Wonkette
Several weeks ago, a brave Computer Hacker proved to an anxious nation that at least one citizen still has an operating brain and can use it to crack difficult computer codes like “Where did you meet your spouse?” Authorities believe they have found the terrible miscreant who broke into Sarah Palin’s Yahoo account, and today he was indicted by a federal grand jury. Sounds fancy!
This goon, a mop-topped economics major at the University of Tennessee named David Kernell, went to court today and pled not guilty and asked the judge if he could talk about the case with his girlfriend in South Carolina.
If John McCain and Sarah Palin are elected, Kernell will be sentenced without trial to 35 years of hard labor in the uranium mines of Guantanamo Bay, side by side with assorted Wall Street Fat Cats and Keith Olbermann.
Lawmaker’s son, UT student David Kernell, indicted in Palin e-mail hacking [Memphis Commercial Appeal]
Obama pals around with unrepentent CYBERTERRORISTS
Jackass.
I didn’t recognize him without his Guy Fawkes mask.
Death to the terrorist! He must be a Muslim!
L33T HAXXORS UNITE!
God bless this child.
You mean he gets punished with food and a place to sleep? Lucky bastard.
Isn’t this the same guy who brought Boston to its knees by throwing up the Mooninite LEDs on bridges (Nevar Forget)?
Does the heavy sigh defense work in cases like this.
If he had a black tuff of hair he’d look like that Muppet Bert
muslin muslin
wait..he doesnt look muslin?
this kid is my hero
“Free David Kernell” websites in 3… 2…
I guess “hockeymom” wasnt such a secure password.
Clearly, breaking into Palin’s private email account is a neo-adolescent metaphor expressing the youth’s unconscious desire to secretly ravage Sarah Palin’s … o, we can’t talk about that anymore.
If Palin had been smart she would have deleted all of her e-mails like the White House did. Clearly not Presidential.
What exactly is the charge? Being altogether too clever? If it’s some kind of
invasion of privacy thing, why hasn’t the entire executive branch been charged with
the same thing? Barry better win two terms, because the payback list is too
long to cover in just four years.
Are you really a “hacker” when all you did was guess someone’s security question? That’s more of a reflection on Palin, than on this guy.
…if he was smart his lap top would be at the bottom of canal in upstate Tennessee.
The article says he was indicted for hacking into Palin’s e-mail account. Is that a crime they just made up? Is it really illegal to read someone else’s e-mail?
Send him to the spice mines in the outer rim!
Naw, this kid is a hero.
Whew, now I can sleep with the windows open tonight. :::sigh:::
How long until Palin “associates” this kid with Obama? If we can’t trust her to keep her email safe - what’s she going to do to keep me and my 17 illegitimate children, trailer, and beer stash safe?
I’m surprised, my money was on a jewish negro as the culprit
…and isn’t this a bit of a slippery slope? I mean does the FBI really want to set the precedent of playing E-mail police? They are going to end up with half a million cases of angry/jealous ex-girlfriend breaking into Myspace account in 5…4…3…2…1!
I hope that this kid has kept EVERYTHING he found in her e-mail. Let the fed know that they will introduce it ALL into evidence as part of their FREEDOM OF INFORMATION defense. Palin, McCain and Bush will shyte a brick and then the charges will be magically disappear.
I think all incidents of the word “hacker” in every story henceforth should be changed to “password guesser.”
Terry: Absolutely. He’s a college kid from TN, for crying out loud. There ain’t that many Rhodes Scholars coming out of TN (see Fred Thompson). Palin is dumber than a bag of rocks.
He taught Bible Spice a valuable lesson! And he gets no thanks for it? Wehre is the love? That’s not how the After School Specials end.
this proves that TERRORISTS look just like regular people. beware.
Terry: No. But facts just don’t matter!
AngryBlakGuy: How many of those victims are actually important, though?
Judge Shirley confined him to East Tennessee pending trial. Dude, that’s harsh.
SlouchingTowardsWasilla: Yes, it is illegal. I wonder if this much effort would have been put into enforcing this law had she been just another lipstick wearing hockey mom?
This kid should be the recipient of the first presidential pardon of the Obama administration.
For the first time in my life, I’m actually enjoying the tune “Rocky Top.” Still hate orange, though.
