Supposed "LulzSec leader" is just a wannabe hacker

On Wednesday, the Australian Federal Police arrested 24-year-old Matthew Flannery, who went by the name Aush0k online and is now being charged with computer sabotage and unauthorised access to restricted data. Until the arrest, Flannery was working as a support technician at Content Security, an Australian IT security company. His former employer says that he did not have access to confidential customer data as part of his job.

Aush0k had claimed to be the ringleader of the hacker group LulzSec, which received quite a bit of publicity two years ago for orchestrating attacks against Sony Pictures, PBS and InfraGard. After the FBI convicted a leading member of the group who agreed to become an informant, law enforcement agencies were able to arrest members in the UK, Ireland and the US.

In a statement to The H's associates at heise Security, one former member of LulzSec denied that Aush0k was ever even part of the group; uninterested in mincing words, he labelled Flannery a "raging egowhoring skid".

Some members of the group have already been convicted; most recently, Cody Kretsinger (also known as Recursion) of the US was sentenced to one year and one day, the minimum for such a crime. Others have yet to be sentenced, including three members in the UK.

(djwm)