In the early morning hours of May 28, 2014, an acquaintance sent Jeffrey Epstein an email with a link to a Los Angeles Times article headlined “Before being freed, hacker Sabu was ‘extraordinary’ FBI informant.”
“Hire this kid,” the email read. “Im serious.”
The email was contained in a data cache of more than 3.5 million pages of files published by the Department of Justice in response to the Epstein Files Transparency Act. The law required the department to release all its investigatory files on Epstein, the late financier and sex offender whose association with rich and famous people has stirred political debate and public fascination.
The Justice Department redacted the name of Epstein’s correspondent. And it is not clear why Epstein might have wanted — or needed — the services of a hacker.
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But this was one of hundreds of references to hackers in the Epstein files. A 2009 email shows Epstein explicitly asking for help in finding “the top hacker codebreaker, nsa type.”
A 2017 FBI document also details claims from a confidential informant that Epstein employed a “personal hacker” — although not the person mentioned in the 2014 email. This hacker, according to the FBI, was known for selling zero-day exploits — cyberattacks targeting previously unknown vulnerabilities in software, hardware or firmware — to governments as well as the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
A friend of Epstein’s, seemingly aware of his possible ties to hackers, even asked the sex offender in a 2018 email whether he knew a hacker who could help them regain access to their Instagram account.
Hacker denies contact with Epstein
The 2014 email alerted Epstein to the talents of Hector Xavier Monsegur, an American hacker who helped found the group LulzSec in 2011, an offshoot of the Anonymous hacking collective.
Monsegur, known online by the pseudonym Sabu, told Straight Arrow News that he was unaware that he had been recommended to Epstein.
“I was never contacted by Epstein nor anyone representing him,” Monsegur said.
Monsegur became an informant for the FBI after his arrest in 2011 for his involvement in a series of cyberattacks. Facing up to 124 years in prison, Monsegur agreed to a plea deal that required him to assist federal investigators in uncovering the identities of other hackers.
LulzSec in the early 2010s took credit for numerous high-profile hacks, including the temporary takedown of the CIA’s website and the defacement of the websites of several newspapers owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation.
Monsegur served seven months in prison and was credited with “time served” at his 2014 sentencing. Since then, Monsegur has worked for numerous cybersecurity companies.
