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Security Crime The Military United States

Feds: Sailor Hacked Navy Network While Aboard Nuclear Aircraft Carrier 43

ClownP (1315157) writes in with this story about a hacker who did some of his work while aboard a nuclear aircraft carrier. " A former sailor assigned to a US nuclear aircraft carrier and another man have been charged with hacking the computer systems of 30 public and private organizations, including the US Navy, the Department of Homeland Security, AT&T, and Harvard University. Nicholas Paul Knight, 27, of Chantilly, VA, and Daniel Trenton Krueger, 20, of Salem, IL, were members of a crew that hacked protected computers as part of a scheme to steal personal identities and obstruct justice, according to a criminal complaint unsealed earlier this week in a US District Court in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The gang, which went by the name Team Digi7al, allegedly took to Twitter to boast of the intrusions and publicly disclose sensitive data that was taken. The hacking spree lasted from April 2012 to June 2013, prosecutors said."
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Feds: Sailor Hacked Navy Network While Aboard Nuclear Aircraft Carrier

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  • by HangingChad ( 677530 ) on Sunday May 11, 2014 @08:42AM (#46972079) Homepage

    “Essentially I am in trouble for posting all of the stuff on Twitter,”

    You're in trouble for bragging about it. It's amazing how many criminals get caught because they can't keep their mouth shut. To me that seems like Crime 101. The first rule of black hat hacking is you don't talk about black hat hacking.

    • by XanC ( 644172 )

      I hope the percentage of criminals who get caught for bragging is high... Because if for every one of these guys in the article, there's one who can keep his mouth shut, then we may be in trouble.

    • by rmdingler ( 1955220 ) on Sunday May 11, 2014 @08:54AM (#46972161) Journal
      To keep a secret perfectly safe, your odds of success are best if you are the only one who knows it happened and you tell no one.

      If you trust someone else with the secret, you are forced to be realistic about the likelihood it will be spread further, since you, yourself couldn't be trusted with it.

      • Yes, but how else will I plot the current advancement of human information conveyance systems if not by spreading previously unknown information and tracking its spread? How else will I map the information hierarchy and determine my next move?

    • by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Sunday May 11, 2014 @08:57AM (#46972181)

      That's the bummer about hacking, you can't brag. If you're black hat, you get caught, if you're white hat, the NDA hits you.

      So, kids, hacking ain't cool. Even if you hack the worlds best secured fortress, it's like doing the once in a lifetime stunt that nobody will believe you did but you forgot to record it.

      • by mysidia ( 191772 )

        That's the bummer about hacking, you can't brag. If you're black hat, you get caught, if you're white hat, the NDA hits you.

        If you're a good white hat; you make sure to negotiate your NDA so it isn't so unfairly restrictive that it prevents you from bragging about your accomplishments.

        • If you're a real White Hat, you're a professional. Professionals work. You complete your work tasking, while abiding by all rules, regulations, SOPS, and agreements associated with your work. Kids and amateurs play...and perhaps brag. Huge difference.
          • by mysidia ( 191772 )

            Kids and amateurs play...and perhaps brag. Huge difference.

            Kids and amateurs brag, professionals create resume entries which chronicle their successes.

            Oh yeah, and the really good ones have so much work that they don't have to accept agreements which forbid them from advertising their accomplishments.

            • True. But professionally, like, "Led or participated in X Blue Team and Y Red Team reviews, resulting in discovery and remediation of z exploitable weaknesses." That's not bragging. If you sound like you're bragging, your credibility is diminished.
              • by mysidia ( 191772 )

                That's not bragging. If you sound like you're bragging, your credibility is diminished.

                It's bragging dressed up in a different way. Yes, people in a professional environment are sensitive to the manner in which you boast about your accomplishments, but at a fundamental level, companies and individuals get hired or not based on what they choose to boast about.

                Kids call it bragging, Pros call it their portfolio, and corporations call it posting their success stories and case studies (which Market

          • "Bragging", in a professional setting, means going around conventions and holding panels.

      • That's the bummer about hacking, you can't brag. If you're black hat, you get caught, if you're white hat, the NDA hits you.

        So, kids, hacking ain't cool. Even if you hack the worlds best secured fortress, it's like doing the once in a lifetime stunt that nobody will believe you did but you forgot to record it.

        http://www.anyclip.com/movies/sneakers/martins-job/#!quotes/ [anyclip.com]

      • That's the bummer about hacking, you can't brag. If you're black hat, you get caught, if you're white hat, the NDA hits you.

        Hackers, even the black-hatted ones, are way too honest for their line of work. They have a lot to learn from the software and video pirates of the 1980's

        THiS PoST CRaCKeD By THe aMaZiNG WoNDuMuNCHeR!!

        • Without saying or implying anything...

          I need people with good assembler skills. REALLY good assembler skills. The kind of people who can look at some asm code and spot the "odd bits" that don't "belong", so they know where to put the crowbar.

          There is exactly one kind of people who have that kind of skill. Or, as a friend put it, there's two kind of people that apply here. The ones with a police record, and the good ones.

          • There is exactly one kind of people who have that kind of skill. Or, as a friend put it, there's two kind of people that apply here. The ones with a police record, and the good ones.

