Unless I’m missing something this seems like a huge fucking overreaction and maybe get this guy some behavioral therapy or whatever. He’s incredibly talented and it would be a damn shame to waste that in a hospital. I’m guessing he’ll get a chance to be released, but some rehabilitation would go a long way and I don’t think his life should waste away in a hospital prison
The court heard that Kurtaj had been violent while in custody with dozens of reports of injury or property damage.
A mental health assessment used as part of the sentencing hearing said he “continued to express the intent to return to cyber-crime as soon as possible. He is highly motivated.”
I’m assuming that’s why. Hopefully they can put his mind to good use because he seems to be talented and is clearly motivated.
Despite having his laptop confiscated, Kurtaj managed to breach Rockstar, the company behind GTA, using an Amazon Firestick, his hotel TV and a mobile phone.
This sounds all impressive, and MacGyver level. But I need more info. Did he just cast his phone screen to the TV so he could see better while he used ssh or ftp in to a poorly secured port at Rockstar or did he do some crazy shit.
Yeah, that is about what happened. According to the BBC, he had purchased a keyboard, mouse and Fire TV stick to “connect to cloud services”:
In a “flagrant disregard for his bail conditions”, jurors were told that police found an Amazon Fire Stick in his hotel TV allowing him to connect to cloud computing services with a newly purchased smart phone, keyboard and mouse.
Right, lol, so the fellow could have just connected to a free cloud VM running Kali and run some scripts, or more likely got access to Rockstar cloud services by social engineering a password out of someone. Riveting stuff, hah
The boy hacked Rockstar using a TV, a fire stick and a phone! I think he deserves a medal, a scholarship and a high payed job as a security consultant, not punishment. Instead they destroy his life for … being too smart and too talented?! Fuck capitalism!
He sounds like a very troubled kid: “ The court heard that Kurtaj had been violent while in custody with dozens of reports of injury or property damage.”. He is deemed a danger to himself or others so is being placed is a secure hospital for safety, hopefully he will get treatment there. He will be released if the doctors deem he is no longer a danger.
Are there any reports of him being violent outside of custody though? If not, he is obviously not a danger to the public and the primary problem is that he was put in custody.
I think the real problem (and not saying I agree, just the motivation of the legal system) is that he keeps saying he intends to keep breaking the laws he's been convicted of.
In most countries, that doesn't go down well.
Having said that, this is a stealth whole life tariff. These should be reserved for the most heinous crimes. The sadistic/multiple murderers and the like. Not compulsive hacking.
Yeah people like to ignore the part where it says something along the lines of " he will stay in prison hospital for life or until a doctor determines he isn’t a danger to himself or society."
I think the problem is that once institutionalised, it can be very hard to get out.
But also it's quite important to remember they've determined he's a danger to society because he won't stop hacking. If that's the bar they're testing for, maybe it's a long wait in store.
The judge said they confined him because he said he’d do it again. Not because of violent outbursts, which without further information do not rise to the level of involuntary commitment.
Sounds like he had serious issues in life and wouldn’t likely be able to hold a job or complete a scholarship. Not to mention he’s ruined any form of trust you would need to be a security consultant.
A mental health assessment used as part of the sentencing hearing said he “continued to express the intent to return to cyber-crime as soon as possible. He is highly motivated.”
The jury was told that while he was on bail for hacking Nvidia and BT/EE and in police protection at a Travelodge hotel, he continued hacking
This doesn’t sound like a kid that accidentally found some loopholes in a website and got lost down a rabbit hole. Instead it sounds like he deliberately knew what he was doing was wrong but didn’t give a shit and was quite happy to blackmail users why threatening to reveal their personal data he had stolen.
Let’s hope they can reform him over time, poor kid.
Savants are on the spectrum but are genius. You cannot remove one without the other. The reason they are so brilliant is because part of the brain has been sacrificed to increase another part.
Obviously treatment is still good but you can’t change it
The part where you didn’t understand what I said, misinterpreted it so badly, assumed something that wasn’t implied, and went on a rant equating people with dangerous severe mental illness (as in the kid in the article) to people in the creative arts.
Once I read that book describing many cases of extreme mental deviations like those you refer to here : having both extreme mental abilities in one very specific domain while having big social issues. You name a few historic cases of people which could very well be of this kind. People here reading what you write are skeptical (to put it politely) as I was at first reading that book, but those cases do exist,
… and a few of us understand what you say.
Appreciate it but I don’t really bother with what the masses think of me. Joan of arc I remember is thought to have had schizophrenia. However she had an uncanny ability to rally people around her. Not sure that could be classed as savant.
The masses are generally unwilling to remove themselves from the status quo. Happy with their lives and just want a simple life.
Why learn about anything.
More than likely most of the most well known artist were so spectacular because they weren’t “normal” normal people do normal very well. They font excel and push the boundaries of human existence. Gotta be fucked out to push past that. Drugs can do it to some degree but for real greatness you need to be abnormal
“Drugs can do it to some degree” … you are typing very fast I guess … but still I understand and I agree. I am probably myself about 2xSigma outside of the norm and (mostly) happy to be so.
You have clearly strong views which makes conversations more animated and interesting : I am happy to hear that you are fine with this.
Typing on phone can autocorrect for some reason. I’ve no idea about out of the norm, but I’d expect it to be pretty likely. No worries. Happy to converse whenever. I’m a bit head strong but happy to be proven wrong
I agree with most of what you said, but what the hell does it have to do with capitalism? He committed a crime and this is the justice system at work. Capitalism is irrelevant. I think a diversion program would have been more appropriate. He obviously has talent and needs to be redirected to apply it in more constructive ways that are legal.
Czech police say several people have been killed and “dozens” injured in a shooting near a university in central Prague.
University staff were told to “stay put”, barricade themselves in rooms and turn off the lights, Reuters reported.
Targ Patience, a British-Australian who was staying in a flat near the scene, told the BBC that he heard “a lot of gunshots”.
Unverified images from the scene appeared to show people clinging onto the outside wall of the university building, several storeys up.
It read: “Stay put, don’t go anywhere, if you’re in the offices, lock them and place furniture in front of the door, turn off the lights.”
If you are reading this page and can’t see the form you will need to visit the mobile version of the BBC website to submit your question or comment or you can email us at [email protected].
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France has had quite a few for example. Although these were more organized terrorist attacks than lone gunmen.
But most shootings in europe are most often done with air rifles or small caliber weapons, access to automatic weapons is extremely restricted and rare. So the death toll is also much smaller. For example, school shootings in my country (which borders the czech republic) are very rare and make big headlines but most often result in a few wounded, not dozens killed like the US.
Not to detract from the sentiment, but automatic firearms have been fully banned in the USA for 40 years now and have been illegal in most of the country since the 1930s.
I guess the article title has been changed, now it says “indefinite hospital order” which, as far as I understand, means reevaluation every 6 months until he’s deemed “safe” to society.
bbc.co.uk
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