Dude, his World of Warcraft guild thinks he’s the shit. It was so worth the impending prison time and $250,000 fine. L33t password guessers of the world, unite!
http://thesebastards.blogspot.com/
Shit. That wannabe drop out (you know? That one) is stoked. In five years he can return with cyber-street cred.
Also, my friends, let’s never play debate drinking *burp* games again my friends (maverick- drink!). That shit was rough last night.
Kernell’s punishment will be to marry that tramp Willow Palin and thus make honest preteen of her.
AngryBlakGuy: Naw, angry-jealous girlfriends have particular rights under the law. And, of course errant boyfriends subconsciously want to be caught so they leave all kinds of clues around as to what a password COULD be.
Not that I’d know anything about that….
Poor kid. I hope he lands on his feet. He only did what any of us would have done. It’s not “hacking” if it’s that simple. Hell, if making Sarah Palin look like an idiot is a crime we’re ALL guilty. We’re all Spartacus.
Don’t you really wish this guy’s dad, who is a state legislator, had been a Republican?
They can’t get you for breaking and entering if the door was open.
Oliver Stone has already bought his story, that guy from Napolean Dynamite will play the kid.
“You know, like nunchuku skills, bow hunting skills.. computer hacking skillz”
I think all of us would be much safer if you gave this kid a gun…
WadISay: isn’t that a violation of some part of the Constitution.. I vaguely recall from my school days something about cruel and unusual punishment…
oh silly me! I forgot that the Darth Cheney, bush, and emperor Palpatine Changed that part of the Constitution from the Bill of Rights to the “Bill of Whatever We Fuckin Say it Is”
It’s too late, Palin, we can all sit around NOW and talk about a time when Americans were truly free…
Terry: Yeah, no joke. They should change his crime to disrespecting stupid elders. Unfortunately, if Palin gets into power she will reinstate Old Testament biblical law in which case disrespecting your elders means death.
It’s so reassuring to know that the intelligent are punished while the stupid get put in charge of governing one of our 50 states.
Andy Dick’s younger brother broke into Palin’s e-mail account?
NoWireHangers: Today we are all amateur Palin email account hackers.
Sooo..lessee..Dubya and can read MY email, and Dubya can tap MY phone and Dubya can read everthing I blo…oh shit…
Here’s a hint to future hackers of America: Don’t use your real email address.
someone needs to start a “FREE DAVID KERNELL” web site and campaign!!!
dannygutters: If that doesn’t work, switch to the Sob Uncontrollably defence.
jinmoom: azw88: …by publicizing it in this way they are going to have to actually show effort in tracking down regular people who do this as well, otherwise it looks like favoritism(equal protection under the law). If it is a law, they may have just quadrupled their own workload. If anything fine the kid and give him community service.
Why does God hate McCain? If he didn’t he would have made this guy a Palestinian or heck even brown youth would suffice.
Spackle Camshaft Palin: RIGHT ON! Or perhaps, password guessing prankster? Or one who uses information in the public domain to be funny? (It was funny, until he got arrested.)
Kev-O-Tron: 4chan were, at least.
Two words, kid:
TWINKIE DEFENSE
graceless: Palin uses the same password for everything: “mooseburgers”
He should be charged with not forwarding all of the emails to wonkette and instead taking screenshots of some family photos. Fucking moran.
And thanks to Wikipedia’s entry on “twinkie defense,” I now know the outcome of the upcoming movie MILK.
DAMN YOU, FREE REFERENCE SOURCE!!!
Here’s the law:
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/1030.html
gurukalehuru: Actually, they can. It’s a constructive breaking and entering. The things you learn doing an internship with a public defender’s office. I also learned that people who walk into a house where a police picnic is going on in the back yard are very stupid.
No, no, people!
This kid should be commended, for his experiment proving that the internet is IN THE TANK
Dreamer: Well, he looks a little Jewish, so God loved the Palin.
So, we’ll neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeever know who outed Valerie Plame, but this kid gets popped and locked inside a fortnight. ‘Nuff said.
