'Anonymous' collective hackers intensify cyber attacks across south-east Asia

[NewWorldRecord]

December 2nd, 2013, 10:58 GMT · By Eduard Kovacs

Hackers Target Bitcoin Talk via Vulnerability in AnonymousSpeech Registrar

Bitcointalk.org targeted by cybercriminals

On Sunday, users of the popular Bitcoin discussion forum Bitcoin Talk (bitcointalk.org) noticed that the website was being served via CloudFlare. It turns out that the change is the work of cybercriminals.

According to Bitcoin Talk administrator Theymos, this appears to be a man-in-the-middle attack that leveraged a vulnerability in the systems of AnonymousSpeech.com, an anonymous domain registration service.

“8-14 hours ago, an attacker used a flaw in the forum's AnonymousSpeech registrar to change the forum's DNS to point to 108.162.197.161 (exact details unknown). Sirius noticed this 8 hours ago and immediately transferred bitcointalk.org to a different registrar,” Theymos stated a few hours ago.

However, he warns that it might take around 24 hours until the changes propagate.

It’s believed the attacker could have intercepted encrypted communications, including passwords, authentication cookies and private messages. However, only information submitted while the DNS was changed could have been compromised.

All security codes have been invalidated, but while this is sorted out, users are advised to add “109.201.133.195 bitcointalk.org” to their hosts file to make sure they’re communicating with the right server.

Interestingly, the man-in-the-middle attack coincided with a massive distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack launched against the website.

“These two events are probably related, though I'm not yet sure why an attacker would do both of these things at once,” Theymos said.

The incident is still being investigated. A discussion on this topic can be followed on Bitcoin Talk.

It’s worth noting that several Bitcoin-related services have been targeted by hackers over the past period, especially since the value of the digital currency skyrocketed. The list of targets includes Bitcash.cz, Inputs.io and BIPS.

Also, this isn’t the first time Bitcoin Talk suffers a data breach. A couple of months ago, the website was taken offline after hackers breached the forum.

 

[SU8ZER0]

Anonymous Hacks Honduras’s Elections Website

Hacktivist Group Protests Alleged Wrongdoing in Latest Presidential Race

By Sofía Ramírez Fionda on Monday, December 2, 2013

EspañolAs of the evening of December 2, the international network of hacktivists, Anonymous, has successfully hacked the website of Honduras’s Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE). This came just a few hours after the tribunal announced its willingness to recount the votes and review the official electoral records of the recent presidential elections, held on November 24.

In the website, Anonymous Honduras declares “we commit the sin of giving you the benefit of the doubt, even when we are certain that your institutions are useless, and don’t serve anyone but the one that has the money and the power in this country. We can no longer tolerate this and the help of your bribed media, who want the people to stay quiet and consume the process no matter what.”

In their message, they inform of a portal where they have allegedly collected evidence of electoral fraud. They also call for peaceful protests as a way to demand freedom. They ask people to “remember they have the weapons and money, we only have our voice, indignation and our desire for freedom. If you’re abroad, protest in front of embassies. If we don’t wake up now that we can, there won’t be another possible moment.”

Update: Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Soon after we published this story, at around 8 p.m. EST on Monday, the TSE regained control of its website — after only about two hours of it being hijacked. Until 11 a.m. this morning, however, the site remained “Under Construction.” “Come Back Soon,” was all it said, but it is now back live with its content available again.

Anonymous Honduras has not given up, though. As of this morning, they have managed to infiltrate parts of various government agency sites, including the Instituto de Conservación Forestal and the Instituto de Acceso a la Información Pública.

Guillermo Peña Panting, executive director of Honduras’s classical liberal policy institute, Eléutera, does not believe the exercise will have any repercussions. The “presidential election had already been declared,” he said via email.

An independent group of computer programmers and volunteers has already scoured the counting for errors, and they have found the results to be basically correct. Even if they were slightly off, a more than 7 percent margin would be difficult for the second-place candidate to recoup.

However, Elena Toledo, a Honduran blogger, is more sympathetic to their acts.

“On one hand,” she says, “they demonstrate the system’s vulnerability, and on the other, they voice the people’s rejection of the fraudulent electoral process.”

Gina Kawas — a policy liaison and Young Voices Advocate in Honduras — says the hacking must have been planned well in advance, since the site had been prepared for such an attack. And she doesn’t believe Anonymous Honduras is aligned with Partido LIBRE and Xiomara Castro. Rather, “they are more inclined to the new Anti Corruption Party.”

