In this week's Security bytes, Anonymous hacker Jeremy Hammond has been sentenced to 10 years' in prison; and six people have been arrested in New York for lifting debit card information from MasterCard. Get the details on these stories and more below.
Rowan Atkinson death hoax
The news of Mr Bean actor, Rowan Atkinson's alleged suicide has been all over social networks. However, it turned out to be nothing more than an elaborate hoax used to spread malware. Techtree reported that the posts trick users into installing a malicious app, claiming to be a video of the actor's suicide. It asks for access to the victim's account, then sends the hoax to their friends list.
Brooks did not authorise PI payments
Rebekah Brooks, former editor of Britain's News of the World, on trial for phone hacking, could not be shown to have authorised a single payment to Glenn Mulcaire, a private eye at the heart of the scandal, writes The Guardian. The name 'Glenn Mulcaire', who was paid £1 769 a week, did not appear on a list of her authorised payments drawn from payment records, the phone-hacking trial was told.
Anonymous hacker gets 10 years
Activist and hacktivist Jeremy Hammond was sentenced last week to 10 years in prison and three years' of supervised release, following his hacking of intelligence contractor Strategic Forecasting and other government, law enforcement and military suppliers' Web sites, the Huffington Post reported. Hammond was working under AntiSev - an offshoot of hacking collective Anonymous.
vBulletin hacked
European hacking group "Inj3ct0r Team" claims all recent versions of the vBulletin online forum software are vulnerable to a zero-day exploit that would give attackers full access to the targeted system, reveals Information Week. Last week, the group took credit on Facebook for hacking not only Macrumors.com, but also vBulletin.com, both of which run on vBulletin's forum software. vBulletin issued a hacking alert to its customers.
Cyber heist nets $45 million
Five men and a woman from New York City have been charged for their involvement in a cyber crime outfit that lifted debit card information from MasterCard, says Technewsworld. It is alleged the six are "cashers" in the crime ring, reportedly having withdrawn nearly $3 million from 140 ATMs in New York. Similar cells are believed to exist in more than 20 other countries.
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