Woman accused of hacking Paypal speaks out

(video at link)

SAN JOSE, Calif. (KGO) -- A woman facing federal charges for hacking with the group 'Anonymous' went on camera with ABC7 on Friday and denied her involvement, claiming she was wrongly accused.

When you see Tracy Valenzuela, you have to wonder if she is the face of a hacker from Anonymous or really just a massage therapist and single mother of try trying to get by.

"I'm normal," Valenzuela said. "I have a garden, I'm a person."...

Valenzuela pleaded not guilty recently to federal charges of hacking into the Paypal website last December. The group Anonymous was protesting PayPal's decision to not forward donations to the Internet whistleblower website Wikileaks.

"The indictment alleges that several people launched a DDoS attack on the PayPal servers," Jordanna Thigpin with Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy.

A DDoS, or Dedicated Denial of Service, attack floods a server to a point where it is rendered inaccessible.

"I was on the Internet, reading the news," Valenzuela said. "I saw something about PayPal shutting down payments to Wikileaks, and I clicked on some other site and joined a protest. And next thing I knew, my house was surrounded by guns."

Federal agents took her computers and questioned her for five hours....

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