In terms of the sentiment among the population, Kawas believes young people in particular are viewing it positively and praising it via Twitter. She affirms Toledo’s sentiment about the TSE’s vulnerability, and says these attacks embarrass the institutions.

TSE Screenshot, as of Monday, 7:45 p.m. EST:

 

[SU8ZER0]

Anonymous-related Twitter accounts suspended after misogynist abuse

Hacktivist collective blames Labour MP Stella Creasy and Times columnist Caitlin Moran for the suspension of 30 accounts

Alex Hern
The Guardian, Wednesday 4 December 2013 12.26 GMT

Members of Anonymous threatened prominent feminist campaigners. Photograph: Isopix/Rex Features

More than 30 Anonymous-related Twitter accounts, including @Anon_Central, one of the largest with over 150,000 followers, have been suspended by Twitter following a campaign of misogynist abuse aimed at feminist campaigners on the social network.

The four women, Labour MP Stella Creasy, Times columnist Caitlin Moran, freelance journalist Caroline Criado-Perez and campaigner Hannah Curtis, were all named in a document shared by the largest anonymous Twitter account, @YourAnonNews, which claimed that "mentioning these accounts can result in suspension and possible scrutiny for future accounts." It also claimed that "Perez and Creasy appear to have some direct line to Twitter to get accounts suspended sooner."

Criado-Perez, who has been the subject of campaigns of misogynist abuse before, says that those claims are nonsense. "I certainly don't have the power to ban accounts, but I do report accounts that send threats and harass me," she said. "Sometimes they get suspended and sometimes they don't.

"I don't bother reporting accounts that just call me a cunt, which is what they seem to think. Just ones that are directly threatening or are inciting harassment, like the Anonymous accounts have been."

Moran also confirms that she "doesn't even have a verified account, let alone any contact with Twitter."

She added: "If I had a hot-line to Twitter HQ, I'd have used it to campaign for all half-naked pictures of Bruce Springsteen to be much bigger."

Judge and jury?

In the past, groups related to Anonymous have made headlines for carrying out apparently feminist campaigns, including attempts to bring vigilante justice to the Steubenville and Maryville rape cases. In both situations, the hacktivists helped bring the situation to greater public awareness, but also faced criticism for taking on the role of judge and jury.

But the group itself is too fractured and nebulous to pin any single ideology on to, and while some members may consider themselves feminist, it is clear that others do not.

The last tweet of @Anon_Central, one of the suspended accounts, was directed at Criado-Perez: "How much sex with an unconscious person until it counts as rape?", twisting the facts of the Steubenville case into something halfway between a rape joke and a threat.

Anonymous allies

Twitter doesn't comment on individual accounts, nor does it comment on response times on support requests, but the company does have a stated policy on IP blocking, something various Anonymous allies have accused the site of doing in what they are calling "#Trollocaust".

"IP blocking is generally ineffective at stopping unwanted behavior," Twitter says, "and may falsely prevent legitimate users from accessing our service.

"IP addresses are commonly shared by numerous different users in a variety of locations, meaning that blocking a single IP may prevent a large number of unconnected users from logging into Twitter."

The @Anon_Central account had been the centre of a previous controversy when it began tweeting out virulently anti-semitic and racist material in June.

At the time, the larger, more respectable Anonymous accounts line @YourAnonNews and @YourAnonCentral neither condoned nor condemned the messages, but this week they are firmly on the side of their "fallen comrade".

"Nobody is ashamed Perez. #RIPAnonCentral" tweeted @YourAnonCentral.

• "The FBI were embarrassed by Anonymous and they feel that they need to save face," said Anonymous hacker Jeremy Hammond the day after his 10-year sentence

• Is hacktivism on behalf of Rehtaeh Parsons a revolution in rape campaigning?

 

[SU8ZER0]

December 3rd, 2013, 15:55 GMT · By Eduard Kovacs

Hackers Claim to Have Defaced Website of Japan’s Ministry of Defense

The Anonymous hackers behind Operation KillingBay admit that the Twitter storm they had planned for December 1 wasn’t as successful as they had hoped. However, they claim the campaign has had some success so far.

The hacktivists say they have briefly defaced the official website of the Japanese Ministry of Defense. However, I couldn’t find any evidence to support these claims.

