(Reuters) - The
LulzSec group of
rogue hackers are
threatening to steal
classified
information from governments, banks
and other high-
ranking
establishments, in
what would be an
escalation of their cyber attacks. So far LulzSec's publicized
assaults on Sony Corp, the
CIA, News Corp's Fox TV and
other targets have mostly
resulted in temporary
disruptions of some websites and the release of user
credentials. But now, LulzSec says it is
teaming up with the
Anonymous hacker activist
group to cause more serious
trouble. "Government hacking is
taking place right now,
behind the scenes," LulzSec
said on Monday in a message
posted on Twitter, the
microblogging site where the group has cultivated more
than 210,000 followers. LulzSec had said last Friday
that it hacks to have fun and
to warn people that personal
information is not safe in the
hands of Internet companies.
But two days later, Lulz said its top priority was to leak
"classified government
information, including email
spools and documentation." Cyber police have had trouble
capturing the members of
LulzSec, whose hacks started
to hit headlines last month.
For example, it published the
email addresses and passwords of thousands of
alleged subscribers to porn
sites, it temporarily took
down the public website of
the CIA, and it published data
from internal servers of the U.S. Senate. Security experts who have
researched LulzSec's origins
say it emerged from
Anonymous, which became
famous for attacking the
companies and institutions that oppose WikiLeaks and its
founder, Julian Assange.
Anonymous also attacked
Sony and governments
around the globe that it
considered oppressive. LulzSec's members are
believed to be scattered
around the world,
collaborating via secret
Internet chat rooms.
Suspected leaders include hackers with the handles
Kayla, Sabu and Topiary,
security experts say. Bruce Schneier, a security
technologist who studies
cyber attacks, said he believes
LulzSec members are not
hardened criminals but are "a
bunch of guys who met in a chat room, plus everyone else
who thinks it would be cool
to take on that name." "They're not going to do any
damage. They're just out
having fun...they'll probably
never be tracked down," he
said. The group's name is a
combination of lulz, which is
slang for laughs, and sec,
which stands for security. "You find it funny to watch
havoc unfold, and we find it
funny to cause it," LulzSec said
in a statement posted on its
website,
Lulz Security® (LulzSec), the world's leaders in high-quality entertainment at your expense , last Friday to mark its 1,000th
Tweet. "We release personal
data so that equally evil
people can entertain us with
what they do with it." JUST FOR LAUGHS? LulzSec's new campaign to
steal sensitive government
data may signal that it is
getting more ambitious. But so far, LulzSec has not
implied that it was looking to
profit financially from hacks,
nor has it acted as guns for
hire that are willing to break
into any network for a price. In fact LulzSec turned down a
potential reward from a
security firm, Berg & Berg,
that had offered $10,000 to
anyone who could change a
picture on its website. LulzSec did it, and left a message to
say the task was easy. "Keep
your money, we do it for the
lulz." The group's unpredictable
nature can make for
interesting drama. It openly
discusses who it should
attack, welcomes debates
with its Twitter followers, and set up phone hotlines in
Europe and the U.S. for people
to call in with suggestions. Last week, LulzSec bragged
that it had shut down the
websites of some video game
companies, broken into the
servers of others, and had
