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Boy, 16, faces prison for sending bomb hoax threats to airlines
A British teenager faces a jail sentence after being found guilty of sending bomb hoax threats to two US airlines via Twitter.
The 16-year-old boy, from Plymouth, Devon, England, who cannot be named, sent messages to Delta Air Lines and American Airlines and previously admitted cyber attacks on SeaWorld in Florida and on his local police force.
According to a BBC report, American Airlines received a Tweet on February 13 2015 which read: "One of those lovely Boeing airplanes has a tick, tick, ticking in it. Hurry gentlemen, the clock is ticking."
Delta Airlines received a similar Twitter message on the same day.
Neither airline, nor US authorities, decided not to take any action on the back of the threat and the matter was deferred to UK authorities.
The judge at a hearing this week at a youth court in Plymouth said the teenager had made ‘both detailed and sophisticated’ plans and said he faced a custodial sentence despite his age.
The boy pleaded guilty to three offences relating to denial of service attacks under Section 3 of the Computer Misuse Act
He was also found guilty of two offences under the Criminal Law Act relating to the communication of bomb threats.
The case has been adjourned until July 20 for sentencing.
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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