Marcus Hutchins wasn’t, until recently, a name particularly well-known outside hacking circles. But when his work helped forestall the Wannacry ransomware attack, mostly by accident and by his own admission, his profile rose considerably and, among other things, he was invited to speak at the annual hacking conference Defcon. Now, it appears he has been detained by U.S. authorities, and worse, no one seems to know where he is.
Vice is reporting that Hutchins was detained on Wednesday and sent to a federal facility in Las Vegas. However, it appears he has been transferred from the facility, and it remains unclear where he’s currently located and under whose authority Hutchins was detained:
“I’ve spoken to the US Marshals again and they say they have no record of Marcus being in the system. At this point we’ve been trying to get in contact with Marcus for 18 hours and nobody knows where he’s been taken,” the person added. “We still don’t know why Marcus has been arrested and now we have no idea where in the US he’s been taken to and we’re extremely concerned for his welfare.”
As of noon today, Hutchins’ whereabouts remain unclear:
I can confirm @MalwareTechBlog was detained yesterday and FBI/US Marshalls won't tell me where he is. https://t.co/lV5SxZjsRi
— Andrew Mabbitt (@MabbsSec) August 3, 2017
It’s not clear why Hutchins would be a person of any interest to federal authorities. Most of the 22-year-old’s work is abstract “white hat” malware study, attempting to find and close loopholes in software that allow viruses, ransomware, and other dangerous programs to slip through security networks. Hopefully Hutchins’ whereabouts, and reason for being detained, will be quickly disclosed, and Hutchins can be freed.
(Via Vice)