DDoSing Hospital Networks Landed This Hacktivist in Jail for Over 10 Years

A Massachusetts man has been sentenced to over 10 years in
prison for launching DDoS attacks against the computer network of
two healthcare organizations in 2014 to protest the treatment of a
teenager at the centers.

Beyond serving 121 months in prison, Martin Gottesfeld,
34, was also ordered by U.S. District Judge Nathaniel Gorton to pay
nearly $443,000 in restitution for damages he caused to the
targeted facilities.

Gottesfeld carried out the DDoS attacks on behalf of the Anonymous
hacker collective against Boston Children’s Hospital (BCH) and
Wayside Youth & Family Support Network—a nonprofit home treatment
facility that provides a range of mental health counselings to
children, young adults, and families in Massachusetts.

In April 2014, the hacker used a botnet of over 40,000 network
routers that he infected with customized malicious software to
carry out the DDoS attacks that not only knocked BCH off the
internet but also knocked down several other hospitals in the
Longwood Medical Area.

The DDoS attacks crippled Wayside Youth and Family Support
Network for more than a week, causing the facility to spend $18,000
on response and mitigation efforts.

However, the cyberattacks on BCH was terrible which disrupted
the BCH network for at least two weeks, crippling the hospital’s
day-to-day operations and its research capabilities that eventually
costed the facility a total of over $600,000 in damages.

Gorton has been in custody since February 2016 when he was
arrested^[1] in Miami after he and
his wife attempted to flee Massachusetts on a small boat, which was
then rescued after being disabled off the coast of Cuba by a nearby
Disney Cruise Ship.

Gottesfeld was convicted in
August last year when a federal jury found him guilty of two
counts, including conspiracy to intentionally damage protected
computers and conspiracy to damage protected computers.
^[2]

Gottesfeld represented himself at the hearing on Thursday at the
U.S. District court in Boston and said he planned to appeal but had
no regrets, according to Reuters.

BCH and Pelletier’s parents entered a dispute over a diagnosis
of their daughter and a judge awarded the teen’s custody to the
state of Massachusetts. After her diagnosis, Pelletier was later
moved to Wayside Youth & Family Support Network and 16 months
later, she was released to her parents on the court order.

Gottesfeld told Judge Gorton that he made a big difference in
Pelletier’s life and urged the judge to sentence him to time
served, adding that “My only regret is that I didn’t get to Justina
sooner. I wish I had done more.”

Assistant U.S. Attorney David D’Addio also called Gottesfeld a
“self-aggrandizing menace” who put children’s lives at risk and
even believed that he could strike again once released from
prison.

Gottesfeld’s wife has planned to appeal the court hearing.

^[3]