They also say they’ve launched DDOS attacks on the website of WAZA, Macy’s and Microsoft.

Finally, the hackers claim to have obtained the details of several hundred “Taiji enablers.” So far, they’ve only leaked information belonging to a single individual.

The campaign has raised some awareness of the killing of dolphins in the Japanese town of Taiji. However, it remains to be seen whether OpKillingBay will have any real impact.

 

[SU8ZER0]

Singapore denies bail to 'Messiah' hacker

Updated 4 December 2013, 22:51 AEST

A Singaporean court has denied bail to a man charged with hacking a website linked to the Prime Minister.

A Singapore court has denied bail to a man charged with hacking the district website of the Prime Minister, using the symbol of international hacker group Anonymous.

35-year-old Singaporean James Raj was extradited from Malaysia and charged on November 12 with hacking the Ang Mo Kio district website, whose MPs include Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.

He also posted the image of a Guy Fawkes mask used by Anonymous.

The alleged hacking took place three days before a self-proclaimed spokesperson for Anonymous appeared in a video on October 31 to demand the scrapping of a recent Singapore law requiring news websites to obtain annual licences.

According to court documents, he identified himself as "The Messiah", a name also used by a hacker targeting a reporter's blog in the pro-government Straits Times website on November 1.

District Judge Soh Tze Bian said Mr Raj posed a flight risk, because he previously jumped bail and fled to Malaysia after being charged with illegal drugs consumption in 2011.

Mr Raj has not yet commented on his links to Anonymous, an amorphous group of hackers.

Singapore's Internet licensing rules, which came into effect in June, have sparked anger among bloggers and activists who say they are designed to muzzle free expression.

The country strictly regulates the traditional media, but insists the recent rules do not impinge on Internet freedom.

Police have previously said Mr Raj was linked to other hacking attacks, including on the website of a charity associated with the ruling People's Action Party.

Other attacks

His alleged hacking was among a string of cyber attacks which have also targeted the websites of Premier Lee and President Tony Tan as well as pro-government media, in a row over Internet freedom in the city state.

Two Singaporean men have so far been charged with defacing the president's website.

Police have said that there are no links between Mr Raj and these suspects.

AFP

 

[SU8ZER0]

183,000 Reasons You Don't Want To Help 'Anonymous' Cyber Attack The Koch Brothers

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[SU8ZER0]

US man sentenced for participating in Anonymous DDoS

Eric J. Rosol was charged with participating in a DDoS attack for about a minute

John Ribeiro (IDG News Service) 03 December, 2013 05:41

A man from Wisconsin was sentenced for participating in a DDoS (distributed denial-of-service) attack by hacker group Anonymous on a Kansas company.

Eric J. Rosol, 38, is said to have admitted that on Feb. 28, 2011, he took part in a denial of service attack for about a minute on a Web page of Koch Industries -- Kochind.com, using software called a Low Orbit Ion Cannon Code, which was loaded on his computer.

LOIC is a popular DDoS tool used by Anonymous and other online attackers to overload websites with requests and disrupt the target server.

Rosol, who pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of accessing a protected computer, was sentenced to two years of federal probation and ordered to pay US$183,000 in restitution, the Department of Justice said in a statement.

A plea agreement was earlier entered by Rosol and the government in the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas. The parties had agreed that the direct losses as a result of the attack on the website were less than $5,000 but Koch Industries had argued that it hired a consulting group to protect its Web sites at a cost of approximately $183,000.

Koch Industries' owners, David and Charles Koch, were targeted by Anonymous for their alleged role in weakening the bargaining power of trade unions. The attack by Anonymous is said to have forced the Koch website offline for 15 minutes.

The company is privately held with headquarters in Wichita, Kansas, and has businesses in a number of areas including oil and manufacturing.

The use of U.S. computer laws to charge individuals for crimes that could lead to long sentences in jail has been criticized by some civil rights activists who argue that the punishment is often disproportionate to the online crime, and higher than sentences for similar crimes in the physical world.

Jeremy Hammond, 28, a member of Anonymous, was sentenced last month to 10 years in prison for hacking into the computers of a geopolitical analysis firm Strategic Forecasting, also called Stratfor, and obtaining subscriber and credit card information and emails, among other data. Hammond and supporters said he was a whistle blower, whose hacks aimed to expose government secrets, data gathering and surveillance.

