Indian-origin hacker gets 51 months jail for computer fraud in US
Darpan News Desk IANS, 24 May, 2023 12:52 PM
ew York, May 24 (IANS) A 38-year-old Indian-origin hacker from Virginia was sentenced to more than four years in prison for hacking into computers and stealing customer credit card numbers.
Chirag Patel from Norfolk pleaded guilty to computer fraud and was sentenced by US District Judge G Murray Snow to 51 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release.
He also was ordered to pay $87,522.25 in restitution, the US Attorney's Office for the District of Arizona said on Monday.
According to a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), between August 2017 and July 2020, Patel hacked into the Phoenix-based computers of an international hospitality company on numerous occasions.
He then fraudulently transferred and redeemed customer reward points from the company's customer loyalty program.
In addition, Patel also stole credit card numbers and other personally identifying information (PII) from customers and loyalty program members, which were stored in the company's computers.
Patel took screenshots of customers' and members' information, which included credit card numbers and other PII, and saved the screenshots to a Google Drive he controlled.
In total, between August 2017 and July 2020, Patel stole and possessed more than 1,200 credit card numbers, the FBI investigation found.
He used some of the stolen credit card numbers to make unauthorized purchases and also tried to sell some of the stolen credit card numbers.
A 32-year-old UAE-based Indian man sustained severe burn injuries while he tried to save his wife from a fire at their apartment in Umm Al Quwain, here, police said on Wednesday.
Saeed, a UN designated terrorist whom the US has placed a $10 million bounty on, was arrested on July 17 in the terror financing cases. He is lodged at the Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat jail in high security.
Native American burial sites in Arizona have been blown up by construction crews building the US-Mexico border wall, according to lawmakers and tribal leaders.
US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump will visit India from February 24-25, during which they will also travel to Prime Minister Narendra Modis home state.
A Los Angeles-based Sikh-American couple run a food truck service, which dishes out 200 burritos on a daily basis, to feed the city's homeless, it was reported.
Shah recommended that the patients have regular breast and vaginal examinations, when there was no clinical need. He highlighted the urgency of check-ups for cervical cancer, breast cancer and other illnesses by talking about celebrities who suffered similar conditions.
