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December 24, 2019 01:00 pm

A 22-Year-Old Was Convicted For Attempting To Blackmail Apple For $100,000 In iTunes Gift Cards

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Gizmodo: A 22-year-old boss backed by a gangster cabal of "internet buddies" has been thwarted and convicted in their attempt to blackmail Apple, the UK's National Crime Agency reports. In 2017, London-based Kerem Albayrak made Apple an offer they couldn't refuse: deliver $100,000 in iTunes gift cards or $75,000 in cryptocurrency or kiss 319 million iCloud accounts goodbye. On Friday, a court sentenced him to a two year suspended jail term. On March 12th, 2017, Albayrak, don of hacker syndicate the "Turkish Crime Family," sent Apple Security and several media outlets a YouTube video showing him apparently logging in to two victims' iCloud accounts. The NCA reports that Albayrak had threatened to factory reset the accounts and sell the database vis-a-vis his "internet buddies," boasting to outlets that he'd had access to 300 million accounts (a figure which was later increased to 559 million). They gave Apple until April 7th to fill their demands, Apple Insider has reported. One week and zero gift cards later, they upped their demands and reportedly sent ZDNet a set of 54 sample accounts. ZDNet confirmed their authenticity, though the plot thickened: at least one account had been compromised years prior. Apple and UK authorities ultimately found that the Turkish Crime Family had not, in fact, successfully compromised the network, and concluded that the data came from an unrelated breach of largely defunct third-party services. Albayrak pleaded guilty to one count of blackmail and two counts of unauthorized acts with intent to impair the operation of or prevent/hinder access to a computer. He was handed a two year suspended jail term, 300 hours of unpaid labor, and six months of "electronic curfew" (an ankle bracelet).

Read more of this story at Slashdot.


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