A New Zealand teenager was accused of leading an international cyber crime team called the A-Team and is now facing a 10-year jail term. Together the “A-team” has infiltrated more than a million computers worldwide and has made more than £12,5 million out of it.
This case was part of a crackdown on “botnets”, created by hackers to steal personal information or send out spam messages. Eight people have been charged already and there are more warrants pending. The teenager, who’s name cannot be revealed because he was still underage when the offences are alleged to have happened, was released on bail. The teenager, described by the police as “very bright”, wrote software that was capable of evading computer spyware systems and then sold it to hackers around the world.
The New Zealander is also being associated with crashing the server of University of Pennsylvania in February 2006 and some other operations.
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