Hacked cybersecurity firm HBGary storms back after ridicule fades

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://www.sacbee.com/2011/08/21/3851214/hacked-cybersecurity-firm-hbgary.html

By Dale Kasler
The Sacramento Bee
Aug. 21, 2011

For years, few people knew about HBGary Inc., a Sacramento tech firm 
working on the esoteric frontiers of cybersecurity.

Then a bizarre episode turned the 30-employee firm into a combination 
global laughingstock and villain.

A maker of software designed to thwart hackers, HBGary was itself 
victimized by hackers in February. The group called Anonymous stole 
thousands of HBGary's emails and gleefully posted them on the Internet.

As if that weren't bad enough, the emails revealed a dirty-tricks 
scheme, cooked up by HBGary's sister company, to undermine foes of the 
U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The plot brought a cascade of threats to HBGary's headquarters in a Fair 
Oaks Boulevard office complex. Customers postponed purchases.

"We were terrified," said Chief Executive Greg Hoglund. "I saw all the 
fruits of my labor, my livelihood, being jeopardized."

But HBGary didn't implode. Customers returned and new ones followed.

In a sit-down interview recently, the owners insisted the whole episode 
wound up enhancing their credentials as defenders of Internet security.

"The amount of brand recognition that we got out of that -- you couldn't 
have bought that for a million dollars," Hoglund said.

[...]


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