US jails LulzSec hacker Cody Kretsinger

The US has jailed a member of hacktivist group LulzSec – an offshoot of Anonymous – for a year for his role in breaching computer systems at Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2011.

The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arrested the 25-year-old Cody Kretsinger in Arizona in September 2011.

He was charged with the unauthorised impairment of a protected computer in connection with a SQL injection attack and pleaded guilty last April.

A Los Angeles judge ruled that in addition to a year in jail, Kretsinger must complete 1,000 hours of community service, according to the BBC.

At the time of his arrest, Kretsinger was expected to face up to 15 years in prison, but prosecutors have declined to say if he is cooperating with authorities in exchange for leniency.

Sony said the hack, which involved breaching the company’s website and accessing a database of customer details, caused more than $600,000 in damage.

The data was published within weeks of a massive data breach at Sony's PlayStation Network (PSN) that forced the company to suspend the service for more than two months.

In April, three UK members of LulzSec pleaded guilty to attempting to break into computers run by the NHS, Sony and News International.

They were arrested in 2012 after the LulzSec's apparent leader, Hector Xavier Monsegur, was arrested by the FBI and persuaded to turn informant.

Ryan Ackroyd (26) of South Yorkshire, Jake Davis (20) from Shetland, and Mustafa al-Bassam (18) of south London are to be sentenced on 14 May along with a fourth LulzSec member, Ryan Cleary, a 21-year-old from Essex, who was arrested in June 2011 and pleaded guilty to six related charges.