"Life is a mine field and sometimes you find the land mines by stepping on them and I did in this case," Fitzgerald said. "If others can benefit from my mistake, by all means take those strong measures."
Law enforcement in Canada have arrested a 16-year-old boy for gaining similar access to computers in five states and multiple cities. Fitzgerald said the first indication something was wrong came about six weeks ago, when the family was a victim of "swatting."
"Swatting is a fake call to police to bring out the SWAT team, one of the most serious police responses," Fitzgerald said. "The call was my son murdered his mother. They rolled out with numerous patrol cars at four in the morning."
It was a bogus call and so too were bomb threats phoned in at Stockton schools. It was because the hacker appeared to be making those calls from a Stockton address, police responded.
"He got remote access to the computer, got addresses, names and other information," Fitzgerald explained. "You get control of the WiFi, then you get control of every computer in the house and the phones."
Other calls brought pizza delivery workers to the house and an escort as well. Fitzgerald said some of the pranks would be considered funny if there wasn't so much damage being done.
'He (was) posting social security numbers and bank pin numbers to a hacker website," Fitzgerald said. "The numbers are still out there, with 50 attempts by identity thieves to get a credit card."
Fitzgerald blames not his son for the computer invasion, but himself.
"I needed to be a stronger parent. You're tempted to say 'let him have space', but don't do that," Fitzgerald said. "Be the parent. Demand their passwords and if they don't give them, take the computer away."
A friendship made over the online game "Minecraft" led to the hack of a Stockton family. (Wednesday, May 14, 2014)
News10
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