The hacker group LulzSec has apparently decided to shut down operations and sail off into the sunset.
Fellow hacker community Anonymous, with which LulzSec has teamed up, may take up where LulzSec left off.
“We can confirm that all @LulzSec members have reported aboard,” Anonymous tweeted.
Anonymous vowed to continue Operation Anti-Security, the attack on government sites worldwide that it launched jointly with LulzSec June 19.
However, the seemingly random hack attacks may not stop with LulzSec’s apparent shutdown, cybersecurity consultant Charles Dodd warned.
“Groups like this don’t just fade out into the sunset,” Dodd told TechNewsWorld.
Instead, LulzSec’s members have teamed up with Anonymous, which “has strength in numbers,” Dodd said.
Auf Wiederhsen From LulzSec
“For the past 50 days we’ve been disrupting and exposing corporations, governments, often the general population itself, and quite possibly everything in between, just because we could,” a press statement posted on LulzSec’s website Saturday reads.
“Our planned 50-day cruise has expired, and we must now sail into the distance…,” the release continues.
LulzSec also delivered a parting shot, releasing internal data from AOL, AT&T, the beta version of the “Battlefield Heroes” game, NATO’s e-bookshop and the U.S. Navy.
By Their Foes Ye Shall Know Them
LulzSec’s last days saw it battling other hackers, including Team Poison, The A-Team and cyber-vigilante “The Jester,” whose so-called Web Ninjas exposed hackers alleged to be members of LulzSec.
There are reports that The A-Team is working with the FBI, and LulzSec claims to have outed the hacker behind that group.
Meanwhile, agencies of various governments are hot on their trail. Suspected members of LulzSec and Anonymous have been arrested in the UK, Turkey and Spain.
What Happens Next
LulzSec may have decided to shut down because it was feeling the heat.
There had been no mention of a 50-day time limit in its previous announcements, and on Friday, the group had tweeted that it would “cease fire on all targets forever” if President Obama wore a shoe on his head throughout his next speech.
“I think LulzSec got more popular than they wanted,” Dodd said.
That sent LulzSec members running to Anonymous for cover.
“LulzSec being a much smaller group, it’s easier to locate them,” Dodd suggested. “Now they’ve teamed up with Anonymous they get better health benefits, in the sense that it’s harder to track them — Anonymous has the strength in numbers.”
The next phase will be one of cyberwarfare and disinformation.
“We know there are certain areas these hacker groups will target,” Dodd said. “What’s to stop us from planting documents with tracking software so, once you get them, we know who you are?”
Something along these lines may already have happened.
Someone with the handle “@uhhmnet” claimed LulzSec’s farewell press release contains a Trojan that was cracked 10 years ago .
Anonymous responded that the Trojan came from AT&T
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