6 ms·

Hacker known as Guccifer sentenced to 52 months in prison

58 points by hotgoldminer 10y ago

th0ma5 10y ago
Is that a hard or soft G?
- jonnathanson 10y ago
  It's meant to be pronounced like the brand "Gucci." The name is a portmanteau of Gucci and Lucifer, using the Italian cc- pronunciation of Gucci and not the soft-c of Lucifer. The G is hard.
toyg 10y ago
> U.S. District Judge James C. Cacheris of Alexandria imposed a 52 month sentence, saying a tough penalty was needed to deter future hacking. “This epidemic must stop,” Cacheris said. Funniest thing I've read all day.
- DINKDINK 10y ago
  >A high school graduate, Lazar had no formal training or computer expertise. He told the New York Times that he obtained access to high-profile people’s email and social-media accounts by reading their Wikipedia pages and guessing passwords based on their personal information. If true, this is even more concerning.
  - ifoundthetao 10y ago
    It's a "common" attack. Well, common enough, that it's something to consider if you have wells of information out there for people to draw from. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin_email_hack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin_email_hack
  - pavel_lishin 10y ago
    To be fair, if you break into my house, I don't care if you've spent years learning how to pick complicated locks without leaving a trace, or whether you just batter the door down with a big hammer. Although to call this a symptom of a "hacking epidemic" is ludicrous.
    - mpweiher 10y ago
      Dunno. Less like a hammer, more like picking up the spare key taped to the wall with a big sign taped to the door that says "key taped to wall".
      - throwanem 10y ago
        If there's one thing I have learned in my time on Hacker News, it's that likening software compromises to physical B&E or unlawful entry goes nowhere that's useful to anyone.
        treehau5 10y ago
        Then why do security experts do it all the time? My first few security courses in my college computer science curriculum was filled with them, one of them was a book co-authored by Schneier.
        throwanem 10y ago
        Because they aren't interacting with an audience composed in significant part of querulous pedants who will promptly proceed to poke every imaginable hole into the metaphor, resulting in a vast and ultimately unproductive digression. (As a querulous pedant myself, I can hardly condemn such behavior! But I do try not to indulge that habit when doing so offers no benefit to anyone.)
      - logfromblammo 10y ago
        I'd say more like finding the key hidden in the fake rock. ...which is the only rock--real or fake--sitting on the front porch. ...and which is also coated in glow-in-the-dark orange paint, in case you need to find it at night. The epidemic must indeed stop. We need to immediately enroll 10% of all celebrities in remedial network security classes, and stop crying "hacker!" for stuff like informed password-guessing attacks against insecure passwords and violating terms of service by scraping web pages with curl or wget. The actual crime this guy committed was to annoy the powerful.
mindslight 10y ago
Plebs just aren't entitled to "no charges are appropriate in this case". It's odd how people will contemplate past failed societies and file them as some sort of barbaric "other". But this is what lawful corruption actually looks like, right in front of our faces. Even disregarding the public service aspect, what exactly did he do that warrants even four months in jail? But when "the law" really just serves as a justifier for the powerful, actions that poke holes in the abstractions of power are punished the harshest.
- droopyEyelids 10y ago
  Did you catch the part where they said the harm he caused was incalculable? That was clever wording by the judge.
  - jcoffland 10y ago
    Or a silly pun.
  - brokenmachine 10y ago
    I would say that most harm caused by any crime is incalculable.
- rybosome 10y ago
  Can you explain that further? Although I see Snowden as a whistleblower who deserves legal protection, I'm not sure that I feel that way about Guccifer. Though he may have exposed misdeeds, this information was not something naturally in his possession as it was with Snowden; he had to force his way in to private networks and accounts to retrieve it. Given also the Russian interest in the upcoming US presidential election and in gaining access to this sensitive data to influence the outcome towards the candidate they prefer, I also see material harm done as a result (unlike Snowden, where the nebulous "because Terrorism" was deployed to explain the damage done). If you were referring to the fact that only his crime was punished while the crimes of those he exposed were ignored, then I understand your point.
  - 10y ago
mfkp 10y ago
> Lazar stored megabytes of victims’ stolen private documents and turned them over to media outlets. Megabytes? As in just a couple of pictures? That can't be right.
- cmdrfred 10y ago
  999 megs is a lot of text.
  - quaresma 10y ago
    *1023
    - RKearney 10y ago
      Actually 999 MB is correct. Mega is an SI prefix meaning 10^6. What you described is a binary prefix mebi, which means 2^20.
      - emodendroket 10y ago
        The use of the term "megabyte" to refer to the other measure predates the coining of "mebibytes," which is used by rather few people. And as you can see on that page, at least one standards body still uses "megabytes" for the power-of-two units.
- takk309 10y ago
  Technically I could measure a couple of gigabytes of data in megabytes. I suppose if the media where after the biggest number (big numbers are more scary) they could use bits.
vaadu 10y ago
While Hillary's crimes get a pass.
- treehau5 10y ago
  Love the fact these are getting down-voted, but it's the clear truth. Doesn't matter if you folks want to hear it or not.
  - AnimalMuppet 10y ago
    True but off-topic is still off-topic. You want to talk about it here? Post a story where it's on-topic, and we'll talk about it there.
