>Where's the "Like" button?

That's the "Insightful" or "Interesting" option, which you don't have but I do. Oops!

$100 Billion may sound like a lot to you but that doesn't mean it's meaningful in regards to the actual damages done. More often than not when massive horrible things are done by Corporations (the crash of the financial/real estate markets, the Gulf oil spill, etc.) large corps get hit with penalties that look massive to an individual but actually only represent a small part of the true cost of restitution and only represent a day or two of operating profits at most for the company.

What happened in the story is so astonishingly unjustly inverted from that scenario because, in contrast, this guy was hit with the entire cost of the damages (even though he was only a tiny contributor to the actual crime, and that penalty probably represents many years worth of profits for him (minus the basic costs of living and taxes). It would be like fining JP Morgan all the Trillions of dollars that were estimated to have been lost throughout the economy because the courts didn't feel that they were likely to be able to clearly identify any of the other big players in the crime. Then, for good measure, make it so that the costs of litigating appeals of that verdict would be so expensive that it was guaranteed to drive the company into complete bankrupts (since even if this guy has a decent job and was able to afford a non-state appointed attorney for this trial it's unlikely he'll be able to hire a highly competent set of lawyers throughout the entire appeals process in the same way major companies to in order to successfully drive down the original, already too small, fines they are hit with).

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/nobody-should-shed-a-tear-for-jp-morgan-chase-20131025 [rollingstone.com]

• First of all, the settlement, as the folks at Better Markets have pointed out, may wipe out between $100 billion and $200 billion in potential liability -- meaning that the bank might just have settled "for ten cents or so on the dollar." ...
• Moreover, the settlement is only $9 billion in cash, with $4 billion earmarked for "mortgage relief." Again, as Better Markets noted, we've seen settlements with orders of mortgage relief before, and banks seem to have many canny ways of getting out of the spirit of these requirements. ...
• There's also the matter of the remaining $9 billion in fines being tax deductible (meaning we're subsidizing the settlement), and the fact that Chase is reportedly trying to get the FDIC to assume some of Washington Mutual's liability.
• But overall, the key to this whole thing is that the punishment is just money, and not a crippling amount, and not from any individual's pocket, either. In fact, the deal that has just been completed between Chase and the state represents the end, or near the end, of a long process by which people who committed essentially the same crimes as Bernie Madoff will walk away without paying any individual penalty. ...
• A few more notes on the deal. This latest settlement reportedly came about when CEO Jamie Dimon picked up the phone and called a high-ranking lieutenant of Attorney General Holder, who was about to hold a press conference announcing civil charges against the bank. The Justice Department meekly took the call, canceled the presser, and worked out this hideous deal, instead of doing the right thing and blowing off the self-important Wall Street hotshot long used to resolving meddlesome issues with the gift of his personal attention.

Charging the defendants with the cost of 'fixing' their web site is bogus, because they should have had that done in the first place to prevent themselves from being open to attack

Then you get to learn what ACTUAL violence is, either buy police officer or prison inmate.

His point is that this fellow is learning what ACTUAL violence is, by police officer and prison inmate, for doing nothing more than sending TCP packets.

Except that property damage is not protest.

Two things: A DDOS is not property damage. And are you claiming the Boston Tea Party [wikipedia.org] was not a protest?

It is possible to protest without damaging anyone or anything

It's not possible to effectively protest anything in todays America. You can have your say all you want inside free speech zones, but you'll never be heard. What good is a phone call if you are unable to speak?

First of all, you'll note I am mainly referring to the comment that the 'worst part" is that he only participated for a minute. You seem to be arguing the worst part is the fine.

I partly agree, however I would also say that computers allow us to magnify actions beyond what we can do physically - just as we can send a message to millions via computer, we can also easily do millions of dollars in damage via computer to. I can't say what the right fine would be but it's probably not proportional to what someone would think one persons fine should be...

Two things should happen when you toss a brick through a store window. First the owner or perhaps the state on the owners behalf should initiate a civil proceeding against you where minimally upon being found liable be compelled to pay the full replacement and installation costs of a new window. Additional you might reasonably be expected to compensate the owner for the temporary loss of use of his property while the windows is being repaired. You must compensate for the harm to the owners property.

Then a criminal charges should be brought against you because its not in societies interest to have people thinking they can go around and break windows. Given throwing bricks through plate glass in public places has a high probability of injuring others that penalty too should be not insignificant. When its all said and does committing a senseless destructive act of vandalism like that should set you back a few thousand dollars; in the interest of justice.

Now lets think about the DDOS attack. Its vandalism pretty similar; but unless you are DDOS a hospital, public utility, or some government sites and similar there is basically no probability of anyone getting hurt as a direct consequence. So if anything the harm is automatically much lower. Unlike the window your computer is still perfectly fine once the DDOS is over and done with. So we are really down to society wanting to discourage vandalism and the short term loss of the use of property. Seems to me the penalty might be tied to the revenue the site nominally generates during the period for the owners and a little wrist for society to remind you not to be a prick.

183K is way out of line for 60 of participation in a DDOS, even if your hitting a site like Amazon.