[3][7] HBGary Federal had been set up with Aaron Barr as CEO instead of Hoglund to provide services and tools to the US government, which might require security clearance.

?Step 3 : Profit In 2010, Aaron Barr, CEO of HBGary Federal, alleged that he could exploit social media to gather information about hackers.

[3][14] His e-mails depict his intention to release information on the identities of Anonymous members at the B-Sides conference and to sell it to possible clients,[3][15] including the FBI.

[16] In the e-mails, Barr explained that he identified his list of suspected Anonymous "members" by tracing connections through social media, while his main programmer criticized this methodology.

[27] In the emails, two employees of HBGary referenced a blog post that endorsed manipulating translation software in order to 'mitigate' damaging content within information leaks.

The hacked emails revealed HBGary Inc. was working on the development of a new type of Windows rootkit, code-named Magenta,[16] that would be "undetectable" and "almost impossible to remove.

"[40] In October 2010, Greg Hoglund proposed to Barr creating "a large set of unlicensed Windows 7 themes for video games and movies appropriate for the Middle East & Asia" [sic] which "would contain back doors" as part of an ongoing campaign to attack support for WikiLeaks.