Hacker group Anonymous pleads guilty in PayPal hack

By Nicel Jane Avellana

Dec 07, 2013 03:23 AM EST

Anonymous, a hacker group, pleaded guilty to charges to involvement in a cyberattack on PayPal, a unit of eBay Inc, three years ago. Thirteen people admitted orchestrating the attack, saying that their move was a retaliation to the payment platform which suspended the account of anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks.

In a statement issued today, US Attorney Melinda Haag said, "Citing violations of the PayPal terms of service, and in response to WikiLeaks' release of the classified cables, PayPal suspended WikiLeaks' accounts such that WikiLeaks could no longer receive donations via PayPal." The website of WikiLeaks said the suspension of their PayPal account was a move that tried to strangle WikiLeaks economically.

The statement said ten of the thirteen defendants pleaded guilty in a San Jose, California federal court to a single count of conspiracy and one count of causing damage to a protected computer. The remaining three defendants also admitted guilt to a single count each about the attack.

According to a Bloomberg report, the charges made came from distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS), which flooded targeted computers by the hackers. Communication requests will fill the said computers, which in turn, will impair its ability to function. This ultimately led to legitimate users being denied of service. Prosecutors depicted Anonymous as an online group of individuals linked with collaborative cyber attacks whose goals were politically and socially motivated.

The names of the defendants were released by Haag and reported by the Los Angeles Times. The thirteen people who pleaded guilty were Christopher Wayne Cooper, Joshua John Covelli, Keith Wilson Downey, Mercedes Renee Haefer, Donald Husband, Vincent Charles Kershaw, Ethan Miles, James C. Murphy, Drew Alan Phillips, Jeffrey Puglisi, Daniel Sullivan, Tracy Ann Valenzuela and Christopher Quang Vo. According to the Los Angeles Times report, the defendants were released on bond. Except for Valenzuela who will have her sentencing hearing on November 20, 2014, the others will have their sentencing hearings on December 4, 2014, the report said.

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