Phineas Fisher, notorious hacktivist, is launching a new kind of bug bounty incentivizing crime. Fisher announced on Friday that he would pay hackers up to $100,000 to reward hackers for public interest hacks and leaks. Fisher aims to encourage hacktivists to carry out politically motivated attacks and leak documents in public interest. Examples of targets include mining and livestock companies in South American, Israeli spyware vendor NSO Group, and oil company Halliburton. Typically, bug bounty programs reward hackers for finding bugs in their own software, like iOS, Android, and Chrome.
In 2014, Fisher stole internal data from British-German surveillance vendor Gamma Group. In 2015, he broke into the servers of an Italian company that made surveillance software for police and internationally located intelligence agencies. After an extensive investigation by the Italian company, the results were inconclusive and Phineas Fisher’s real identity remained secret. Fisher often publishes manifestos on how these attacks were carried out in an attempt to inspire other hacktivists. in 2016, Fisher claimed to have hacked the offshore bank Cayman Bank and Trust Company, reportedly stealing a few hundred thousand dollars. Fisher claims that they gave this money away afterward.
Read More: Phineas Fisher Offers $100,000 Bounty to Hack Banks and Oil Companies
