I’m thinking about Gary McKinnon.

For anyone who doesn’t know: Gary McKinnon is a 43 year old Scottish hacker (actually a cracker, but no one ever gets that right any more) facing extradition to the US for computer security crimes. He has Asperger’s, and it’s likely that the stress of extradition and trial in the US would cause him serious harm and possibly put him at risk of suicide. US legal expert Joseph Gutheinz writes bleakly of McKinnon’s prospects in the US system.

McKinnon says he caused no harm to the systems he infiltrated, although he clearly embarrassed the hell out of the Pentagon; he located and trawled through a bunch of unsecured (Windows) systems and left snarky notes for people to find telling them to improve their security. He was, he says, looking for evidence of UFOs.

He used a 56k dial-up modem to do it.

In the grand tradition of this kind of thing, the US Government says he caused millions of dollars’ worth of damage and is a major criminal. Honestly? Did you forget to throw in the cost of feeding the cat? And the paperclips you bent when you realised how many of your computers were completely open?

Guys, I don’t want to be unkind here, but you have waaaay more serious problems. China’s GhostNet is kicking your ass from here to Beijing. 

The US has by now wasted more money on trying to extradite a minor eccentric with a psychological condition than he ever cost the country in the first place, even if the six/seven figure estimate is accurate. I assumed this was a Bush War, but it seems to be carrying on regardless of the new administration. Go figure.

But the people who really, really suck in this story are not the US administration. No, indeedy. The real stinkers are right here in my beloved London town. And let me tell you why…

Fun With Extraditions

The introduction of the 2003 Extradition Act in the UK was apparently intended to cut down on red tape in extraditions. (Um. For red tape, should I be reading ‘due care and attention to the merits of the case’?) It has been widely criticised as asymmetrical. In essence, many MPs and lawyers feel that it’s much easier for the US to demand extradition of someone from the UK than the other way around. And it is. (There’s a curious argument that the US can’t make the treaty reciprocal because the Constitution doesn’t allow it, so somehow that makes it less odious. Um. No. It just means that either the US has an unreasonable provision asserting rights citizens of other countries don’t have, or it has a reasonable provision and we should have the same. Either way… no, no. Sidetrack.)

The relevant bit is this: prior to the 2003 Act, the Home Secretary could intervene in an extradition if it was seen as ‘wrong, unjust, or oppressive’. But we can’t do that any more. Indeed, we don’t even get to ask for evidence of a crime. We just hear the charges and say “oh, okay”.

This government simply doesn’t want to get involved, anyway. There was the possibility that he could be tried here. There still is. This would, as I understand it, block the extradition. Lord Carlisle, the government’s Anti-Terror advisor (and incidentally a very, very smart man I met briefly in some BBC back room), has urged the government to prosecute McKinnon. They refuse.

I can’t help myself. I just think he’s been sold for chum. 

So: Free Gary McKinnon.

Because he’s just some schmuck.