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Every time I see a ruling like this, I can't help but think that future historians will view this time period in the same way that present day historians view the crusades/religious persecution/witchhunts of the past millennium. It's amazing how much point of view can change perspective.
If you are driving down the street, and notice that I put the deadbolt onto my house backwards (so that it locked from the outside), is the appropriate thing to do to let yourself in and walk around looking at all my stuff and then call the local news station and invite them in along with you, or is it to call the police or leave me a note letting me know I've got a problem?
It just does not work.
Yes I would download a car if I could....
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Probably because they were the ones who royally screwed up in the first place, disclosing tons of customer details to literally anyone who wanted it (including automatic web spiders), and nobody from AT&T is going to spend a day in jail or pay restitution for that.
Precisely that. Sure, he made a mistake, but so did AT&T, and now because of it he's potentially going to spend 41 months of his life in jail. Life is too short as it is.
Marcia Hofmann is joining his appeals team, so I suspect this is going to SCOTUS. Normally you pick the most compassionate defendant (like they did in Heller in DC) for a test case. Weev is probably the least sympathetic defendant. But I guess you go to war with the weev you have, not the aaronsw you wanted.
I think somebody that publishes this: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1ahkgc/i_am_weev_i_may... a day before his sentencing is either completely sure for some reason he gets away with it or is an idiot. Nothing more effective to prove you're not a criminal that saying in public "I only regret I didn't do more harm to whoever they accusing me of harming, next time will be worse". It's like saying "no, I didn't b…
If he'd gotten 3-6 month suspended sentence, even if you thought that was a bit much for essentially incrementing numbers, you'd probably not care much.
If he were facing life in prison, you'd probably leave the US if you were doing anything in security research, change how you vote, etc.
For context, this guy used to be part of the GNAA. They don't care at all about exposing security holes. His goal probably wasn't to cause some sort of security improvement. Yeah, the punishment was harsh, but this guy isn't exactly a folk hero.
We are supposed to prosecute, convict and sentence on the facts of the case, not the likeability of the defendant
Whether they've stated it publicly or not, I would imagine AT&T's main contention with weev is that he released the information publicly (to Gawker) without attempting to disclose the information to them first (please correct me if he did and I've overlooked that). Nonetheless, if he were to have gone to AT&T first I don't think there's anything that could have stopped AT&T from accusing him of hacking and pressing c…
Additionally, when he gave the data to Gawker he told them he had already disclosed the issue to AT&T, which is later turned out wasn't the case.
Every time I see a ruling like this, I can't help but think that future historians will view this time period in the same way that present day historians view the crusades/religious persecution/witchhunts of the past millennium. It's amazing how much point of view can change perspective.
it's ridiculous how a single, cohesive act can be broken apart into individual charges which each has its own punishment independent of the others. it's like sentencing someone for murder to 10 years in prison and another 3 years because the person used an illegally acquired weapon to do it.
You are also conflating the issue of sentencing with the issue of charging.
The charging/conviction part is actually relatively sane. You can be charged of things you cannot be simultaneously convicted of. You can be convicted of anything that is not a lesser included offense of something else.
IE you could be charged with manslaughter and murder of the same person, but not convicted of both, because manslaughter is a lesser included offense of murder.
As for the federal sentencing guidelines, they were created to standardize what was previously a complete crapshoot. Rightly or wrongly, they were at least based on real data.
They give guideline ranges based on an offense level and criminal history.
The offense level is determined based on the crime plus any enhancements. So yes, you may start out at offense level 23 for murder, and then add 4 more levels because you used an illegally acquire weapon to do it.
However, this is still the sentence for murder, not for the illegally acquired weapon (and note that if the illegally acquired weapon is used as a sentence enhancement, the facts must be proven to the jury)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think somebody that publishes this: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1ahkgc/i_am_weev_i_may... a day before his sentencing is either completely sure for some reason he gets away with it or is an idiot. Nothing more effective to prove you're not a criminal that saying in public "I only regret I didn't do more harm to whoever they accusing me of harming, next time will be worse". It's like saying "no, I didn't b…
I think the thing is that weev genuinely doesn't care if he gets 41 months vs. 36 months. This is a long troll by him; by being a troll, he brings more attention to the case, maximizing lulz, and bringing bigger guns to bear in his defense. If he'd gotten 3-6 month suspended sentence, even if you thought that was a bit much for essentially incrementing numbers, you'd probably not care much. If he were facing life in…
I've never seen an uglier IAMA on reddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1ahkgc/i_am_weev_i_may...