Adam Mudd from the UK has received 2 years in jail for setting up a global computer hacking business. He was 16 when he created the Titanium Stresser software, which carried out over 1.7m attacks on major websites, including Minecraft, Xbox Live and Microsoft. Mudd earned more than $500,000 in dollars and bitcoins from selling the software to hackers.
Now 20-year-old pleaded guilty and was sentenced, with the judge noting that he came from a “perfectly respectable and caring family”. The judge also admitted that the sentence in the case must have a “real element of deterrent” and refused to suspend the jail term. He pointed out that it was a serious money-making business and Titanium Stresser was doing exactly what Mudd created it to do and sent the defendant to a young offender institution.
Mudd, who lived with his parents, had previously undiagnosed Asperger syndrome and was eager to gain status in the online gaming community than the money. He carried out about 600 of DDoS attacks against 181 IP addresses in 2014 and 2015. The man admitted to security breaches against his college while he was studying computer science. On one occasion, the college hacking affected 70 other schools and colleges, including Cambridge, Essex and East Anglia universities.
It was revealed that there were more than 112,000 registered users of Titanium Stresser who hacked about 666,000 IP addresses worldwide. Mudd created the software in September 2013 using a fake name and address in Manchester. His customers were offered a variety of payment plans, including discounts for bulk purchases, as well as a referral program.
The teenager was arrested in March 2015, when he was in his bedroom at his computer. Mudd refused to unlock the machine before his father intervened. He was expelled from college and now works as a kitchen porter, banned from the Internet for 2 years – this was a form of punishment for any computer-obsessed teenager.
His sentencing comes on the day that alleged hacker Lauri Love was given the go-ahead to challenge his extradition to the United States. American authorities have been fighting for Love, suffering from Asperger syndrome, to face trial on hacking charges. He could face 99 years in prison if he is found guilty. Love is alleged to have stolen huge amounts of data from a wide range of the US agencies, including the Federal Reserve, the US army, Nasa and the FBI.
