Of all places to have the scoop on the resurrection of famed rapper Tupac Shakur, we would not have expected PBS NewsHour to be the first on the scene with the news. That's partially because it's still a fake story.
A hacking group named LulzSec, or "The Lulz Boat," used an SQL injection attack to break into the servers for the Public Broadcasting Service last night. The group then posted a false story that Shakur was alive and well on PBS NewsHour's front page. According to the fake news article, Shakur has been resting in "a small resort in New Zealand" this whole time, alongside other famed '90s rapper Christopher "Biggie Smalls" Wallace.
PBS seems to have resumed control of its network even though the story itself lived within the NewsHour's blog until around 7 a.m. or so today (EST). But fake news wasn't Lulzsec's only target. The group also posted up all of the MySQL root passwords for PBS servers, passwords for PBS affiliates around the country, passwords for all sorts of PBS press accounts, and a full network map of every PBS site and subdomain. In short, Lulzsec got the motherload.
But why? It seems as if LulzSec took offense to the "WikiSecrets" show that recently aired on the PBS show Frontlines–essentially, a profile of suspected WikiLeaks mole and former U.S. Army intelligence analyst Private First Class Bradley Manning.
"Greetings, Internets. We just finished watching WikiSecrets and were less than impressed. We decided to sail our Lulz Boat over to the PBS servers for further... perusing. As you should know by now, not even that fancy-ass fortress from the third s----y Pirates of the Caribbean movie (first one was better!) can withhold our barrage of chaos and lulz. Anyway, unnecessary sequels aside... wait, actually: second and third Matrix movies sucked too! Anyway, say hello to the insides of the PBS servers, folks. They best watch where they're sailing next time," reads a statement by the group.
A hacking group named LulzSec, or "The Lulz Boat," used an SQL injection attack to break into the servers for the Public Broadcasting Service last night. The group then posted a false story that Shakur was alive and well on PBS NewsHour's front page. According to the fake news article, Shakur has been resting in "a small resort in New Zealand" this whole time, alongside other famed '90s rapper Christopher "Biggie Smalls" Wallace.
PBS seems to have resumed control of its network even though the story itself lived within the NewsHour's blog until around 7 a.m. or so today (EST). But fake news wasn't Lulzsec's only target. The group also posted up all of the MySQL root passwords for PBS servers, passwords for PBS affiliates around the country, passwords for all sorts of PBS press accounts, and a full network map of every PBS site and subdomain. In short, Lulzsec got the motherload.
"Greetings, Internets. We just finished watching WikiSecrets and were less than impressed. We decided to sail our Lulz Boat over to the PBS servers for further... perusing. As you should know by now, not even that fancy-ass fortress from the third s----y Pirates of the Caribbean movie (first one was better!) can withhold our barrage of chaos and lulz. Anyway, unnecessary sequels aside... wait, actually: second and third Matrix movies sucked too! Anyway, say hello to the insides of the PBS servers, folks. They best watch where they're sailing next time," reads a statement by the group.