Faking sick apparently no longer works to get out of school or homework. Nowadays everything has to be much more dramatic—something Harvard student Eldo Kim knows all too well.
The Harvard undergrad has been charged with faking a bomb threat to escape taking a final exam for one of his science courses. Twenty-year-old Kim admitted to the FBI on Tuesday that he sent the bomb threat—the Monday warning that shrapnel bombs were set to go off soon—by using a temporary email address and a temporary IP Address.
After reporting the threat (Kim said he added the word “shrapnel” to the email to make the threat more dire), he casually walked to class. When the emergency alarm began to ring and students were evacuated, Kim knew that his plan had worked. However, the payoff didn’t last too long.
Harvard officials were able to locate Kim by the end of the day as he had used the Harvard wireless network to create his fake addresses, which left digital footprints in the Internet snow.
Due to the bomb threat, three buildings in the Harvard Year were closed, which included Emerson, Sever and Thayer, in addition to the nearby Science Center where Kim was scheduled to take his exams. Some people say the international response after the Boston Marathon attack prompted law enforcement officials to respond quickly and intensely to prevent any new attacks—especially one at a prestigious university like Harvard.
The bomb hoax charges come with a penalty of up to five years in prison and/or up to a $250,000 fine.