Car technician gets suspended jail term over 320 hacking attacks on Hong Kong government
Car mechanic given suspended jail term after he launched 320 attacks on government website
A motor vehicle technician received a suspended sentence yesterday for launching more than 300 hacking attacks on the Hong Kong government website in five seconds during last year's Occupy protests.
Yu Tat-sing was jailed for four months, suspended for two years, by Kwun Tong Principal Magistrate Ernest Lin Kam-hung after the 39-year-old pleaded guilty to one count of criminal damage. He was also fined HK$8,000.
The charge accused Yu of launching more than 320 attacks on the site on October 4 last year.
Jailing Yu, Lin said: "It is an intended and planned attack to affect the operation of the government. The court has to pass a deterrent sentence and send a clear message to society that such acts will not be tolerated."
In earlier court proceedings, Yu's lawyers argued that he had launched the attacks because he was dissatisfied with the police's use of tear gas against Occupy protesters in late September.
But in yesterday's mitigation submissions, his solicitor Kane Mak said that Yu acted on impulse, and merely vented his anger at the government after he divorced his wife and closed down his pet shop.
The lawyer did not mention anything about the protests.
Mak said that his client felt remorseful immediately after he ran the automatic hacking software and therefore stopped it after five seconds.
The court heard that parts of the webpage were down during the attacks. However, the magistrate noted that there was no evidence that the government's operations were affected.
Addressing Yu's reasons for initiating the attacks, Lin said: "The court would not consider the motive, however noble it is. And his motive is not noble at all."
Yu's parents, two sisters and employer were in court to show him support. They submitted letters of mitigation to Lin.
A University of Hong Kong study last month showed a huge spike in cyberattacks on both supporters and opponents of the pro-democracy protests last year.
Study author Dr Chow Kam-pui said up to 10,000 computers were involved in one attack on Occupy supporters. Attacks on the government and its supporters, encouraged by international hacking collective Anonymous, were less sophisticated but still highly disruptive, Chow said.
