Saturday 14 September 2013

Anonymous hacktivist behind police cyber strikes gets three years' hard time

Anonymous video screenshot
A hacker with ties to the Anonymous hacking collective has been sentenced to serve three years in a federal prison for involvement in attacks on a number of police departments' websites.
The US District Court in Salt Lake city sentenced 22-year-old Ohio resident John Anthony Borell III after he pled guilty computer fraud in April. As well as the jail time, Borell will also be required to pay $227,000 in damages to computer servers affected by attacks.
Borell is believed to have participated in several Anonymous-backed "operations". In 2012 he is believed to have targeted websites associated with the New York police, Los Angeles County Police Canine Association and Salt Lake City police. The attack on the Salt Lake Police was particularly devastating, managing to knock it offline for four months, while coders redesigned it to be more secure.
The Associated Press reported that Borell's sentencing was diminished due to concerns over his mental well being. The AP reported Borell has been ordered to accept mental health treatment and refrain from drug use.
Borell is one of many ex-Anons to receive jail sentences for their involvement in cyber attacks on public and private sector companies and agencies. Prior to this, 21-year-old Arizona resident and former Lulzec member Raynaldo Rivera, known online as Neuron, was sentenced to serve 13 months of home detention, perform 1,000 hours of community service and pay $605,663 in restitution for his involvement in a 2011 cyber raid on Sony Pictures.
LulzSec was a sister group to the Anonymous hacktivist collective, more anarchic in character. Its primary focus was to instill comedic panic rather than punish perceived crimes, like the main Anonymous collective.
Within the UK, LulzSec member Ryan Ackroyd, 26, pleaded guilty to carrying out an unauthorised act to impair the operation of a computer, contrary to the Criminal Law Act 1977. Earlier still, Ryan Cleary and Jake Davis pleaded guilty to involvement in attacks on several high-profile agency and company websites in July 2012

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