06/07, 10:57am
Leaked documents allegedly cover PRISM, supporting systems
More documents allegedly related to the National Security Agency (NSA) and its data harvesting activities has surfaced, courtesy of hacking collective Anonymous. The group released a total of 13 documents that it claims "prove that the NSA is spying on you," and that its spying activities are not just covering Americans, but also people in over 35 different countries.
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04/04, 5:55pm
Anti-Kim Jong Un photos posted, Anonymous demands reiterated
In the latest phase of hacker collective Anonymous' attack against the bellicose North Korean regime, the Twitter and Flickr accounts associated with a North Korean propaganda site have been seized. The accounts taken over belonged to Uriminzokkiri, a web site which had 14,000 users' records stolen earlier this week by the same hacker group.
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04/02, 6:30pm
News site's Twitter account, website taken down
In its latest cyber assault, the Anonymous collective has reportedly broken into the Chinese-hosted North Korean news site Uriminzokkiri.com and pilfered 15,000 user records -- including user names, email addresses, birthdates and hashed passwords. To prove the intrusion, the group has included details for six users, including three North Koreans, and three people from China. One of the identified Korean users had an email address from the Korea Electric Power Company.
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03/15, 9:19am
Charged on three counts for part in LA Times defacement
A social media editor for Reuters has been indicted for his part in an Anonymous hack on the Los Angeles Times website at the end of 2010. Matthew Keys, charged with counts of conspiracy to transmit, transmitting, and attempted transmission of information to damage a protected computer, faces penalties for each count of up to five or ten years in prison, three years of supervision, and fines of $250,000.
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02/04, 4:59pm
Reveal part of 'operation last resort' Aaron Swartz activism
Hacker collective Anonymous, in an attempt to provoke computer crime law reform in the US, has published the personal information of over 4,000 bank executives on the Alabama Criminal Justice Information Center's website. The leak is part of the group's "Operation Last Resort" developed in the wake of technology maven and hacker Aaron Swartz's death, believing that the lead prosecutor in the case was less interested in justice than career advancement; the group also holds that outdated computer crime laws contributed to Swartz's suicide.
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12/07, 1:33pm
British hacker faces 10 years in prison for attacks
A British hacker has been found guilty for his part in a Distributed Denial of Service attack against payment services. Anonymous member Christopher Weatherhead, attacked MasterCard, Visa, and Paypal after they turned away from processing payments for Wikileaks, as well as music industry companies, in attacks costing those involved over $5.6 million.
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11/04, 7:03pm
Hacktivists to remember fifth of November with Facebook attack
Hactivist group Anonymous is rumored to be planning an attack on social networking giant Facebook tomorrow, marking Guy Fawkes Day by taking down the site unless Zynga backpedals on what Anonymous contends is a plan to cut 1,000 jobs. Tomorrow's action would also include the release of Zynga's games for free download. Anonymous claims that Zynga's job-cutting maneuver is inexcusable in light of the company's significant financial reserves.
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05/22, 12:14pm
Hacking group video has TV network personality speaking
Hacktivist group Anonymous has reportedly leaked data belonging to the United States Bureau of Justice Statistics. A torrent posted on The Pirate Bay contains an “entire database dump” of the website and internal e-mails, writes ZDNet. A video from Anonymous claiming the hack also contains footage of a man on a mock news program speaking to a camera and wearing a Guy Fawkes mask.
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05/01, 7:00pm
Video details targets, dates of local protests
In a video recently uploaded on YouTube, hacker activist group Anonymous has changed its traditional direction. Nodding to recent countermeasures to distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks against targeted websites, Anonymous announced a list of companies and dates for more conventional protesting. The group plans traditional protests beginning May 1 against companies that support the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), recently approved by the House of Representatives.
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03/07, 3:35pm
Vatican website down after Anonymous attacks
The Vatican website was inaccessible on Wednesday, after hackers from the Italian arm of Anonymous attacked it. The group's motivation was reportedly the Roman Catholic Church's scandals and conservative doctrine, according to Reuters. The hackers claimed centuries-old arguments as the reasons, such as selling indulgences in the 16th century and burning heretics during the days of the Inquisition.
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03/06, 12:05pm
Main LulzSec members arrested in Europe, US
Three top-rung members of hacking group LulzSec have been arrested by the FBI on Tuesday morning, Fox News reported. Two others were charged with conspiracy, all thanks to the cooperation of the organization's leader, 29-year-old Xavier Monsegur, otherwise known as Sabu (pictured). He pleaded guilty on August 15 of last year to 12 counts related to hacking, fraud, and identity theft and has worked with the government since, sources told the outlet.
