UFO Hacker to Be Extradited
[Interview] Gary McKinnon claims to have seen online evidence of UFO technology

Nigel Watson (NigelXL5) Email Article Print Article

Published 2006-07-10 12:52 (KST)

After four years of legal wrangling and several hearings, British Home Secretary John Reid has signed papers to extradite Gary McKinnon to the United States. McKinnon has until July 18, 2006, to make a final appeal against this decision.

Gary McKinnon

©2006 Nigel Watson

McKinnon is charged with gaining unauthorized access to U.S. security computer networks at a time when it was still recovering from its worst-ever terrorist attack on Sept. 11, 2001. This is accordingly seen as equivalent to a terrorist attack itself on U.S. security networks.

McKinnon was indicted by New Jersey and Virginia District Courts in Nov. 2002.

In New Jersey, he is accused of stealing passwords and hacking into the Earle Naval Weapons Station Colts Neck computer system. The court accuses him of using the commercially available software system RemotelyAnywhere to access the NWS Earle network on April 7, 2001, during June 18-21, 2001, and on Sept. 23, 2001.

In Virginia, the charge is that he caused $900,000 worth of damage by hacking into computers in 14 states during February 1- 22, 2002.

The U.S. has since removed from the original indictment all mention of his having gained unauthorized access to civilian computers in American universities, etc., after at least six of the civilian establishments denied that Gary had caused any damage. This could still lead to his receiving a 70-year prison sentence in the U.S., the risk of being sent to Guantanamo Bay and the possibility of fines of up to $1.75 million.

Gary McKinnon's defense is that he was searching for evidence for the existence of UFOs and for the technology of free energy.

He regards himself as a bumbling computer nerd who just wanted to hack into computer systems to find out more about aliens. From his home in North London he systematically searched through computer networks used by NASA, the Pentagon, U.S. Navy, Army, and Air force facilities, as well as by civilian systems.

By way of mitigation, McKinnon claims that his hacking was not very sophisticated or malicious. Armed only with a copy of The Hacker's Handbook, a computer with a paltry 56kbps dial-up modem and a tiny Perl script available from off-the-shelf software, he was able to scan for blank passwords and scan 65,000 computers in about eight minutes. He was then able to hack into computers that had inadequate firewall or password protection. Using the codename "Solo" and taking time zones into account, he avoided detection as he looked for classified information relating to UFOs.

There was some hope for McKinnon when a note from the U.S. Embassy was produced at a hearing on April 12, 2006, saying that if he were extradited he would not face charges under military law designed to deal with suspected terrorists. Defense witness, attorney Clive Stafford-Smith, based in the U.S., said, however, that since the note was not signed it was not binding and that the U.S. need not provide any evidence for their charges, according to the U.K. Extradition Act of 2003.

When a continuance was obtained to another hearing on May 10, 2006, at Bow Street Magistrates Court, London, his defense argued that McKinnon might be held as an enemy combatant and subjected to inhumane treatment. Judge Nicholas Evans rejected these claims and referred the question of his extradition to the Home Secretary, the Hon. John Reid. Denied access to the Internet, McKinnon has been on bail and plans to appeal.

As a teenager Gary read science fiction novels and joined the British UFO Research Association (BUFORA). These interests, combined with The Hacker's Handbook, led him to seek for evidence of UFOs on the Internet. As he put it in a telephone interview with me on May 19, 2006, "Hacking for me was just a means to an end."

From his reading he felt that governments have suppressed anti-gravity and UFO-related technologies and information about free energy. He feels that "This should not be kept hidden from the public, when pensioners can't pay their fuel bills."

He came across something called the Disclosure Project, whose Website explains that it is "a nonprofit research project working to fully disclose the facts about UFOs, extraterrestrial intelligence, and classified advanced energy and propulsion systems." Gary emphasized that it contains "400 testimonials from everyone from air traffic controllers to those responsible for launching nuclear missiles -- very credible witnesses. They talk about reverse technology taken from captured or destroyed alien craft."

He found the most direct evidence of suppressed UFO evidence in Building Eight at NASA's Johnson Space Center. His slow dialup connection struggled to download graphics, but he was able to glimpse a picture of a silvery, cigar-shaped object with geodesic spheres on either side. It had no visible seams or riveting and certainly did not look man-made. It looked as if the photograph had been taken by a satellite above the craft. There was no reference to how big or small this object was. As he was downloading this information during what he calls his "crowning moment," someone at the center discovered what he was doing and disconnected him.

On another occasion, he obtained access to Excel spreadsheets entitled "Non-Terrestrial Officers," containing the names and ranks of U.S. Air Force personnel who are not registered anywhere else. There was also information about ship-to-ship transfers, referring to vessels not logged anywhere else by the U.S. armed forces.

He speculated that these references could be to real but very secret space missions or could be part of some form of military strategy game, outlining hypothetical situations. He was certain that "The military want to have military dominance of space." I asked him more about his interest in UFOs. He told me.

"I was a member of BUFORA as a teenager but, with starting work and other things, my interest in UFOs lapsed. When I was in my mid-thirties I got back into UFOs. This was because there is so much information about them on the Internet, without having to pay for magazine subscriptions."

What do you think are the most important UFO books?