 

[SU8ZER0]

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[MOLANY0NG]

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[MOLANY0NG]

Huge Anonymous hack from Holland! Change Passwords!

Posted by shaun gibson on December 5, 2013

I was already aware of this huge cyber hack, that is still happening, it is coming from Holland but the many sites being attacked can’t find the servers the hack is being implemented from but found the proxy servers. This hack has been on the cards for 2 months. I would suggest YOU ALL WATCH THIS AND CHANGE PASSWORDS FROM SITES IT TALKS ABOUT. You may be the one to have this bug called “Keylogging” software. If you have been hacked, too late, but I would suggest changing passwords. If you don’t change passwords from the hacked sites and you get hacked, it’s your own fault, this is an official line of protocol here.

Thanks again to Daboo7 for the video

<iframe src="//www.youtube.com/embed/xiIB71vIdVo?rel=0" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" width="640"></iframe>

Hacked:

Facebook
Gmail
Yahoo
Twitter
ADP (Financial software)
Linkeden
Odnoklassniki (Russian Social Network

 

[MOLANY0NG]

December 5th, 2013, 08:06 GMT · By Bogdan Popa

Microsoft Denies Having Been Hacked by Anonymous

Last month, Microsoft’s websites, including Outlook.com, MSN.com, and Windows.com, went down with Redmond managing to bring all pages back online in a matter of minutes.

Shortly after that, an individual who claimed to be part of Anonymous hacker group posted a statement on Pastebin to say that Microsoft’s websites have actually been taken down following a larger DDoS attack aimed at Redmond’s Japanese servers.

And still, Microsoft claims that this wasn’t the case, explaining that it only experienced some DNS-related issues that have been fixed very fast. Although it did register some attacks, none managed to break down its servers and take websites offline.

“We are aware of reports of a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack where it appears that Microsoft was not the intended target. We do not believe this alleged attack is related to any interruption of Microsoft online services,” a company spokesperson told The Register.

Anonymous, on the other hand, said that they were behind the outage and all websites that went down in November and belonging to Microsoft have actually been targeted by its DDoS attack.

“A couple days ago a DDoS attack was launched at Japanese Microsoft (Domain) Websites and Servers. We are sorry to report that the Japanese Microsoft Websites and Servers did not go down as planned. Although something did go down. We took the pretty much the entire Microsoft domains down,” Anonymous said.

There are still some discrepancies between the two versions of the story though. Microsoft’s outage occurred on November 21 and lasted for only a few minutes, while the statement issued by Anonymous came two days later and claimed to have taken down many more Microsoft services.

Anonymous, however, claims that the attacks have been part of Operation KillingBay, even though Microsoft barely has something to do with dolphin hunting in Taiji.

 

[MOLANY0NG]

December 4th, 2013, 14:25 GMT · By Eduard Kovacs

Anonymous Hackers Take Down Angola Government Websites Amid Protests

Some of the Angola government websites targeted by hackers

Massive anti-government street protests have taken place in Angola after opposition leaders accused officials of being involved in the killing of two political activists last year. Anonymous hackers have joined the protesters.

Over the past couple of days, hacktivists have been launching distribute denial-of-service attacks against all Angola government websites.

A list of around 70 websites that the hackers are currently targeting has been published on Pastebin. A couple of hours ago, most of the websites were inaccessible.

Currently, most of them are back online, but they’re experiencing performance issues. Some of them are still down.

At least one man was killed during the recent protests and a few hundred were detained by police. The country’s President, Jose Eduardo dos Santos, accuses the opposition of promoting chaos. The opposition, on the other hand, claims that protests are the only way to get some attention.

 

[MOLANY0NG]

December 5th, 2013, 09:12 GMT · By Eduard Kovacs

Anonymous Threatens Tunisian Government over Return of Censorship

Anonymous Tunisia makes announcement regarding censorship

After news broke that Tunisian officials might reinstate the old web surveillance and censorship mechanisms in the country, Anonymous hacktivists issued a statement to warn the government.

“Censorship is now active again. Ammar 404 is facing the Tunisian web wearing a bear even more back-stabbing and sneaky than before. We will not give up against these hypocrites, we are reacting against them,” the hackers noted in a video statement.

“We have spent years fighting corruption. We shall never let our martyrs’ blood go in vain. The fact that the Tunisian government is trying to get away with stealing the people's privacy has shocked us and has driven us to take more precautions. This censorship signifies the comeback of years of oppression and tyranny,” they added.

