FBI had prior knowledge of STRATFOR targeting

[EffectsDiaspora]

Been pouring through the indictment for Lulzsec, that lil mayhem cell that sprang forth from Anonymous' womb (the hacker bandits), and later targeted STRATFOR, but some things are not adding up.

Sabu (CW-1 or Chief Witness 1 in the indictment), a member of Lulzsec was caught, flipped and released, for lighter sentencing early on in 2011, serving until recently as an FBI informant in the cell.

Through his duties as mole he provided early warning on the behaviours of his co-conspirators, and acquired, among other information, advance knowledge that STRATFOR was being targeted as early as December 6 2011(as indicated by chat logs, PAGE 16 of the indictment currently published on guardian.com). According to the afidavit, he also provided a server (courtesy of the FBI page 13 indictment) to the other members, in order to store the stolen STRATFOR data. The possibility that the hackers stored the data on multiple servers is mentioned(the indictment page 13 also). The indictment suggests that the hack began around December 14, 2011 (page 2, also 17; suggests hack began on December 13)

So either the FBI was unwilling, or unable to act in order to protect STRATFOR, despite having advanced warning? Seems kind of strange to my untrained self to sacrifice a company and it's clients, while you have information that can protect them. Did the FBI maybe collaborate with STRATFOR in some covert or less visible manner? Your thoughts?

The indictment:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/interactive/2012/mar/06/lulzsec-indictment-documents-prosecution-complaints?INTCMP=SRCH&fb_source=message

[AdamG]

Russia Today spins it -


A pretrial hearing in the case against accused LulzSec hacker Jeremy Hammond this week ended with the 27-year-old Chicago man being told he could be sentenced to life in prison for compromising the computers of Stratfor.

Judge Loretta Preska told Hammond in a Manhattan courtroom on Tuesday that he could be sentenced to serve anywhere from 360 months-to-life if convicted on all charges relating to last year’s hack of Strategic Forecasting, or Stratfor, a global intelligence company whose servers were infiltrated by an offshoot of the hacktivist collective Anonymous.

Hammond is not likely to take the stand until next year, but so far has been imprisoned for eight months without trial. Legal proceedings in the case might soon be called into question, however, after it’s been revealed that Judge Preska’s husband was a victim of the Stratfor hack.

http://rt.com/usa/news/anonymous-stratfor-hammond-judge-440/

[Fuchs]

What puzzles me more is that conspirational organisations still haven't figured out how to deal with caught and 'flipped' members.

It's not that hard to prepare against such a well-known standard tactic, after all.


About the prior knowledge / FBI thing; as I understand it public services in the U.S. can be sued with success if they were capable of protecting someone, but didn't.

[carl]

So either the FBI was unwilling, or unable to act in order to protect STRATFOR, despite having advanced warning? Seems kind of strange to my untrained self to sacrifice a company and it's clients, while you have information that can protect them. Did the FBI maybe collaborate with STRATFOR in some covert or less visible manner? Your thoughts?

The indictment:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/interactive/2012/mar/06/lulzsec-indictment-documents-prosecution-complaints?INTCMP=SRCH&fb_source=message

I believe the Whitey Bulger case demonstrated that the FBI is sometimes not averse to sacrificing citizens in order to make a case.

[bourbon]

Anonymous recently hacked DEBKA File, which is an Israeli site known for peddling intel/news of dubious veracity. Could be interesting if Anon got the email spools.

[EffectsDiaspora]

i bet the folks at stratfor are enjoying the news of the attack on debka. i hear they don't think to highly of that outfit.

i have to admit though, i do read debka every now and then for both entertainment value and to adequately define my left and right limits.

regarding the FBI handling of STRATFOR hack and pre-attack intelligence; as it's been a year now, and no additional information/condemnation/complaints have surfaced, i'm assuming they followed their SOP and any concerns anyone may have had were probably unfounded.

regarding anonymous' lack of countermeasures, or hardening itself against infiltration; i think it's tough enough for states/agencies to counter infiltration, much less loosely affiliated hacker collectives.