1. Your belief about significance of the data is immaterial - these emails were private and were not intended for disclosure. The fact that you think they're not that interesting does not matter - I may think the content of your private email account is nothing of interest and will give nobody any useful information - that still doesn't give me the right to access it.
2. As I noted elsewhere, here the word "hack" is not used in a sense of "cleverly use the technology" but in the sense "used computers to access information he was not authorized to access". Unfortunately, the battle for the former meaning agains the latter is long lost, and the press is using this word in the latter meaning for years now.
The fact that he had to write the script which uses special algorithm based on geographic distribution of IDs means the information was not public and he had to commit some work and apply his own ingenuity to access it.
3. Unauthorized access of private information is a crime. I'd rather it stay so - otherwise I'd have to rely on a good will of people like Auernheimer to keep my private information private. I think the consequences of this would be very grim. The problem is not that this guy was an ass - he was an ass long before that, and still was free to commit his jackassery. Until he crossed the line between being jackass and committing a crime. I agree that it is not the most heinous crime committed in the US ever - it is probably a small crime, like petty theft or trespass - but it still is. I hope he will be punished in accordance with the severity of the crime - not too hard, not too lightly.
> I agree that it is not the most heinous crime committed in the US ever - it is probably a small crime, like petty theft or trespass - but it still is. I hope he will be punished in accordance with the severity of the crime - not too hard, not too lightly.
But he was convicted of a felony. There is no "lightly" on a felony... only varying degrees "You're F'ed!" Fines will be high. Even if probation/community service is used rather than prison (yes, PRISON... not jail), the punishment lasts for a lifetime for a felon. Many, many, many forms have a special check box for felons.
2. As I noted elsewhere, here the word "hack" is not used in a sense of "cleverly use the technology" but in the sense "used computers to access information he was not authorized to access". Unfortunately, the battle for the former meaning agains the latter is long lost, and the press is using this word in the latter meaning for years now. The fact that he had to write the script which uses special algorithm based on geographic distribution of IDs means the information was not public and he had to commit some work and apply his own ingenuity to access it.
3. Unauthorized access of private information is a crime. I'd rather it stay so - otherwise I'd have to rely on a good will of people like Auernheimer to keep my private information private. I think the consequences of this would be very grim. The problem is not that this guy was an ass - he was an ass long before that, and still was free to commit his jackassery. Until he crossed the line between being jackass and committing a crime. I agree that it is not the most heinous crime committed in the US ever - it is probably a small crime, like petty theft or trespass - but it still is. I hope he will be punished in accordance with the severity of the crime - not too hard, not too lightly.