Seven hackers have been arrested in raids by judicial police officers, one is the journalist Rui Cruz who runs the Tugaleaks site, the other are from 'Anonymous' whose activities have been causing deep embarrassment to the government.
According to a statement from the Attorney General's Office, those arrested are suspected of the crime of unlawful access (hacking), computer damage and possible criminal association and face 5-10 years in prison if successfully prosecuted.
The police said also that two dozen house searches have being carried out due to the cyber attacks and of the seven arrested, one was a female.
The police would not say where exactly their raids had taken place but did say that the journalist Rui Cruz, the founder of Tugaleaks which is inspired by Wikileaks, was one of the seven arrested.
Rui Cruz was not hard to find as he works from his home in Pinhal Novo. Cruz's 'Tugaleaks' site was quick to ally itself to an attack on the District Attorney General’s website in June last year which may be sufficient grounds to charge him.
The June 2014 attack was claimed by the OutsideTheLaw group, associated with Anonymous which itself has claimed many high profile attacks during the Passos Coelho government causing annoyance, embarassment and anger to ministers who have seen the publication of data they were keen to conceal.
The police investigation has involved 70 highly specialised employees who have been working on tracking down these computer wizz-kids who repeatedly have been involved in acts of computer sabotage, computer damage, hacking and unauthorised access where data has been downloaded from the website of various government agencies and some private sector companies.
The investigation into the activities of Anonymous and associated websites began in April last year, and staff have amassed a mountain of data relating to the hackers and their activities.
Those arrested were all from the Lisbon or Oporto areas and in addition to the seven arrests, another fourteen have been made arguidos.
The operation led to the seizure of dozens of computers which will be analysed carefully by the police team.
