Fraudster Unlocks Over 2 Million AT&T Phones, Pays $1 Million

[Porthos]

Millions of mobile phones were illegally unlocked by AT&T insiders who took bribes of hundreds of thousands of US dollars to also plant unauthorized tools and devices on the company's internal network.

For five years between 2012 and 2017, Muhammad Fahd, 34, of Pakistan recruited young AT&T employees at the customer service center in Bothell to remove the company's protection against unlocking phones.

The proprietary locking software prevents devices from being used with other networks, making them compatible with mobile carriers across the world.

Arrested and extradited
In total, Fahd and his partner Ghulam Jiwani (deceased, according to the DoJ), paid over one million USD to AT&T employees and were able to unlock this way more than two million phones.

Three of the co-conspirators pleaded guilty and admitted their role as well as taking bribes of thousands of U.S. dollars.

Fahd has been arrested in Hong Kong on February 4, 2018, and extradited to the U.S. on August 2, 2019, where he faces charges for crimes that could get him up to 20 years in prison.

Muhammad Fahd charges:

• conspiracy to commit wire fraud
• conspiracy to violate the Travel Act and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CAAA)
• four counts of wire fraud
• two counts of accessing a protected computer in furtherance of fraud
• two counts of intentional damage to a protected computer
• four counts of violating the Travel Act.

More: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/ne...-over-2-million-atandt-phones-pays-1-million/

 

[phaZed]

Something about this story stinks. I can't quite put my finger on it though.



Really? Cause' that has never stopped them from continuing to charge me or my friends and it's not what is says on their website... It's a contract, it doesn't require that your phone be part of the equation. Drop it in a river? You still pay for it and you still have a 2-year service contract... and they are happy to pursue recovery and credit dings:




and, ATT has an unlock application on their website - assuming you are out of contract/installments:




So, AT&T is going to have to prove they had losses, in regards to the unlocking - which is a free service. AT&T is going to have to prove that they lost money even though they state that your plan and installment payments continue regardless of the phone's condition or whereabouts, yet claim differently in the lawsuit.


On another, simply legal note... the offense occurred when the defendant was in Abu Dhabi - Which does not recognize Washington State law... of which 90% of the claim is based on - which is why the US had to apply the 1951 "Travel Act" (Again, would seem to only apply to inter-state/Federal US) in order to bring this suit.

Under the law, I can certainly see the US-based co-conspirators at AT&T get nabbed by this, but I fail to see how Washington State law applies to the entire world.

An interesting note is that the guy was extradited from Hong Kong - where they are currently having riots over mainland China's extradition rights over Hong Kong. Fitting?

The news story claims big money paid out to the operatives, up to $1M over 5 years, yet the lawsuit doesn't claim that, nor the $428,500 paid to a single co-conspirator.. the lawsuit claims:



That's only $15,000 - and $15,000 EXACTLY... which wouldn't surprise me if that were the exact amount needed to qualify as some offense. A far cry from $1M or even $428.5K.


I'm not excusing the computer abuse, hacking, etc, nor defending this guy, but the story seems like there is more going on here than simply "Unlocking phones".


On a separate note, who's talking about AT&T being hacked for over 7 years (since 2012) with physical pentest devices on-site and malware communicating over their network - and nobody noticed? Wow.

Sounds weird. My 2 pennies.