Vindictive Man Guilty of Hacking Computer, Faces Prison

According to news reports published by ComputerWorld on November 4, 2008, an individual from Mill Valley in US faces a sentence to serve prison for full one year. The man had committed the crime of gaining access to his ex-employer's computers network to expose the e-mail system to spammers, 5 months after he was sacked.

The court also ordered 37-year-old Steven John Barnes on October 30, 2008 to serve home detention for another three months, while the judge told him that he has to pay $54,000 as compensation to the organization, Blue Falcon Networks Inc.

Furthermore, the prosecutors, in a brief on the sentence, contended that the systematic form of the destruction reflected the culprit's grudge against his former employing company.

In addition, the prosecutors said that John Barnes had hacked into Blue Falcon's computer over a period of two days and manipulated the e-mail server to cause spamming of messages, including viruses and pornography. Barnes had also erased the organization's Microsoft Exchange e-mail database as well as key boot files; thus, not allowing the server to boot up.

Consequently, employees at Blue Falcon could not receive or send e-mails or check old e-mails for a number of days. Further, an anti-spam company blacklisted Blue Falcon, federal prosecutors stated in court documents, as reported by PCWorld on November 3, 2008.

Besides, Barnes admitted guilt in court in March 2008 for unlawfully hacking into a secured computer, recklessly bringing it to damage, said reports.

He also admitted that he infiltrated the organization's computer on September 30 and October 1, 2003, and transformed the mail system of the online media organization into an exposed mail server with which spammers could send out bulk messages.

Barnes said that he gained access into the organization's servers by using a password that was valid prior to his sacking. However, he was taken by surprise when he realized that the organization did not have a firewall protection and there had been no change in the passwords since then, Barnes added, as reported by PCWorld on November 3, 2008.

» SPAMfighter News - 11/18/2008