The same hacker believed to be involved in a recent SWAT team attack [3] on journalist Brian Krebs's home and a DDoS attack on Ars Technica may also have been responsible for hacking Wired journalist Mat Honan. Krebs wrote on his blog [4] that he uncovered leads tracing back to a hacker using the alias “Phobia,” who worked with the Team Hype crew. Phobia, in reality a 20-year-old Connecticut resident named Ryan Stevenson, also played a role in the infamous hack of Honan's online life.

The 2012 destruction of Honan's digital presence, engineered by malicious pranksters, wiped out saved data and his presence [5] on Apple, Amazon, Google, and Twitter. After the hack, Apple and Amazon began evaluating their security policies [6] to handle the social engineering loopholes used to gain access to Honan's accounts.

[Image: Flickr user Walt Stoneburner [7]]