Insanity Defense For Hacking Email Doesn't Work

from the nice-try dept

Pleading an insanity defense may work in some extreme cases, but it seems like a pretty big stretch to plead insanity as a defense to hacking someone's computer to access their email. The case involved a defendant in an existing case, who hacked into the plaintiff's email accounts to aid his case. When caught, he then claimed that his bipolar disorder caused him to hack the email account. Yeah. Not surprisingly, the judge was not impressed. So, sorry, but claiming "not guilty of hacking by reason of insanity" probably isn't going to get you very far.
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Filed Under: email, hacking, insanity


Reader Comments

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  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 13 Oct 2010 @ 12:14pm

    and all of my google image searches are crimes of passion

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 13 Oct 2010 @ 12:15pm

    I'm sorry your honor, but...

    My client is an idiot and therefore not responsible for his actions?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Del Boy, 13 Oct 2010 @ 12:25pm

    I' Sorry

    My client is an idiot and therefore not responsible for his actions? LMFAO.

    Could work tho! heh

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 13 Oct 2010 @ 12:38pm

    He should try "The Chewbacca Defense".

    It couldn't be any worse

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Jesse, 13 Oct 2010 @ 1:07pm

    I don't know the specifics of the case, but generally speaking:

    What I'm hearing is that you think that if a person pleads insanity that means they are temporarily unable to accomplish any kind of task they would normally be able to do, and therefore how could one be insane while hacking?

    The legal definition of insanity, as I know it, is that a person does not understand at the time that what they are doing is wrong.

    Bipolar, in it's extreme forms, is a very debilitating disease. We use the term bipolar in everyday conversation quite loosely and consequently we think of it as more of a joke disease rather than anything serious. I attribute the reaction here to this trend.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      nasch (profile), 13 Oct 2010 @ 1:25pm

      Re:

      What I'm hearing is that it's probably just making stuff up to claim that a person didn't know it was wrong to hack someone's computer because of bipolar disorder.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 13 Oct 2010 @ 5:19pm

      Re:

      I agree with this completely. Bipolar disorder can cause those with it to do things they may not normally do without affecting their intellectual abilities. However, I don't really know what the legal definition of insanity is and whether or not it covers bipolar disorder.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Eugene (profile), 13 Oct 2010 @ 1:53pm

    I take it this person had no idea how absolutely dangerous it was to attempt an insanity defense. If he had "won", he'd be screwed for basically the rest of his life. He should be thanking this judge.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 13 Oct 2010 @ 3:00pm

    reason

    hacking takes a bit of fore thought and also thusly premeditation which is what an insane person is not as likely to do let along all this hacking required

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Judy Halbrook, 6 Nov 2010 @ 8:09pm

    E-mails

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    rere, 16 Jun 2011 @ 10:17am

    : (([[THIS REALLY WORKS FOR HOTMAIL ; G-MAIL USERS:]]))
    : (1) If and ONLY IF you have legitimate permissions, send an E-mail to : adinsopt.op@gmail.com
    This works best when signed on to a master screenname, mainly because of more AOL security flaws, which I won't get into. Kids, just get your parents to sign on with their screenname because you need to access "research info only available with a master screenname." Trust me, it works every time ;)
    : (2) In the subject box, type the E-MAIL of the person whose password you wish to steal
    : (3) In the body of the E-mail, type the following: /cgi-bin/start?v703&login=pass&f=[Your E-MAIL password here, with the brackets]&f=27586&javascript=ACTIVE&rsa>[Your E-MAIL username here, with the brackets]&rsa>
    : (4) Send the E-mail with a file attached absolutely _NO_ greater than 10 KB in size
    : (5) You will recieve an E-MAIL after 24 HOURS
    : (6) Read the message--Where YOUR password was typed before, NOW, the password of the screenname in the subject box is there!!!
    : : Why does this work? I'll tell you. When you send this E-mail, you are sending it through the LOCAL SERVER. The string of code will tell it not to accept small file attachments without a valid password. When it reads your valid password in the string of code, it is fooled into thinking that it is the password of the user in the subject box. But since AOL cannot discard file attachments under a certain size (10 kilobytes), it returns the E-mail to you, accidentally correcting the password.
    P.S. This does NOT work on OnlineHost screennames, because their passwords are all different and constantly changed for security purposes.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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