Zikes 10y ago
When asked if he hacked Hillary's email servers he replied "What, like with an axe?"
pavel_lishin 10y ago
> A maximum punishment “would also help address any false perception that unauthorized access of a computer is ever justified or rationalized as the cost of living in a wired society — or even worse, a crime to be celebrated,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Maya D. Song wrote. Unless you're the FBI.
dmix 10y ago
> U.S. District Judge James C. Cacheris of Alexandria imposed a 52 month sentence, saying a tough penalty was needed to deter future hacking. > “This epidemic must stop,” Cacheris said. Will tough sentencing in US courts really dissuade future Romanian/foreign hackers? I mean the US is always giving out tough sentences for everything, you'd basically factor that in already if were to get caught and they put all that effort into extraditing you to the US. Seems like par for the course. If it wasn't tough sentencing it would be superfluous charges getting tagged on, so any length is justifiable if you have a motivated prosecutor/judge or a politicized case. Although I may be reading too much into the judges rationalization.
- eykanal 10y ago
  Not to mention that this "tough penalty" is LESS than what some poor schmuck who was caught with 1 gram of LSD, for the first time, would get as a _minimum_ sentence.
  - DanBC 10y ago
    One gram of LSD is a lot of LSD, since a single dose is about 100 ug. One gram would be around 10,000 doses. I think the drug war is fucking stupid, but still.
yread 10y ago
So such a long sentence probably means he wasn't cooperating with other investigations, right?
- tptacek 10y ago
  Is there any evidence that he'd have any means of cooperating with other investigations? He seems like a garden-variety social engineer, like the person who "hacked" their way to all those celebrity nudes a few years back.
jcoffland 10y ago
> A maximum punishment “would also help address any false perception that unauthorized access of a computer is ever justified or rationalized as the cost of living in a wired society — or even worse, a crime to be celebrated,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Maya D. Song wrote. If the US judicial system is serious about that statement they should be addressing the blatant violations of the law perpetrated by the NSA and FBI. As long as our own elite groups engage in hacking crimes, "unauthorized access of a computer" will remain "justified" in the minds of hackers.
- wmeredith 10y ago
  I don't agree with this logic. The government engages in all sorts of activities that are illegal for citizens. Use of lethal force, for instance.
  - jcoffland 10y ago
    The problem is that the US government is engaging in activities that are illegal for the US government. The government is not above the law.
  - calgoo 10y ago
    And I think a lot of people would start to shoot back if the government was massively shooting people. But you don't need to worry, they will only shoot you in the foot, so they know where you have been by following the blood trail /s I'm not for lawlessness on the net, but like mentioned here, until the elite is punished for their crimes, people will fight back.
  - Zigurd 10y ago
    War is, or should be, an extreme case where the ability to live under a legitimate set of laws is threatened. Both our optional wars of aggression, and mass surveillance are lawless acts, and acts against the people. The reason people find such a sentence offensive is that they find our government has lost the legitimacy it takes to impose such a sentence on a non-violent crime.
- tptacek 10y ago
exabrial 10y ago
Why is he being sentenced? Clinton and FBI said she had nothing to hide.
exabrial 10y ago
Seems like an inherent conflict of interest when he hacked the head of State Department, and they're the ones that would be dealing with his extradition.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
nxc18 10y ago
I really don't understand the comments here. My first response was "only 52 months?" This guy broke into people's accounts by guessing passwords and then used the identities of his victims to victimize others. How are people rationalizing this as OK? He's certainly not a white-hat hacker. He didn't publish work for the public interest (Snowden). He didn't responsibly report a security vulnerability, as there was no vulnerability beyond public figures using question-answer authentication. Think about if your accounts were hacked for the "crime" of being a public figure's relative? Friend? I know you think "public figure" only means politician, but to make this thought exercise more real, remember that Linus Torvalds, Steve Wozniak, celebrity startup CEOs (the types of people many of you want to someday become), etc. are public figures as well. Finally, ask yourself if you can honestly say you've never broken a law; never had a moment that affected others negatively; never did anything that the public could judge you for. If you don't pass all those tests, consider whether anyone could pass those tests, and then consider whether Hillary or anyone else should be expected to. (Unlike you, Hillary and many others probably didn't grow up with internet, or email, or the concept of basic things like legal equality for African Americans - will you find it easy to pass the test of public perception for your past actions 20 years from now? 30 years from now? 40?)
ajbetteridge 10y ago
'A maximum punishment “would also help address any false perception that unauthorized access of a computer is ever justified or rationalized as the cost of living in a wired society — or even worse, a crime to be celebrated,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Maya D. Song wrote.' Perhaps someone should pass this on to the NSA?
HackermanMad 10y ago
I'm not US citizen but what could be done (by me or other people) to support this guy? To reduce and expose this abuse of power and corruption by the US government so that things would get better? Are there organisations for that?

