National Lottery Hacker Jailed for Nine Months

National Lottery Hacker Jailed for Nine Months

A cyber-criminal has been jailed for nine months for committing offences against the National Lottery.

Following a National Crime Agency (NCA) investigation, Anwar Batson, 29, of Notting Hill, London, was sentenced at Southwark Crown Court on 10 January. He admitted four offences under the Computer Misuse Act 1990 and one fraud charge.

The NCA was notified of the attack against National Lottery accounts in November 2016. The customer database affected contained around nine million records.

Daniel Thompson, 27, of Newcastle, and Idris Kayode Akinwunmi, 21, of Birmingham, were jailed for eight months and four months respectively for the attack in July 2018, having used an online application to bombard victims’ web domains with thousands of attempts to log in to customer accounts.

The NCA stated that Batson was responsible for using a widely available hacking tool – Sentry MBA – to create a file that launched the attack, telling others they could make quick cash by using the tool against Camelot (which runs the National Lottery) and also giving the username and password of one lottery player to Akinwunmi, who stole £13 from his account before sending Batson £5.

Batson was arrested in May 2017 and, whilst he first denied any involvement in the crime, police officers discovered conversations between him and others about hacking, buying and selling of username and password lists, configuration files and personal details. His computer also contained a conversation with Akinwunmi about stealing the £13, the NCA added.

NCA senior investigating officer Andrew Shorrock said: “Even the most basic forms of cybercrime can have a substantial impact on victims.

“No one should think cybercrime is victimless or that they can get away with it. The NCA will pursue and identify offenders and any conviction can be devastating to their futures.” Source: Information Security Magazine