unless we the tech community do something about //

Do you think there's anything that can be done? You can petition your
representative (I'm in the UK, so that's an MP) but the chance of computer
crime ever being an issue that's relevant to them are practically non-
existent. It's not an issue that will win/lose votes significantly.

This seems to be a problem with representative democracy that only the major
areas of focus can ever really get representation - do you vote for the party
that's moving in the right direction on health and gets computer crime wrong?

~~~
marcosdumay
That's a problem caused by voting on people, instead of voting on issues.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
OK, but that's how representative democracy works isn't it. How do we overhaul
that, main parties aren't going to move towards an issue based democratic
process because that's ceding power to the _demos_.

~~~
dragonwriter
> OK, but that's how representative democracy works isn't it.

No, representative democracy is largely issue-based and less personality-based
in many regimes, particularly parliamentary systems with electoral systems
which produce roughly proportional results while supporting multiple (
significantly more than 2) viable parties.

The US combination of a presidential (or, for states, gubernatorial, which
amounts to the same thing) rather than parliamentary system and an electoral
system which has poor proportionality and strongly favors duopoly (the latter
more significantly than the former, though both are factors) creates a weak
party system with weak issue focus on elections based on personalities and
identity politics more than issues at both state and federal levels.

Because of the federal nature of the US system and the distribution of much
power over even federal elections to the individual states, and the fact that
many states feature citizen initiative processes, this could be radically
changed for state government in many states without direct support from
existing elected politicians, and could also be changed to a limited extent
for federal elections without elected politician involvement.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
>representative democracy is largely issue-based and less personality-based in
many regimes //

Could you give examples please?

>many states feature citizen initiative processes //

I'm not from the USA, what do you mean by this? There is some system to get
laws passed or governmental processes altered that bypasses representatives?
If that's the case then doesn't it prove my point, that the part of the system
that's a representative democracy doesn't allow the populous to address issues
atomically.

For me in the UK I've a choice of maybe 8 parties. But ultimately it comes
down to one or two issues - do you cut the NHS [health], do you keep Trident
nuclear missiles, do you address income gaps in favour of the poor, ...
suppose you say yes/yes/no and only the We-Are-Evil party is doing that then
if they get in to power you're largely stuck with their predetermined answers
for all other issues until the next general election (5 years). Indeed local
elections become proxies in some cases for addressing issues, but the party
whose candidate is elected need not vote with that candidate, nor uphold a
"promise" they give prior to that election.

As I see it the electorate is left to sit on their hands most of the time.
Then at election times we get the hard sell with psychological manipulation,
character assassination, personality cult, anything to avoid presenting
genuine working solutions to issues the electorate wants to address.

------
neonbat
Even though the kid probably won't get a felony it is absurd that the
government can even use that bargaining chip in this scenario to gain
leverage. This is the same kind of garbage they used against Swartz.

------
UUMMUU
It sounds more like they're doubling down trying to make this "hacker" seem
more malicious than he was to draw attention away from the fact that their
security measures are pretty atrocious.

------
lallysingh
This is one of the reasons I'm considering private school for my kid: parents
are customers and (hopefully) get treated better than this.

------
jostmey
A teenager picks up a gun. Could they be arrested for assault because "who
knows what this teenager might have done"?

------
moron4hire
This makes me fear that we are going to make a generation of people too afraid
to screw around on computers.

------
graycat
The school and the cops should just have refused to make what the boy did a
police or legal matter.

~~~
graycat
Let's have a US information technology venture partner with their "deep domain
knowledge" take up my bet on finding the typo in my paper!

Come on VCs! Good information technology entrepreneurs are eager for VCs who
can actually understand the work and play a constructive role in the future of
the company!

So, "deep domain knowledge" VCs: Show us what you've got! Let's see your
"deep" abilities in information technology!

------
vjdhama
They be like : "Let's get'em young. Don't want no trouble in future".

------
istvan__
Welcome to the USA.

"The test of the morality of a society is what it does for its children."

~Dietrich Bonhoeffer

------
Fando
Lunatics! These people need help.

------
twobits
The usa is realizing the sad pov that people are robots.

It is becoming the first, past-human society. There are "entities". Powerful
entities. And some other things, we don't care about.

It is the first to realize in a social context, the halting problem. That
imperfect rules imposed on an extremely huge social canvas, are not Turing
complete. The limits of discreet rules. Which in a social canvas, has also to
include in the description, "harsh", "absolute", "cold blooded", etc.

In societies where you still have humans running the show, you don't kill -9
kids.

Yes, "I" (for some values of "I"), am the most important thing in the world
ever, "I" am the law, and "I" am a powerful entity, but show some "dignity",
"humanity", "judgment", and "honesty" about what we have been in the past
ourselves.

------
manyxcxi
Leave it to Florida...

~~~
NietTim
National organisation/institution?

------
amateurpolymath
Good to see Florida is determined to remain a national joke.

~~~
noir_lord
Yes because no other state in the US has ever had police or sheriffs do crazy
shit.

It's just Florida..and next time it'll just be Colorado and the time after
that just Montana.

------
cwisecarver
Isn't this akin to charging a teen with murder that entered a teachers house
and swapped out framed family photographs with men kissing using a key known
to be hidden under a planter?

It's probably not even that ridiculous since the computer was, I assume,
school property and not personal property.

