Contents of Leaked HBGary Emails Reveal Wrongdoing

chargersfan420 writes "Ars Technica has sifted through the contents of the HBGary emails leaked last week in the attack by Anonymous and posted an interesting story about some of the things they were up to (which include rootkit development, selling rootkits to the private sector, and an entire list of 0-day exploits in a variety of OSes and other software, among a variety of other devious plans). Today they are reporting a democratic push for a congressional investigation of HBGary Federal."

Comments

Haha. Read the memo they left in the conference

[unity100]

http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2011/02/16/lessons-to-learn-from-the-hbgary-federal-hack/

down below.

http://sophosnews.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/hbgary-rsa-sign.jpg?w=640

"A group of AGGRESSIVE hackers known as 'Anonymous' illegally broke into blah blah ..... blah blah and stole proprietary and 'confidential' information which was STOLEN by us by using ROOTKITS and VIRUSES and 0 DAY EXPLOITS from private citizens' computers ....."

corporate lack of shame. you produce rootkits, viruses, 0 day exploits, malware to spy on people, steal their confidential, legally private information to SELL them, and then you dub that information 'proprietary' information belonging to you ....

i wonder what will they say in their defense in front of senate committee. what's more, i wonder what will the senate committee say to them, in regard to their dealings with this filthy outfit.

whats the slogan of hbgary anyway ? "hey - we produce viruses, rootkits, 0 day exploits and malware to steal your private information to sell to corporations and government !!!" ?

Re:Haha. Read the memo they left in the conference

[Bob9113]

> i wonder what will the senate committee say to them, in regard to their dealings with this filthy outfit.

Here's my guess: "When Blackwater got caught doing evil shit, they had to split up into a bunch of shell companies with different names so we could keep paying them enormous sums of taxpayer money to keep doing business as usual. Now you are going to have to do the same. One of the contractors from one of the new Blackwater shells who works for the CIA just got caught shooting non-combatants in the back, and we are having a motherfucker of a time keeping people from making the connection. Like that guy, we'll give you diplomatic immunity or state secrets protection, or whatever we need to do to prevent justice from being served, but it is a pain in the ass. Don't get caught again."

Of course, that's not going to be the public part.

Re:Careful what you wish for

[Anonymous Coward]

As an "Obama supporter" (if that even makes sense) I would like this investigation, so that this comes to light if it is true. Since my support of people is not axiomatic, I would like evidence supporting their trustworthiness. I understand this position may appear alien.

Re:Careful what you wish for

[twoallbeefpatties]

I've been occasionally hearing this argument lately. "Yeah, we know these guys are doing bad things, but what if you find out that your guys are doing bad things, too? That would prove that you're even more evil, now wouldn't it!" It sounds like an attempt to conflate a hypothetical situation with what's actually going on. You know, things that there are no evidence for yet do not deserve equal weight with things that are actually evident.

This is in no way to say that I think the Obama administration is completely blameless and angelic in all things. If we were to discover that this firm was working on some of the same hacking and propaganda techniques on behalf of the government, then I'd damned well like to know about that as well. If the Obama administration was using these tactics on American citizens, I hope the investigation uncovers it somehow. And if you, parent poster, murdered a bunch of people ten years ago, I would hope that you are sent to jail for it. You know, if you did that. But in the meantime, we've got documents pointing to fraud being done by this firm on behalf of the Chamber of Commerce, so why don't we start with that?

Re:Score one for Anonymous.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget ACS:Law as well.
Us Britons had to suffer their bullshit and lies for many years.
No more people suffering their crap anymore. And they will get the punishment they deserve.
Now if only someone would go after Global Debt Recovery AKA Tower Investigations AKA a bunch of other terrible companies who buy off loans legally out of date and scare people in to paying up or face "harsh punishments"...

The Anonymous Movement isn't one group, it is many, there are no members, just people with the same ideals.
This gives them power.
Of course, no doubt many countries are in the process of getting rid of any anonymity online.
It won't work, but they will try. Even many ISPs are against some of the crap governments try to pull.
The moment a "No-Anonymity" law is mentioned, all rights groups it applies to will instantly shoot it down. (you can bet your ass EFF will be on it in a heart beat)

Re:Countermeasures against HBGary

[Red Flayer]

If you set out to behave ethically in all your endeavours, and are honest and forthright with people, the only attacks people can make against you will be lies. Sure, you'll face attacks, but you don't have anything that you would need to be actively hiding to stay "safe".

That only holds true if

1. "ethically" is the same as "legally".
2. You're version of "ethically" is the same as everyone else's version of "ethically".

Re:Careful what you wish for

[MeateaW]

Did you read the other article where they were hired by a law firm to spy on and defame unions?
I think the main wrongdoing is not the *acts* themselves, but using knowledge gained/obtained by funding of their government military contracts (ostensibly to be used on the non american enemy) and then going around and selling those services for private companies to use against american businesses/corporations/individuals.

I think it is sort of a research to make sure the military isn't effectively funding private espionage. Forget the part where it is American businesses. What's even worse is it is possibly espionage against unions (political speech)