Delicious: Doesn’t look like he violated that law. I’d be interested to hear how you think he did.
thank zeus that sara escaped the white slavery that ken had tried to sell her into…
Delicious: I don’t think §1030 applies in this matter because it was not a government controlled e-mail address, and the Prosecutor doodz could argue that the defendant (hereinafter “Mop Head”) accessed Mooselini’s personal computer, thereby §1030 would be thrown out and it would go underthe 1986 cluster-fuck of laws pertaining to violations of personal privacy with the intent of obtaining malicious data about another individual.
Assfucking for Mop Head.
If I had any money, I’d contribute to his legal defense fund, which would probably make me a domestic terrorist according to the Governess.
Does the guy have a defense fund? They don’t make numbers that go as high as Obama’s bank account any more, so I’ve got to find a place to send my last wooden nickel before setting down to starve.
Bush and Cheney, unrepentant war criminals whose hands drip with the blood of thousands, have been giving this country a lubeless ass fucking for eight years with no legal accountability.
Now this kid shows Sarah Palin what a complete fucking idiot she is and he’s in front of a grand jury within weeks? Unbelievable.
Yes, this is selective prosecution! Mop-head’s getting off.
Big Ass Belle: WIN!!!
AngryBlakGuy: They had to do something, or it would have looked like they were in the tank for Obama, plus the fact that she is the VP candidate does give the case some added priority.
That being said
Indicted for being smarter than a governor?
Delicious: shortsshortsshorts: Where is the defined terms section? I’d like to know what a “protected computer” is. If that means any old personally owned computer, I think (a)(2)(C) applies.
(a) Whoever—
(2) intentionally accesses a computer without authorization or exceeds authorized access, and thereby obtains—
(C) information from any protected computer if the conduct involved an interstate or foreign communication;
shall be punished as provided in subsection (c) of this section.
Delicious: shortsshortsshorts: Duh. Found it in (e).
(e) As used in this section—
(2) the term “protected computer” means a computer—
(B) which is used in interstate or foreign commerce or communication, including a computer located outside the United States that is used in a manner that affects interstate or foreign commerce or communication of the United States;
I’m thinking they are definitely prosecuting under (a)(2)(C). If there’s one thing we learned in law school EVERYTHING is related to interstate commerce.
Sussemilch: shortsshortsshorts: I know this subsection
(C) information from any protected computer if the conduct involved an interstate or foreign communication;
was used against someone else who did similar snooping…it’s the interstate thingy
Delicious: He had authorisation. Yahoo! gave him authorasation, in return for typing in the answers to thier security questions. Those answers were found on the public internet, sort of like an open book test.
azw88: The kid says he read all her emails but didn’t find anything interesting, not even gay moose porn.
Cogito Ergo Bibo: That part is correct, but I believe the entire section refers to Government controlled computers and data. Mop Head went after a personal e-mail address. Again that’s why ye old 1986 laws apply.
Delicious: Nope. It don’t apply.
Just because Caribou was doing the defrauding by using the non-government computer for state government stuff, it still ain’t no government computer.
Pics of the family aren’t worth $5,000. Now if there were naked pics it might be different.
A good lawyer (do they still exist?) should get him off easily if this is the statute being used. Not as easily as those naked pics would have.
azw88: …I have no arguement with the “added priority”, my concern is whether they have ever pursued an indictment for this “crime” in the past. Or do they plan on going after email account hackers in the future with the same kind of fervor that they pursued this dummy. If the answer is “no” then they may find themselves in a bind, to explain why they are now pursuing a kid whose only crime is being smarter than Sarah Palin(which isn’t saying much). My personal opinion is this case will quickly turn into more trouble than its worth and he will eventually walk(if he is stubborn).
shortsshortsshorts: Exactly. Cant even delete her illegal secret emails. Got any dumb brunette jokes? This could start a whole new and exciting genre of sexist jokes!
A guy with his appearance will be very popular in the slammer.
Cogito Ergo Bibo: Problem is, he didn’t access it in an unauthorized manner. He entered the correct password, and it let him in.
OOPS
…that being said, how is Sarah Palin doing government business from a private e-mail account any different from a government employee improperly handling confidential material? If “Joe Six Pack” went to work at the Pentagon and left with confidential material that he improperly secured and was robbed he would be FIRED for breaching protocol!
