Computer Crime and Running Club Rivalries
What do you get when you cross a college student, a running club rivalry, and escalated permissions on another team’s website? A class C felony, apparently.
The Eden Athletics team was allegedly formed as a splinter group after a falling out with Crow Athletics. There is friction between Crow Athletics and Eden Athletics, despite the fact that a lot of the local runners in the area belong to both organizations. The person in question had administrative access to the Eden website, and she has confessed to using that access to deleting thousands of files and defacing the site.
According to Officer Shaun Faraar, she had previous administrative access to the Eden Athletics Web site. “It was a technical problem that Eden Athletics should have taken care of,” he said. “She had access but no right to delete content.”
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Brian Hubbell, Web editor for Eden Athletics, reported that the organization’s site had been hacked into and files had been deleted on Feb. 16. “We were lucky that Brian caught on when he did,” said Christine Ganz, president of Eden Athletics.
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The organization has been able to restore almost all of its Web site files, but had problems reclaiming its original location at EdenAthletics.com. “We have gone through a not-overly-friendly period,” said Mr. Allen. “But this is about one group constantly making allegations that we are somehow bad. We are putting on events that are healthy and we encourage them to participate.”
I was not aware of any of the history between the two groups, and only know a few people from either team. I find it a little humorous that there is such a strong rivalry between two organizations that share so many of the same membership. I feel some rivalries with local teams in my area, but I am also friends with the members of those teams and even do weekly workouts with some of them.
Hacking a rival team’s website is inexcusable, as any crime would be. I think that they would be better served by convincing their members to quit the other team and then to race better than them in team races. Stealing rivals to your team and winning races is the way that rivalries should be handled. Before the race and after the race, I prefer to make friends with those other guys.
Maybe I am off base, though. Do you think that it is okay to hack a rival’s website?
(Source: Mount Desert Islander)
- 50 States Marathon Club
- Race Directors » Is your event insured?
- USATF National Club Cross Country Championships
- Andy Schachat Will be the Voice of the Patriot’s Day 5 Miler
- USATF Club Cross Country Championships (2006)
March 7th, 2007 at 11:07 am
Even if you have a username an password, going into a computer system when you are not authorized to do so is inexcusable. Leaving your password active leaves you open to all kinds of fraud perpetrated in your name.
People do stupid things all the time. This will get lost in history
March 8th, 2007 at 6:29 am
Hacking a rival’s website is not ok. What a strange story.
March 10th, 2007 at 5:42 pm
This is a black eye for all running club in the State of Maine. From time to time, a organization will put on a event that is a flop or something go wrong. Maybe someone was a crook maybe not. The big problem is this negative stuff gives all Maine Running clubs a bad name. People end up thinking all clubs are dishonest.