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Two men, aged 20 and 24, have been arrested by British police in connection with a series of internet attacks orchestrated by the Anonymous and LulzSec gangs.
Scotland Yard says that the men, who were arrested in Mexborough, Doncaster, and Warminster in Wiltshire, remain in custody for questioning, and are being held at police stations in South Yorkshire and London.
As part of the investigation computer equipment has been seized which will undergo forensic examination by police experts. There is speculation online that the arrests are connected specifically with the criminal activities of a hacker who used the online handle ‘Kayla’.
Kayla, alongside the likes of Sabu, Topiary and Tflow, is considered to be one of the key figures in the LulzSec hacking gang.
However, Kayla – who has claimed involvement in the hack against security firm HBGary – has presented herself online to be a giggly 16-year-old girl. Although Kayla has given interviews to the press in the past, “she” has always declined to use Skype to confirm an adolescent female voice.
Many eyes will no doubt be on Kayla’s Twitter account to see if any messages are posted following these most recent arrests.
At the time of writing, the most recent tweet from Kayla is dated 1:34 PM UK time, 1 September.
The two arrests follow a series of hacks and denial-of-service attacks against UK and US businesses, law enforcement agencies and government bodies.
Detective Inspector Mark Raymond from the Police Central e-Crime Unit (PCeU) said: “We are working to detect and bring before the courts those responsible for these offences, to disrupt such groups, and to deter others thinking of participating in this type of criminal activity.”
Charges brought against other suspects
Earlier today the media reported that 20-year-old Christopher Jan Weatherhead, from Northampton, and Ashley Rhodes, 26, from London, have been charged by police with computer crime offences.
They have been remanded on bail until 7 September. A 17-year-old from Chester and 22-year-old student Peter David Gibson, of Hartlepool, County Durham, are also due to appear at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court on the same day.
Earlier this month the Met Police issued a stark warning to anyone considering supporting internet attacks against companies and governments.
Certainly the police appear to be mopping up a lot of suspected hackers in connection with the Anonymous and LulzSec hacks. If nothing else, that should be something for other budding hacktivists to stew over and perhaps reconsider if it’s a risk that they really want to take.
From what I've been told it's to prove to Governments that they need to tighten their security especially where the internet is concerned and to show the public just how vulnerable they are for relying on government security
The governments are scared because supposedly in November Anonymous want to destroy Facebook – the best machine to invigilate people in the world…
That turned out to be a hoax.
What are you talking about Anonymous? Anonymous has their super shiny new DoS tools. Of course operation Facebook is a go.
No, it's a hoax.
There is something missing. In the end it should say ‘The others remain Anonymous’ 🙂
Please don't take our Lulz away!!!
That is wrong Truthspoken.
Anonymous never agreed to or endorsed any operation on facebook.
“gang” They are a gang.
The biased Mr. Clu-less strikes again.
I find it interesting that a man of your intelligence would slant your blog like that, I particularly noticed the repetitive use of "Gang". Neither are a "Gang", gangs have hurt people because they don't like them, Lulzsec did it for the lulz and Anonymous does it for freedom.
Just curious, are the LulzSec guys still laughing?
maybe Sabu, the others not 😉
I imagine sabu is. Especially after all the trolls were so sure he was going to be arrested thanks to their inaccurate information. I'd be having a nice laugh if I were him. hackers are as expendable as the soldiers governments send to die for their selfish reasons. I think there's actually probably more angry hacktivists in training, than people willing to put their lives on the line for governments who do nothing for them.
Learn how to use a dictionary FFS.
I find it interesting that people buy into the BS these two groups are shoveling. Luzsec claiming to have done it for the "lulz" is the more believable of the two. I can see that some total jerks would enjoy harming innocent people by exposing their information on the web. This is hardly something to cheer for though. Then you have Anonymous, This group leaves me just furious. I will admit that a lot of their ideas appeal to me. They have a good sales pitch. What bothers me though is this, they run around talking about being "anonymous" stressing the importance of it and how great it is. Then they turn around and toss the personal information of thousands of people out on the internet. Does anyone else see the hypocrisy in this? They are harming people who have done nothing wrong. The only mistake many of these people made was in assuming the companies they shared there info with would protect it. That is hardly a mistake worthy the treatment they got.
What essentially was peaceful political dissidence is criminalized? I know the technologies that need to be used to not get caught and when they don't work, it means the gov't has way over-stepped their bounds. I might have to write a guide for this, these people are engaging in a peaceful protest, no different from any other. If you can't live without being able to just use amazon or a law enforcement site, you've got serious internal issues to deal with.
XKCD couldn't have put it any better: http://xkcd.com/932/
Here's a novel concept, gov't and laws can be WRONG.
Indeed I agree government and laws can be wrong and I am all for peaceful protests. I actually would go far enough to say I would be for some cyber attacks. What I have a problem with is these groups tossing out information on innocent people. They did not really hurt the companies or organizations all that much by doing that. The people they hurt are the innocent individuals who now have to deal with identity theft and other issues due to these groups. If you have a problem with a company or organization then take it out on them, do not take it out on the innocent people who have done nothing wrong.
I could not agree with you more. Where we clearly see a major failing point in the current legal ecosystem and culture is the accountability of these organizations who have allowed their customers data to fall victim to a data breach. This is clearly due to not following updated/current security best-in-class practices. Much like we hold people accountable for negligence we need to hold organizations accountable for the same. Until the penalties for not-paying attention impact the bottom-line we will never see a change in behavior. That fact scares me and frankly makes me a little upset. Why have we as a collective society become so complacent.
The harm these idiots have done goes far beyond the immediate danger they placed law enforcement staff in.
They risk EVERYONE losing what little internet freedom we have. And they didn't ask my opinion before starting down this road.
The quicker they are blasted by the courts, the better. Hopefully it will stem the flow of newbies wanting to further rip a hole in our freedoms by doing similar actions.
Kayla Arrested and its probably a bloke.
There you have it folks, get that image of Angelina Jolie out of your head there are no girl hackers
Well, there was GigaByte..