I can’t wait for the trial so he can test the “I did it for the lulz” defense.
zenferretwork: The case I’m familiar with involves co-workers in a private company. E-mails were stolen and sent to another party in another state. No government involvement, except when the feds swoped in. The guy is now convicted.
…geez, how many lawyers do we have on Wonkette?! Does this mean I can break out the Lawyer jokes?!?!
shortsshortsshorts: Looks like a protected computer can also be a personally owned computer based on the definition; all you need is a computer engaged in interstate commerce. I’m thinking the statute applies. Which is not to say you couldn’t also maintain a 1986 suit. But a 1986 suit is about civil damages. The feds have to have a crime in mind in order to have him dragged in, here. (a)(2)(C) looks like the likely one to me.
Sussemilch: If only it were the end of it. Bible Spice didn’t authorize the sneaky peek. Although, I’ll grant you, she made it easy enough to make it look as if she did.
Sussemilch: Well, if someone guessed your ATM PIN, I am sure you’d call any withdrawal “unauthorized”.
The only thing that can save Carrot Top now is that he obviously did it as a prank, since he did not try to disclose his identity and did not save or spread the entirety of the e-mail account content (which, if Palin’s e-mails are like everyone else’s, must contain at least some stuff that she would consider embarrassing or damaging). Basically, he just went online and boasted he had done it.
Give him a few days of community service and a job as the next director of NSA, and be done with it.
He should simply explain that he has used this opportunity to learn from the great example set by Sarah Palin and shall therefore decline to acknowledge this investigation since it has obviously been hijacked by his enemies.
Cogito Ergo Bibo: I went back on teh webz and checked out the 86 and 87 laws, and yup you are right. I even went to Lexis and found out that my head is in my ass. Right on.
Here’s a random law website (which of course is trustworthy because it is random): http://www.lawguru.com/cgi/bbs/message.php?i=898003333&view=a
Some random dude asks if this shit is illegal, and some random law dude says yes.
Case Closed. Book ‘em Dano.
Q: What do you have when a lawyer is buried up to his neck in sand?
A: Not enough sand
Sussemilch: Depends on who needs to authorize, Yahoo! or Palin. My money’s on Palin. If someone guesses the combination to a lock on a locker you rent at the YMCA, and steals your shit, does that mean they had authorization?
Q. What’s the difference between a lawyer and a vampire?
A. A vampire only sucks blood at night.
shortsshortsshorts: My evil employer overlords thank you for choosing Lexis for your searching needs. Me too. I need job security. Westlaw sux! Until I’m fired for Wonketteing all day and need a new evil overlord.
Thus ends today’s edition of Crime School. Class dismissed.
Q. What do you call a smiling, sober, courteous person at a “Bar Association” convention?
A. The caterer.
Cogito Ergo Bibo: My firm (REDACTED) has been in a BITTER fucking poke-fest with Westlaw, so yup we loves yooos.
Q. What’s the difference between a lawyer and a trampoline?
A. You should take off your shoes before you jump on a trampoline.
So where are these emails ? I wonder if there are any from her BFF Lynette Clark, AIP chairwoman.
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/10/07/palins_unamerican
On the other hand, it looks like Gawker and Wikileaks are not going to get in trouble (despite the fact that Bill O’Reilly is gay). See:
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2008/09/gov-palins-yahoo-email-account-hacked
Citing Bartnicki v. Vopper (and who doesn’t remember this gem? — clearly the Roe v. Wade of illegally gay computer hacking), it seems that if you come into information which was illegally obtained, but you were not involved in the obtaining, you can sell it to the Enquirer and the government can’t do anything about it (EVEN if you know it was illegally obtained, which is the kicker). The case has to do with intercepted cell phone calls, but the underlying principle seems the same.
I love this country.
shortsshortsshorts: Hey, their loss is our gain. Search on, my friend. In this economy, we need to keep as many happy customers as possible. Although, we need the angry ones too, but we don’t like them as much.
Aurelio: At this very moment K-Y is negotiating a sponsorship contract with him. Every cloud has a silver lining, you gloomy gus.
AngryBlakGuy:
Q: What do you call a million lawyers drowning in the ocean?
A: A good start.
Whatever, all he did was guess a password; Noob.