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02/07, 8:25pm
Hacker tried to extort $50k to "humiliate" company
Symantec has revealed that a hacker has followed through on a threat to release the source code for the company's pcAnywhere utility software. The hacker, known as YamaTough, took the action after negotiations via e-mail for a forced payment of $50,000 failed. The exchange, it has been revealed, was actually between the hacker and police in a sting.
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02/03, 2:45pm
Anonymous shares secret FBI investigation call
The hacking group Anonymous has intercepted a 15-minute call between the FBI and the British police's cybercrime investigators, according to a Friday report. Available to download, the conference call ironically focused on how to track and prosecute the very group of hackers. The FBI has launched an investigation into how Anonymous able to attain the recording, which has some names of the suspects edited out.
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01/19, 5:50pm
Anonymous carpet bombs Megaupload opponents
(Update: FBI too) The forced closure of Megaupload and accompanying arrests may have backfired on proponents after Anonymous launched one of its largest attacks ever in retaliation. Multiple statements from the hacking collective confirmed they were responsible for successful denial of service attacks against the websites of the Department of Justice, MPAA, RIAA, and likely arrest instigator Universal Music. All of the sites were partly or completely unresponsive as of early Thursday evening.
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10/11, 11:10pm
Sony locks down 93K accounts after possible breach
Sony's chief security officer Philip Reitinger warned late Tuesday that there had been a "massive" account cracking attempt on the PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment. While it failed against the wide majority, the attempt successfully cracked the login info for about 93,000 accounts, 60,000 of which were PSN. All of those accounts were locked down to prevent a hijack, Sony said.
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09/22, 8:25pm
Arrests occur in San Francisco and Phoenix
The FBI has reportedly arrested two individuals who are accused of participating in hacking attacks organized by LulzSec and Anonymous. The Justice Department suggests charges have also been filed against a third suspect, while search warrants have been executed at separate locations in New Jersey, Minnesota and Montana.
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09/02, 4:25pm
Two more arrested in separate investigation
Scotland Yard has announced two more arrests in conjunction with recent online attacks by hacker groups Anonymous and LulzSec. The arrests, made separately, were the result of a continuing investigation by the Yard, the FBI, and other law enforcement agencies into alleged illegal criminal activities by the two hacker groups. The men, aged 20 and 24, were charged with conspiring to commit offenses under the Computer Misuse Act 1990.
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08/08, 11:45am
AntiSec reveals 10GB of US police private data
AntiSec hackers said they have made their biggest hack and revealed it to the world by posting 10GB of confidential US law enforcement information, the group revealed in a statement. This move, the group said, is in response to the arrests of Anonymous and LulzSec hackers. The so-called Shooting Sheriffs Saturday dump is said to include private e-mail, passwords, addresses, social security, credit card numbers, informants, training files, and more.
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07/11, 8:50pm
Hackers target military contractor
Anonymous has continued its hacking campaign, claiming responsibility for an attack that targeted US military contractor Booz Allen Hamilton. The group reportedly posted e-mail accounts from 90,000 military personnel associated with the consulting company. Leaked accounts are said to include the Air Force, Marine Corps, Department of Homeland Security, CENTCOM, and SOCOM, among others.
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07/03, 11:10pm
Anonymous hack Apple survey site because it can
Anonymous on Sunday boasted of a minor hack into Apple's servers. The rare move scraped a list of admin users and passwords for a survey site from a MySQL table. A statement from the collective claimed it as part of its AntiSec (anti-security) push but also implied that it had more important targets.
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06/29, 1:55pm
Anonymous hacks officers of Arizona Border Police
The hacking group known as Anonymous has once again hacked the Arizona Border Police servers, Gizmodo reported on Wednesday. This time around, however, Anonymous claims it has acted alone and taken social security numbers, photos of girlfriends, and more personal information. This information was reportedly taken from twelve Arizona police officers.
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06/29, 8:40am
Anonymous hacks Universal Music, Viacom
Anonymous is reported to have hacked into the Universal Music and Viacom servers. According to the Wall Street Journal [sub. req.], the group has released a cache of files that it claims represents the passwords and other user data stolen from a Universal Music affiliated site, as well as those from Viacom networks. The group is also thought to have absorbed members from the recently dissolved LulzSec, ‘Antisec’ group.
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06/23, 8:10pm
Internal documents posted for review
Hacking collective LulzSec has continued to keep up a swift pace in its hacking endeavors, today announcing that it has released hundreds of documents from Arizona law enforcement e-mail systems. The documents are claimed to include personal correspondence, private intelligence bulletins, training manuals, and other information, some of which is classified as sensitive and not intended for public disclosure.
