Man charged with malware 'sextortion' plot

Federal prosecutors have accused a man of hacking into scores of computers and using the personal information he found to extort sexually explicit videos from female victims, many of whom were juveniles. Luis Mijangos, 31, of Santa Ana, California, was arrested on Tuesday and charged with extortion, according to court …

[Musical hog]

Question

"He has not been charged with the manufacture or possession of child pornography or crimes involving identity theft or the theft of credit card numbers."

one question, WHY NOT?!?!?!?!?!?

[The First Dave]

untitled

" He has not been charged with the manufacture or possession of child pornography or crimes involving identity theft or the theft of credit card numbers"

Any idea why not? If those alegations are correct then the charges should be automatic.

[Ray Simard]

Why not...?

They probably need more time to secure and process evidence before they're confident that they have a strong case they can bring to trial.

[Otto von Humpenstumpf]

The title is required, and must contain letters and/or digits

My guess is that the only victims that could be identified were of legal age, and/or there wasn't any way of identifying the juvenile victims, so their age could not be established.

So the prosecution are going for the obvious (and pretty safe) conviction, rather than jeopardising the success of future convictions with bringing a weak case now.

IANAL though, so what do I know...

[PooPoo the Korruptah]

hmmmm....

Maybe now all the nasty requests for me and my buttplug will cease?

[TimeMaster T]

Title!

Un F'ing believable.

A guy in Idaho got twenty years for having some cartoon images that looked like depictions of "underage persons" and this guy may only get two years?!

[asdf]

because he is lucky enough to live in California

where all crimes are societys fault and all the reckless spending has left precious little money for prosecuting crimes. Even as a moderate to liberal Democrat I have to laugh at that mismanaged basket case state. As ole Maynard sings:

Here in this hopeless fucking hole we call LA

The only way to fix it is to flush it all away.

Any fucking time. Any fucking day.

Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona bay.

[Raumkraut]

Think of the children!

"In all, he allegedly infected more than 100 computers used by approximately 230 individuals, at least 44 of whom were juveniles, prosecutors said."

So what they're saying is that these 44 juveniles had access to the infected computers, not that the perp elicited any material from them or had any desire to. From the article, it seems that he was only interested in 1 of the 2.3 people who had access to each computer.

AFAICT this is no more than the "authorities" cynically adding an emotive "think of the kiddies!" factor to sway the public perception against Mijangos: "Plead guilty and we won't add spurious kiddie-porn charges."

Implication is guilt in the court of public opinion.

[Sweeping Brush]

Turn off your PC.

Dammit , don't people turn off their PCs anymore.

No matter how much malware and shite is on a PC its gonna have a tough time recording you doing the horizontal dance if you just turn the damn thing off before you go to bed.

[Mike Cardwell]

Two?

If he is guilty of those crimes, then the two year maximum sentence is insane. I'd have thought at least ten years... Two years inside is an annoyance, ten years is punishment. The guy is clearly a deranged asshole.