Greenpeace Reports Computer Compromises Allow Environmental Damage in Brazil

Greenpeace has just released a story concerning a major investigation in Brazil in which computers that control the logging and exporting of timber in the Amazon rain forest have been compromised to allow logging companies to exceed their timber quotas:

"Police started investigating the suspect hackers in April 2007, swooping a couple of months later to arrest 30 ring leaders. One is still in jail - the intermediary who brought the hackers and the loggers together - and in total, 202 people are facing prosecution. "

Greenpeace is highlighting this activity in advance of a vote by the Brazilian congress allowing greater legal logging of timber:

"If this scandal weren't bad enough, it comes as the Brazilian national congress prepares to vote on a change to the country's forest code which could massively increase the amount of legal logging that will be allowed"

Hackers help destroy the Amazon rainforest