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Ryan Cleary, pictured here aged 13, is suspected of launching cyber attacks from his Essex bungalow
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencet...zSec-cyber-terrorist-targeted-CIA-Essex.html#
'Cyber terrorist targeted CIA from Essex bungalow': Teenager held as mother says he rarely left his bedroom
By Rebecca Camber, Colin Fernandez and Lucy Collins
Last updated at 3:07 AM on 22nd June 2011
A British teenager is suspected of masterminding computer hacking attacks on the CIA, the U.S. Senate and Sony from his bedroom.
Ryan Cleary, 19, was arrested at his family’s home in Essex in a dramatic swoop following a joint inquiry by Scotland Yard and the FBI.
He was held hours after the UK’s serious crime unit came under online siege from the hacking group known as LulzSec. The group recently declared on Twitter its intention to break into government websites and banks and leak confidential documents.
Ryan Cleary, 19, who lives in this house in Wickford, Essex, is accused of being a 'major player' within LulzSec
LulzSec wasted no time in claiming responsibility for Monday's Soca attack on its Twitter page
On Monday the Serious Organised Crime Agency – dubbed ‘Britain’s FBI’ – was forced to take its website off-line after hackers bombarded it.
Ryan, described as a loner who ‘lives his life online’, faces the prospect of extradition to the U.S. where he could face 60 years behind bars for allegedly hacking into the CIA and Senate websites.
Detectives believe he is a ‘major player’ with LulzSec, which has been linked to recent attacks on games firm Sony in which details and passwords of millions of users were accessed.
Warning: Family of hacking suspect Ryan Cleary are telling the press to stay away
LulzSec has claimed its other victims include the NHS and Nintendo.
Ryan’s mother Rita, 44, said her son suffers from agoraphobia and attention deficit disorder and had not left his home for four years.
She said he hardly ever left his dimly-lit bedroom which consisted of a computer with two monitors, a cooling unit, a broken TV, and a double bed.
Mrs Cleary who suffers from bipolar disorder said: ‘He is a complete recluse, he would only come out of his room to use the bathroom. I would have to leave his dinner outside his room door.
‘I don’t know how he would be coping with being dragged out of the house like this. He didn’t go out at all.’
The 19-year-old suffers from ADHD and Emotional Behavioural Disorder and was excluded from school for disruptive behaviour at the age of five.
Following a suicide attempt at the age of ten, Ryan was sent to special school in Colchester.
Speaking at the family’s home in Wickford, Mrs Cleary said he was an introverted boy, adding: ‘I’m really worried. He could seriously harm or even kill himself. He is incredibly intelligent but he has very complex needs.’
When questioned about what he was doing on the internet by his father Neil or his brother Mitchell, 22, the teenager told them: ‘I am just gaming’.
He is said to have constantly spoken in computer jargon and cybertalk, which his family were unable to understand.
Ten police cars arrived at the house on Monday night and officers are said to have spent five hours talking to Ryan.
Apart from a mass of computer equipment, his bedroom was like that of many teenage boys with photographs of scantily-clad women on the walls.
Another family member, who did not want to be identified, said: ‘He is a recluse and he never leaves the house.’
Ryan’s brother Mitchell said: ‘He is not the sort of person to do anything mad or go out and let his hair down or do anything violent. He stays in his room – you will be lucky if he opens the blinds.
‘I barely see him – I am more of a football person – he is more of an inside person.’ Neighbours said his father Neil is a musician who had played the tuba at the Royal Albert Hall, worked with names such as Andrew Lloyd Webber and once played at a private function for Princess Diana.
Yesterday neighbours told of their shock at his arrest.
One, James Rounce, said he presumed Ryan had been at university because he had not seen him for so long.
He added: ‘You could tell he was very bright just from the way he spoke and presented himself.
‘I knew he was into computers because we would often take in parcels for him and when I asked about them his mother said he was working from home and it was something to do with IT.’
Last night Ryan, who uses the online name ViraL, was being questioned in a police station in central London under the Computer Misuse Act and Fraud Act. A Scotland Yard spokesman said it was liaising closely with the FBI. He added: ‘The arrest follows an investigation into network intrusions against international business and intelligence agencies by what is believed to be the same hacking group.
‘Searches at an address in Wickford, Essex, following the arrest last night have led to the examination of a significant amount of material.’
The arrest of a Briton in relation to hacking attempts in the U.S. will prompt comparisons with Gary McKinnon.
McKinnon, 45, who is battling extradition to the U.S., faces 60 years behind bars for hacking into Pentagon and Nasa computers between February 2001 and March 2002 while searching for ‘little green men’.
Last night the LulzSec group sought to distance itself from Ryan.
On Twitter, the group said: ‘Ryan Cleary is not part of LulzSec. We house one of our many legitimate chatrooms on his server, but that’s it.’
Lulz Security's rise to prominence has been extraordinarily fast.
The hacking group first emerged in May and in the past few weeks has attacked the websites of some of the world's leading corporations and governments.
It is regularly abbreviated to LulzSec, which breaks down into two parts - Lulz refers to 'LOL' (laugh out loud), while Sec is short for security.
The group specialises in locating websites with poor security and then stealing information from them and posting it online.
The attacks do not appear to be financially motivated - instead, LulzSec seems content to receive international recognition for embarrassing some of the world's largest companies.
Not all the attention has been negative, either, as some cyber experts have praised LulzSec for exposing the inadequacy of online defences without maliciously exploiting these weaknesses.
The first LulzSec attack on record took place against the Fox.com website in late April - the hackers gained access to emails and passwords of hundreds of employees.
In a matter of weeks, the group has claimed responsibility for breaching the security of conglomerates including Nintendo, Sony, the NHS, the CIA and Soca.
