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Surrey teen charged over Mumsnet hack attack

Met also conducts interviews about 'swatting'

A Surrey man has been charged with hacking offences related to the attack on the Mumsnet website last year.

David Gerrard Buchanan, 18, of Haslemere, Surrey, was charged on Saturday with three offences under the Computer Misuse Act following an investigation by the Met’s Cyber Crime Unit (MPCCU). Two of the alleged offences relate to unauthorised access while another relates to the more serious offence of hindering operations of a computer system.

“The charges relate to various incidents of computer intrusion and damage to network profiles following attacks on systems controlled by the website Mumsnet and others between July and August 2015,” A Metropolitan Police statement explains.

Buchanan was bailed to appear at Guildford Magistrates' Court on Tuesday, 7 June.

Two unnamed 17-year-old males were questioned by police under caution over the same alleged offences but have since been eliminated from inquiries. The police investigation into the Mumsnet attack remains ongoing.

Mumsnet founder Justine Roberts and another user were both targeted in swatting attacks as part of a series of hack attacks that also involved a denial of service attack against the high-profile UK-based parenting site. Rogue posts on Mumsnet’s user forums around the same time last August fuelled concerns that at least 11 user accounts had been compromised, as El Reg reported at the time.

Swatting involves making an emergency call to the police claiming that a crime is taking place at the house of the intended victim, in order to get cops to send an armed response team to the target address. ®

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