Turkish Hacker Admits to Orchestrating Worldwide Theft of $55m

A hacker from Turkey considered key person behind orchestrating a scheme leading to theft of several million dollars worldwide recently pleaded guilty inside New York's federal court. The hacker, 34-yr-old Ercan Findikoglu, faced accusation that he masterminded the scheme through which an aggregate of $55m was withdrawn from ATMs globally.

According to prosecutors, this Tuesday, from New York court in Eastern District, Findikoglu admitted to accusations involving conspiring for computer-intrusion, conspiring to fraudulently access devices, as well as performing transactions via illegitimately accessing computers.

The cyber-thug managed towards falsely raising account balances. Thereafter, he sent details of those accounts at 26 cities where his 'cash crews' were positioned during July 2010-February 2013. The intrusion which Findikoglu executed was done from the country-of-his-origin, the guilty said to the judge. Nydailynews.com posted this, March 1, 2016.

Moreover, on receiving the green signal the 'cash crews' accessed the 'automatic teller machine' accounts from where they withdrew huge sums. The balances in those accounts had been inflated, court papers indicated.

Findikoglu and his gang dispatched to the crew members the data of filched debit cards so money could be withdrawn from ATMs worldwide. Subsequently, according to Reuters, Findikoglu as well as other important people in the scheme got personal deliveries that were electronic currency or cash, and wire transfers. The scheme's largest operation involved theft of debit cards maintained at Oman's Bank Muscat through which the cyber-criminals managed taking out $40m. As per the prosecutors, the criminals as well obtained $10m from payment cards that JPMorgan Chase & Co. issued to the American Red Cross which supported natural disaster victims.

It was December 2013 when Findikoglu faced detention inside Frankfurt. But, over a span of 2-yrs, he fought to not be extradited to USA till he failed in June 2015. Had he been discovered guilty of committing each of the initial charges when his extradition process was ongoing, he would've got a maximum of 247 years and 5 months jail.

But as per the Office of United States Attorney, following admission of crimes, Findikoglu currently gets a sentence counting up to 57 years and 5 months imprisonment.

» SPAMfighter News - 3/10/2016