Megaupload Domains Seized by FBI 'Hijacked' to Host Porn Ads

Well, we all know that the FBI has previously hosting porn on the Internet. I still remember the case of PlayPen, the world's largest

dark web child pornography

site, which was seized by FBI and ran from agency’s own servers to uncover the site's visitors.

Now, one of the most popular sites owned and operated by the FBI has been serving porn as well.

FBI-owned Megaupload.org and several other domains were allegedly serving up ads for "casual sex," "adult cam chat," "adult affair dating," and "live sex cams" and other 18+ entertainment.

Megaupload was once a famous and highly popular site for pirate and copyright contents that agency seized from

Kim Dotcom

almost five years ago.

Since a criminal case against Dotcom is still pending in the United States, the FBI also retained control over several of the company’s assets, including cash, cars, and over a dozen of Megaupload’s former domain names, including Megastuff.co, Megaworld.mobi, Megaclicks.org, Megaupload.com, and Megavideo.com.

Initially, these Megaupload domains served a banner indicating the federal agents had seized them as part of a criminal investigation, those users who visited the site yesterday were surprised to see soft porn ads, offering links to adult entertainment.

But, How did this Happen?

'Lost control'

Yes, the hijacking of the Megaupload domains was not the result of some sophisticated hack that allowed hackers to serve you soft porn and sex ads, rather the FBI had "lost control" of the domains in the same way it lost control last year.

TorrentFreak

suggests

the FBI forgot to renew an expired domain, CIRFU.NET, which the feds used for their "name server" to redirect traffic from sites it had seized, and that someone else just purchase it and linked it to the Megaupload domains.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation fell into the

same trap

last year when the web addresses it seized led people onto to sites peddling porn, fake security software, malware, adware and bogus special offers.

Though the federal authorities reportedly removed the nameservers altogether to fix the issue, the exact identity of who got control of Megaupload.org and its associated sites is not known. However, it is clear that the feds have not learned from their past mistakes.

The FBI has yet to comment on what happened to the domains.

from The Hacker News http://ift.tt/2bOZ4fZ