CRIMINAL PRIORITIES

Headline on yesterday's Evening Standard: "World's worst hacker arrested in London".

If this guy was such a poor hacker, why did the police bother to catch him? Why did they waste numerous man hours and reams of paperwork trying to catch this guy? Why tie up the court system convicting him? They really should be trying to arrest the world's best hacker. I mean, that guy's doing some mean work out there and getting away with it. All those pop ups that tell you your computer may have a virus, all that irritating spam e-mail you get about Viagra and dubious cigarettes, that time we almost nuked France - that's the handiwork of the world's greatest hacker. But the police are chasing after the worst possible hacker they can find, figuring they'll make an easy arrest with that loser.

Okay, it's possible I've misinterpreted that headline. That, in fact, what the Standard is trying to tell us is that the world's most successful hacker has been arrested in London. But, just because an activity is bad doesn't mean all the descriptions get reversed, Evening Standard journalists take note. We are not living on Bizarro World here. The world's worst serial killer wouldn't be Jeffrey Dahmer or Hannibal Lecter. To date I am the world's worst serial killer. I could be on the front page of tonight's Evening Standard with a caption beneath the photograph: "I'm innocent I tell you! You got the right guy!"