Benevolent Hackers Clear Stalking Spyware From 75,000 Phones

According to TechCrunch, unnamed hackers reportedly breached the spyware firm WebDetetive, deleting device information to protect surveillance victims and denying spyware users new data. Engadget reports: Users of the spyware won't get any new data from their targets. "Because #fuckstalkerware," the hackers wrote in a note obtained by TechCrunch. The WebDetetive breach compromised more than 76,000 devices belonging to customers of the stalkerware, and more than 1.5 gigabytes of data freed from app's servers, according to the hackers.

While TechCrunch did not independently confirm the deletion of victim's data from the WebDetetive server, a cache of data shared by the hackers provided a look at what they were able to accomplish. TechCrunch also worked with a nonprofit that logs exposed datasets, DDoSecrets, to verify and analyze the information. Hackers obtained information on customers like IP addresses and devices that they targeted.

Still Good People In The World

[zenlessyank]

Pay attention folks. This is what really makes a difference.

Re:

[myowntrueself]

Pay attention folks. This is what really makes a difference.

I think the bandits, I mean 'police', the FBI and the NSA are going to have a problem with these 'good people'.

Re:

[zenlessyank]

So? And your point is? Evil will always look for more victims. 3 letter acronyms doesn't make it better.

Re:

[myowntrueself]

So? And your point is? Evil will always look for more victims. 3 letter acronyms doesn't make it better.

if anything it makes it worse. KGB, NSA, FBI, FSB, CIA. Pot? Meet kettle.

Re:

[ShanghaiBill]

The primary customers are companies spying on their employees, sometimes with notification, sometimes without.

Another spyware company serving the same market is Teramind Inc. [teramind.co]

Picking a nit

[93 Escort Wagon]

The hackers didn't "clear stalking spyware from 75,000 phones". They hacked the spyware firm's servers and removed the data that allowed them to tie a specific phone to a specific person. Depending on how that spyware worked and what changes it made to the phone (if any), it's possible the phones are still in a less-than-optimal state security-wise and can potentially be exploited by other bad actors.

Regardless, the hackers did a good thing!

Re:

[spaceman375]

> it's possible the phones are still in a less-than-optimal state security-wise and can potentially be exploited by other bad actors. It's more likely that the infected phones will misbehave in a manner that will expose the malware's presence. Which is, as you said, a Good Thing.

Re:

[Cowardly Lurker]

It sounds like compromised phones always have the most reliable "evidence". Interesting.

Re:

[youngone]

20 kB could be 5,120,000 characters. That's a lot of data about someone or their phone.

Re:

[geekmux]

20 kB could be 5,120,000 characters. That's a lot of data about someone or their phone.

More people should realize this, but in the era of "phones" creating 75MB raw images I think no one does.. 20 kB is considered "nothing" by comparison, even though it can certainly represent a considerable something when used against someone.

Re:

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

Yeah, and it fits on a floppy too!

Re:

[sg_oneill]

Since when did a floppy have 1.5gb of storage.

Hell, the 3.5" had about 1.4mb. You'd need around 1000 of those to fit 1.5gb.

Or two DVDs.

Or a blueray.

Re:

[fuzzywig]

There was the "SuperDisk LS-120" which was a 3.5" 'floptical' disk that held 120MB of data, and the drive was backwards compatible with a standard 3.5" floppy. Not that you could fit 1.5GB on that.

You would only need one DVD though (they can hold 4.7GB), and if the data was text, it might compress down small enough to fit on a single 650MB CD-R. (Compression ratios of 70% are easily achievable with text).

And they they restored the backups

[iAmWaySmarterThanYou]

And patched up their security hole.

What kind of phones?

[RogueWarrior65]

Inquiring minds want to know.

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