New Zealand hacker jailed in computer fraud and blackmail case

Last week, the High Court in Auckland, New Zealand, sentenced a hacker to three years in jail after finding him guilty of blackmail, document and computer fraud.

22-year-old Thomasz Grygoruk attracted the attention of the FBI after stealing personal information from thousands of people over the web in a five year spree.   The court heard that Grygoruk, from Howick, Manukau City, used a combination of Trojan horses and fake banking websites to steal information such as credit card numbers and PINs from unsuspecting internet users.

Having stolen information, the hacker would then create ATM cards and stole up to NZ $300,000 (US $233,000) from cash machines.

According to media reports, Grygoruk also attempted to blackmail an American teacher in Pennsylvania to the tune of NZ $13,000 (US $10,000) by threatening to tell his local newspaper…

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

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Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the cybersecurity industry, having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of cybersecurity, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter, Mastodon, Bluesky, or drop him an email.