The hacktivists haven’t announced any immediate plans yet.

Before 2011, Tunisia was known as an enemy of the Internet, many of the sites accessed by users showing a “404 Not Found” error message. This is actually the error message that led to the censorship being named Ammar 404.

After President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was removed from power, several popular websites, such as Facebook and Twitter, were unblocked. However, there were still some restrictions.

Back in September, TechPresident reported that Tunisia’s communications minister announced the end of Internet censorship.

However, in November, Tunisia Live informed that many cyber activists started raising concerns that the launch of a new telecommunications investigative agency would mean the return of censorship.

Now, Anonymous hackers say they’re determined to prevent the government from taking away their rights.

“We do not tolerate these acts! Under Natural Law, the Tunisian people have the right to knowledge, the right to think and express their opinions, the right to be free from tyranny,” they noted.

Check out the video released by Anonymous Tunisia:

<iframe src="//www.youtube.com/embed/hK2B6eogNZ4?rel=0" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="360" width="640"></iframe>

 

[MOLANY0NG]

http://www.haveibeenpwned.com/

 

[NewWorldRecord]

December 5th, 2013, 14:39 GMT · By Eduard Kovacs

Anonymous Threatens Moroccan Government Just Before Sentencing of Kissing Teens

Anonymous wants to make sure Moroccan teens will not get harsh sentences Enlarge picture - Anonymous wants to make sure Moroccan teens will not get harsh sentences

On December 6, a Moroccan court will sentence the 14-year-old girl and the 15-year-old boy who took a picture of themselves kissing and posted it on Facebook. The two, along with the youth who took the picture, were arrested in early October.

The Moroccan government has faced a lot of criticism. However, Anonymous hacktivists threaten that they’re “ready to take action” in case the court’s sentence will be harsh.

“Regardless of the sentence though, Morocco will remain a focus for the Anonymous collective, for human rights violations and corruption heinous and unchecked,” the hackers noted.

In order to prove that they’re serious, the hacktivists have leaked some data allegedly stolen from the systems of a “prominent Moroccan financial institution.”

They claim they’ll leak more, including information stolen from government organizations, if the Moroccan government misbehaves.

 

[NewWorldRecord]

<iframe src="//www.youtube.com/embed/qhrW4gBfZOc?rel=0" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="480" width="853"></iframe>

Face Time: Hundreds march in DC in Anonymous inspired protest


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[NewWorldRecord]

December 6th, 2013, 08:00 GMT · By Eduard Kovacs

Most of PayPal 14 Group Will Likely Not Go to Jail

The trial against the PayPal 14, the group of men and women who participated in Anonymous’ distributed denial-of-service attack against PayPal in 2010, took place on Thursday. Most of them have pleaded guilty to felony and misdemeanor charges, but they’ll likely avoid jail time.

Alexa O’Brien has closely followed the trial. She reports on The Daily Beast that 11 of the suspects have entered a plea deal and agreed to plead guilty to felony and misdemeanor charges. However, the sentencing has been scheduled for December 4, 2014.

If they don’t commit any other crimes until then, the prosecution has agreed to drop the felony counts and recommend a sentence of 1-3 years probation for the misdemeanor charge. Each of them will also have to pay $5,600 (€4,000) in restitution to PayPal.

The 11 individuals have pleaded guilty to a felony count under the controversial Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). Some of them to intentional damage to a protected computer, while others to conspiracy to cause damage to a protected computer.

Two other suspects have pleaded guilty only to the misdemeanor charges. They will spend up to 90 days in jail.

The case of the last PayPal 14 defendants is being handled separately.

PayPal noted that it had lost $5.5 million (€4 million) due to the attack launched by Anonymous after the payment processor cut off donations to WikiLeaks. However, it appears that the company will only get around $80,000 (€58,000).

On the other hand, it’s worth noting that, a couple of days before the trial, Pierre Omidyar, the founder and chairman of eBay, noted that the PayPal 14 should not be held accountable for the actions of all the individuals who took part in the attack.

 

[NewWorldRecord]

Hacker Group Anonymous Sets Facebook Destruction Date

by Kendrick Cardella

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How Students Can Make the Most Out of Skype -if you are new to Skype or are wanting to know additional about Skype and study what it can do for you then I urge you to Hacking Facebook Backtrack 5 R3 (Redir.Ec) check out out some fantastic books and manuals on how to use, customize, set up and save from Skype and so on. However, I leave that preference up to you. The way to guard your self in this situation is to make certain that you are obtaining the e mail from the business.

