British Spies Attack Anonymous Cybercriminals

A British spy group known as Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG) was reportedly formed by the U.K intelligence unit to attack anonymous cybercriminals.

In another report disclosed by ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden to NBC News, it was revealed that the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), U.K's own intelligence agency unit which acts like the U.S National Security Agency (NSA), has created JTRIG to block communications among anonymous cybercriminals by performing a denial of service (DDoS) attack.

DDoS attacks are not considered hacks as people doing this act do not steal any personal and confidential information. Instead, they just close a specific site or service by flooding it with fake requests.

Critics of the British government, on the other hand, said that the act was overkill because majority of the affected users were teenagers. They also said that shutting down Internet communications among cybercriminals implied that the spy group violated the free speech of individuals never charged with any offense.

According to sources of NBC News, the DDoS attack performed by the intel was directed against Internet relay chat (IRC) rooms, which are most commonly attacked by cybercriminals, and identified individual cybercriminals who had stolen restricted information from Internet sites. In one instance, the group was able to identify hackers who attacked government websites. It also managed to send a cybercriminal to jail for looting data from the e-commerce business PayPal.

However, it also blocked Internet communications of political protesters who were not doing illegitimate hacking and closed websites not related to the cybercriminals.

"While there must of course be limitations, law enforcement and intelligence officials must be able to pursue individuals who are going far beyond speech and into the realm of breaking the law: defacing and stealing private property that happens to be online," said analyst Michael Leiter to NBC News.

"No one should be targeted for speech or thoughts, but there is no reason law enforcement officials should unilaterally declare law breakers safe in the online environment," he added.