First, the Judge:

http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/homepage/abox/article_1585206.php


Now, the kid who caught him:

http://www.crime-research.org/news/2002/08/Mess1901.htm

This kid authored a trojan program, disguised it as an image that would appeal to child molestors, and released it on several USENET groups, frequented by these kinds of people.

That's brilliant, but it's also quite scary as well. Remember in the list of computer safety tips: don't download something you don't need!

IMHO, we are gonna see more of this kind of thing. It's gonna bend our perception of the law, boundaries, and other things before it's all over. No matter where you stand on this kids actions, this is very interesting stuff!

Awesome. Call me a hypocrite, but I'm ok with all of that on this one.

He kicks some serious ass doesn't he?

The rub is that he broke a lot of laws doing what he did. It's a totally classic ends justify the means kind of thing.

We are living in a time where our generation, and the one coming up behind us are gonna get to settle new legal questions that are on par with the kinds of questions our founders grappled with! Where society, the law and technology collide is just a freaking mess right now.

Lots going on, history being made.

Coupla teasers:

Should be craft some exception to the law for this kind of thing, who regulates it, how can we prevent abuse of it?

What ramifications for the law, in general, come into play when a conviction is upheld that came about from another violation of the law?

Do these things diminish the accountability of both parties?

Damm... wish I were in law school right now. There is gonna be some excellent cases coming through over the next 30 years or so.

Does this mean, that if I suspect my next door neighbor is breaking the law, I can break in, and install cameras and microphines, then turn the info over to the police.

And you liberals complain about George W. Bush invading privacy Seems just a bit hypocritical to me.

Now if the kid lured only child predators to his material, and then, and only then, did he go after them, I would come closer to accepting it as a citizen who is fed up with this criminal action.

Perhaps what he did, but it wasn't clear to me.

I know Deane. I HAD to admit the hypocrisy of being so ok with it. I could not help it. It's a subject that drives me apeshit - a weakness even.

If I thought for one second that this kid was going to have influence over innocent citizens and or misuse his information garnered for anything other than what it was used for, I would have had more problems wiht it. But this kid, amazingly, kept it pretty pure and even righteous. He is good - they were evil. A very distinct line that Governments can't do nearly as well as this kid did.

If I thought that the Government had as much discipline as this kid did, I would be less worried about that they do with the information. But they don't. So I don't like it in their hands. Sue me.

He's a hero to me.

So if someone decides to go on a personal vendeta against drug dealers and users, its ok to do this?

How about anti abortionists?

Nope. Just these guys.

When I was in high school, some genius rigged up a shotgun to keep people out of his bedroom. It worked, as I recall, on his girlfriend.

This kid here is an actual genius, cleaning up a mess that apparently is no concern for the many feds who rifle through information every day.

Do I have serious concerns about privacy? Sure, we all do. I have to agree with CJ, KSKD and all the other hypocrites who say, "Nice Goin' Kid!"

That's what I found very interesting about this case. NOBODY cares how the child molestors are caught. NOBODY.

Had this kid targeted other crime, I believe it highly likely he would have been prosecuted himself.

The privacy concerns are obvious, though I cannot see a solution, barring simply stripping us of turing complete computers.

(Turing complete means you actually control the computer fully, not just use a subset of what would be otherwise complete functionality.)

I have an old friend from Philly who told me a little story a few years back about the Mayor thanking "a group of concerned citizens" for helping solve a case. Basically, the mob got to a serial rapist, the rapes stopped immediately, and his lifeless body washed up a week or two later in New Jersey. When two and two were put together, the community breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Closer to home, a good man, known to many Portlanders for his warm inviting taxi, did some time years back for killing another fellow. That fellow was beating the living tar out of a prostitute and probably would have killed her if someone had not stepped up and confronted him. I only wish that the judge and jury hadn't seen his action as a crime, but as a rescue.

I must admit, in those cases, I am a hypocrite too. I would never condone vigilante justice, but at the same time, the local police were stumped or not doing their jobs, and women were in danger. These were grown women, not children. Perhaps, a danger to a kid is the one thing that might make most any of us cross that line, and face whatever retribution came, for the sake of doing what we felt was right.

I get the point. But those cases are different. This kid is not a vigilante. He's not carrying out the justice. He is reporting the crime. If he was going out and killing who HE suspected was guilty, I would have a problem. Well, a larger problem.

He's not deputized to carry out anything. But he is certainly qualified to do what he is doing. He is reporting a crime. And yes, he is doing it illegally. Yep. Oh well, in this case. This kind of bait is set out for pedophiles all the time - legally. It is publically funded and advertisers pay to be associated with the act of catching a predator. I think a social judgement call can be made here. People that can't work within a slight bit of grey will have a problem with it. I understand. Heck, I even agree with why. But, uh, yeah. No. He's a gifted and resourceful kid who, THANK GOD, decided to use this all for good. And let's not forget one really big thing here - HE IS GETTING ACTUAL, TANGIBLE RESULTS. Put this kid on some kind of payroll and make him legit. And pay him a ton of money. It's worth EVERY single dime. ( Oh, and get him Robert Blake's attorney on retainer. THAT guy is good. )

CJ, good points and I do agree, get him on a payroll.

