Tuesday 11 September 2012

LulzSec hacker arrested over Sony attack

A second member of the LulzSec hacking was arrested by US authorities in connection with attacks on Sony Pictures Europe .
US police was arrested Raynaldo Rivera, 20, a member of the hacking group LulzSec, on charges that he took part in breach of the computer systems belonging to Sony Pictures Europe.

The indictment, which was unsealed on Tuesday, accuses Rivera and co-conspirators of stealing information from Sony Pictures Europe's computer systems in May and June 2011 using an SQL injection attack – which exploits flaws in the handing of data input for databases to take control of a system – against the studio's website.SQL injection, or SQLi, is an increasingly common technique used by hackers to break into systems.

The attack, which may have leaked credit card details for millions of users, has never been traced to any group – although Sony suggested not long afterwards that Anonymous might have been involved.Since then it has given no further details about who it suspects of carrying out the attack, and no data from the attack has ever been posted publicly.

"From a single injection we accessed EVERYTHING," the hackers said in a statement at the time. "Why do you put such faith in a company that allows itself to become open to these simple attacks?"

Authorities have said the Sony breach ultimately cost the company more than $600,000 (£378,000).
An accused British hacker, Ryan Cleary, 20, was indicted by a US grand jury in June on charges related to LulzSec attacks on several media companies, including Sony Pictures.

The rise of LulzSec saw a burst of similar "crews" aiming to hack sites, but since then Anonymous has focussed on providing an outlet for documents released by WikiLeaks.

No comments:

Post a Comment