14 DAY TRIAL // The British Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has announced its decision not to prosecute Gary McKinnon, a Londoner wanted by the U.S. authorities for hacking into numerous military and government systems. The hacker previously agreed to plead guilty if prosecuted in the UK under the Computer Misuse Act.
Between 2001 and 2002, Gary McKinnon hacked into 97 computer systems belonging to the U.S. Military and NASA, prompting U.S. authorities to name him the biggest military hacker of all times. Arrested in 2002, McKinnon has faced extradition several times, but his lawyers have always found ways to avoid it.
The U.S. investigators claim that the damages the hacker did amounted to $800,000 at the time. McKinnon dismissed these claims, saying that he only hacked into the systems in search for UFO technology that he thought the U.S. government was hiding and that he did not damage any data on them.
The House of Lords rejected the extradition appeal made by Gary's attorneys last year, but at the beginning of this year they sent a letter to the CPS claiming that, if it agreed to prosecute him in the UK, the hacker would plead guilty. Being sentenced in the UK would have most likely put an end to any extradition effort.
The British Crown Prosecution Service explained its decision by the difference in amount of evidence it has compared to the U.S. authorities. According to Alison Saunders, head of the CPS organized crime division, the Service has enough evidence to prosecute McKinnon for nine crimes under the Computer Misuse Act, however "The evidence we have does not come near to reflecting the criminality that is alleged by the American authorities."
Gary's mother, Janis Sharp, noted that her son was vulnerable due to his medical condition and that he shouldn't be treated as a terrorist. Gary McKinnon has been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome and his doctors argue that locking him in a maximum-security prison will have a devastating impact on his mental health.
Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos commented that "My own opinion is that when the really serious cybercriminals are the ones doing it for money, stealing identities and creating botnets, should we really be making such an example of a guy who appears to have been just a UFO conspiracy theory nut?" The security researcher also pointed out that "There is a danger that McKinnon is being used as a whipping-boy by a country embarrassed about the poor security of its computers in the days after September 11, 2001."
However, the British hacker has one more chance of avoiding being shipped to the U.S. Back in January, the High Court judges have also granted him a judicial extradition review, regardless of the CPS decision. The review is scheduled to take place sometime in March.