Investigators believe a teenager was the brainchild behind a series of high-profile hacks, including those at Nvidia and Microsoft, according to a Bloomberg report.
A group of four researchers started researching the Lapsus$ hack group, and the chase led them to a 16-year-old boy living with his mother in Oxford, England. Young is currently anonymous but uses the aliases "White" and "breachbase" online. Bloomberg reported that authorities did not publicly accuse the teenager of any crime.
The group is also said to be suffering from "weak security" that has led to their addresses and other personal family information being leaked by rival hackers.
The teen's mother spoke to a Bloomberg journalist for about 10 minutes via a doorbell intercom in her home, just five miles from Oxford University. The woman claims she was previously unaware of the charges and was disturbed by the leaked personal information, which included photos of the teenager's father's home.
But the unnamed teenager is just one of several known Lapsus$ members. Researchers believe the group is based in South America and was able to track several accounts linked to the hacking group. Another suspected Lapsus$ member is a teenager living in Brazil, according to Bloomberg.
Following the group with the ID DEV-0537, Microsoft was able to prevent another Lapsus$ intrusion after the source code was stolen before. Lapsus$ isn't too keen on hiding its tracks. He frequently announces his actions and intentions via social media.
“Our team was already investigating the compromised account based on threat intelligence when it made the intrusions public,” Microsoft said in a blog post. “This public release has escalated our action and limited wider hacking penetration by allowing our team to intervene and disrupt the hacker mid-operation.”
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang described the Lapsu$ hack as a "wake-up call" and pointed to similar vulnerabilities that each company has.
Kaynak
