#Anonymous target is US security think tank
As I travel through this world I see many a stange man
Some will rob you with a six-gun, some with a fountain pen. - Woodie Guthrie
The loose-knit hacking movement “Anonymous” claimed Sunday to have stolen thousands of credit card numbers and other personal information belonging to clients of U.S.-based security think tank Stratfor. One hacker said the goal was to pilfer funds from individuals’ accounts to give away as Christmas donations, and some victims confirmed unauthorized transactions linked to their credit cards.
Anonymous boasted of stealing Stratfor’s confidential client list, which includes entities ranging from Apple Inc. to the U.S. Air Force to the Miami Police Department, and mining it for more than 4,000 credit card numbers, passwords and home addresses...
Anonymous said the client list it had already posted was a small slice of the 200 gigabytes worth of plunder it stole from Stratfor and promised more leaks...
By The Legendary Jim Parks
The Legendary year of 2012 started with a bang early Monday morning when Stratfor – Strategic Forecasting, a private intelligence service based in Austin – contacted me to say that my name, address and banking records have been hacked by Anonymous.
The “loose-knit organization” is protesting such financial services as Visa and MasterCard retaliatory actions against the massive data leak of classified government information by Wikileaks, much of it obtained by stealth by accused traitor U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning from a forward communications base in Iraq.
According to a webiste attributed to the “hacktivist organization,”
“Anonymous said the client list it had already posted was a small slice of the 200 gigabytes worth of plunder it stole from Stratfor and promised more leaks. It said it was able to get the credit card details in part because Stratfor didn’t bother encrypting them — an easy-to-avoid blunder which, if true, would be a major embarrassment for any security-related company.”
The Stratfor organization informed me it has arranged for a one-year complimentary subscription to a cybersecurity organization that will track any intrusions into my banking records.
Sure enough, early Tuesday morning that organization contacted me to let me know there have been breaches of my records, that my passwords and usernames for e-mail and ATM banking have been stolen and traded to people who are not authorized to have them.
Later in the day, the phone rang and it was a bank representative to who let me know they are going to shut off my card and reissue new ones right away.
At that point, there had been about $1,000 worth of fraudlent transactions and they were continuing as we spoke on the phone.
So far as I can tell at this point, they have been able to prevent the cyberthieves from getting away with any of my money.
The Anonymous hackers say they are going to give the funds to such organizations as Wikileaks to continue their work in exposing sensitive information to the world.
“We are legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget...”
We don't, either, y'all.
Have a nice day.
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