The now-infamous hacker group known as Anonymous is showing no fear. Just two days after a series of international raids put nearly two dozen members behind bars, Anonymous has claimed to have breached the databases of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and walked away with about 1GB of confidential data.
Anonymous said in a tweet that it accessed the restricted material using a simple injection technique, and asked followers to wait a few days for the release of some “interesting” data. The group later posted links to two restricted NATO documents, one of which is related to “outsourcing CIS in Kosovo (2008).”
The hacker collective added that it cannot publish all of the data that it pilfered because it would be “irresponsible,” which suggests that the group got its hands on some highly sensitive material.
An unnamed NATO official confirmed to the AP that security experts are looking into the claims, and condemned the leaking of classified documents that could put member nations in peril.
The group’s actions follow a string of hacker arrests in the U.S. and Europe. The coordinated effort was the result of an investigation into the role Anonymous played in the alleged distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on PayPal earlier this year.
Deputy assistant FBI director Steven Chabinsky told NPR that the arrests were meant to “send a message that chaos on the Internet is unacceptable.”
“[Even if] hackers can be believed to have social causes, it’s entirely unacceptable to break into websites and commit unlawful acts,” he added.
Anonymous got wind of Chabinsky’s comments on Thursday and issued a statement of their own, detailing what they find to be unacceptable.
The hackers’ gripes include governments lying to and inducing fear in citizens, large corporations conspiring with governments and lobby conglomerates who push their own agenda for profit.
“These governments and corporations are our enemy,” the group said,” and we will continue to fight them, with all methods we have at our disposal, and that certainly includes breaking into their websites and exposing their lies.”
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Beecher Tuttle is a TechZone360 contributor. He has extensive experience writing and editing for print publications and online news websites. He has specialized in a variety of industries, including health care technology, politics and education. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.
Edited by Jennifer Russell
