Junaid Hussain, the leader of the Islamic State Hacking Division group working for ISIS, was killed in a drone strike by the U.S. military on Tuesday, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Hussain, also known as Abu Hussain al-Britani, was a Briton who joined ISIS a few years ago and created a hacking group in Syria called CyberCaliphate.
Before joining ISIS, Hussain had gained notoriety in hacking circles after he hacked and stole former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's electronic address book. This happened in 2012, and Hussain spent six months in prison for his act. A year later, he moved to Syria to join ISIS.
As the leader of the CyberCaliphate, he spent most of his time recruiting new ISIS members through social media, but he also participated in the creation of various hacking tools as well as training new hackers within ISIS.
His biggest hacking success came in August, when he managed to leak the data of several US citizens belonging to the Air Force, Navy, NASA, FBI, State Department, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
The data was posted on Twitter, with Hussain and other ISIS members urging “lone wolves” to analyze it and carry out attacks on military personnel.
According to online reports, the US military used tracking technologies built into today's smartphones and mobile phone apps, and managed to locate and kill Hussain by striking him with a drone while he was in his car in front of his home.
