Apparently Russia's President Gets Angry When You Hit His Blog With A Denial Of Service Attack

Hacker Behind Largest Credit Card Number Heist Now Claiming US 'Authorized' His Crimes

from the good-luck-there... dept

Fri, Apr 8th 2011 3:44pm — Mike Masnick

Last year, we had a discussion around the movie-like backstory behind Albert Gonzalez, and a few other hackers, who were accused of gathering the largest number of credit card numbers ever, in a series of security breaches. One of the key points, of course, was that Gonzalez was on the government payroll at the time of the hacks, acting as an informant and a security expert. Gonzalez took a plea bargain, and ended up with a twenty-year sentence a little over a year ago. However, he's now trying to go back on that, and is claiming that he actually had government authorization for the hacks themselves, and complained that his lawyers failed to defend him properly (a common complaint among those who lose). The filing is an interesting read, and given what I've seen recently about government plea bargain deals, it definitely would not surprise me to find out that the government offered something in a plea deal that it did not live up to -- and that it put pressure on Gonzalez to accept it. Of course, chances are that this appeal is going nowhere fast. The likelihood of success is pretty damn slim, so I fully expect that this appeal will go nowhere.

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Filed Under: albert gonzalez, hacking

12 Comments

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The eejit (profile), 8 Apr 2011 @ 3:17pm

Be hilarious if it actually was Government backed.
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The Devil's Coachman (profile), 8 Apr 2011 @ 3:46pm

Just kill him
That's what he deserves.
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:Lobo Santo (profile), 8 Apr 2011 @ 4:14pm

Re: Just kill him
The best way to judge a society is by how the treat the lowest of their number--the prisoners and the poor.

Is that how we should characterize America? "Just kill him"? I'd like to believe we are better than that.
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MrWilson, 8 Apr 2011 @ 6:41pm

Re: Re: Just kill him
Ironically of course, I'd count the top 1% of wealth-possessors in society as the lowest of our number - in which case we're fucked.
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The eejit (profile), 9 Apr 2011 @ 1:55am

Re: Re: Re: Just kill him
no, there are three people AMericans should fear most - Murdoch, Koch and Koch. Notice how all those rhyme with Cock.
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The Devil's Coachman (profile), 9 Apr 2011 @ 5:38am

Re: Re: Just kill him
We're not.
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MrWilson, 9 Apr 2011 @ 10:02am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Just kill him
Koch is pronounced like "coke" as in "Scott Walker is a Koch-fiend."
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Anonymous Coward, 9 Apr 2011 @ 12:13pm

Well, yeah
...and complained that his lawyers failed to defend him properly (a common complaint among those who lose.

Perhaps because those with bad lawyers commonly loose. Imagine that. The best justice money can buy.
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The Devil's Coachman (profile), 9 Apr 2011 @ 1:06pm

Re: Well, yeah
Or perhaps good lawyers don't take cases they know they will lose, because the realize the client is guilty as sin, and there is no way they won't be convicted. Hard to keep your rep as a good lawyer if you keep defending moronic bungholes with death wishes.
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Anonymous Hero, 10 Apr 2011 @ 10:27am

Re: Re: Well, yeah
Or perhaps good lawyers don't take cases they know they will lose, because the realize the client is guilty as sin, and there is no way they won't be convicted.

Bull. I've seen plenty of lawyers taking cases bad cases they knew they were likely to loose, provided that the client could afford to pay their fees, that is. And many more lawyers refusing good cases just because the client couldn't afford to pay. Your idea that lawyers choose cases on their odds of winning rather than the clients ability to pay sounds like a ludicrous attempt to hide the truth. Devil's Coachman? Sounds about right.
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WysiWyg (profile), 11 Apr 2011 @ 3:41am

Re: Re: Re: Well, yeah
Actually I think there might be something to this. Now I don't know EXACTLY how these things work, but I'm pretty sure you win/loss ratio is a part of judging if you're "good" or not. And that it directly affect how much money you can make.

Obviously "can I win this?" isn't the only thing they take into account, but rather "will this benefit me in the long run?".
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mustapha, 15 Jul 2011 @ 4:54pm

let me no your problem
PLS CONTANT ME IF YOU NEED CREDIT CARD
+2348188146684 I M THE MD OF GTBANK
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