London Court Sentences LulzSec Hackers

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Four men who were part of the LulzSec hacking group have all received sentences for cyberattacks against the CIA, the Arizona State Police, the U.K.’s Serious Organised Crime Agency, Britain’s National Health Service, PBS, Nintendo, Sony, and others. Three were sentenced to between 20 and 32 months of jail time, and one received a suspended sentence and community service.

BBC News reported, “British hackers who were behind a series of high profile cyber-attacks in 2011 have been sentenced. The four men, Ryan Cleary, Jake Davis, Mustafa al-Bassam and Ryan Ackroyd, were part of the Lulzsec hacking group. Cleary was jailed for 32 months, Davis for two years and Ackroyd for 30 months. Al Bassam was given a 20-month suspended sentence.”

According to ITPro’s Rene Millman, “The four saw themselves as ‘latter-day pirates’ as they carried out attacks on organisations such as The Sun newspaper, the NHS and Sony. They formed part of the LulzSec collective, a group behind attacks that stole confidential data including emails, passwords and credit card details.”

Henry Chu with the Los Angeles Times added, “Authorities say that the incidents inflicted serious harm on the companies’ and agencies’ reputations and financial damage of more than $30 million. ‘The actions of these LulzSec hackers were cowardly and vindictive,’ said Andrew Hadik of the Crown Prosecution Service in London. ‘They boasted of how clever they were with a complete disregard for the impact their actions had on real people’s lives.'”

PCMag’s Stephanie Mlot noted, “In June 2012, Cleary and Davis admitted to conspiring with other members of LulzSec, an offshoot of the Anonymous hacking collective, to attack government, media, and law enforcement sites in 2011. In April, Ackroyd also admitted in a London courtroom to working with the hacktivist group. The four men make up only a subset of the entire LulzSec group, which is allegedly run by 24-year-old Matthew Flannery, an Australian citizen who was charged last month for his role in the group. He now faces up to 12 years in prison on three hacking-related charges.”