 

[NewWorldRecord]

December 7th, 2013, 07:47 GMT · By Eduard Kovacs

RBS Website Disrupted by DDOS Attack

A website of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) was disrupted by a distributed denial of service (DDOS) attack on Friday.

“Due to a surge in internet traffic directed at the NatWest website, customers experienced difficulties accessing some of our sites today,” RBS representatives stated on Twitter following the attack.

“This deliberate surge of traffic is known as a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.We have taken action to restore affected sites. At no time was there any risk to customers. We apologise for the inconvenience caused,” they added.

It’s uncertain at this time who the perpetrators are. No hacktivist collectives have taken credit for the attack.

This is the second time in one week when RBS’ website becomes inaccessible. On Monday evening, the financial institution’s website went down due to an IT system failure.

The company’s CEO, Ross McEwan, has admitted that the Monday incident is unacceptable, particularly because the downtime occurred on Cyber Monday, a busy shopping day.

“For decades, RBS failed to invest properly in its systems. We need to put our customers' needs at the centre of all we do. It will take time, but we are investing heavily in building IT systems our customers can rely on,” McEwan said.

Since cybercriminals can leverage such incidents to send out spam emails in an effort to trick customers into installing malware or hand over their personal details, the bank has issued a security alert.

Customers are advised to treat unsolicited phone calls and emails with caution. The organization will never ask customers to hand over their full PIN or password. Suspicious activity should be reported to the RBS fraud team at 0845 300 3986, or at bank branches.

 

[NewWorldRecord]

Statement on guilty pleas by Paypal13

Business Sector, Commentaries and Analyses
Dec 06 2013

Statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California on the “Paypal13:”

Thirteen defendants pleaded guilty in federal court in San Jose yesterday to charges related to their involvement in the cyber-attack of PayPal’s website as part of the group “Anonymous,” United States Attorney Melinda Haag announced. One of the defendants also pleaded guilty to the charges arising from a separate cyber-attack on the website of Santa Cruz County.

In pleading guilty, the defendants admitted to carrying out a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) cyber-attack against PayPal in December 2010.

These DDoS attacks were facilitated by software tools designed to damage a computer network’s ability to function by flooding it with useless commands and information, thus, denying service to legitimate users. A group calling itself “Anonymous” claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying they conducted the attacks in protest of the companies’ and organizations’ actions. The attacks were facilitated by the software tools “Anonymous” made available for free download on the Internet. The victims included major U.S. companies across several industries.

According to the plea agreements and statements made in court, in late November 2010, WikiLeaks released a large amount of classified United States State Department cables on its website. Citing violations of the PayPal terms of service, and in response to WikiLeaks’ release of the classified cables, PayPal suspended WikiLeaks’ accounts such that WikiLeaks could no longer receive donations via PayPal. WikiLeaks’ website declared that PayPal’s action “tried to economically strangle WikiLeaks.”

The plea agreements further state that, in retribution for PayPal’s termination of WikiLeaks’ donation account, Anonymous coordinated and executed DDoS attacks against PayPal’s computer. Anonymous referred to these co-ordinated attacks on PayPal as “Operation Avenge Assange.”

The following defendants pleaded guilty:

