College Student Sentenced for Hacking passwords to rig Campus Election

Matthew Weaver, a former Cal State San Marcos student was sentenced one year of prison for stealing almost 750 students password and using 630 of those accounts to cast the ballots.


22 years old Mr. Weaver was a third year business student when he planned to win election as president of the school's student council.

A month before the election Weaver bought three keyloggers.Authorities reports that Weaver installed keyloggers on 19 school computers to steal the passwords.

It has also been reported that he had done a bit of research with computer queries such as “how to rig an election” and “jail time for keylogger.” (utsandiego news reports)

According to a report, Weaver had planned the plot in early 2012. Authorities have found a PowerPoint presentation on his computer about the stipends for the president.

The plot unveiled when in March 2012, the last day of the four voting period, when computer analysts found anomalous activity on one of the college lab computers and they also received an email from a student complaining that the system didn't allow her to vote.

It was then that the technicians called campus police, who found Weaver at the school computer. He had keyloggers with him and was arrested.

After getting caught, Weaver with one of his friend created fake facebook ids for different students and indirectly mentioned a plot against him.
“He’s on fire for this crime, and then he pours gasoline on it to try to cover it up,” the judge reportedly said during Monday’s sentencing hearing.

The school held another election and cleaned security breach at a cost of more than $40,000, which the schools want back.

Meanwhile Mr. Weaver pleaded guilty to three federal charges, including wire fraud and unauthorized access to a computer and is under one year prison sentence.