Hackers Deface PBS Site, Promise More Lulz

A PBS NewsHour web log late Billy Sunday declared that murdered rappers Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls were yet live and living in New Zealand Islands. No, NewsHour did not have an scoop, but were the targets of vindictive hackers who broke into the PBS servers and defaced the web site. The group responsible, called Lulz Sec, too posted online what appeared to be Thomas More than two thousand PBS passwords and login IDs.

PBS was operative to regain control of its site about vii hours after notifying users on Twitter and Facebook it had been hacked. At the time of this writing, however, Lulz Unsweet was still actively posting items on blogs.PBS.org. The group also claimed on Twitter that PBS couldn't do much to shut them out.

Lulz Secant said it broke into PBS.org in response to the way a new Frontline episode entitled Wikisecrets portrayed the whistle-blowing site, Wikileaks. Lulz Sec says it is not attached with the hacker group Anonymous, despite both groups' respect for Wikileaks.

Data Falling out

Lulz Unsweet also posted online what the group claimed were user IDs and passwords for the PBS MySQL database, Eastern Samoa recovered as login credentials for affiliate stations, PBS reporters, Frontline staff, PBS faculty and administrators, and a represent of the PBS internal network. It's not clear if any new data was taken or if the malicious hackers simply wanted to embarrass the network.

More To Come?

This is not the first time Lulz Unsweet has caused havoc online. The group recently exposed a database from a Japan-based Sony site and also stony-broke into Fox.com in mid-May. Lulz Sec isn't ruined with its shenanigans either. The group is promising Sir Thomas More attacks against Sony sites within the adjacent 24 hours in an operation it is calling Sownage (Sony + Ownage).

Attacks Increasing

Corporations and other lifesize organizations are determination themselves increasingly vulnerable to malevolent hacks from pranksters or serious criminals. Defense team contractor Lockheed Mary Martin recently revealed it was the target of a cyberattack, just claimed it had repelled the intruders and protected its data.

The Lockheed Mary Martin attack was the result of a late trespass against RSA Security that compromised the company's SecurID two-factor authentication product.

A March break-in against Epsilon Synergistic, the world's biggest e-mail marketing firm, exposed the customer names and email addresses for dozens of high visibility companies such equally JPMorgan Chase, Capital One, U.S. Rely, Citigroup, and Walgreens.

In late April, malicious hackers stole few megabytes of data from the Oakridge National Laboratory, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy. Finally, the now infamous Sony PlayStation Network hack, which close down the online gaming network for just about four weeks, still has the company reeling from a lot of bad press and discontent users.

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