The group of hackers who carried out numerous cyber attacks against various private and government agencies, under the name of Lulzsec have been sentenced to 32 months in jail.
The group consisted of 8 members: Hector Monsegur, Jake Davis, Ryan Ackroyd, Mustafa AL-Bassam, Darren Martyn, Donncha O’Cearbhaill, Jeremy Hammond and one more member who was not identified and was known by his online handle, Avunit. It is interesting that some of the members lived as far away as the US and Britain, and may have never really met in person.
The Agenda:
The group had targeted institutions like CIA, FBI, Sony and Nintendo. It was even alleged during the mitigation hearing that they were the ones who had hacked into PlayStation network. The attack on the PlayStation network in April 2011 had leaked millions of credit card details online and had forced the company to close their servers for weeks. This incident attracted the attention of millions of people all over the world. The cyber crime has compelled people to worry about the security of their online accounts. The political situation is also affected in turn.
The group had the motto “Laughing at your security since 2011”. They claimed to do it for fun and not for financial greed. The first attack, they carried out, was against Fox.com for calling Common, a rapper, vile on the Fox news channel. Losses had also hacked into Nintendo, although no sensitive information was stolen.
Some of their attacks did have a political message. They targeted PBS for biased treatment of Wikileaks in a documentary titled WIkiSecrets. An announcement on June 20, justified their targeted attacks on government security agencies. They claimed their actions were in retribution for the government’s actions to censor the internet
The Sentencing:
The group’s website had a Bitcoin donation link to help fund their activities. It is estimated that the group had received $18,000 in donations in the form of Bitcoins, which may now be 10 times as valuable, figuring to about $180,000.
On 20 June, 2 members on the “Lulz Boat” had leaked information that aided the authorities in arresting Ryan Cleary, a member who was loosely connected to the group. Four of the members were sentenced to jail for 32 months. All of them were found guilty of committing offenses under the Computer Offenses Act, 1990.
Cleary, aka ViraL, of Wickford Exxex, received a jail sentencing of 32 months after pleading guilty to six charges including hacking into the US Air Force computers.
Ryan Ackroyd, from South Yorkshire, who is an ex-soldier, was given a sentence of 30 months having pleaded guilty for carrying out an unauthorized act to impair the operation of a computer. Ackroyd, 26, used the internet avatar of a 16 year old girl called Kayla.
Bassam, from South London, aka tFlow, was sentenced to 20 months in prison, a suspension of 2 years and 300 hours of community work.
Davis, 20, from Shetland, was ordered to serve 24 months in a young offender institution.
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