The true message was that the sender knew where the receiver lived. The hammering on the door simulated what he warned could come next: so-called swatting, making a prank 911 call that sends gun-toting cops to the victim’s address. Swatting can get people killed."
“An Ohio video gamer who played a role in a hoax phone call that led police to kill a man in Kansas was sentenced Friday to 15 months in prison, authorities said.
Casey S. Viner, 19, was one of three defendants in a case of “swatting” – making a false report to send police somewhere – that led Wichita police to erroneously shoot and kill 28-year-old Andrew Finch at his front door in December 2017.”
FROM:
CNN
An Ohio gamer gets prison time over a ‘swatting’ call that led to a man’s death
“Is the internet real life? The courts don’t seem to think so. But a little-known case hints at a way forward.
A Washington state trial court recently awarded video game developer Bungie almost $500,000 in damages from a “Destiny 2” player who subjected one of its employees and his wife to a barrage of racist, abusive and otherwise alarming calls and messages.
The culprit is a so-called hate raider — which means that he makes a habit of coordinating with fellow racists to spam players of color with bigotry until they shut down their gaming streams. This time, he chose as his target a “Destiny 2” community manager who had the gall to share a Black fan’s tribute art.
“I was wondering if you could add a [n-word]-killing DLC to my favorite video game?” he inquired in a voice mail, using an acronym for downloadable content. Then a text to the wife’s personal phone: “You’re a fat bitch and [the community manager] is a limp wristed homo. … ADD A [N-WORD] KILLING DLC.” After that, he sent a pizza to their door.
This sequence of events may seem more distasteful than dangerous … if you don’t spend much time on the internet. To the extremely online, the details are terrifying. The trick is bridging that gap.
If you’ve never heard of Bungie, and you’ve never heard of “Destiny 2,” maybe you’ve never heard of GamerGate — a year-long campaign by angry, misogynist, mostly male computer nerds and forum-dwellers to heckle and threaten feminist members of the gaming community out of online existence.
Of course, that most people have never heard of any of these things is part of the problem…
But the key to the case, it turns out, was the pizza: a “virtually inedible, odiferous” $50 monstrosity that the respondent ordered to the petitioner’s doorstep. His instructions were explicit: “Knock at least five times. I’ll probably be wearing headphones.”
The true message was that the sender knew where the receiver lived. The hammering on the door simulated what he warned could come next: so-called swatting, making a prank 911 call that sends gun-toting cops to the victim’s address. Swatting can get people killed."
MORE AT:
The Washington Post
Opinion Finally, a court case takes online threats seriously
July 31, 2023 at 6:45 a.m. EDT
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