            No, no, no, you've got it all wrong. Very few black hats have chops. What white hats have is restraint. By and large, they're script kitties... as in utilizing a script kit, and it takes no skill to run a script. (yeah, I know everyone else says "script kiddies" because they think they're young... NOPE... script kitties are OLD and LAZY. The actual kids have WAY more skills than script kitties,... its ridiculous!).

            I need people with good assembler skills. REALLY good assembler skills. The kind of people who can look at some asm code and spot the "odd bits" that don't "belong", so they know where to put the crowbar.

            Then what you want is an early 80's cracker (or programmer). DId everything in assembly. And

    • by StormReaver ( 59959 ) on Sunday May 11, 2014 @09:11AM (#46972269)

      You're in trouble for bragging about it.

      âoeEssentially I am in trouble for posting all of the stuff on Twitter,â

      And now you're going to prison because you just confessed to it all on public forums.

      Again.

      Your trial is going to be very short, and your sentence is going to be very long.

      It's said that there is no accounting for stupidity, but this is natural selection at work.

    • That's exactly it. Most people who are in jail talk themselves into it. These guys were stupid.
      That said, it's the black-hat hackers and criminals in general who don't engage in bravado are the ones you need to worry about.

      • There was a kind of bleach & its slogan was "Kills all known germs - DEAD!".

        My gran always used to reply "It's the unknown ones that I'm worried about!"

        No, I'm not related to Donald Rumsfeld.

    • The first rule of black hat hacking is you don't talk about black hat hacking.

      Does telling people not to talk about it constitute talking about it?

    • Security Culture: Nobody Talks, everybody walks
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by ReallyEvilCanine ( 991886 ) on Sunday May 11, 2014 @08:57AM (#46972183) Homepage
    Sensationalism. Propaganda. We'll be sure to think of the children as ew teach the tairists a lesson.

    "...aboard a NUCLEAR aircraft carrier..."
    Because the US also has a bunch of coal-fired carriers and a couple of old-fashioned pedal-powered ones?

    HACKED network... while ABOARD
    So... he accessed other networks. While he was working or when he had a rack pass and time to kill?
    • See how at least some of them did while in the Navy and hacked the Navy?

    • Sensationalism. Propaganda. We'll be sure to think of the children as ew teach the tairists a lesson.

      Think about it.

      Knight was an active duty enlisted member of the Navy assigned to the nuclear aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman. He worked as a systems administrator in the carrier's nuclear reactor department. He is accused of conducting some of his unlawful hacking while aboard.

      Feds: Sailor hacked Navy network while aboard nuclear aircraft carrier [arstechnica.com]

      That cuts a little too close to the bone.

      It gets better:

      ''Essentially I am in trouble for posting all of the stuff on Twitter,''Knight told ABC News by email in his first interview. ''Although a lot of people are saying I was the leader of some crime organizations that was out to get people which wasn't true. Just a group of people that were dumb and did dumb things.''

      In criminal information filed Monday, prosecutors allege that while Knight served in the Navy as a systems administrator in the nuclear reactor department of the USS Harry S. Truman, he was also leading a double life as a self-proclaimed ''nuclear black hat'' and the leader of a hacking group called Team Digi7al that stole or attempted to steal confidential or private information and post it online.

      After the attacks, the group then bragged about their accomplishments on Twitter, with Knight acting as the main ''publicist,'' according to the Department of Justice.

      The court filing noted that three alleged members of the group were minors when they joined.

      Prosecutor Ryan Souders, who is involved in the case, told ABC News that generally when a suspect is charged in a criminal information filing, rather than an indictment, that means the defense has indicated they will not contest the charges.

      Alleged Navy Hacker Says His Group Just 'Did Dumb Things' [go.com]

      I

      • by waddgodd ( 34934 )

        The interesting part is the three minors. I thought that the Navy has gone back to the "nobody under 18, period" rule for enlistments

  • by Gothmolly ( 148874 ) on Sunday May 11, 2014 @09:32AM (#46972419)

    Way to sensationalize.

    • Way to sensationalize.

      In the United States, prosecutors have the job of sensationalizing in order to get a conviction and longer sentences. They are spinning a story they design out of the facts, so they pick the facts which make someone seem as guilty as possible and of as big a crime as possible.

      The defense attorney's job is to whittle that down. The jury has the job of guessing the truth from two competing false narratives (the prosecution and the defense). Only the judge can ask witnesses questions impartially, and he or

    • by waddgodd ( 34934 )

      Guy was a 3rd class, prolly the ink was barely dry on his promotion to 2nd class, then busted to 3rd out the door. TIR start of April 2011, enlisted 2009 He wasn't a "system administrator", he was cleaning the dust bunnies out of the computers.

  • Really, they were hacking on the aircraft carrier? Hacking what? Would be funny if a system failed so catastrophically they had to have sailors on board actually patch and recompile on the spot, and even if they were just innocently hacking away at a recalcitrant build-script for their photomanager or something it would still be cool, right?

    At least that was what I thought when I read the headline. Imagine my surprise to find out this is actually a story about crime-on-the-internet and has othing to do with

"The vast majority of successful major crimes against property are perpetrated by individuals abusing positions of trust." -- Lawrence Dalzell

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