First Suspected Heartbleed Hacker Arrested

A Canadian cyber crime unit has arrested and charged a 19-year-old Ontario man for allegedly hacking into the country’s tax agency using the Heartbleed Internet security bug.

The suspect, Stephen Arthuro Solis-Reyes, was arrested Tuesday at his home “without incident,” law enforcement authorities with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said in a news release. Officials found and seized computer equipment from Solis-Reyes’s home.

Earlier this week, the Canada Revenue Agency said an attacker using Heartbleed stole900 Social Security numbers. It was the first known case of a hacker taking advantage of the security flaw for malicious purposes.

The vulnerability stems from a fault in OpenSSL, a widely used security protocol that encrypts Internet traffic for vast numbers of Web sites.