Fury as #AntiSec dumps 10GB of sheriffs' private data

By Richi Jennings (@richi ) - August 8, 2011.

AntiSec hackers have leaked 10GB of private data from sheriffs' offices. The loose group, allied to the 4chan-spinoffs Anonymous and LulzSec, stated they did it in revenge for recent arrests of their friends. In IT Blogwatch, bloggers blog it for the lulz.

Your humble blogwatcher curated these bloggy bits for your entertainment. Not to mention: OMG ponies glitch remix!..

Robert McMillan reports:

[They] say that they hope to "embarrass, discredit and incriminate police officers across the US. ... It took less than 24 hours to root BJM's server and copy all their data." ... [They] compromised servers at...Brooks-Jeffrey Marketing [which] builds websites for sheriff's agencies.
...
[It goes] beyond mere Web defacement, by posting...passwords, social security numbers, credit card numbers [and] messages from confidential informants. ... The hackers claim to have obtained passwords, contact information and [SSNs] from the Missouri Sheriffs' Association's website.   

   
Paul Suarez adds:

The information released includes more than 300 mail accounts; personal information for more than 7000 individuals;...online police training files; a snitch list...and server passwords.
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"We have no sympathy for any of the officers or informants who may be endangered,"...[says AntiSec]..."It's retribution time: we want them to experience just a taste of the kind of misery and suffering they inflict upon us."
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It can be difficult to tell where the line is...[but] it makes the whole "we're doing this to fix injustice" thing a little less believable.   

Lucian Constantin was among the first to report the cache:

Antisec hackers are at war with both the intelligence community and law enforcement agencies, and there's no end in sight. ... Neither side is likely to back down.   

And Zack Whittaker breaks out the asterisks:

Known as ‘Shooting Sheriffs Saturday’, this follows ‘F**k FBI Friday’ in June. ... Since the Wikileaks’ releases, this is thought to be one of the largest caches of government data to be leaked.
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Across the Twittersphere, where a war of words broke out earlier this week [with] law enforcement...the group is acting ‘in solidarity with Topiary’, the LulzSec spokesperson charged with hacking offenses.
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AntiSec’s movement follows the initial work of LulzSec and continued by Anonymous. [It's] of an ideological nature rather than an organised collective...making the task for law enforcement far more difficult.   

James Johnson agrees:

In true AntiSec, Anonymous fashion they also managed to humiliate victims of crimes, including [images] of teenage girls in swimsuits which were part of an ongoing investigation.   

But Paul Hales points to Sheriffs' idiotic initial denials:

The hackers say they were watching...police officers...denying anything of worth had been hacked. "Many lulz have been had as we taunted the sheriffs by...tweeting teasers exposing their SSNs, passwords, addresses, and private emails."
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In all, the hackers say they broke into the systems of over 70...offices and many of these attacks have now been confirmed by red-faced sheriffs.   

  
And Finally...
My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic Intro (Alex S. Glitch Remix)
[hat tip: Nina "naz14" Lee]

         
 
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Richi Jennings is an independent analyst/consultant, specializing in blogging, email, and security. He's the creator and main author of Computerworld's IT Blogwatch -- for which he has won American Society of Business Publication Editors and Jesse H. Neal awards on behalf of Computerworld. He also writes The Long View for IDG Enterprise. A cross-functional IT geek since 1985, you can follow him as @richi on Twitter, pretend to be richij's friend on Facebook, or just use good old email: itbw@richij.com. You can also read Richi's full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.