Hacker loses extradition battle
Computer hacker Gary McKinnon lost the latest round of his fight against extradition to the US when British prosecutors refused to bring charges against him.
Mr McKinnon, 42, from Wood Green, north London, is accused of sabotaging vital American military systems after the terror attacks of September 11 2001.
His lawyers appealed for him to be prosecuted in Britain on lesser charges, but the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) rejected their request.
Mr McKinnon insists he was only looking for evidence of UFOs when he hacked into a series of US military networks in 2001 and 2002. He has signed a statement accepting that his hacking constituted an offence under the UK's Computer Misuse Act 1990.
His supporters say he acted through "naivety" as a result of suffering from Asperger's Syndrome - a form of autism - and should not be considered a criminal.
But the US military alleges that he caused 800,000 dollars (£550,000) worth of damage and left 300 computers at a US Navy weapons station unusable immediately after the September 11 atrocities.
Mr McKinnon's legal team hoped to avoid his extradition by having him prosecuted in the UK, and made a formal request for this to director of public prosecutions Keir Starmer in December.
The CPS said it found enough evidence to bring charges against the hacker under the Computer Misuse Act for obtaining "unauthorised access with intent". But Alison Saunders, head of the CPS organised crime division, said: "The evidence we have does not come near to reflecting the criminality that is alleged by the American authorities."
The CPS also decided that the case was best prosecuted in the US. Mrs Saunders said: "The bulk of the evidence is located in the United States, the activity was directed against the military infrastructure of the United States, the investigation commenced in the United States and was ongoing, and there are a large number of witnesses, most of whom are located in the United States."
Glasgow-born Mr McKinnon is accused by the US of "the biggest military computer hack of all time". He allegedly hacked into 53 US Army computers and 26 US Navy computers, including those at US Naval Weapons Station Earle in New Jersey, which is responsible for replenishing munitions and supplies for the Atlantic fleet. He is also accused of hacking into 16 Nasa computers, one US Department of Defence computer and one machine belonging to the US Air Force.
-Nova
