The team, assembled by intelligence blogger Jeff Carr and called "Gray Goose" (ha!) includes folks with a pretty impressive collective resume that lists several big names—Microsoft, Dept. of Homeland Security, Lexis-Nexis security, among others. They will scour the network data that's already been released, as well as comb the blog presence of the shady Russian Business Network, thought to be Russia's most lethal hacker guns for hire.

Carr says: "Although our collection and analysis effort is still nascent, it has already demonstrated [that] in matters of sufficient import, collaboration can occur on both sides of the [intelligence community's] black gate." Whether this type of "investigation" borders on actual clandestine hacking itself is another matter, but as of now, Gray Goose's mission seems to be to analyze data that's already out there for more answers. Citizen's arrest! Citizen's arrest! [Danger Room]

The online attacks came on Thursday, a day before fighting began on Friday. Similar DoS attacks on Georgian government sites also struck in July, and if you've seen this video of a Russian MiG-29 shooting down a Georgian UAV, you know these countries are not the greatest of friends. But in much the same way that invading forces have traditionally targeted media outlets first, this type of pre-invasion online warfare attack is surely to become SOP—whether carried out by rogue groups like the RBN or the attacking governments themselves. Or both.

RBNexploit is announcing a conference call with Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili later today for more details. [Ars Technica]