Teen Hacker Who Brought Down Xbox and Playstation Networks Guilty Of 50,700 Charges

One of the hackers who brought down Microsoft’s Xbox Live and Sony’s Playstation Network has been convicted of 50,7000 charges related to computer crimes.

That's a lot of charges.

According to Finnish newspaper Kaleva – helpfully translated by Daily Dot – 17-year-old Julius “zeekill” Kivimaki will not spend any time behind bars, instead receiving a two-year suspended prison sentence as punishment.

He will also have his online activities monitored and his PC confiscated. That's right; the punishment is only slightly worse than that doled out by a reluctant parent to a kid who was caught visiting some, ahem, unsavoury sites.

Kivimaki was charged with data breaches, felony payment fraud, violations of company secrets and telecommunications harassments.

His age at the time of the crimes – 15 and 16 – was reportedly taken into account during sentencing.

One of his victims, Brian Strater, was disappointed with the leniency of the sentencing, noting instances where Kivimaki orchestrated the deployment of SWAT teams to Strater’s home based on false threats.

That seems significantly worse than the typical 'fake pizza order' prank run by most teenagers.

Kivimaki has been identified as a member of Lizard Squad, the group who claimed responsibility for the Xbox and Playstation hack that ruined our summer.

As "zeekill", he acted as spokesperson for Lizard Squad during the time of the hack, making him super popular and endearing himself to millions.

Not really. Everyone's pretty bummed about how this sentencing has gone down. Except for Lizard Squad of course. They're laughing it up on Twitter. We'd link to them... but you don't need that noise in your life.