In the UK, as in most countries, the instrument of Mudd can not be considered illegal.
On Tuesday, April 25, a British citizen was sentenced to two years in prison for creating Titanium tool by which the hackers staged a powerful attack on computer systems around the world.
The guy, almost never leaving the house and suffering from the attacks of his classmates, was able to make a profitable business out of his bedroom and landed in jail for developing threat of cyber weapons.
Did what you did
When 20-year-old Adam Mudd heard that going to prison because of his outstanding ability, his face reflected no emotion. At trial, he admitted that he really developed a Titanium Stresser is a tool that literally worshipped the most seasoned hackers. With his help, was attacked nearly two million sites in the USA, Russia and Chile.
In 2014, Mudd, already tired of stupid classmates in College, I noticed that he had been robbed. Naturally, this upset him, but he hoped that the police will find the culprits and return his things. After he realized that no one is going to conduct a serious investigation, he just came home and knocked 70 educational sites in the district. Brought trouble to his College and apparently for fun, hooked the University of Cambridge.
At the age of 16 student-loser launched its program to full power and began to rent it based on their own business strategy. He was calculating a separate price for each attack depending on its duration, and in the process sold premium accounts. It all worked like clockwork, and Mudd all day sat at a computer in his bedroom.
Seems that the parents did not even know that their son is a born programmer earning on your talent a lot of money. They naively believed that the teenager doesn’t get along with classmates and with the head goes into computer games. He was expelled from College, he almost never left the house and, as it turned out only on the court, suffered from Asperger’s syndrome. Mother and father Mudd learned about the dark deeds of his son, only when they broke into the house police. They demanded that the guy unlocked the computer, and he only yielded to the persuasion of his father.
Yes, it’s made in Titanium a lot of money, but it’s not particularly interested. When Mudd turned eighteen, on its balance there were already more than 400 thousand pounds (more than 28 million rubles), but the family did not know about. He didn’t bought, and was only saved money and improved software.
At the final hearing, the judge Michael Topolski was clearly favorably situated to the Mudd: he repeatedly stressed that the boy had grown into good, respectable family, and early showed extraordinary ability. In his speech Topolski assured the guy that in the future he will make a brilliant career as a programmer and in need of special services, but the next two years he will spend in prison.
Too much stress
In the UK, as in most countries, the instrument of Mudd can not be considered illegal. This is the so-called stresser — program to check the stability of resources. The Creator of a load the server is responsible only in the case that knowingly sells services hackers causing damage.
Stresser of Titanium in the cyber environment quickly recognized is very convenient: it automatically reloaded need website standard queries that allow you to quickly disabling. Some stresser used to verify the functionality of the website, but Mudd knew that strangers paid him big money not for the sake of the test, and to commit real crimes.
For those interested in the work of Titanium Stresser 15-year-old came up with a winning marketing solution: first attack can be carried free of charge, however, just 60 seconds or at the same level.
But the owners paid account to use the tool for different attacks on several levels. As a bonus it was “useful” stuff: software for “bombline” email addresses of letters, the program to define the IP addresses and other tricks to track the victim. For premium clients, the student came up with such nice options as parallel double the load on the servers of the victims.
The attackers transferred money to the bitcoin wallet or a prepaid card PaySafeCard. Customers could use stresser to attack the prey from 100 seconds ($3) to 30 thousand seconds (over $ 70).
Created in the bedroom business brought the Mudd stable income and, more importantly, finally let the teenager feel valued, respected figure. He was available at any time of the day and worked independently as a technical support.
Probably a little Mudd would continue to remain unnoticed by law enforcement, if his product at some time is not used to attack the servers of Sony and Microsoft. Stresser, the British proved themselves worthy and from 2013 to 2015, several times left in offline game servers, used by the PlayStation and Xbox. Later on the court said that Titanium was used for the attack on Minecraft, Runscape and TeamSpeak.
It would be better studied
In case the Mudd drew the attention of the American journalist and expert in the field of information security Brian Krebs. He said that authorities in many countries are already dealing with stressare. Although by themselves the program is not a violation of the law in the US and Europe from December 2016 issued arrested more than 30 people.
The journalist remembered how once his investigation is about “fighting against corporations” — hacker group Lizard Squad brought him to the Finnish teenager Julius Kivimaki, who was part of the group made more than 50 thousand cybercrimes. The guy gave himself when in an interview on Sky News praised the hackers behind the attack on the servers PlayStation Network and Xbox Live. Young scammers were proud that we were able to knock down such a major player, “which brings users a lot of money for a subscription”.
In July 2015 Kivimaki was sentenced to two years in prison. The judge, as in the case of Maddon, after his release, advised the guy to fight cybercrime. Finn joined the hacker community at the age of 15 years, as did the defence and the prosecution could pursue a career on the bright side, think about their actions while in custody.
Case Mudd was widely reported in the UK: local authorities insist that in this situation, not so much to blame the guy how many people around him, lack of education and carelessness of parents. At the final hearing, the judge seems to be sincerely regretted that he read out the guilty verdict, and more than once reiterated that the abilities of gifted children just need time to redirect in the right direction.
“The case of Adam Mudd deplorable, because this young man is obviously very gifted, but he chose to exchange their talent for personal gain at the expense of other people’s misery. We just want to make it clear that the real penalty for minors is not our personal whim and the desire to teach young people to take responsibility for their actions. It is important that other equally gifted students understand that before set foot on the path of crime. Parents, if your kids are out of the room, at least ask what they are doing on the Internet”, — stated in the message of the local police.
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