By Donna Leinwand Leger
USA TODAY
An influential computer hacker turned FBI informant led investigators to his former accomplices, helping federal agents make their first significant crack into Anonymous, a cybergroup that attacks corporate and government websites.
Four members of the international computer hacking group LulzSec were charged Tuesday with a worldwide conspiracy after the legendary hacker known in Internet circles as Sabu exposed the inner workings of the sophisticated attacks.
LulzSec hackers are allegedly part of a loose confederation of computer saboteurs known as Anonymous, which has “waged a deliberate campaign of online destruction, intimidation and criminality,” according to an indictment made public Tuesday in a federal court in New York.
Twitter, where many hackers boast of their conquests, lit up with recriminations after the indictment disclosed that Hector Xavier Monsegur, 28, of New York, had pleaded guilty to federal hacking charges in August. He worked for the FBI for eight months following his June 7 arrest, according to a sworn statement by Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephanie Christensen.
"#Anonymous has grown beyond #Lulzsec,” tweeted @AnonymousIRC, a Twitter handle for the hacking group. “We’re sailing close to the wind, our crew is complete and doing fine.”
The indictment alleges that Monsegur and others attacked Visa, MasterCard and PayPal websites after the companies refused to process donations to Wikileaks; launched cyber-raids on government computers in Tunisia, Algeria, Zimbabwe and Yemen; and stole confidential data for about 70,000 potential contestants on The X-Factor.
Monsegur’s lawyer, Peggy Cross-Goldenberg, declined to comment.
Others indicted are Jack Davis, 29, of the Shetland Islands; Ryan Ackroyd, 23, of England; and Darren Martyn, 25, and Donncha O’Cearrbhail, 19, both of Ireland.
Prosecutors say after Ackroyd, Davis, Martyn and Monsegur formed LulzSec in May 2011, they hacked PBS in retaliation for unfavorable news coverage of Wikileaks. During the PBS breach, the hackers allegedly inserted a fake article claiming dead rapper Tupac Shakur was in New Zealand.
O’Cearrbhail is charged with hacking the personal e-mail of an Irish police officer and accessing a conference call with the FBI about the Anonymous investigation.
Separately, federal agents arrested Jeremy Hammon, 27, of Chicago, and charged him with hacking Stratfor, an Austin intelligence company, in December. Prosecutors say that breach exposed private information of 860,000 people.
Copyright 2012 Gannett Company, Inc.