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July 20, 2011

Global Crackdown on Hacking Highlighted by Arrest of 16-Year-Old Brit

By Beecher Tuttle, TMCnet Contributor

U.K. authorities have arrested a 16-year-old South London boy who is believed to be one of the leading members of LulzSec, an infamous hacker group that has taken responsibility for a number of high profile attacks against major corporations and government entities.



The group, which is known to be a smaller offshoot of the hacking organization called “Anonymous,” has taken down systems controlled by Sony, PBS, the U.S. Senate and, most recently, Rupert Murdoch's Sun tabloid.

The Metropolitan Police's E-Crime unit in London told FoxNews.com that the juvenile suspect, who goes by the alias “Tflow,” is being held on suspicion of breaking the Computer Misuse Act.

Forbes has said that the suspect can be tied to the hacker group through a series of leaked instant messenger discussions where he talks about money-raising efforts and the release of confidential information related to certain hacks.

The arrests come just one day after the FBI conducted a nationwide raid on alleged Anonymous members, resulting in 14 arrests in California and one each in New Jersey and Florida. The coordinated effort was the result of an investigation into the alleged distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on PayPal (News - Alert), which were said to be in retribution to the money-transfer site shutting down the donation account of controversial document-leaking organization WikiLeaks.

Fox News has reported that the suspects are being charged with intentional damage to a protected computer and other counts of conspiracy.

LulzSec's most vocal and well-known hacker, “Sabu,” has said that he has not been taken into custody and that the group has yet to confirm the arrest of Tflow. He also taunted authorities and fellow hackers via Twitter for trying to reveal his identity.

The crackdown of hackers continued later on Tuesday when Dutch authorities arrested four men who are believed to be responsible for cyber attacks carried out by another Anonymous offshoot known as AntiSec NL.

Only time will tell if the rash of arrests will help slow the hacktivist movement that has been gaining so much momentum over the last few months. Anonymous and its many affiliates have cost corporations like billions of dollars this year.

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Beecher Tuttle is a TMCnet 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

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