A Canadian teen has plead guilty to more than 23 counts related to a series of “swatting” incidents across Canada and the US.
Swatting, one of the teen’s tactics, involves calling in hoaxes to police in an attempt to encourage the dispatch of a heavily-armed Swat team.
The 17-year-old admitted to offences including extortion, public mischief and criminal harassment on 15 May. He had been targeting gamers who played the popular multiplayer online battle arena (Moba) game League of Legends, particularly young women who played the game and their families.
In a swatting incident in February, Minnesotan air force veteran Joshua Peters had his house raided by armed police while he was broadcasting live to thousands of viewers. The caller, Peters later said, had given his address when they told police that someone “had shot their roommate and now they were pointing their gun at them”. Then on the phone call, the police heard “two gun shots” before the call ended.
The aim is typically only to scare the victim, but in practice it risks greater implications. The more hyperbolic the threats made on the call, the more likely the police will take an aggressive stance in response. Swat teams in the past have shot and killed a man who called a suicide hotline, thrown a stun grenade in a baby’s cot, and killed more than one family dog.
The Canadian teen was responsible for an attempted swat attack on a young woman from Phoenix, Arizona, according to the local paper Tri-City News. After cyberstalking her to the point where she withdrew from university, he called the Tucson police and claimed he had shot his parents, had bombs and would kill the police. He gave her address.
Five days later, he repeated the attack while the woman was visiting her parents. That time, police raided the home with a helicopter in support and escorted her father and brother out at gunpoint.
Crown prosecutor Michael Bauer told the Tri-City News that the victims were left shaken by his attacks. “All of his actions had a strong impact on their livelihood,” he said.
The user, whose real name has not been released due to his age, has identified himself online as a member of the Lizard Squad hacking collective, and went by the handle “obnoxious”.