DOJ releases details alleged talented hacker working for Jeffrey Epstein

An FBI informant said in 2017 that Jeffrey Epstein had a “personal hacker,” according to a Justice Department document released Friday.

An FBI informant said in 2017 that Jeffrey Epstein had a “personal hacker,” according to one of the documents released by the Department of Justice (DoJ) as part of the Epstein Files.

The accuracy and reliability of the information remain unclear because the document reflects only the informant’s allegations, not FBI findings.

The hacker’s name is redacted, but the document says he was an Italian born in Calabria who sold his company to CrowdStrike in 2017 and later became a VP there, leaving enough clues to identify him.

He was highly skilled at finding zero-day flaws in iOS, BlackBerry, and Firefox. He reportedly created zero-day exploits and offensive cyber tools and sold them to several countries, including the U.S. and the U.K. The informant also claimed he sold a zero-day to Hezbollah in exchange for a trunk of cash.

“S//NF) [OMISSIS] was Epstein’s personal hacker. [OMISSIS] was an Italian citizen born in Calabria who developed zero-day exploits and offensive cyber tools and sold the tools to governments. [OMISSIS] established the Saudi government’s cyber surveillance program. [OMISSIS] sold a zero-day to Hezbollah. [OMISSIS] was known as the first person to hack and find vulnerabilities in Blackberries and iOS.” reads the document published by DoJ. “He was also known for finding Firefox vulnerabilities. [OMISSIS] surrounded himself with powerful friends like Epstein; he leveraged his connections with his billionaire friends. [OMISSIS] former company, [OMISSIS], was acquired by CrowdStrike in fall 2017, and [OMISSIS] was currently a Vice President there. [OMISSIS] had three billionaire backers: [OMISSIS], Jeffrey Epstein, and [OMISSIS]. [OMISSIS] provided the company’s seed money; [OMISSIS] had a Japanese company called [OMISSIS].”

According to the FBI informant, the Italian expert maintained ties with “old school” European hackers. He earned six-figure sums. He laundered proceeds through a California theater company.

“(S//NF) [OMISSIS] was very good at finding vulnerabilities. [OMISSIS] was friends with “old school” European hackers. One “friend” was a hacker named “[OMISSIS]” (phonetic, “PH”).” continues the document. “Another friend was OMISSIS. [OMISSIS] received a trunk of cash from Hezbollah when [OMISSIS] was in Italy; [OMISSIS] drove the money to Switzerland and deposited it in another ba[OMISSIS] owned a theater company in California and he used the theater company to launder his zero-day money.”

The expert declined requests from the Italian government, claiming it was incompetent. The man avoided selling to Asian countries.

Although the expert’s name was redacted in the document, it is quite easy to uncover his identity with a bit of online research. If the facts are verified, one has to wonder why a figure like Epstein would rely on an expert with such offensive capabilities. I’ll leave the proper considerations to you, but I certainly wouldn’t want to be in the shoes of the Italian expert, who will clearly have to provide explanations to law enforcement regarding his alleged relationship with Epstein and the services he provided.

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Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, Jeffrey Epstein)