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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!princeton!down!tilt!smw
From: smw@tilt.UUCP (Stewart Wiener)
Newsgroups: net.misc,net.legal
Subject: Password hacker gets probation
Message-ID: <90@tilt.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 1-May-84 09:24:03 EDT
Article-I.D.: tilt.90
Posted: Tue May  1 09:24:03 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 2-May-84 04:31:19 EDT
Organization: Princeton Univ. EECS
Lines: 26

As reported in this morning's Washington Post, Gerald Wondra, a 21-year old
from the Milwaukee area, was sentenced in U.S. District Court to two years'
probation for gaining "unauthorized access to computers at a Los Angeles bank
and a New York hospital....  Wondra pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor counts
in connection with his part in a scheme by local computer enthusiasts to gain
unauthorized access to computers.  The loosely knit group of young computer
hobbyists or 'hackers' became nationally known as '414s,' the telephone area
code for the Milwaukee area.

Thoughts:

(a)	At least the media equated the honorable term "hacker" with "computer
	hobbyist" instead of criminal.  Not a perfect definition, but they
	seem to have learned a little.

(b)	Who thinks this guy should have served time in prison?  I don't, but
	then I favor probation for most "white-collar" (or victimless) crimes.

(c)	Does anyone know just what misdemeanor Wondra was charged with?  There
	are lots of laws on the books that the D.A. might have tried to apply
	to this case.  Which did they settle on?

--
	   Stewart Wiener		:-)   "Avast, ye scurvy corporate
	Princeton Univ. EECS		:-)  swabs!  Prepare to be boarded!"
	 princeton!tilt!smw		:-)     --Oliver Wendell Jones