Irish police free man held in global computer hacking probe

An Irish man arrested as part of an international police operation against computer hackers has been released without charge, police said Wednesday.

They did not name the man they arrested on Tuesday but he was identified in the Irish media as Donncha O'Cearrbhail, a 19-year-old Trinity College Dublin student from Birr in central Ireland.

O'Cearrbhail was among five British, Irish and US men charged in the United States on Tuesday over high-profile cyber-attacks linked to hacking collectives such as Anonymous and Lulz Security.

After 24 hours at a Dublin police station, "the male has been released without charge", a spokesman for the Garda (Irish police) said.

The US charges cover some of the most notorious hacking incidents of the past few years including those against Sony Pictures Entertainment, private intelligence firm Stratfor and computer security firm HBGary.

The other suspects are Britons Ryan Ackroyd, 23, of Doncaster, and Jake Davis, 29, of Lerwick, Shetland Islands; Darren Martyn, 25, of Galway, Ireland; and Jeremy Hammond, 27, of Chicago.

They were also accused of involvement in attacks on the Fine Gael party of Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny, videogame maker Bethesda Softworks, the Fox Broadcasting Company and the US Public Broadcasting Service.