58 points by hotgoldminer 10y ago

th0ma5 10y ago

Is that a hard or soft G?

jonnathanson 10y ago
It's meant to be pronounced like the brand "Gucci." The name is a portmanteau of Gucci and Lucifer, using the Italian cc- pronunciation of Gucci and not the soft-c of Lucifer. The G is hard.

toyg 10y ago

> U.S. District Judge James C. Cacheris of Alexandria imposed a 52 month sentence, saying a tough penalty was needed to deter future hacking. “This epidemic must stop,” Cacheris said. Funniest thing I've read all day.

DINKDINK 10y ago
>A high school graduate, Lazar had no formal training or computer expertise. He told the New York Times that he obtained access to high-profile people’s email and social-media accounts by reading their Wikipedia pages and guessing passwords based on their personal information. If true, this is even more concerning.
- ifoundthetao 10y ago
  It's a "common" attack. Well, common enough, that it's something to consider if you have wells of information out there for people to draw from. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin_email_hack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin_email_hack
- pavel_lishin 10y ago
  To be fair, if you break into my house, I don't care if you've spent years learning how to pick complicated locks without leaving a trace, or whether you just batter the door down with a big hammer. Although to call this a symptom of a "hacking epidemic" is ludicrous.
  - mpweiher 10y ago
    Dunno. Less like a hammer, more like picking up the spare key taped to the wall with a big sign taped to the door that says "key taped to wall".
    - throwanem 10y ago
      If there's one thing I have learned in my time on Hacker News, it's that likening software compromises to physical B&E or unlawful entry goes nowhere that's useful to anyone.
      - treehau5 10y ago
        Then why do security experts do it all the time? My first few security courses in my college computer science curriculum was filled with them, one of them was a book co-authored by Schneier.
        throwanem 10y ago
        Because they aren't interacting with an audience composed in significant part of querulous pedants who will promptly proceed to poke every imaginable hole into the metaphor, resulting in a vast and ultimately unproductive digression. (As a querulous pedant myself, I can hardly condemn such behavior! But I do try not to indulge that habit when doing so offers no benefit to anyone.)
    - logfromblammo 10y ago
      I'd say more like finding the key hidden in the fake rock. ...which is the only rock--real or fake--sitting on the front porch. ...and which is also coated in glow-in-the-dark orange paint, in case you need to find it at night. The epidemic must indeed stop. We need to immediately enroll 10% of all celebrities in remedial network security classes, and stop crying "hacker!" for stuff like informed password-guessing attacks against insecure passwords and violating terms of service by scraping web pages with curl or wget. The actual crime this guy committed was to annoy the powerful.

