A Swedish teenager has been charged with a 54000 euro fine after he had hacked the Swedish city Umea. The teenager had found a vulnerability which allowed him to gain access to the City network of Umea. The teenager tried to inform the city by sending them various emails with information about the vulnerabilities but the city did not respond to the information.
So the teenager decided to hack the Umea city network, but he got tracked down and got arrested. The government fined him the 54000 euro fine because the government now has to change all their passwords and they will have to pay for the investigation expenses.
I do not think that the teenager did a good thing, but I do think that the fine is ridiculous. If it was a cybercriminal, the damage would have been immense, the teenager showed them their weakness, and instead of fixing it, they take down the Whistleblower. It is a very sad case indeed…
The father of the teenager started an online petition to get the teenager free from the 54000 Euro fine.