News
Imperva: Electronic footprint led to Head of Lulzsec arrest
March 2012 by Imperva
It has just been reported that Sabu, the reported head of Lulzsec and pictured below, was arrested. But that’s not all—apparently he’s been working as an FBI informant. Below is a comment from Rob Rachwald, Director of Security Strategy at Imperva on how Lulzsec got caught out:
"During the Lulzsec rampage last summer, some speculated that the hackers could never be caught. We believe they left enough electronic fingerprints that made their arrest inevitable. But the most interesting part of the plot is the fact that Sabu has been working for the FBI. This should surprise no one. The FBI had to cut a deal in order to bring down as many hackers as possible. This is especially true in the case where they arrest the reputed leader.
The question moving forward is this: what impact will hackers acting as informants have on hacking groups—especially Anonymous. For years, the Sicilian mafia seemed impenetrable. Then, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino used informants with such skill that the mafia never recovered.
Last Monday the New York Times had a quote from Cole Stryker, an author who has researched the Anonymous. He said, “Anonymous is a handful of geniuses surrounded by a legion of idiots." It seems the FBI is taking down the geniuses to paralyze the idiots.
How were they brought down? Lulzsec made two errors:
– Mistake #1: They brought too much attention to themselves. The Lulzsece hackers were extremely unfocused in their goal and gained attention mainly due to the relative intensity of their activity and lack of other good media topics. They brought too much attention to themselves and you could expect law enforcement to find them. If you look at hacking historically, over the past 20 years many of the high-profile attacks or those that involve serious losses to governments or commercial companies have ended up with law enforcement finding the perpetrators eventually, such as Albert Gonzalez.
– Mistake #2: They didn’t cover up their tracks. Let’s review some of the Lulzsec chat logs from a few months ago. One snippet, in reference to discussions Lulzsec was having with the media, shows how the hackers themselves admit they gave away too much information:
Topiary - Sabu and I got a bit carried away and gave LulzSec away a bit.
As Imperva’s Tal Be’ery said in this USA Today article, “When you’re running this kind of operation for a long time, especially with not very concrete plans, you’re bound to make mistakes."
The mistakes Lulzsec and Anonymous made during their hacking spree left an electronic trail with enough foot prints to product today’s arrests"
