home
IDs of 1 million devices
online, which they claim
were being stored on FBI
computer"
A hacker group has claimed to
have obtained personal data
from 12 million Apple iPhone
and iPad users by breaching
a Federal Bureau of
Investigation (FBI) computer, raising concerns about
government tracking. The group called AntiSec,
linked to the hacking
collective known as
Anonymous, posted one
million Apple user identifiers
on Monday purported to be part of a larger group of 12
million obtained from an FBI
laptop. In the posting, AntiSec said
the original file "contained
around 12,000,000 devices" and
that "we decided a million
would be enough to release". The group said it "trimmed
out other personal data as, full
names, cell numbers,
addresses, zipcodes, etc". Contacted by AFP news
agency, FBI spokeswoman
Jenny Shearer said: "We're not
commenting." It also raises question over
why the FBI had held the
details of consumers of Apple
products. Apple also did not
immediately respond to a
request for comment. One website set up a database
to help users determine if
their device was on the
hacked list of Apple unique
device IDs (UDIDs). "Quite why the FBI was
collecting the UDIDs and
personal information of
millions of iPhone and iPad
users is not yet clear - but it's
obvious that the data (and the computer it was apparently
stored on) was not
adequately secured," said
Graham Cluley of the British
security firm Sophos. The hacker group said it
posted the information to
draw attention to Apple's
practices which allow users to
be tracked. "We never liked the concept
of UDIDs since the beginning
indeed. Really bad decision
from Apple," it said. 'Very worrying' Hacker and computer security
expert, Jason Moon told Al
Jazeera: "I think we should be
very concerned". He said: "If the intelligence
agencies are going to spy on
their own citizens and retain
this kind of personal
information it's very
worrying that hacker can get their hands on". "Our enemies can get their
hands on it just as easily
then…So it's kind of like doing
the spying for our enemy in a
sense", he added. "If they are going to be this
negligent with the way the
information is secured
keeping it all in one place in
the manner that they did, it's
really disturbing." The cyber incursion set social
networking sites aflutter
with technology bloggers
questioning consumer
privacy. Peter Kruse, an e-crime
specialist with CSIS Security
Group in Denmark, confirmed
on Twitter that the leak "is
real" and that three of his
own devices had been included. He tweeted: "Also notice that
they claim to have full name,
addresses, phone numbers
etc... Big ouch!" A security expert with Tata
Communications, Eric
Hemmendinger, said: "The
question is not whether it's
accurate, it is why did the feds
have the information and why did they not take due
care to secure it". "If you work in cybersecurity
and your machine gets
hacked, that's a pretty
embarrassing scenario," he
added...
Home