mindslight 10y ago

Plebs just aren't entitled to "no charges are appropriate in this case". It's odd how people will contemplate past failed societies and file them as some sort of barbaric "other". But this is what lawful corruption actually looks like, right in front of our faces. Even disregarding the public service aspect, what exactly did he do that warrants even four months in jail? But when "the law" really just serves as a justifier for the powerful, actions that poke holes in the abstractions of power are punished the harshest.

droopyEyelids 10y ago
Did you catch the part where they said the harm he caused was incalculable? That was clever wording by the judge.
- jcoffland 10y ago
  Or a silly pun.
- brokenmachine 10y ago
  I would say that most harm caused by any crime is incalculable.
rybosome 10y ago
Can you explain that further? Although I see Snowden as a whistleblower who deserves legal protection, I'm not sure that I feel that way about Guccifer. Though he may have exposed misdeeds, this information was not something naturally in his possession as it was with Snowden; he had to force his way in to private networks and accounts to retrieve it. Given also the Russian interest in the upcoming US presidential election and in gaining access to this sensitive data to influence the outcome towards the candidate they prefer, I also see material harm done as a result (unlike Snowden, where the nebulous "because Terrorism" was deployed to explain the damage done). If you were referring to the fact that only his crime was punished while the crimes of those he exposed were ignored, then I understand your point.
- 10y ago

mfkp 10y ago

> Lazar stored megabytes of victims’ stolen private documents and turned them over to media outlets. Megabytes? As in just a couple of pictures? That can't be right.

cmdrfred 10y ago
999 megs is a lot of text.
- quaresma 10y ago
  *1023
  - RKearney 10y ago
    Actually 999 MB is correct. Mega is an SI prefix meaning 10^6. What you described is a binary prefix mebi, which means 2^20.
    - emodendroket 10y ago
      The use of the term "megabyte" to refer to the other measure predates the coining of "mebibytes," which is used by rather few people. And as you can see on that page, at least one standards body still uses "megabytes" for the power-of-two units.
takk309 10y ago
Technically I could measure a couple of gigabytes of data in megabytes. I suppose if the media where after the biggest number (big numbers are more scary) they could use bits.

vaadu 10y ago

While Hillary's crimes get a pass.

treehau5 10y ago
Love the fact these are getting down-voted, but it's the clear truth. Doesn't matter if you folks want to hear it or not.
- AnimalMuppet 10y ago
  True but off-topic is still off-topic. You want to talk about it here? Post a story where it's on-topic, and we'll talk about it there.

Zikes 10y ago

When asked if he hacked Hillary's email servers he replied "What, like with an axe?"

pavel_lishin 10y ago

dmix 10y ago

> U.S. District Judge James C. Cacheris of Alexandria imposed a 52 month sentence, saying a tough penalty was needed to deter future hacking. > “This epidemic must stop,” Cacheris said. Will tough sentencing in US courts really dissuade future Romanian/foreign hackers? I mean the US is always giving out tough sentences for everything, you'd basically factor that in already if were to get caught and they put all that effort into extraditing you to the US. Seems like par for the course. If it wasn't tough sentencing it would be superfluous charges getting tagged on, so any length is justifiable if you have a motivated prosecutor/judge or a politicized case. Although I may be reading too much into the judges rationalization.

