We are approaching the judicial conclusion of the extortion attempt that targeted an English financial services company in May 2017.
The victim had been ordered to pay 730,000 pounds sterling in exchange for information on a computer flaw. To be more credible, the blackmailers had then usurped the notoriety of the group of hackers Rex Mundi. The investigation had finally identified three French Internet users who had met on the Alphabay black market.
At the end of their trial, which took place in Paris, the public prosecutor wanted to hit the wallet with heavy fines. The maximum amount that could be claimed for each defendant was 100,000 euros. In the end, the public prosecutor demanded a total of 190,000 euros, almost half of which for Moush, the mastermind of the extortion attempt, now a house painter. “The fine is as disproportionate as the ransom demand,” chokes one of the lawyers, while a second recalls that his client is at the RSA.
More lenient prison sentences
To balance the scales, the prosecution requested more lenient prison sentences, thus making it possible to avoid reincarceration given the pre-trial detention already carried out. If the extortion attempt is punishable by a seven-year prison sentence, three years (including 18 months suspended) were thus required against the project manager of the operation, Moush.
A period that increases to 18 months, six of which are suspended, for Jonathan, the computer developer accused of having written the script that allowed the computer intrusion. Finally, 12 months, including six suspended, were requested against Gaëtan, the one who had put the other two men in contact. The former manager of a shop on Alphabay now devotes his days to his daughter suffering from a serious genetic disease.
During the three-day hearing, Moush had kept a low profile, while acknowledging that he was the sponsor. “I acted out of opportunism, it was a very bad plagiarism”, he summarizes at the end of the debates. But if his cooperation, upon his arrest, advanced the investigation, he also awkwardly understated his shady activities at the bar. Like these sales of Zeus, “obsolete software” whose “viral load was not really destructive”.
Minimization of roles
The other two defendants have more frankly revised their role downwards. “Apart from finding out, I didn’t go any further. I did not believe in this story, “says Gaëtan to the judges. “His involvement is real, but modest,” insists his lawyer, Ludovic Sireau. After having listened to him, however, President Lasserre-Jeannin notes that the transcripts in the file show marked enthusiasm. Like these messages which speak of “jackpot”, of a “well thought out” operation, and of an IT security manager coding “with his feet” and likely to “lose his place”.
At the hearing, this tall thin man has multiplied the awkwardness. On the second day, he was thus dressed in a T-shirt referring to the series Money Heist, whose heroes are robbers. Then he accused himself in full court of having considered blackmailing a man he had hacked. Thanks to a Trojan horse, he would have discovered child pornography images on the targeted computer. Without him sharing this information with justice.
Technical challenge
“I was like a flea, in full euphoria. It’s the first time I’ve found a real flaw”, explains Jonathan, this developer with the air of a big teddy bear. Before then specifying that any computer scientist could have written this brute force script which had made it possible to compromise the bank card accounts of the victim company.
“He is a passionate man who slipped, but he was not specifically interested in money and only provided assistance,” assures his lawyer Maxime Bailly. Either for the lawyer, simply an accomplice and not one of the authors of the extortion attempt. “It was Nickel Feet,” adds William Marco, Moush’s attorney. “It was a bluff, they would never have gone all the way. »
Whoever prepared the extortion would “not really have done it, and whoever had the technical ability would not have thought of it”, ironically the public prosecutor. And the prosecution to worry about “a dilution of responsibilities”. “The markers of organized crime are nevertheless very present”, summarizes the substitute.
Gaëtan, the matchmaker, never called to stop the extortion attempt, she recalls. As for Jonathan, he actively collaborated in the project, for example by translating ransom letters – a final point contested by the defense. The 13e Chamber of the Paris Court of Justice has reserved its decision on September 23.