Thai agencies nab Russian hacker
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A RUSSIAN NATIONAL, Farid Essebar, who allegedly hacked and duplicated bank website pages to dupe 1,000 people of $4 billion, has been arrested in Thailand, a senior official at the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) said Tuesday.
The 27-year-old Moroccan-ethnic suspect went by the online screen name “Diabl0.”
The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arrested him and an accomplice when he was 18 years old for unleashing the “Zotob” computer worm to hack information. He served one year in prison.
DSI Bureau of Foreign Affairs and Trans-national Crime director Pol Col Songsak Raksaksakul said that, following a request by Switzerland police, his agency joined forces with the Immigration Police and the Office of the Attorney-General. They launched an investigation into some 10 Russian and Moroccan nationals on suspicion of hacking activities.
The Thai authorities’ probe found that Essebar and two other gang members had laid low in Thailand for 3-4 years. They allegedly hacked into computer systems to set up phoney bank front pages and used the victims’ personal information on the Internet banking system to reserve accommodation and flights.
The Nation
