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Thread: How do you punish kids that hack?

  1. #1
    Senior Member
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    Unhappy How do you punish kids that hack?

    A friend of mine brought her son's computer to work last week. He's about 13 years old. He just wanted to upgrade his processor so I told her I would help. We went through all the fun of upgrading a compaq's processsor (torture I tell you!!). Started his computer up, it had win2k on it. Well I'm not one to be nosy, so I left it be, because bios recognized everything, and it would bring to you the login screen, that was good enough for me. Well she was curious about what her son was doing, but we didn't know the password. Well he had the HDD formatted for fat32, muhaha. After using the good old win98 boot disk, steal the sam file and a few brute force hacking program, got his password and logged in. I think he had atleast 2 or 3 trojan clients like sub7, bo, etc in plain site on the desktop. Anyway, told her to have "the talk" with him. Next day, he apparently had trojaned his brothers (it's a big family) computers and a lot of his friends computers. She's not really sure how to punish him or if she should punish him. Not really sure if he's done anything *wrong*.

    I've never really run into this kind of situation before? She is turning to me for advice, but I don't know if I will give the correct advice.

    Should I:
    • tell her to ground him and take away all computer equipment?
    • tell her that boys will be boys, no harm done (that we know of)?
    • tell her to be paranoid because now the FBI is coming to take her son away?
    • take his pc and install a copy of Linux on the other hard drive to jumpstart his tech career?
    • do nothing, hope for the best?


    I know this isn't really security related unless you are one of his friends but feedback is certainly appreciated.

  2. #2
    Computer Forensics
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    take it away. If this isn't stopped now, then its just going to get worse. She should also have a serious talk with him about it.
    Antionline in a nutshell
    \"You\'re putting the fate of the world in the hands of a bunch of idiots I wouldn\'t trust with a potato gun\"

    Trust your Technolust

  3. #3

    hmmmm tough one - i guess it depends what he was doing once he gained access......screwing around with ur bro's can be fun just as long as its nuthin malicous - but then again he may get into trouble with some form of 'higher' authority at some point if she don't have a talk with him.......

    maybe some sort of net monitor is needed? or even a firewall to block all outgoing traffic cept for ones for browser (80) etc?

    But as long as he ain't going to far with it my tendancy would lean towards the whole boys will be boys Hey theres alot worse things he could be getting himself into online!!!

  4. #4
    Senior Member
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    have her take his computer away or at least his internet access. Or if she has a friend from the police department have him come and scare the **** out of her son and see if he will do it again.
    [gloworange]\"A hacker is someone who has a passion for technology, someone who is possessed by a desire to figure out how things work.\" [/gloworange]

  5. #5

    Lightbulb

    mm... I think the kids equipment should be taken away. Yes on one hand it is only his brother and friends that he is hacking it to. But if he did this without their consent... well look at it this way. Sooner or later the kid will want to see "who else he can connect to" and he will want to explore alittle more. I'm all for exploring, when it is legal.

    I would also look at it from this view. is the kid being destructive or is he just having fun. Certainly if he is abusing the power, the power should be taken away and stronger punishment should be enforced.

    Either way the kid won't see it the parents way. (I'm 18, i know, my computer has been taken away many times) He will try and find ways to hide his crime. I think the parents should somehow present the risk he faces if he gets caught and let them know that his machine is being taken away (for a short while) to protect him from that risk

  6. #6
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    I actually found a few documents here on the site about kids and hacking. Well it seems that most here agree to "take the computer away". I should probably tell her to have a good *talk* with him and perhaps he shouldn't have his computer for a while. Although
    Or if she has a friend from the police department have him come and scare the **** out of her son and see if he will do it again.
    sounds like an interesting idea, hehe Anyway, I'll leave it up to her, but my advice will certainly help. Big thanks to everyone for the feedback

  7. #7
    Banned
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    Capital punishment.

    Only messing I recommend simply scaring him with tales of hackers in jail and taking away the internet for a while or he will escalate like all trojan users into a full blown script kiddie [this is more likely than him becoming a real hacker which some trojan users do].

    Good luck anyway.

  8. #8
    Senior Member
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    Kids and Hacking

    What to do with kids who hack?

    Well I guess this would all depend on the kid himself... What is his ethics? Why did he do it, for fun? or malicous intent? How mature is this kid? Did he think it was "l33t and keVVL" or was he just experimenting. The unfortunate truth is the internet offers many malicous temptations for children and teenages who think that messing with other peoples computer are cool. I guess the question is "what kind of kid is this? is he ignorant and deserves, for his and everyone elses good not to have access to a computer. Or is he mature enough to understand the impact of his choices?

    Just my thoughts on the subject!
    Simon Templer

    \"Your work is to discover your world and then with all your heart give yourself to it. \"
    -The Buddha

  9. #9
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    That will be left up to the mom. From what she tells me, he does really well in school, never gets in trouble at school, does his homework, respects his brothers (except for the backdoor he put on their system ) and just loves taking computers apart, putting them together, play online games, etc. I don't think he intented on breaking into a bank system, but when parents step it, it's always for a reason. I think I hated my parents a lot long ago, I thought they were strict bastards, but now I'm glad they were. But, this is out of my hands now, I wish her the best of luck.

  10. #10
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    Thankful

    Sounds like a pretty ok kid, [and smart].

    As for strict parents well mine were kinda strict but I think it dosent matter bout the parents its the kid him/herself and what way they choose to go.

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