Hacker charged in Argonne break-in

March 24, 2000

ASSOCIATED PRESS

An alleged computer hacker is being held on $100,000 bail after being charged with breaking into computers belonging to Argonne National Laboratories in DuPage County and other systems owned by NASA and the U.S. departments of energy, defense and transportation.

Max Ray Butler, 27, of Berkeley, Calif., turned himself in earlier this week in Oakland, Calif., after being indicted March 15 on 15 criminal counts that accuse him of breaking in to computers and causing damage, intercepting electronic communications and having unauthorized "access devices."

Butler had been an FBI source, helping agents solve computer crimes. His attorney did not return a call seeking comment.

An Argonne spokeswoman said Thursday that a hacker--allegedly Butler--broke in to a nonclassified research computer system at the research lab last May. Security systems in the computer network discovered the break-in "almost immediately," Argonne spokeswoman Catherine Foster said.

The system was shut down, and a hard drive was removed in an effort to capture information about the hacker, she said.

That device was turned over to federal investigators, though Argonne officials don't know if that helped lead investigators to Butler, Foster said.

Butler allegedly hacked into computers at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y., Marshall Space Center in Alabama, IDSoftware in Mesquite, Texas, and the office of the secretary of the defense in Washington.

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-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), March 24, 2000