"I've never bought a UFO book in my life. With the Internet, there is no need to. I used mainly to download files and information. Now of course I can't because I'm not allowed access to the Internet as a condition of bail. At the moment I have given up studying UFOs because I've got to concentrate on dealing with my legal case."

What do you think about claims of alien abductions?

"I think some are attention seekers. A lot are made up, a few do seem to be real. I read about one case involving a mother and daughter. They saw a saucer-shaped craft and suffered from radiation sickness."

Do you think there are actually ETs visiting us, then?

"We seem to be getting technology from recovered ET craft, or we are making reproductions of it. The U.S., Britain, and Russia know about them. I imagine most members of the United Nations know about them. They have government departments to collect reports, but when it comes to suppressed technology, that is dealt with by so-called black projects; there are a lot of defense contractors who deal with this kind of thing."

Musing about the legal issues he told me, "It's weird. This is the worst time of my life, but I'm meeting interesting people, discussing UFOs and the like, but I wish it was under better circumstances."

In an interview with Gary's mother via email she told me.

"I don't see Gary as having hacked, as the doors were left wide open. Gary isn't a hacker.

I see Gary as having trespassed into an unknown but fascinating new cyber world, which he then explored, although I agree he shouldn't have. The fact that you can sit in your own room and explore a cyber universe has to fascinate anyone with a curious mind, but I still wish he hadn't done it. I'm seriously concerned for his safety.

Gary is a kind and gentle person and the thought of him being locked up when he's never hurt anyone and would be the first to help anyone to me is wrong. The crime is that there was no security, and the American government should be ashamed of how bad their security was, many years after Mathew Bevan was accused of virtually the same thing.

UFO's are fascinating, as is the mystery that surrounds them."

Writing in his editorial for UFO Review, Stuart Millar considers Gary to be naive, but added.

"As fundamentally a coward, I admire the activities of those much braver than me and would give them every encouragement. To an extent, people like Gary McKinnon and Mathew Bevan do our dirty work, and I feel that to an extent we are in their debt even though I know there are some of you reading this who will not agree with me on that point. I wish Gary every success in fighting his extradition and believe that the combination of British justice and a desire on the part of the American intelligence community not to see their dirty washing laundered in public may swing things in his favor."

Stuart Millar told me that an example is being made of Gary because he has caused embarrassment to the authorities. "It is they who are culpable for not having tight enough, or any, security, for their computers. Whatever they do to Gary will not stop the next kid sitting in his/her bedroom from trying to access information in this manner." He continued, "Men in suits in anonymous buildings are hiding information from us. I'm full of admiration for the likes of Gary McKinnon and Mathew Bevan. Their actions are attributable to frustration, information is being kept from us, and they want to find it and make it public."

Gary makes an excellent scapegoat. His knowledge of ufology and hacking is not very sophisticated. You would also expect him to be bored with the same questions, and might be forgiven if he was suspicious about his words being used against him, yet I found him very easy to talk with, and he did not seem to hold anything back.

He seems like a pleasant and well-meaning person who has stumbled into a legal minefield that could cost him his liberty. Can this veritable Forrest Gump really be thrown to the lions? Given the concerns about national security, the answer is frighteningly inevitable.

UFO researchers are as divided as everyone else about McKinnon's activities. Greg Boone, writing at Virtually Strange, reflects the attitude of many ufologists towards McKinnon's plight:

"The way things have been going I fear for the well being of McKinnon. Sure he committed a crime, but being extradited to the U.S. is like a pending death sentence. To have his own countrymen sell him out is very disturbing. It's not like he was running amok and stabbing people or running them over with cars. Heck, there are guys who put up spamming programs and even password hacking stuff that should do more time."

In contrast, Paul Kimball, states.

"I must be the only guy associated with ufology who feels like the whole McKinnon story is just one big waste of time. After all, we only have his word that he was booting about looking for UFO information, and that he 'found things.' Consider me less than impressed and not fooled.

And, on the off chance that he WAS stupid enough, or stoned enough, to be hacking into the Pentagon to look for info on UFOs, then he has no one to blame but himself...I'll save my sympathy for people who deserve it."

The last words on the matter are these, taken from the pledge to oppose Gary's proposed extradition to the United States.

"It is a reflection on our world when people who murder, rape, and abuse children get sentences of as little as six months.

Our U.K. government/home secretary recently released hundreds of criminals, including rapists and murderers from abroad, some of whom have very recently committed murder again in the U.K., yet our government wants to send Gary to America to face seventy years in jail for a computer hacking offence."



To pledge your support for Gary McKinnon or to add your comments online visit:

http://www.pledgebank.com/FreeGary
http://FreeGary.org.uk

References

The Disclosure Project at:
http://www.disclosureproject.org/

Gary McKinnon: Complete Moron or Ufological Hero? Or both? UFO Review, March/April 2006, Number 15 at:
http://www.uforeview.net/documents/issue15.doc

United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Indictment at:
http://files.findlaw.com/news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/cyberlaw/usmck1102vaind.pdf

United States District Court, District of New Jersey, Indictment at:
http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/cyberlaw/usmck1102njind.html

This is an updated and shorter version of an article published in the July edition of UFO Magazine (U.S.A.).

©2006 OhmyNews

Other articles by reporter Nigel Watson