Arrested hacker of World of Hell for breach of military website
Arrested hacker of World of Hell for breach of military website
Self described male model and member of the notorious computerhacker group World of Hell was arrested last weekend and accused of
breaking into U.S. Air Force computer servers in Denver, authorities
said.
Rafael Nuņez-Aponte, 25, of Venezuela bragged about bringing down a
Web-based server network in 2001 that provided training for thousands
of Air Force personnel, according to a federal arrest warrant unsealed
Tuesday.
Investigators said the telecom-security expert replaced the Air
Force's Web page with his own and left the World of Hell website
address.
Authorities arrested Nuņez- Aponte on Saturday at an airport in Miami,
said Jeff Dorschner, spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in
Denver.
Dorschner declined to reveal how authorities knew that Nuņez-Aponte,
who works for a Venezuelan telecommunications company, would be at the
airport.
The 24-page warrant details a litany of illicit activity that group
members are said to have engaged in. They collected stolen credit-card
numbers, bragged about defacing Web pages and hoarded pornographic
images, including child pornography, authorities said.
"It's a nefarious world," Dorschner said.
The group, which took pride in proving that no site was too secure to
be hacked, broke into more than 450 Web pages, according to arrest
paperwork filed at U.S. District Court in Denver.
Nuņez-Aponte, who used the computer name "RaFa," is said to have
hacked websites belonging to drugmaker Pfizer and Rolex, the watch
company, as well as other military sites.
Nuņez-Aponte said he had been majoring in computer science at a school
in Caracas until moving to Paris to pursue a career in the fashion
industry, according to the arrest warrant.
Investigators have snared other members in Virginia and Tennessee.
Last year, Thomas DeVoss, 21, was sentenced to 27 months in federal
prison for breaking into hundreds of sites belonging to the military
and other federal agencies, Dorschner said.
And in 2002, a minor identified only as Cowhead2000 pleaded guilty in
juvenile court to 133 counts of sexual exploitation of a minor and 176
counts of identity theft. He was sentenced to a youth detention center
for an unspecified period.
