David Kernell the son of Tennessee democratic house representative Mike Kernell is claiming responsibility for hacking into Sarah Palin’s email account.

A message was posted by Kernell on the 4chan forum claiming that he was behind the attack, which he says involved little more than online research to find the necessary information to request a password reset.

“It took seriously 45 mins on Wikipedia and Google to find the info, birthday? 15 seconds on Wikipedia, zip code? Well she had always been from Wasilla, and it only has 2 zip codes,” says the message, posted under the alias Rubico.

Kernell claims in the message that the motivation for the attack was to see if rumours that Palin had used her personal email account for business, which is not allowed under US law, were true. He claims that after reading every email in the account that this was not the case.

Additionally reports are that the accounts of Sarah Palin’s family and staff were also hacked.

Kernell’s father confirmed that his son was the subject of speculation but declined to give further comment.

“Yesterday, the Department received a referral alleging that the personal e-mail accounts of Gov. Sarah Palin, her staff, and her family had been unlawfully hacked. The Department is reviewing the matter,” Justice Department spokeswoman Laura Sweeney said on Thursday.