A 66-year-old British rock guitarist has been sentenced to prison for joining the hacker collective Anonymous in 2010 DDoS attacks against various US institutions and organizations.
In this action, called Operation Payback, the attacks targeted different organizations that oppose WikiLeaks as well as financial institutions.
The rocker, named Geoffrey Commander, has previously played music in large stadiums with the Electric Light Orchestra (ELO), George Harrison or Elton John.
Commander was accused in 2013 as a member of the hacker group Anonymous along with 12 others, of helping to enhance the attack by using the LOIC (low-orbit Ion cannon), along with thousands of others, in a form of protest.
LOIC is a network strength test, specifically for executing DDoS attacks, and the greater the number of participants, the stronger the attack.
The guitarist admitted his involvement in a hearing on Friday and promised not to return to the U.S. after he is released, which is expected to be less than 10 days after his sentencing on Friday, the Washington Times. Commander was originally facing 10 years in federal prison, but the charges against him were later reduced to a misdemeanor.
Basically, what the guitarist did in 2010 was join an IRC chat room run by Anonymous members and participate, along with 1,000 other people who were already involved, in an attack targeting MasterCard . It appears that the company suffered losses of $1,000,000 / €800,000 as a result of the attack.
Commander took part in the attack for three hours and then deserted and was arrested last year, upon his return to the US from England where he had gone with his family, years after the attack.
