Jeremy Hammond was the FBI's No. 1 most wanted fugitive when he was arrested at his Chicago home in 2012 for the Stratfor website hack . Authorities tracked him down with the help of top LulzSec member Hector Xavier Monsegur. It's not known how they managed to search his encrypted computer, which the hacker had managed to shut down when armed agents entered his home.
An Associated Press profile gives a possible answer. Hammond's code was "Chewy 123.".
The hash algorithms used to protect encryption keys are, by design, extremely slow, making brute-force attacks difficult to perform. The more attempts an attacker makes, the longer it will take. Assuming that the agents had conducted a thorough investigation of the suspect, then the password “Chewy 123” would almost certainly be near the top of their list. The password “Chewy” turns out to be the name of Hammond’s cat.
