In December the notorious DDoS group Lizard Squad led a number of attacks against Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network. Some of the attacks were only days apart and other attacks were done during the winter holidays. Since December, attacks have been sparse with both Xbox Live and PSN going down once in May and Lizard Squad claiming responsibility for the service interruptions.
Two members of Lizard Squad were arrested in relation to various cyber-crimes after the holiday DDoS attacks in the UK and Finland. Yesterday, the Julius "zeekill" Kivimaki, 17, was sentenced by the Finnish Justice system. Today, the dust has settled and the details on Kivimaki's sentence have been made official.
Regardless of the massive amount of convictions Kivimaki was hit with, he will not be going to prison. Kivimaki was sentenced with a two-year suspended sentence and have his online activities monitored. Let's be honest, someone who is as good at using the computer as he is can probably fake some activities for them to monitor while tending to other activities off the radar.
A suspended sentence means that Kivimaki will have two years of probation for his actions.
Kivimaki helped lead the attacks on Xbox Live and PlayStation Network in December and was charged and convicted of 50,700 computer crimes including, data breaches, felony payment fraud, telecommunication harassment and various other fraud and violations of company secrets.
Blair Strater, one of Kivimaki's harassment victims, told the Daily Dot that he was “absolutely disgusted” by the light ruling. Strater and his family was harassed by Kivimaki through identity theft and by 'wreaking havoc' in their financial and personal lives. According to Strater, Kivimaki's harassment even led to Strater being raided by SWAT team.
“I’ve lost complete faith in the justice system, and that includes the FBI. He’s harmed American targets and the FBI should have stepped in by now,” saud Strater continuing his conversation with the Daily Dot. “The reality is, Julius Kivimaki will never be made to pay for his crimes.”
After the conviction, Lizard Squad had a statement of their own to make:
All the people that said we would rot in prison don't want to comprehend what we've been saying since the beginning, we have free passes.
— Lizard Squad (@LizardLands) July 8, 2015
Swatting and doxxing are dangerous and definitely affect the victims in more ways than having SWAT teams enter their home.
