#hackingcase

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1) What was this case about?

             The case was all about computer hacking, where a 19 year old British hacker, Raphael Gray from rural of Wales, was guilty for illegally accessing credit card details from thousands of people from sites with unreliable security and disclosing it in ecrackers.com and freecreditcards.com including the Microsoft founder Bill Gates' account details and notably sent a consignment of Viagra to him. He was also guilty of eight counts of unauthorized access to customer databases of his ‘targeted’ companies in the US, Britain, and Canada, which he then called himself the 'Saint of e-Commerce', and obtained computer equipment by deception. One of the reasons why he hacked when he was interviewed was that he had been concerned of the security weakness in one particular software, the Microsoft Internet Information Server.

2) Who were the protagonists and parties involved?

             There were no protagonists involved. He only relied to his computer at home. The parties involved were the law enforcers, owners of the credit card information, e-commerce sites, and other organizations who were concerned.

3) Did any prosecutions result?

            There were no results done by the prosecutors because on March 2000, he was arrested after tracing him to a computer in his bedroom by FBI agents and the local Dyfed Powys Police officers. Raphael reasoned that he did it to inform the people and users of e-commerce sites to be careful in trusting or should not trust their credit card details to any e-commerce retailers sites. He wanted to expose that e-commerce sites has a low security and is very vulnerable to hacking like what he did. Raphael faced a ten count indictment where each count is under Section 2 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990 which has an intent to use the computer to perform a function to secure unauthorized access .

4) If so, what were their outcomes?

             Raphael Gray was given two year rehabilitation for his case after proven guilty of the ten counts alleging an offence under the Computer Misuse Act 1990 but was later reduced the first six counts to section 1 charges of simple unauthorized access if the defendant pleaded guilty to the remaining four counts which are obtaining services by deception on two separate occasions, by using a credit card number to set up two separate websites to where the credit card information is displayed, and the related offences under the Computer Misuse Act section 2(1). In other words, unauthorized access.

              He had lived an unremarkable school life until he was 14 when he fell and banged his head, resulting in serious physical and mental side effects and becoming interested in computers, said by the defense. The court heard that Gray, who has "massive promise" and "intellectual gift", was unemployed when he committed the offences but later on worked in a computer software company where his talents were finally being appreciated.

5) What ethical issues are raised by this case?

             The ethical issues raised by this case was that of Raphael Gray’s intention, as it was stated in the previous part, to make the individuals and e-commerce users be aware that their credit card or personal information they posted to e-commerce sites are very prone to hacking, and may be used for bad purposes. It may sound reasonable enough and the intention was good he since it made the industry improve their system security but we must not forget that there is a law that we should abide. In Gray’s case, he violated the UK Computer Misuse acts, when he publicly exposed the credit card numbers and information, and as for the e-commerce sites and credit card owners, he had committed unauthorized access to their data which is a violation for their rights of privacy and security.

References:

Staff and agencies (2001, July 6). Welsh teen hacker sentenced.  Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2001/jul/06/security.internetcrime

Leyden, John (2001, July 6). ‘Bill Gates’ hacker escapes jail. Retrieved from https://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/07/06/bill_gates_hacker_escapes_jail/

What was this case about?

           This case is about a computer system that was hacked by an 18 years old boy named Raphael Gray from rural Wales. This case was described that Raphael Gray invaded into nine e – commerce websites in Britain, Canada, Thailand, and Japan. He exposed 26,000 credit card numbers and he revealed some of the credit card information on the Internet.

Who were the protagonists and parties involved?

           There were no protagonists mentioned. The parties involved was the law enforcement officers which he insulted, Chris Davis the one who tracked him, e – commerce sites, and other organizations concerned as well as the owners of all the credit card information he exposed.

Did any prosecutions result? If so, what were their outcomes?

           The result of prosecution was accepting that Raphael’s motivation in hacking the computer system was that he wants to expose and publish that e – commerce retailers has a low security measures which is vulnerable to hacking, and also to inform individuals/users that they should not trust their credit card information to any of the e – commerce sites.

           This results in six initials count alleging an offense under the Computer Misuse Act 1990 section2(1), alleging the defendant had committed an offense under section 3(1) of the said Act by doing an act which caused an unauthorized modification of the contents of a computer. The other four counts alleged obtaining services by deception on two separate occasions, by using a credit card number he downloaded to set up two websites upon which to display the credit card information and the related offenses of the Computer Misuse Act 1990 Section 2(1).

What ethical issues are raised by this case?

           The ethical issues that were raised in this case was that the hacker’s intention was to make the users aware that the information they entered in an e – commerce sites is vulnerable to hacking. But through this, the hacker or Raphael Gray also violated the UK Computer Misuse Act, when he made the information of the credit card numbers public. Maybe, at first, his intention was good but the owners of the e – commerce sites as well as the owners of those credit cards would basically say that his act is unethical because he make an unauthorized access to those information.

Sources:

https://jadefactura.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/research-hacking-cases-raphael-gray/