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06/21, 2:00pm
LulzSec quickly dampens rumors of UK trouble
Lulz Security quickly shot down any claims that it had been embroiled in UK trouble. The hacker collective argued that reports of the hack were "fake" and that its Twitter account was the authority. Everyone in the group was accounted for, it added, leaving any UK arrests to either unrelated cases or innocents.
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06/20, 4:45pm
Group teams with Anonymous to take down sites
Hacker group LulzSec has continued to cause trouble for government websites, today claiming to have taken down the UK's Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) website. "Tango down - soca.gov.uk," the group posted on its Twitter feed. The tweet also made a reference to "Operation Anti-Security," a campaign that aims to oppose alleged corruption in business and government.
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06/10, 10:20am
Spanish Police arrest three Anonymous hackers
Spanish National Police on Friday said they have made three arrests from what they believe is the Anonymous group of hackers, the New York Times reported. Members of the group are believed to have been responsible for the crippling of Sony's PSN gaming servers and Sony Entertainment Online. One of them is 31-year-old man who was detained in Almeria.
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05/29, 5:25pm
LulzSec plans new wave of Sony hacking
Hacking collective Lulz Security teased on Sunday that it was about to launch a fresh campaign against Sony "within the next day." Following attacks on Sony Music Japan and elsewhere, the first phase of "Sownage" (Sony ownage) was coming along with a "pre-game show." As expected, the group didn't name its targets other than some Sony websites.
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05/09, 7:45am
Sony says PSN may stay partly down until May 31
Sony spokesman Shigenori Yoshida said Monday in Tokyo that the ongoing PlayStation Network outage wouldn't be resolved until May 31. While basic service didn't have a timetable for coming back, it wasn't expected to impact a more definitive plan to have everything back by the end of the month, he told Bloomberg. PSN is due to come back with a new security model and will require a password change along with new PS3 and possibly PSP firmware.
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05/07, 12:05pm
Sony stalls PSN restoration as names leak
Sony in an update said that its PlayStation Network restoration would take longer than expected. The company was still in final testing but said "additional comprehensive system checks" were needed before it went back up. The company explained that the estimate given at its media conference in Japan of a week-long process hadn't factored in the then-unknown SOE breach and needed extra time.
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05/06, 9:00pm
Sony mulls price on head of PSN hackers
Sony might offer a cash reward to whoever could turn in those who hacked into the PlayStation Network. A slip from sources said Sony was actively discussing the prospect of a bounty and, if it went ahead, would team with regional police to coordinate the payout. The electronics giant hadn't settled on a reward as a course of action and would need top-level approval from Sony headquarters to go ahead, AllThingsD said.
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05/06, 4:10pm
Splinter from Anonymous said at fault for PSN hack
A pair of unnamed Anonymous members alleged on Friday that the PlayStation Network hack was the fault of a splinter group from their team. While the larger group has publicly denied involvement, the two told the FT that one or a small number of those backing OpSony, the campaign to punish Sony for limiting and suing over PS3 jailbreaks, decided to go further than everyone else. One of the two claimed to have seen details of an exploit posted shortly before the hack went through.
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05/04, 1:20pm
Sony at PSN hack hearing says Anonymous sign left
Sony in a statement given to the Congressional hearing on the PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment hacks implicated Anonymous in the attack. Consumer Product head Kaz Hirai claimed that a file had been deliberately left behind in the attack on SOE that was named "Anonymous" and had the activist hacker coalition's slogan "We are Legion" inside. While not directly accusing Anonymous, it made a link back to the earlier protest campaign and implied strongly that Anonymous was to blame.
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04/04, 2:50pm
Sony faces impact from Anonymous on PSN, PS3
Anonymous has quickly acted on threats to attack Sony's network for its lawsuit against PS3 jailbreaking by hitting out at the company's websites. Along with reports of European and North American PlayStation pages being hit, the company said at mid-day that PSN service was randomly going offline due to "sporadic maintenance." Website access was up as of Monday afternoon, but PSN has been less stable.
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04/04, 12:45pm
Anonymous threatens to attack Sony websites
A hacking group known simply as Anonymous has announced it will turn its attention to Sony for the legal action it's taken against hackers such as George Hotz for hacking the PS3 console. In an open letter to the electronics maker, Anonymous wrote "your recent legal action against our fellow hackers, Geohot and Graf_Chokolo has not only alarmed us, it has been deemed wholly unforgivable." According to CNET, Anonymous has accused Sony of abusing the judicial system in order to censor information on how its products work.
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