http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=521958
By ABBY D. PHILLIP
Crimson Staff Writer
February 19, 2008
Hackers broke into the Web site of the Graduate School of Arts and
Sciences this weekend and posted secure information to an online
peer-to-peer network.
The user kaboom73 uploaded the 125-megabyte filewhich contained the site
administrators secure user name and password, a back-up of the sites
server, site databases, and contact databasesto the torrent site Pirate
Bay on Saturday.
At 8 p.m. yesterday evening, 30 seeders were distributing the files
while 16 leechers were downloading them.
Likely in response to this breach, the GSAS site was shut down.
The Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) Information Technology office
could not be reached for comment.
The uploaded file was accompanied by a message from the sites hacker
stating that the information was released to expose the vulnerability of
Harvards servers.
Maybe you dont like it but this is to demonstrate that persons like [the
site administrator]...dont know how to secure a web site, the message
read in broken English.
Thomas Gatton, FAS systems administrator and user support specialist,
could not be reached for comment.
The weekends incident was described as a major security breach by the
Web site Torrentfreak.com, which first reported the incident.
FAS servers were breached multiple times in the summer of 2003 in
episodes that were traced to Brazilian hackers.
Hackers again broke into university Web sites in 2005, when they
distributed secure admissions information from top business schools,
including Harvard Business School.
Staff writer Abby D. Phillip can be reached at adphill (at)
fas.harvard.edu.
Copyright 2008, The Harvard Crimson, Inc.
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