The Ashley Madison site was hacked by a woman, according to an article written for the International Business Times by security expert John McAfee. According to McAfee's article, he believes -- nay, is convinced -- that the hack was an inside job. Done by a lone female operative who had intimate knowledge of the site's structure, protocols, and programs in place for security.
And just how did he come to this conclusion? He explains that because of his expertise in security, given the right amount of data, he can tell immediately if a security breach was an inside job. In addition to that, he claims that he was able to discern the gender of the hacker because of the language the alleged “she” used.
For example, one of his more colorful paragraphs describes how the hacker used the word “scumbags” which apparently, in his view, “is a word that only a woman would ever use to describe men.”
“In a separate section, the perpetrator describes men as cheating dirtbags. I think in any language this would suggest that a woman is speaking,” he went on to add.
John McAfee had already written an article on July 23, sharing his hypothesis that the hack was not conducted by the so-called group The Impact Team, but by a single person who was able to obtain information on the security systems of not only Ashley Madison, but of other Avid Life Media properties such as Cougar Life and Established Men.
(He also elaborates in his current article that his sources in the Dark Web have told him that the hacking group does not exist.)
Using some old school hacking methods which required him to simply pick up a telephone and ask, McAfee was able to obtain the passwords of a higher up at the corporate headquarters of Avid Life Media and that of his secretary.
He did this test to show that it did not require a team of people to get such critical information but just a single person on the phone feigning agitation and “pressing legal matters” to discuss.
In his original article, McAfee still referred to this lone operator as a “he” and also observed that this person probably had a grudge against Ashley Madison based on this statement released by the hacker which has been taken down from all web and media sites:
"Trevor, ALM's CTO once said "Protection of personal information" was his biggest "critical success factors" and "I would hate to see our systems hacked and/or the leak of personal information". Well Trevor, welcome to your worst f**king nightmare.”
Back to McAfee's latest article for IB Times, he claims he can undoubtedly conclude, without a question in his mind, that the hacker was a lone woman operator.
In addition to the use of the word “scumbag” as one the proofs to back his claim, he also says that the fact that the hacker described one user's act of creating an Ashley Madison account the day after Valentine's Day as “spiteful” is also telling of the hacker's gender.
“Anyone who ever had a significant other knows that women rate Valentine's Day higher than Christmas, and men think so little of it that they have to remind each other the day is nearing. To call an act the day after Valentine's Day "spiteful", is a thought that would enter few men's minds,” according to McAfee.
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