eykanal 10y ago
Not to mention that this "tough penalty" is LESS than what some poor schmuck who was caught with 1 gram of LSD, for the first time, would get as a _minimum_ sentence.
- DanBC 10y ago
  One gram of LSD is a lot of LSD, since a single dose is about 100 ug. One gram would be around 10,000 doses. I think the drug war is fucking stupid, but still.

yread 10y ago

So such a long sentence probably means he wasn't cooperating with other investigations, right?

tptacek 10y ago
Is there any evidence that he'd have any means of cooperating with other investigations? He seems like a garden-variety social engineer, like the person who "hacked" their way to all those celebrity nudes a few years back.

jcoffland 10y ago

> A maximum punishment “would also help address any false perception that unauthorized access of a computer is ever justified or rationalized as the cost of living in a wired society — or even worse, a crime to be celebrated,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Maya D. Song wrote. If the US judicial system is serious about that statement they should be addressing the blatant violations of the law perpetrated by the NSA and FBI. As long as our own elite groups engage in hacking crimes, "unauthorized access of a computer" will remain "justified" in the minds of hackers.

wmeredith 10y ago
I don't agree with this logic. The government engages in all sorts of activities that are illegal for citizens. Use of lethal force, for instance.
- jcoffland 10y ago
  The problem is that the US government is engaging in activities that are illegal for the US government. The government is not above the law.
- calgoo 10y ago
  And I think a lot of people would start to shoot back if the government was massively shooting people. But you don't need to worry, they will only shoot you in the foot, so they know where you have been by following the blood trail /s I'm not for lawlessness on the net, but like mentioned here, until the elite is punished for their crimes, people will fight back.
- Zigurd 10y ago
  War is, or should be, an extreme case where the ability to live under a legitimate set of laws is threatened. Both our optional wars of aggression, and mass surveillance are lawless acts, and acts against the people. The reason people find such a sentence offensive is that they find our government has lost the legitimacy it takes to impose such a sentence on a non-violent crime.
tptacek 10y ago

exabrial 10y ago

Why is he being sentenced? Clinton and FBI said she had nothing to hide.

exabrial 10y ago

Seems like an inherent conflict of interest when he hacked the head of State Department, and they're the ones that would be dealing with his extradition.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

nxc18 10y ago

I really don't understand the comments here. My first response was "only 52 months?" This guy broke into people's accounts by guessing passwords and then used the identities of his victims to victimize others. How are people rationalizing this as OK? He's certainly not a white-hat hacker. He didn't publish work for the public interest (Snowden). He didn't responsibly report a security vulnerability, as there was no vulnerability beyond public figures using question-answer authentication. Think about if your accounts were hacked for the "crime" of being a public figure's relative? Friend? I know you think "public figure" only means politician, but to make this thought exercise more real, remember that Linus Torvalds, Steve Wozniak, celebrity startup CEOs (the types of people many of you want to someday become), etc. are public figures as well. Finally, ask yourself if you can honestly say you've never broken a law; never had a moment that affected others negatively; never did anything that the public could judge you for. If you don't pass all those tests, consider whether anyone could pass those tests, and then consider whether Hillary or anyone else should be expected to. (Unlike you, Hillary and many others probably didn't grow up with internet, or email, or the concept of basic things like legal equality for African Americans - will you find it easy to pass the test of public perception for your past actions 20 years from now? 30 years from now? 40?)

ajbetteridge 10y ago

'A maximum punishment “would also help address any false perception that unauthorized access of a computer is ever justified or rationalized as the cost of living in a wired society — or even worse, a crime to be celebrated,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Maya D. Song wrote.' Perhaps someone should pass this on to the NSA?

HackermanMad 10y ago

I'm not US citizen but what could be done (by me or other people) to support this guy? To reduce and expose this abuse of power and corruption by the US government so that things would get better? Are there organisations for that?