Hacker Sells Root Access to U.S. Supercomputers

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Supercomputing time is a valuable commodity, but what’s root worth to you, buddy? Over at Wired, David Kravet writes that a 24-year-old Pennsylvania hacker pleaded guilty today to accusations he tried to sell access to Energy Department supercomputers he unlawfully accessed.

Among other exploits, Andrew James Miller pleaded guilty to propositioning an undercover Federal Bureau of Investigation agent during an online chat to pay him $50,000 for “root” access to the supercomputers at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab California. Using the handle “Green,” he pasted during the chat that he had proof of access, the government said in an indictment. The research center, which houses some of the world’s most powerful computers, offers high-end computing power for Energy Department-approved projects.

According to court documents, the defendant bragged to FBI agents online that he had broken into the corporate servers of American Express, Yahoo, Google, Adobe, WordPress and other companies and universities. Read the Full Story.