I dunno how the kids are today, but I grew up in the 70s and 80s on Mount Tabor. We stayed together, watched out for each other and weren't afraid to shift from softball to using our bats on a creep. Thank heavens, we never had to go that far, a collective move his or her way and usually they would scurry in a hurry. If not, we knew who lived closest and went there together, fast.

This kid is smart and doing something few adults do consistently: Confronting a problem with imagination and solving it. His tactics weren't legal, but his heart was definitely in the right place.

I hate to make a joke, but I bet the first thing the former honorable hears when he steps in the prison shower will be, "Justice is served, dig in boys!"

I'll bet he gets posh prision. The suicide worry alone would likely justify that.

I would be worried if I were him though. NOBODY cares about the child molestors. Maybe he will do a short stint in PMITA prison first... just long enough to make it count, but not so long as to warrant that suicide.

It's gonna be ugly for the judge, if his appeal does not go well. Heck, it's ugly all the way around, because he's out now.

Yep we are lucky that kid is doing good things. Wonder if that mindset does not warrant some government intervention. I met some really smart kids once, that entered some special government program. The family was going to move, and they didn't know where.

The kids where SCARY SHARP. Like they look you in the eye as a peer, scary.

They framed it as some special entitlement program, but I got this sinking feeling that it was more like, "Oh no, you are coming with Uncle Sam where he can keep a close eye on you from now on."

Don't know if the canucks do this kind of thing, but maybe...

This guy broke into peoples computers, how do we know he didnt put the bad data there? He had no oversight, so he finds some one he thinks is a child molester, but theres not enough proof, he could easily put a few files on the computer.
I personally think child molesters should be shot after a short trial.

We don't know that he didn't. I didn't read anything that would lead me to believe he had a motive to do that. In fact, in the case cited, specific dates, locations and names were written about in a diary. So uh, unless he is a telepath and is downloading information from a person's brain to write a ficitious story in the diary, it looks like the judge was guilty.

NWOkie, you are just asking questions, I think. All good ones. I'd like to know how you feel about this case. Not Bush's use or some political angle. Just in this case, what's your take?

Also, should we now be concerned about the kid attending a madrassah?

Actually, there is plenty of proof. He reproduced journals and writing that can be compared, in terms of style and form, to that of the Judge himself. The images, timestamps, logs, all are very difficult to reproduce exactly.

A forensic analysis of the machine would easily determine if this kid had actually planted anything. Also, his ISP logs may well demonstrate him having snagged the image in the first place as well.

I personally don't favor the kids approach and think he should get some dicipline for his actions. However, nobody seems to care about child molestors, which is the interesting part of this whole thing.

And there is another wrinkle here as well. What he really did was offer a dataset for download that was not what it appeared to be at first glance. Any responsible computer user (see the computer do's and don'ts thread) would not have done what that Judge did, nor would they be frequenting the places he did.

I'm at a moral impasse with this whole thing. I don't like the idea of people getting into machines, but I also recognize there is very little we can do about it, particularly given the state of most win32 computers people are running these days.

So, if I choose to break the law, I'm accepting some risk in this. That's not cool, but it is real and does provide a nice check on the actions of a lot of people.

Maybe it's not so bad to know there are people out there who can do this kind of thing. Might make people think twice about:

-continuing to use devices they remain ignorant about
-breaking laws, particularly these laws!


I know enough about these things to seriously worry about the average joe. There is no fixing it either, if we actually want to have computers we can use. Being stupid about these things does have it's consequenses.

Maybe people will wake up and give these little devices the consideration they deserve. It's just not that hard and the Internet would be a far better place if they did.

I suppose this is part of why I posted this story.

My take? in this one instance the end result is probably a good thing.
However, it could start a bad trend, sonmeone reads about it, and thinks, hey I can do that, but maybe isnt as careful, and decides well this person is guilty, so decides to help the case along, either by sending the person a virus or just planting info.

True. And I'm sure that has already happened without this good kid giving anyone the idea.

FYI, there's been a movement going in the black-hat community for probably close to a decade now to do exactly this. I haven't kept up on their progress(or lack thereof), however.

"I'll bet he gets posh prison. The suicide worry alone would likely justify that."

If he committed suicide, the problem would be...?

I see no problem. In fact, leave a coil of rope in his cell.

Think of how much money it would save the tax payers.

I'm so glad I don't have to paint the actual picture of what it can feel like for a kid to go through this, the terror and scarring, and we can all just secretly or overtly want the offenders gone by just about any means possible. JUST about.

Anyone ever see Sleepers?

I am fortunate to not have any direct experience with molestation. I don't take it for granted that I don't. But there is just SO much of it out there and there will NEVER be enough done. I can't help it.