Yesterday we learned of the arrests of five members of hacker group LulzSec, seemingly brought down by their own leader working in tandem with the FBI. Hector Xavier Monsegur, aka “Sabu”, was arrested back in June 2011 and is thought to have been working with the FBI ever since. In response, members claiming to be part of Anonymous have hacked and defaced Panda Security’s PandaLabs website.
The LulzSec saga continues, although it may perhaps be at its end in this bizarre development that reads like something out of a movie. The shadowy organization has reportedly been brought down by the FBI, who have been working with LulzSec’s own leader, Hector Xavier Monsegur, otherwise known as “Sabu”, after the hacker agreed to cooperate having been arrested in mid-2011.
There's quite a bit of hubub about the Steve Jobs FBI file that's been put up for download by any man, woman, or child who would dare read it today, but not a whole lot of people speaking about how it came to us all now, of all times. What's going on here is that the FBI was vetting Jobs for a tech job with the President - a Bush at the time. The result of this interview process was a set of papers with interviews of colleagues of Jobs speaking highly and in some cases not so highly of his character - this packet of papers is now available for download thanks to the Freedom of Information Act and a fellow by the name of Michael Morisy.
The FBI has released its file on Apple founder Steve Jobs, a 1991 investigation into the CEO that characterizes the iconic exec as both "a deceptive individual" and one of "high moral character and integrity." The contrary report documents feedback from colleagues, employers and others and was constructed by the FBI when Jobs was being considered for political office in the President's Export Council under the original Bush administration. Although many spoke positively of Jobs, others were less convinced, with suggestions that he "has integrity as long as he gets his way."
Just as authentication service VeriSign admitted it has been hit by very strong hacking attacks a couple years ago, US officials have revealed that computer crimes will be more of a threat to the country than terrorism. VeriSign is an example of how cyber attacks can affect tens of millions of civilians, but government offices are also the target of malicious hackers.
Computer programmer Bo Zhang had access to data that only a privileged few have the authority to touch. He worked for the Federal Reserve and dealt with sensitive information on a regular basis. He scored security clearance levels that most foreign entities would die for. And what happens when you get to play with hyper sensitive government data?
The saga continues to unfold in the matter of the data-mining finger-tap-recording application known as Carrier IQ, the one that just a couple of days ago the FBI was accused of using for "law enforcement purposes," and today we get a response from that bureau on whether they actually did or did not. What the FBI is saying today is that no, of course the FBI would never do such a thing. In fact, they're saying that they've never even requested information from Carrier IQ in the past, much less have they gotten any. Watch as this conversation unfolds on video, courtesy of who else by Senator Al Franken himself!
The scandal involving the data and location tracking software called Carrier IQ that's been installed on more than 140 million phones may now involve the FBI. In refusing a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Muckrock, the FBI has inadvertently revealed that it may have been using the Carrier IQ software for law enforcement purposes.
Two alleged members of Anonymous and LulzSec have been arrested by the FBI, the law enforcement bureau has confirmed, with a further suspect facing more charges. One of the men, Cody Kretsinger who goes by the LulzSec handle "recursion," is accused of assisting in the Sony hack earlier this year, Fox reports, and attempted to cover his tracks by wiping his hard-drives.
The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation, this being the real official FBI, have launched a totally legit FBI Child ID app in the iOS App Store. What this Child ID app does is allow parents to electronically store photos and "critical information" about their children for later use should their child turn up missing. In addition to being able to store info and images of your child, Child ID has an archive of information on how to keep your child safe and what your courses of action should be if they do indeed go missing. Our first question, us being part of a rather paranoid generation, is in regards to how secure this app really is, and how we'll be able to know if this information really is being kept only by the FBI OR if it'll be all too simple for predators to get the information we've shared.
A fellow by the name of Sanford Wallace, otherwise known as one of the "Spam Kings", has been charged with 11 federal criminal counts, these counts related to 27 MILLION unsolicited SPAM messages sent via Facebook servers. FBI officials note that Wallace received "substantial revenue" for this so-called "scheme" in which 500,000 Facebook users accounts were compromised. As of August 7th, 2011, Wallace has turned himself into authorities, has pled not guilty, and is free on a $100,000 bond while he faces more than 40 years in prison for his alleged crimes. Lulzsec and Anonymous have been unavailable for comment.*
Hacking groups Anonymous and LulzSec have released a taunting message to the FBI, challenging the law enforcement agency in the aftermath of recent arrests of supposed members of the groups. "Your threats to arrest us are meaningless to us as you cannot arrest an idea" the joint statement says. "Any attempt to do so will make your citizens more angry until they will roar in one gigantic choir." Meanwhile, both groups claim to have fresh caches of information, including documents supposedly from NATO.