Re: Mark Abene (Phiber Optik) sentenced

[Mike Godwin <mnemonic@eff.org>]

Paul Ferguson reports on the MOD case:

> The Reuter article give background information, including
<text deleted>
>  
> o the young men were apparently competing with each other and other
>   hacker groups for "rep" (reputation) and were also interested in
>   harassing people they didn't like.
  
Reuters doesn't mention, for some reason, that these defendants,
and Mark Abene in particular, were primarily motivated by the desire to
learn about the systems they were using.

> o the Reuter article mentions that "they wiped out almost all of the
>   information contained on a system operated by the Public Broadcasting
>   System affiliate in New York, WNET, that provided educational
>   materials to schools in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut" and
>   left the message, ""Happy Thanksgiving you turkeys, from all of us at MOD."

No MOD defendant has admitted to doing this. In fact, it seems certain
that this particular act was committed by a rival who wanted to frame the
MOD members.


--Mike