Update: What’s next in the Palin hacking case?
By Chris Gaylord | 10.08.08
Today we got the latest word on the Gov. Sarah Palin’s hacked e-mail account.
David Kernell, the University of Tennessee student suspected of breaking into the governor’s personal e-mail account, turned himself in to the FBI this morning and headed to federal court for his arraignment. He pleaded not guilty to the one count of accessing a computer without permission.
While he was released today without bond, the upcoming trial carries some serious weight. He faces up to five years in prison (one-quarter of his 20-year-old life), another three years of “supervised release,” and a $250,000 fine.
Yesterday’s indictment didn’t provide much new insight into Mr. Kernell’s alleged hack – mostly because someone going by the online name “Rubico” (which prosecuters think was Kernell) posted a fairly detailed account of how he broke into the Palin’s Yahoo e-mail. We reported on the backstory here.
<< Pro sports leagues give us a mix of digital experiences | MainThe hacker also showed the vulnerability of many web-mail services, such as the vice presidential candidate’s Yahoo e-mail. Rubico describes sneaking into the personal account by guessing the simple security questions set up by the governor: where she met her husband, her birthday, and home Zip code. After answering them correctly, Yahoo issued the hacker a new password, “popcorn.”
A quick Google search could uncover such data for many public figures, yet many of us still use such easy hurdles to secure our e-mail, banking, and credit-card accounts.
With little new news on the subject to report, many media reports have turned their attention to Kernell’s father, state Rep. Mike Kernell, the Democratic chairman of the Tennessee Government Operations Committee. “I was not a party to anything of this nature at all,” he told the AP. “I wasn’t in on this – and I wouldn’t know how to do anything like that.”
Comments
2. Coronella Keiper | 10.08.08
So, are we correct to quess that this young man is related by much less than five degrees of friendship to SSSSSSSSarah Palin? Seems obvious that she paid someone to put him up to it.
Snakes In Suits: When Psychopaths Go To Work, by Dr. Robert Hare, so perfectly analyzes her style that it is difficult to remember that the book came out two years ago, when she was manipulating, using, and then throwing to the side people in just one state.
If the young’un had read Snakes In Suits by Hare, he would have learned to ignore bad advice.
Coronella Keiper
p.s. to those who care: I am a Bible believing, “The Lord Jesus Christ reigns to the glory of God The Father” spouting, refuser of fakes like Sarah Palin.
3. Will | 10.09.08
I’ve not used Yahoo, but at all other sites where I have had to provide responses to be used if I forget my password, the site itself has provided the list of questions, and I have had to select one or more of theirs to use. Usually only about a third or a fourth of the questions are usable (I can’t give my brother’s name because I don’t have a brother; I can’t name a favorite artist as it could be a painter, sculptor, or musician, and it varies from time to time; I can’t use my mother’s maiden name because there are varying spellings of it, and since it was never my name, I didn’t learn which spelling she used; etc.) So the options are limited, and anyone who wanted could register, thus discovering the available options, and making it easy to run over that list with public information, thus changing my password.
So it seems to me that the failure here is in Yahoo’s setting up of a verification system, not in a user using the provided system. If mishman had half a brain, one would think that he would have noticed that.
A better system, it seems to me, would be to require the user to make up their own questions, and provide answers, but I can’t recall having seen that anywhere. Perhaps there are technical reasons that argue against it, but I think as more and more of us use online services, the people who create websites should find a way to deal with this flaw.
As to punishment, I think a lot of young people try to hack because they think they are doing no harm and face no consequences. Jailing and fining those that are caught might send a message to the rest that they should find a more useful outlet for their talents.
4. alfred | 10.09.08
I do not see reason : why I have to all keep so secured : name, password etc?
I have no secrets, I have no money- my money has bank.I not doing any crime,
I just live.Who want bother me? Who need to know somthing about me?
My privet e-mails are just for reall my friend. Who can cary this?
But: if somebody get this not cesuret to much informations and used for crime: should be punishet for his crime!
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1. MichMan | 10.08.08
Here’s a 20 year-old kid whose only crime is hacking into the e-mail account of a deserving idiot. If this VP candidate had half a brain she would have better protected her account and also not used it illegaly for Alaskan state business. Give the kid a medal instead of jail time.