Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Senator's eMail Gets Hacked

Just a few months after someone hacked Rep. Al Park's email -- and tried to get people to send him money so he could get home safely from London (Park wasn't really in England) another hacker has gotten his or her hands on the email address of Sen. George Munoz.


But Munoz's hacker isn't trying to scam money. This one is trying to kill some legislation Munoz is sponsoring.

It's not clear right now what the false e-mail said.

Here's the press release:


Sen. George Munoz (D-Gallup) said his personal e-mail address had been hijacked by an out-of-state hunter opposed to his Senate Bill 196 (SB196) in an effort to put out misinformation under the Senator’s name. “We think this is an immoral act,” said Sen. Munoz, “in that non- residents and people behind the non-residents are trying to influence New Mexico legislators by fraudulently using sponsor’s e-mail.”


The fraudulent e-mail, purportedly signed by a Longview, Texas hunter, was sent to at least one New Mexico Senator this morning. Sen. Munoz says “We should probably ask the State Police and DPS to investigate and send a strong message.”


Sportsmen have come out strongly behind Sen. Munoz’ SB196 that gives this state’s hunters a bigger share of the state’s Big Game Draw licenses. SB196 would raise the license draw quota for resident hunters to 90 percent. Current state law sets aside only 78 percent of the licenses for residents, the lowest percentage of any Rocky Mountains state.


The current law gives 12 percent of licenses to nonresidents who must hire an outfitter and another 10 percent to nonresidents who can choose whether or not to hire an outfitter. Sen. Munoz noted that the current quota law actually gives non-resident hunters better odds of drawing a license than residents in more than two-thirds of big-game hunts.


Sen. Munoz said “If a New Mexico resident can’t draw a license, many of them just won’t hunt. That’s bad for our local businesses and bad for our local families.” The change would give 3,500 more residents a chance to draw big game licenses in their own state, at the current hunt levels. “It would give thousands of additional licenses to New Mexico families, and provide them an opportunity to get out hunting and fill the freezer,” Munoz said.