Investigators say the mastermind behind Lapsus$ hacking group is a UK teen who lives with...

[midian182]

What just happened? Has the mastermind behind Lapsus$ been revealed? That's the claim being made by Bloomberg, which writes that cybersecurity researchers investigating a string of attacks carried out by the hacking group have traced them back to a 16-year-old living in his mother's house in England.

The publication reports that four researchers investigating the Lapsus$ attacks on behalf of the companies that were targeted say they believe the teenager is the mastermind. While they haven't been able to conclusively link him with every hack claimed by the group, the investigators have used forensic evidence and public information to identify the teen.

The suspect, who uses the online aliases "White" and "breachbase," has not been accused by police of any crimes. Bloomberg spoke to his mother, who lives in Oxford, England, after tracking her down using material leaked about the teen by rival hackers. She was unaware of allegations against her son and said he has been harassed by others. She declined to discuss him and said she was contacting the police.

Microsoft Security has been tracking criminal actor DEV-0537 (LAPSUS$) targeting organizations with data exfiltration and destructive attacks - including Microsoft. Analysis and guidance in our latest blog: https://t.co/gTMXJCoPY5

— Microsoft Security (@msftsecurity) March 22, 2022

One investigator said they had identified seven different accounts linked to Lapsus$, along with another teenage member living in Brazil. The UK suspect is said to be so skilled and fast at hacking that some believed his work was automated.

Cybersecurity expert Brian Krebs writes that a core member of the group using the handles "Oklaqq" and "WhiteDoxbin" purchased doxing website Doxbin. They later sold it back to the original owner but leaked "the entire Doxbin data set." This resulted in the Doxbin community doxing WhiteDoxbin, "including videos supposedly shot at night outside his home in the United Kingdom," writes Krebs.

Lapsus$ claims to have been behind attacks on Nvidia, Samsung, Vodafone, Microsoft, Okta, and more. It's believed they are motivated as much by notoriety as money, given the group doesn't cover its tracks and has joined in victims' Zoom calls to taunt them.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/93913-investigators-mastermind-behind-lapsus-hacking-group-uk-teen.html

 

[QuantumPhysics]

It's not "Mom's basement"

It's "The command center" to you...

 

[JKnight]

I can see the headlines for this if this is proven true. Billion dollar companies hacked by UK teen living with mom.

 

[elementalSG]

Article next week on Techspot: "Mama's Boy: Telling Signs That Your Teenage Son is Actually a Mastermind Hacker"

 

[BadThad]

If it were my kid, I would turn him and his computer in personally. I have no tolerance for haxors!

 

[Plutoisaplanet]

What a fall guy. That said if he really is the culprit, the government would benefit nicely if they hired him.

 

[y6Tq2RGXEejb]

Megacorporations getting pwned by zoomers is the cyberpunk future we all secretly hoped for.

 

[kiwigraeme]

Probably enjoys bake beans on toast .
Seriously if you could do it for fun . and nobody got hurt and you handed the money bank - who wouldn't enjoy planning a huge bank heist ( not some lame suburb one - except as training ).
Lots of people angry - teens can do exciting things - like drive real fast , smoke ciggies , unprotected sex etc etc .
This is better than any computer game for them.

Now I'm not saying this s right - it's not - They just need to be put on straight and narrow - they are not career criminals .
Think back when you were a kid stealing apples you didn't need as your parents have 2 trees already - because you could of been gored by that bull in the paddock or ripped apart by that dachshund .
This kid will not do jail time and this is a good thing

 

[HavocP]

So, the British were behind the hacking

 

[Goamist]

I blame mainly the parents for being technological illiterates and not instilling responsibility to these kids. Sure, there might be circumstances I am not aware of, but these parents should still make time to actually forge a meaningful bond with their kids, so that they can pass over some basic human qualities.

 

[QuantumPhysics]

I blame mainly the parents for being technological illiterates and not instilling responsibility to these kids. Sure, there might be circumstances I am not aware of, but these parents should still make time to actually forge a meaningful bond with their kids, so that they can pass over some basic human qualities.

Respectfully I disagree.

These parents in NO WAY are prepared to manage their kid's abilities on the internet.

My own parents tried to monitor my TV time when I was a kid by pulling the power cable from my TV. I simply called up the company and told them my cable was damaged and they mailed me another.

These parents nowadays lack the instinct to even manage parental settings.

I purposefully turned parental censors on within my parent's cable boxes because I feel they shouldn't be watching that kind of stuff.

I'm 40 years old...kids younger than me know way more about the modern computer environment than I do.

 

[Goamist]

Respectfully I disagree.

These parents in NO WAY are prepared to manage their kid's abilities on the internet.

My own parents tried to monitor my TV time when I was a kid by pulling the power cable from my TV. I simply called up the company and told them my cable was damaged and they mailed me another.

These parents nowadays lack the instinct to even manage parental settings.

I purposefully turned parental censors on within my parent's cable boxes because I feel they shouldn't be watching that kind of stuff.

I'm 40 years old...kids younger than me know way more about the modern computer environment than I do.

The underlying problem is what the kids are doing with their abilities and this is where the parents fail - not that they cannot control the kids' screen time, but that they didn't teach their kids what responsibility is. The real control should come from the inside.

 

[McMurdeR]

The underlying problem is what the kids are doing with their abilities and this is where the parents fail - not that they cannot control the kids' screen time, but that they didn't teach their kids what responsibility is. The real control should come from the inside.

That's very true. As a parent myself I know how hard it is to manage the children's screen time. Better to teach them to be responsible for the content they consume.
What I don't get is this - the teenager in question here is clearly very inventive, savy and clever. How could he not have foreseen that he'd be either caught or ratted out - and understood the consequences?