Garry Mckinnon is an interesting news story at the moment. Suffering from Asperger's Syndrome, he is an autistic man who would not be much trouble to the international world, one would think.
Garry is a strong believer in little green men from outer space, aliens who have invaded the earth, but the authorities are trying to hide the information from the world. Garry is determined to save the world as he sits at his computer .......................
........................... and hacks into the Pentagon computer system!
An autistic man has been able to infiltrate a complicated computer system as he tried to discover evidence for the little green aliens. Seemingly he left rude messages on the pentagon sites before signing out, and when asked if it was him he freely admitted his guilt.
Am I writing a fictitious tale for the blog? Here is a link to the Daily Mail:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/07/03/mail_mckinnon_campaign/
America wants him extradited to face a possible sentence of 60 years, his lawyers ask that he be tried in his own country, the UK. Well, we might ask, whats wrng with that?, He committed a crime that affects America.
Here is another interesting side to the story. The extradition treaty concerned was signed by UK, but never America. So, it is a one sided treaty.
Why was it that America did not sign?
At the time there was concern in case UK wanted to have Irish terrorists sent back to UK. The treaty was initially set up to cover concerns about the threat of terrorism. The politicians at that time were not keen on being nasty to Irish terorists, but autistic men .........
................. now there is a different story.
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Comments
Any one av ailable to use the internet to track them down?
Anyone who hacks into the pentagon, however, can hack into just about anywhere, and it needs to be clear as to whether this man is a one time threat, or an obsessed one man wrecking crew. Serial hackers require specific measures to insure that they don't ever get another chance to wreak havoc.
I would want to know how much of a threat this man is and if he has done this before. If he has gotten away with thismany time, then, that's another story. Mild autism doesn't deserve to be a "get out of jail free" card, when we execute the severely retarded and mentally ill.
People go on to accomplish incredible things with mild aspergers syndrome. That is why I am looking for more information.
As for the little green men, everyone knows that the FBI and the CIA"s "Men in Black" deal with them, so this guy's story is really suspicious.
Thanks for posting this, Jon.
I would be kooky and insist on karaoke every Saturday and probably stage flag burnings.
Don't vote for me!
he is right to look for little green men. not really, green, or even little- just alien. there are a great many of them around, you can see them in the beltway, gliding by in the big black cars.
Oh, wait a minute, this is about little green men in the Pentagon. How did Mr. MckKinnon find out about that? I think Al's right about the necessity of putting him on Diego Garcia, except he'd be able to hack into the onboard computers of the B-1s based there and make 'em drop their payloads on Ankara or Tel Aviv or Disney World France.
Gorlockness: welcome to the blog, feel free to send those green aliens you have seen this direction.
Kathleen: yes, I find it interesting too. ost interesting is that hackers leaving rude messages are more important to the Pentagon than terrorists seeking to kill citizens of a "friendly" nation
Scanner, you have got it absolutely right.
Zuma: The guys lawyers do not appear to be saying that he should not stand trial. What they are saying is that he should stand trial in this country rather than, dare I say, a country that is "alien" to him.
The second point that is relevent here is that the process being used is one that America refused to sign up for. Therefore, if the same happened in our own Ministry of defence then there is no process to extradite back to the UK. That seems strange to use a treaty that America did not wish to sign up to for any reciprocal action.
The 3rd point is that the treaty was intended because of concerns about terrorism, not hacking and causing embarrassement to a nation.
the 4th point is that America did not sign to this treaty because politicians in both partys at that time were saying that we should talk to terrorists, which is different to the American view of today. Therefore, they did not wish to be under pressure to send the IRA terrorists to trial.
It is certainly true that this hacker would not get a sentence as much as 60 years if found guilty in this country, but it is worth seeing things in the light of the 4 points above.
John: welcome to the post, and thanks for the interest
Aim: I probably wont vote for you, but then being British I never voted for your previous Presidents neither.
Al: I am sure it must be extremely embarrassing for the Pentagon to find that someone could hack the system so easily
Finally, is that "Meat load" or "Nan Ate Hay"? whichever psuedonym you are using, welcome. I guess you would feel safer if we kept him in prison in this country then.
Prosecuting people with mental illness, mental afflictions, is ludicrous. having worked with people diagnosed with mental illness - as a paid support/advocate for them - I can attest to the fact that there's a fine line between genius and unbalanced.
It's inhumane to apply the same rules of law to people who are suffering an illness.
But, y'know, given all of my experiences with the diagnosed, I'm never sure who is truly sane!
It's horrifying that this man is perhaps going to be prosecuted under a vague treaty that doesn't hold up to scrutiny.
The IRA stuff is hilarious. I live in Massachusetts and my partner is first generation Irish. There are lots of drunks who like to moan about Ireland - never having set foot there - and there is, historically, a huge amount of support for the IRA here.
I'm Scottish (I'm American, but.) - my father was Scottish - and grew up travelling between the two cultures. And I loved going to Ireland - the boat from Ayr goes straight to Belfast.
I never met anyone in Belfast who supported the idiocy of the "Irish" in America. I'll sing "Minstrel Boy" and contribute to seisuns - but really, the notion of being Irish, especially in Massachusetts, is a ridiculous blend of misplaced loyalty and fulfilling negative sterotypes.
I'm ranting! Sorry. Just google Holyoke St. Patrick's Day Parade. You'll see what I mean.
Sorry to hijack!
Yes, I realised that you were not intending anything serious in your comments.Some times we can take things far too serious when we need to lighten up a bit.
However, I thought that this item that is getting a lot of coverage over here, particularly in the Daily Mail, would be of interest in this international setting on the internet.