Parent alert: What is your child doing with his laptop?
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: A 14-year-old boy was recently arrested for a cybercrime-related transgression after logging onto his teacher’s computer and changing the desktop background. The eighth grader was subsequently charged with offense against a computer system and unauthorized access, the latter of which is classified as a felony.
The Tampa Bay Times reported the Pasco County sheriff’s department took action after Domanik Green of Paul R. Smith Middle School in Holiday, Florida, used a teacher’s administrative password to long onto a school computer and change its desktop background to an image of two men kissing.
The machine, which was compromised in late March, also had encrypted questions for Florida state exams on it, but district officials say Green did not access them.
“I logged into a teacher’s computer who I didn’t like and tried putting inappropriate pictures onto his computer to annoy him,” Green told the Times.
Green had previously received a three-day suspension for accessing the system inappropriately. Logging into the school’s system was a well-known trick, Green said, because the password was easy to remember: a teacher’s last name. He told the Times he discovered it by watching the teacher type it in.
“Even though some might say this is just a teenage prank, who knows what this teenager might have done,” said Sheriff Chris Nocco. “If information comes back to us and we get evidence [that other kids have done it], they’re going to face the same consequences,” he warned.
Green was released into the custody of his mother from Land O’Lakes Detention Center on April 8. He’ll likely be granted pretrial intervention by a judge, sheriff’s detective Anthony Bossone said. Green also received a 10-day school suspension.