SystemError: “NOT GUILTY”!!! YAY! We seriously need to get on a Free David “I Did It For Teh LULZ” Kernell Defense fund. Think of all the t-shirt possibilities.
facehead: That’s interesting to know. Kewl!
facehead: AngryBlakGuy: Not all lawyers are out for blood, sometimes MONEY tastes even better.
Let the kid go. It is the Governor who mucked it by using Yahoo to get official email.
Is there even a law he can be charged with?
There’s a kernell of truth to the charges, but no reason for what we Mac users know as a kernell panic. Now the big choices begin for The Kernell: guilty/not guilty, original recipe or extra crispy. But seriously, folks, I hope the kid’s initiation as a political football doesn’t permanently sully his record; this is pettiness over a prank that only a Bush or Nixon Administration would foment.
WE ARE LEGION.
facehead: And Barry’s, Michelle’s and Biden’s profession is what?
Famous non-lawyers:
Tom DeLay
John McCain
Bush, the daddy
Bush, the son
Francisco Franco
Joe Lieberman
Sarah Palin
Radovan Karadžić
Reagan
Karl Rove
Hitler
Herbert Hoover
facehead: It ain’t armed robbery if the gun ain’t loaded.
facehead: What a 9 year old kid thinks is NOT interesting may be exactly what an Alaskan court might find VERY interesting. Plus, who knows what e-mails she actually deleted!
If she conducted ANY sort of official government related business using that e-mail account, she is in violation of all sorts of state and federal law. The fact that she had GOV as part of her user name suggests she either used or intended to use this account for state business….
I’d rather have that kid reading my mail than Andy Card. Why did they fire him anyway? I never heard.
If I were a member of the TN bar (ha!), I’d rep this kid pro bono.
Thank GOD I’m not a member of the TN bar….
sati demise: It was one of her private official channels, sadly not the one with interesting/dirty mails remaining, she deleted those already.
Whoa, the fat hobbit lost quiet a bit of weight. And picked up some internet skillz too, it seems.
Sarah Palin should just be glad that Gollum didn’t get her emails.
get a haircut, you damn hippie!
seriously this guy is a national hero for guessing a couple passwords of someone with a 90-IQ. I was actually surprised the password wasn’t Sarah.
For his community service this kid should be made to search for Bin Laden.
And do the UT football teams homework.
After I packed this kids shit, he will do anything for me.
HEY Didn’t Palin use her personal email account for public business? Would not that mean that some of the infomation stored in that account be public record or at least should be??
I mean WTF?
Where can I donate to this young man’s defense fund? Maybe he can do the investigation on her that the so-called “journalists” in this country are too lazy to do.
Was that really the security question? And what are the chances she didn’t change it even after it was hacked?
As the evidence mounts against him, and his ratings in the polls rise, it’s looking more and more likely that Ted Stevens will be re-elected and found guilty right about the same time, which means that he will serve while he serves, so to speak. Some normally left-leaning Alaskans reputedly plan on voting for Stevens because what they hell. So is it conceivable that these two would do time in the same august institution? These are strange times, indeed . . .
Pittsburgh58: http://www.rddlawfirm.com/about.html
His atty is Wade Davies. I think he’s got a good one, so to speak.
Hmm, unfortunate but not surprised that it’s the son of a Dem lawmaker. He’s doesn’t have the creepy, closet-case date rapist look.
The account I read stated the hacker guessed her account name, and then asked to change the password. He recalled from Mooselini’s interviews that she met the Dude in high school and used that answer to change the account password.
this is why i left DC:
What he elegedly did was illegal and therefore should be punished.
As a Republican I’m not pleased to see some punk son of a Democrat hacker geek (cracker is a more accurate term, by the way…’hacking’ is just for fun, ‘cracking’ is to hurt people) do this. As a computer guy, I find it interesting that Gov. Palin used a freakin’ Yahoo mail account for her personal stuff! Someone needs to give her a lesson in encryption algorithms.
http://www.offeringcommonsense.blogspot.com
–JD
So you guys think it’s ok to break into an email account if it’s easy to guess the password? It’s even easier to reach into someone’s mailbox and read all their mail. I’m sure that would be ok with you too as long as it’s someone you don’t like.