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The Sudden Arrest Of Marcus Hutchens AKA MalwareTech

In the Las Vegas airport on Wednesday the 3rd, Marcus Hutches was arrested before boarding a plane back to his home in London. Hutchens, also known as MalwareTech, is a very prominent security researcher from the UK who recently made headlines after he discovered a "killswitch" in the Wanna Cry ransomware that crippled 75,000 computers worldwide, including major sections of the British National Health System in May. He was arrested on his way back from attending the Black Hat and Def Con hacking conventions and although he did not present anything, he was still celebrated for his role in stopping the ransomware attack. He is currently being charged with creating and updating the Kronos trojanware that stole approximately tens of thousands of dollars from bank accounts in 2014 and 2015.  The problem with these allegations is that the Kronos trojanware was created out of parts of many other programs, and it is unclear what parts he is being charged with creating.

Why Did This Happen?

Truthfully something like this has been a long time coming. Since the rewriting of the Wassenaar Weapons Pact in 2013 to include code that could be used to penetrate vulnerable networks, security specialists have been in a state of uncertainty. This makes many of the practices commonly used in the cybersecurity industry like sharing new techniques and programs to test with illegal.  To quote Kevin Beaumont, a fellow UK researcher "I am withdrawing from dealing with the NCSC [UK National Cyber Security Centre] and sharing all threat intelligence data and new techniques until this situation is resolved. This includes through Cybersecurity Information Sharing Partnership. Many of us in the cybersecurity community openly and privately share information about new methods of attacks to ensure the security for all, and I do not wish to place myself in danger".

It is very possible that Hutches did write some of the code in the Kronos trojan, although it would have most likely been for something else, or for testing purposes. The trojan, like most programs, was comprised of many different pieces of code and software created by others, and there is a chance that some of his programs may have been mixed in. Even though these chunks were created for alternative, positive purposes, the law does not differentiate the creator from the attacker. There was a study done a number of years ago that I have been unable to find back, where someone created a large chunk of html framework and made it publicly available on Stack Overflow to see what kind of companies would use it. The most surprising thing was that the code was used in 12 websites owned by the government, including some for military and FBI use. This just goes to show that programmers build off of what others have done most of the time, whether it be chunks of code, compilers, or the languages they use.

There has been major backlash from the cybersecurity community over Hutchens' arrest. Already a fund has been set up for his legal bills, raising over $12,000 in a few days. Also some researchers such as the aforementioned Kevin Beaumont are refusing to work with governments or share information for fear of being charged under these broad laws.

Additionally Hutchens is is being charged along with an unnamed associate who is thought to have advertised Kronos on darkweb markets such as AlphaBay, and created tutorials on how to use it. This arrest may be prompted by the recent takedown of AlphaBay by the government in July. This takedown gave them access to logs and transaction receipts that may have incriminated Hutchens and his associate. The current indictment is mostly centered around the actions of this associate, but does very clearly accuse Hutches of creating, updating and maintaining the software.

What Is The Future Like For These Crimes?

As of right now the future is unclear, as researchers can still be punished under these laws. If it turns out that Hutchens is innocent it will be a wakeup call for lawmakers. Seeing how popular Hutchens is in the security community, paired with his news coverage from the Wanna Cry ransomware, there would most likely be outcry from the public. Hopefully this will lead to some sort of change in the wording and prosecution in cases such as these. At this point it is dependent on Hutchens' sentence, because if he really was distributing malicious programs, it will be a major win for the government, and a blow to his reputation. But if Hutchens in innocent, it will prove that the laws currently in place need to be reworked to protect the many security specialists who are protecting us every day.

Comments

  1. AnonymousAugust 18, 2017 at 8:24 PM

    This seems to be a straight forward legal issue. In the same way that gunsmiths are not charged for murder when someone else using a gun they created, the coder should not be charged for making a bit of a code that someone else later used to do sketchy stuff. Now if there was collusion with the cyber attachers, that is a whole different story. One advent that I think is cool is the growing breed of virtuous hackers. They hack companies and other groups with their consent to find holes. It is cool that this fringe community is being able to do good with their talents when the rest of the world would assume poorly of them. Good Stuff Sam.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousSeptember 30, 2017 at 1:30 PM

    I like the enthusiasm that you have about technology, especially data and computer security. I think its a field which really shows how wrong (and often stupid) the government can really be. People like this should be allowed to continue to innovate in their field, and not punished for crimes they are barely involved in.

    ReplyDelete

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