Feds: Trio hacked Wi-Fi or burglarized 50 firms

[InfoSec News <alerts () infosecnews org>]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2016278295_wardriving22m.html

By Mike Carter
Seattle Times staff reporter
September 21, 2011

It took nearly three years, but Seattle police detectives say they've 
unraveled a theft ring that operated both in cyberspace and through 
old-fashioned burglaries with a technological twist — breaking into a 
company with the sole purpose of installing malicious software to enable 
future thefts.

Federal prosecutors have indicted three men — Joshua Allen Witt, 34; 
Brad Eugene Lowe, 36; and John Earl Griffin, 36 — on charges of 
conspiracy and eight other counts including accessing a protected 
computer to further fraud, access device fraud and aggravated identity 
theft.

The 20-page indictment lays out a scheme that U.S. Attorney Jenny Durkan 
on Wednesday said was "both sophisticated and rudimentary," and combined 
high technology with broken glass and jimmied locks.

The trio is accused of targeting at least 53 companies, with losses 
expected to mount into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

"In some cases, the victims were both burgled and cyber-burgled," Durkan 
said at a news conference.

[...]

_____________________________________________________________
Register now for the #HITB2011KUL - Asia's premier
deep-knowledge network security event now in it's 9th year!
http://conference.hitb.org/hitbsecconf2011kul/