http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/5209779.htm Associated Press Feb. 18, 2003 TURLOCK, Calif. - A Turlock High School senior has been arrested for allegedly hacking into the school district computer network and taking encrypted files. Police believe the 17-year-old intended to prove that the system was vulnerable. Police said the student had told his computer teacher about the system's flaws, and the teacher told the network administrator about them, but the administrator told the teacher that exploiting that security flaw was not possible, said Sheriff's Sgt. Adam Christianson. So police said the student, who was arrested Feb. 5, broke into the network, which contains personnel records and grade reports, copied encrypted files with user names and passwords for the district's 1,300 employees and took the data home. Police said that at home, the boy decrypted the information using a free Web download. Police said he then took the information to school and showed his computer teacher. "What he should have done is offer to sit down with the teacher and the administrator and demonstrate the hole with their permission," Christianson said. The school district is in the process of securing the system, and has sent out a letter to employees advising them on precautions to avoid having their identities stolen, said Lars Christensen, an assistant superintendent for the district. Investigators are still trying to figure out how deeply into the system the student went, how long he has had access to it and if anyone else has hacked it. The district has filed expulsion charges and will press criminal charges against the student, Christensen said. "We consider it very serious. One of the most difficult things is we're depending on the perpetrator of the crime to tell us what he did," he said. "He had the ability to see everything we have." - ISN is currently hosted by Attrition.org To unsubscribe email majordomoat_private with 'unsubscribe isn' in the BODY of the mail.
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