Mark Reilly reports:
Federal prosecutors say a cyberattack on a Monticello-based technology company was prompted by a former worker who hired outside hackers to bring down its websites.
The Star Tribune reports on the charges against John Kelsey Gammell, a former Minnesota resident who allegedly hired a hacking-for-hire service in Israel to target Washburn Computer Group, a point-of-sale system repair business. The company said that the hacking — which took the form of distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS) — cost it about $15,000.
Read more on Minneapolis Business Journal. This case has a number of elements to it that are interesting. Of note, Star Tribune reports:
One of his preferred hacking-for-hire services was called vDOS, which was shuttered last year after the arrests of two alleged operators in Israel. The FBI obtained files from vDOS that included records of Gammell’s purchases, attacks and communications with vDOS administrators and customers.