1. CHRISTOPHER WAYNE COOPER, dob 10/21/87, aka “Anthrophobic,” Elberta,
Alabama

2. JOSHUA JOHN COVELLI, dob 1/10/85, aka “Absolem, and, “Toxic,”
Fairborn, Ohio

3. KEITH WILSON DOWNEY, dob 11/7/84, Jacksonville, Florida

4. MERCEDES RENEE HAEFER, dob 6/21/91, aka “No,” and “MMMM,” Las Vegas,
Nevada

5. DONALD HUSBAND, dob 8/14/81, aka “Ananon,” Fairfield, California

6. VINCENT CHARLES KERSHAW, dob 2/23/84, aka “Trivette,” “Triv,” and
“Reaper,” Fort Collins, Colorado

7. ETHAN MILES, dob 9/1/77, Flagstaff, Arizona

8. JAMES C. MURPHY, dob 11/15/74, Baldwin Park, California

9. DREW ALAN PHILLIPS, dob 4/15/85, aka “Drew010,” Santa Rosa, California

10. JEFFREY PUGLISI, dob 2/19/83, aka “Jeffer,” “Jefferp,” and “Ji,”
Clinton Township, Michigan

11. DANIEL SULLIVAN, dob 6/29/89, Camarillo, California

12. TRACY ANN VALENZUELA, dob 2/11/69, Napa, California

13. CHRISTOPHER QUANG VO, dob 5/16/89, Attleboro, Massachusetts

With the exception of Valenzuela, Phillips and Miles, each of the defendants pleaded guilty to one count of Conspiracy, in violation of 18 USC 1030(b)(Felony), and one count of Intentional Damage to a Protected Computer, in violation of 18 USC 1030(a)(5)(A)(Misd.). Defendant Valenzuela pleaded guilty to one count of Reckless Damage to a Protected Computer, in violation of 18 USC 1030(a)(5)(A)(Misd.). Defendants Phillips and Miles were permitted to plead guilty to one count each of Intentional Damage to a Protected Computer, in violation of 18 USC 1030(a)(5)(A)(Misd.) only.

The terms of the plea agreements allow that unless a defendant violates any of the terms of the plea agreement or fails to accept responsibility, at the time of sentencing, the defendant may make an unopposed motion to withdraw his/her guilty plea to Count One, Conspiracy to Commit Intentional Damage to a Protected Computer in violation of 18 U.S.C. 1030(b) and the government will dismiss Count One, leaving only the misdemeanor count of violating of 18 U.S.C. 1030(a)(5)(A) to be entered as a final judgment against the defendant.

Defendant Joshua John Covelli also pleaded guilty to executing a DDoS attack (with another defendant, presently a fugitive) against the Santa Cruz County web server, admitting that it was in retaliation for a statute enacted by the City of Santa Cruz. The City of Santa Cruz enacted Section 6.36.010 of its Municipal Code, entitled “Camping Prohibited,” which contained restrictions and definitions on camping within Santa Cruz City. In response to the enforcement of Section 6.36.010, protesters occupied the Santa Cruz County Courthouse premises from approximately July 4, 2011 to October 2, 2011. Law enforcement officers from Santa Cruz County disbanded the protest and several protesters were charged with misdemeanors crimes in Santa Cruz County.

According to Covelli’s plea agreement and statements in court, in retribution for Santa Cruz City’s enforcement of Section 6.36.010 of the Municipal Code, and Santa Cruz County’s disbandment of the protest, Covelli and others, calling themselves the “People’s Liberation Front’” or “PLF,” and claiming to be associated with the “Anonymous” group, co-ordinated and executed an attack against Santa Cruz County’s computer servers. The PLF referred to these coordinated attacks on Santa Cruz County as “Operation Peace Camp 2010.”

The defendants are currently released on bond.

The sentencing hearings for twelve of the defendants are scheduled for December 4, 2014 at 10:00 a.m. before the Honorable D. Lowell Jensen, United States District Court Judge, in San Jose. Tracy Valenzuela’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for November 20, 2014 at 10:00 a.m. before Judge Jensen as well. The maximum statutory penalty for each count in violation of 18 United States Code, Section 1030(b) – Conspiracy (Felony), is 5 years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine; for each count in violation of 18 United States Code, Section 1030(a)(5)(A) – Intentional Damage to a Protected Computer (Felony), is 10 years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine; for each count in violation of 18 United States Code, Sections 1030(a)(5)(A) & (c)(4)(G)(i) – Intentional Damage to a Protected Computer (Misd.) is 1 year in prison and a $100,000 fine, and for each count in violation of 18 United States Code, Sections 1030(a)(5)(A) & (c)(4)(G)(i) – Reckless Damage to a Protected Computer (Misd.) is 1 year in prison and a $100,000 fine.

However, any sentence will be imposed by the court only after consideration of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and the federal statute governing the imposition of a sentence, 18 U.S.C. § 3553.

Matt Parrella and Hanley Chew are the Assistant U.S. Attorneys who prosecuted the case with the assistance of Elise Etter. The prosecution is the result of an investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, along with cooperation from PayPal. Authorities in the Netherlands, Germany and France have also taken their own investigative and enforcement actions.

The National Cyber-Forensics and Training Alliance, a public-private partnership whose mission to identify, mitigate, and neutralize cyber-crime, also provided assistance.

Further Information:
Case #: CR-11-471 DLJ (PSG)