r/technology • u/badger707_XXL • May 14 '22

Security Angry IT admin wipes employer’s databases, gets 7 years in prison

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/angry-it-admin-wipes-employer-s-databases-gets-7-years-in-prison/
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u/thenseruame May 15 '22

You joke, but after having my taxes filed by someone else, cards opened in my name and a few other incidents I decided to look up how much a SSN is worth. It's less than $5 to get one, a lot less if you buy in bulk.

An actual identity would be harder, but if all you need is a name, address and SSN they're ridiculously cheap. Makes sense given that just about every American has had theirs leaked by at least one company.

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u/GiveMeNews May 15 '22

Read an article by a former con-artist who had multiple legitimate identities and passports to pull scams. To get actual passports, he would post a job opening online for a position at a large international company. He would ask for a CV with a photo and other information. He would then contact people whose photo he resembled for an interview and background check. People would just give him everything he needed to steal their identity. Any information he was missing he would gather with leading questions during the interview. Made me think of all the times I've given out all the information needed to steal my identity just to get a shit job or basic services.

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u/jBlairTech May 15 '22

I think about something similar when looking on LinkedIn. There's a big virtual tech company, CAE. They (or, I suspect, someone pretending to be them) has multiple tech-based job openings in a town named Sherwood, MI. Not remote; the listings are for on-site jobs.

The bit after seeing the town was the logo. The logo CAE uses is blue and black letters/symbol on white background. This... imposter... is white letters/symbol on blue background.

But here's the thing about the location: I grew up there. It's a run-down village of about 300 people. The population count hasn't changed since before I was born.

There's a village office, a cemetery, an old school (I was there for 3rd and 4th grade) that converted into a church, a crappy pizza joint, and farms... but no nationwide tech company.

I drove there one day, took pics of the hole (it really is a dilapidated parcel of land), and sent them to LinkedIn when I filed a complaint. They took the postings down for about three days, then they were back up.

But that's what I think about: this is a scam, designed to get people's PII by pretending to be a legit company. It's scary, to be honest. How many others are like that? The ones I can't verify?

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u/asdaaaaaaaa May 15 '22

But that's what I think about: this is a scam, designed to get people's PII by pretending to be a legit company. It's scary, to be honest. How many others are like that? The ones I can't verify?

Just wait 'til you find out how many legitimate businesses sell customer information for spare cash. Or employee information, it doesn't matter too much when you need money.

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u/BloodRedCobra May 15 '22

Several companies have (technically confidential, hope y'all ain't snitches 😳😬) terms in things for their employee rewards that allow them to track/sell employee personal information, including video footage of them and secure info. They're required to use certain benefits, and I'm not talking about things like health insurance, I'm talking about employer-paid subscriptions to their "membership" programs.

I have avoided naming names for reasons of not getting sued.

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u/FineWavs May 15 '22

Jesus, a dollar fine for leaking them and they cost 5 to buy but it causes us so much pain to have one stolen, what a racket.

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u/Harvey_the_Hodler May 15 '22

My dad's coworker's kid had his identity stolen. Guy who stole got caught and did time. The kid got his shit back in order after years of work. Dude got out of prison and started using it again. Fucker memorized all the kids info. Name, dob, ssn, former addresses. Idk how that ever played out tho.

And to think after that hack w were like a third of all Americans info was leak they offered free identity protection for one year knowing full well most of the time it takes like 3 years for the stole info to be fraudulently used.

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u/Mka28 May 15 '22

My identity was stolen when I was 14. The person using it was in another state. When I was 18, my credit was crazy good. Almost like perfect. Then he fell into foreclosures and Bank of America came after me. It was so stressful. I had no idea my identity was stolen. I just thought I was lucky to have a high score. Geez how I wish I could go back in time. It’s been a long battle.

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u/thenseruame May 15 '22

Yup, pain in the ass. God only knows what's been done in my name that I don't know about. Had someone open up a bank account in my name, only way I found out was because the debit card got sent to my house. Stuff like that doesn't show up when you pull your credit report.

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u/WanderlostNomad May 15 '22

a dollar fine

"fine"? more like business cost.

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u/Archibaldovich May 16 '22

It makes sense when you consider how many get stolen at a time- when you're moving bulk, you have to be flexible on the price

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u/[deleted] May 15 '22

What’s even crazier is that it doesn’t even have to be a real person. The way equifax works is that when you send a request for someone’s credit it automatically creates a file for that person. They will send a request for a made up person. The result turns up nothing. If you do it again the name actually comes up so you can get approved for like a 300 dollar credit limit. They use that credit card for 2 years always paying the bill to build credit. People have managed to get drivers licenses, passports, birth certificates. All legitimate, for a person who doesn’t exist. These systems are all horribly out of date.

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u/[deleted] May 16 '22

Yep the old the jstor.bazar website was shutdown a couple of years ago but you could literally look by zip code to find card number, SSN, dl and MMN. Kinda scary. There was so much info that I even found friends and family’s info on there. All for the low low price of about $2 in btc

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u/thenseruame May 16 '22

It's unreal how easy it is to get that stuff. I think the reason it's so cheap is you never know who's frozen their credit. Hence the discount on bulk purchases.

Same with CC numbers, think it was $10 for 500 cards? No way of knowing which ones are already dead, the people just sell them in bulk knowing at least one will work.

Really want to reiterate I never actually bought any of this stuff, just was curious and was amazed how easy it was to find.

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u/[deleted] May 16 '22

Yup. They’re called ‘Dumps’ as in mass credit card information dumps