Federal prosecutors in Charlotte, N.C. said Thursday that three men had pleaded guilty in a case that is likely the first criminal conviction of "wardriving," the hacker tactic of cruising for unsecured wireless networks.

The three Michigan men all filed guilty pleas for charges that they penetrated the computer network of home improvement retailer Lowe's through an unprotected Wi-Fi access point in a parking lot of a Lowe's in suburban Detroit.

According to prosecutors, the trio accessed the network more than ten times last fall, and modified software on the Lowe's network to collect credit card numbers. An FBI surveillance team, called in by Lowe's after system administrators detected the intrusion, staked out the parking lot and noticed a car with two men, one working on a laptop, and suspicious-looking antennas.

By Gregg Keizer at Security Pipeline.

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