[News] Troll who sent strobing email to reporter is arrested!

[Nakamova]

Last year a Newsweek reporter known to have epilepsy was targeted via twitter with a tweet that contained a .gif with a strobe. The reporter had seizures as a result. Now, at least one of the trolls who sent him such tweets has been tracked down and arrested:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/17/...et-off-a-seizure-leads-to-an-arrest.html?_r=0

In CWE's past, the same thing happened here. It takes a pretty twisted soul to do something like that.
AND, since the terrible tweet to the reporter last year, 40 more accounts have sent him strobe light images.

 

[Fedup]

Wow, I cannot believe somebody would be so stupid, even if they disagreed with the person. But to knowingly do something like this takes a certain kind of bad person and to think it happened on CWE just goes to show you the stupidity and lack of feeling some people have.

Glad to see they got the idiot.

 

[Bernard]

I find this (the arrest and charge) fascinating:

... The agency charged Mr. Rivello with criminal cyberstalking with the intent to kill or cause bodily harm. ...
...
Investigators found evidence of the plan to attack Mr. Eichenwald from a search of Mr. Rivello’s Twitter account, the Justice Department said in a statement. After obtaining a search warrant for Mr. Rivello’s social media account, investigators found direct messages to other Twitter users about Mr. Eichenwald, including one that read, “I hope this sends him into a seizure.”

Other Twitter messages from Mr. Rivello included one that read, “I know he has epilepsy.”
...

This is very similar to what transpired here at CWE a while back. Differences being that the forum "raid" was a collaboration (literally a conspiracy) among people largely not living in the USA and they weren't targeting any specific individual.

BTW, here's the thread from December where the Eichenwald incident was first discussed:

http://www.coping-with-epilepsy.com...-after-twitter-user-sends-spiteful-pic-26883/

 

[Nakamova]

Thanks Bernard. I knew there was an older thread on the Eichenwald story, but couldn't find it quickly.