US man convicted for helping thousands steal Internet service
- 03 March, 2012 03:47
- Comments 9
An Oregon man has been convicted of seven courts of wire fraud for helping thousands of people steal Internet service, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
Ryan Harris, 26, of Redmond, Oregon, was convicted Thursday by a jury in U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. He faces a prison term of up to 20 years and a fine of up to US$250,000 on each of the seven counts.
Harris was owner of the company, TCNISO, which distributed products that helped customers steal Internet service, the DOJ said in a press release. From 2003 to 2009, Harris distributed software and hardware tools that allowed his customers to modify their cable modems to disguise themselves as paying customers, the agency said.
The products included a packet sniffer, called Coax Thief, that intercepted Internet traffic so that the users could obtain the media access control addresses and configuration files of surrounding modems. TCNISO and Harris offered customer support, primarily through forums on the TCNISO website, to assist customers in their cable modem hacking activities, the DOJ said.
"Mr. Harris tried to hide behind the banner of freedom of access to the Internet, but the evidence established that he built a million dollar business helping customers steal Internet service," Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer of the DOJ's Criminal Division, said in a statement.
Harris' lawyer wasn't immediately available for comment on the conviction.
Harris' sentencing is scheduled for May 23.
Grant Gross covers technology and telecom policy in the U.S. government for The IDG News Service. Follow Grant on Twitter at GrantGross. Grant's e-mail address is grant_gross@idg.com.
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Comments
D smith
1
The article needs proofreading. Convicted of seven "courts"? That's a lot of courts.
Paul Farmer
2
And all the investment bankers who brought the US ecomomy to it's knees in 2008 are still walking around free. Apparently this guy didn't steal enough so he wasn't "too big to fail" (or is it too big to charge?).
Mike
3
There is a big difference between this guy and the bankers. This guy stole from a corporation, not vice-versa.
JD
4
Doesn't sound like he stole anything, just sold stuff the allowed people to hack their cable modems. I guess it won't be long before you can go to prison for selling a screw driver if someone uses it to remove the door and break into someone's house.
JP
5
Yes, but the primary purpose of the screwdriver is not to break into someone's house. I own many screwdrivers and not one of them has stolen anything or been used in such a theft, nore were they promoted for that purpose.
To quote one of my early mentors, you may not see the cost at your level, you just don't know where to look. Nothing is free, if we all pay for what we use then it will be a more fair place.
Dave
6
The purpose of these modded cable modems was to have full control over the cable modem which allowed to do allot of very specific and detailed diagnostics to address many issues that may come up with running a cable modem.
This is a legitimate use and a much needed one for a private cable contractor looking for such diagnostic equitment but not wanting to pay 3 or even 4 times as much as it would to buy one of this guys modems and even then not having as good and as many diagnostic features as these modems do.
Of course having full control of the modem and the needed knowledge to circumvent the ISP's authentication process to get online can also result in stealing service but I would think that would be on the person owning the device, not the one selling it.
popo
7
Ah yes, Dave -- but the purpose of a structured mortgage-backed derivative is to misrepresent-risk and assign elevated value to otherwise worthless paper. ie: To steal from those who buy it. It is garden-variety "fraud" by any definition of the word.
Those who created them, and made fortunes are still at large and still making million-dollar bonuses on equally fraudulent scams which continue to injure the innocent and cost taxpayers millions.
Rich
8
@JP
this is only true in a Socialist nation, which the US is, but is not.
lp
9
If you were to sell screwdrivers with detailed instructions on how to use the screwdriver to commit a particular crime, and then provided guided technical support directly to customers that were having trouble committing said crime, you would probably go to prison too!