Lorenzo Franceschi-Bichhierai reports:
Four years ago, a vigilante hacker pulled off one of the most daring hacks of all time.
The hacker, known as Phineas Fisher, broke into the servers of Hacking Team—one of the most hated companies in the cybersecurity world—and put all its data online. This was the equivalent of a museum robber breaking into the MoMA and then putting all its most valuable paintings on the sidewalk, for anyone to grab.
In this case, instead of Van Goghs, it was the source code for the spyware made by Hacking Team and used by governments that was put on the internet for all to see and download.
The thing that made this hack even more audacious is that Phineas Fisher did the same thing a year before to another unpopular company called FinFisher. Phineas Fisher’s hacks exposed the highly guarded secrets of those two spyware companies—and thus far, he’s gotten away with it.
Read more on Vice.