| |
|---|---|
| Born | 1996 (age 27–28)[2] |
| Other names | cybanakinvader[1] |
| Occupation | Grey hat hacktivist |
| Known for | Hacking websites and computer systems[1] |
| Website | cyberanakinvader |
Cyber Anakin (also known by the handle cyberanakinvader[3]) is the pseudonym of a computer hacktivist who named himself after Anakin Skywalker, a Star Wars character.[4][5]
In July 17, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down in Ukrainian airspace amidst the War in Donbass. At the time Cyber Anakin was a student when he first heard about the crash on Interfax. When the Russian representatives began to deflect the blame from their own regarding the crash, causing Cyber Anakin to take revenge against Russia. For another two years after the fall of MH17, Cyber Anakin could not do anything because he "lacked knowledge". An emotional breaking point occurred in 2015, during the vote of draft United Nations resolution S/2015/562 that called for the creation of an international tribunal to investigate the crash which was vetoed by then Permanent Representative of Russia to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin.[6][7][8][9] In 2016, in order to retaliate against Russia and after learning hacking methods, Cyber Anakin, who was then a teen, started targeting Russian websites and databases, including the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, the news site and email provider km.ru and gaming company Nival Networks. The information gained during the breaches included dates of birth, encrypted passwords, and geographic locations. In the case of km.ru, secret questions and answers were obtained. There were 1.5 million victims while the leaks were eventually cataloged by Distributed Denial of Secrets among other leaked Russian documents/data, under the "Dark side of the Kremlin" collection.[10][11][12]
The km.ru and Nival data breaches were confirmed by computer security researcher Troy Hunt. In a subsequent interview with online news outlet VICE Motherboard, Cyber Anakin said that he had done the hacks in retaliation for the Russians causing the MH17 crash.[13][14]
Besides that, according to Ukrainian magazine "InternetUA", he performed denial-of-service attacks against several Russian websites such as those belonging to Information Satellite Systems Reshetnev, Moscow Metro, and Kaliningrad Regional Duma, in support of Ksenia Sobchak's presidential campaign during the 2018 Russian presidential election.[15]
Cyber Anakin subsequently used the content of the km.ru data breach to assist Latvian independent news website Meduza in establishing the identity of a man who had been sexually harassing female chess players by sending them letters containing used condoms and pages from pornographic magazines.[6]
In 2018, as a response to the assassination of Kim Jong-nam, Cyber Anakin took advantage of an error in a North Korean propaganda website ournation-school.com that erroneously linked to a non-existent Twitter account @juche_school1 instead of its actual official profile @juche_school (without the number 1).[16] As an "April Fools prank" he registered a spoof account under that empty username and posted numerous anti-DPRK propaganda messages including unflattering images and obscene slurs directed against Kim Jong-un. In addition, Cyber Anakin claimed to have hacked the website of the U.S. branch of the Korean Friendship Association, a pro-regime group that publishes pro-Pyongyang articles and promotes vacations to North Korea.[17][18][19][20][21] According to North Korea Tech's website directory, the ournation-school.com website is run by Kim Il Sung Open University which teaches Juche philosophy teachings in Korean.[22]
He was also involved in spreading messages via TV set top boxes in opposition against Article 13 of the European Union's Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market. In an interview with ZDNet, he expressed concerns that the proposed filter will "let things which shouldn't to pass through and block those that should be allowed". He also warned that the Internet "will become a boring, gloomy place" if MEP Axel Voss "has his way".[23]
In the aftermath of the Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 shoot-down, Cyber Anakin defaced the website of the Water and Power Organization of Khuzestan, Iran and placed the names of Flight 752's victims on its webpage. His nationality was hinted but not confirmed to be Iranian.[1]
Since 2019, Cyber Anakin was involved in an effort that was named #FreeHKSaveKorea by employing methods such as printer hacking in order to spread a proposal entailing the use of a peace plan first proposed in the book "Stop North Korea!: A Radical New Approach to Solving the North Korea Standoff" written by former Inha University professor Shepherd Iverson with the purpose of enticing the Chinese government allowing Hong Kong to accede to some or all of five demands of the 2019-2020 Hong Kong protests. In the book he suggested "buying out North Korea" with a $175 billion fund to achieve re-unification of the Korean peninsula.[1][24][25] Shortly after that it was further disseminated by the Anonymous hacking collective during their United Nations hack.[1][26]
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Cyber Anakin participated in the OpenVaccine project of the game with a purpose platform EteRNA that aims to assist the creation of COVID-19 vaccine where he submitted one solution.[27][28] In 2022 according to Taiwan News, he had contracted COVID-19 and under five days long "Operation Wrath of Anakin: No Time to Die", hacked Chinese computer systems which included government websites, agricultural management systems, coal mine safety interfaces, nuclear power plant interfaces, and satellite interfaces, as acts of retaliation. Cyber Anakin also left a "souvenir" in the form of defacement page on the systems that included flags of various separatist movements in China specifically that of Tibet, Taiwan, East Turkestan, Southern Mongolia, and Black Bauhinia flag used during 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests. Besides that, the "souvenir" contains a memorial for Li Wenliang and a list of notable people who have died from COVID-19 as well.[3][29][30]
After the Russian invasion of Ukraine had occurred, acting on behalf of decentralized hacking collective Anonymous he defaced five Russian websites, specifically the Russian heavy metal band Aria's site, a Russian hockey site, a Panerai watch enthusiasts site, a basketball team site, and an educational organization site, on Cosmonautics Day which commemorates cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin's Vostok 1 mission to space. Materials posted on the hacked sites included pop up messages such as "Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the defenders" and "I find the orcs lack of morality disturbing", videos featuring Darth Vader and the Star Wars song "The Imperial March," the online game Roblox, disco song "Kung Fu Fighting", Mandopop music video "Fragile", a performance of Ukraine's national anthem by cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and memes showing characters wearing a Guy Fawkes mask and the acronym "A.S.S." which stands for "Anonymous Strategic Support". Besides that, the hacktivist includes a list of "post-war settlement solutions" proposed by Anonymous; examples included financial compensation for the victims of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, the establishment of a United Nations interim administrationinoccupied territories of Ukraine, a referendum on the status of such territories, creation of a neutral security belt in the region, monetary reparations of at least US$70 billion to Ukraine for reconstruction, the fulfillment of Soviet–Japanese Joint Declaration of 1956 to presumably resolve the Kuril Islands dispute, cession of some Russian Antarctic bases to countries such as Iran, agreement to a potential enlargement of UN Security Council to include Brazil, South Africa and India with the increase of the minimum number of a successful veto to two or more, alongside unusual ones such as the pooling of funds from Russia to develop novel treatments against COVID-19 such as DRACO (double-stranded RNA activated caspase oligomerizer) and long COVID experimental treatment drug BC 007, and to construct a knowledge arkinspace, ideally located at least in the middle region of the Asteroid Belt within Solar System.[3][31]
On September 2022, an editing conflict occurred at an entry about Cyber Anakin at English Wikipedia. In response, the hacker group Anonymous conducted defacement attacks against the website of the Chinese Ministry of Emergency Management as well as the systems of the private satellite company Minospace, due to suspicions that the instigators of the editing conflict are Chinese agents.[32][33][34] The hacking incident received widespread attention in Taiwan.[35][36]
As of 15:43, 12 April 2022 (UTC), this article is derived in whole or in part from Taiwan News. The copyright holder has licensed the content in a manner that permits reuse under CC BY-SA 3.0 and GFDL. All relevant terms must be followed. The text and its release have been received by the Wikimedia Volunteer Response Team; for more information, see the talk page.
