A 34-year-old citizen of Pakistan, who is alleged to have paid insiders at AT&T to plant malware and misuse computer networks to unlock cell phones, was charged in a 14-count federal indictment unsealed Monday following his extradition from Hong Kong to the U.S. Muhammad Fahd was arrested in Hong Kong on February 4, 2018, at the request of the United States. He was extradited to Washington State last Friday, according to the Department of Justice.
The indictment alleges Fahd recruited and paid AT&T insiders to use their computer credentials and access to disable AT&T’s proprietary locking software that prevented ineligible phones from being removed from AT&T’s network.
The scheme resulted in millions of phones being removed from AT&T service and/or payment plans, costing the company millions of dollars, according to the DOJ.
Fahd allegedly paid the insiders thousands of dollars, paying one co-conspirator $428,500 over the five-year scheme. Muhammad Fahd is charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, conspiracy to violate the Travel Act and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, four counts of wire fraud, two counts of accessing a protected computer in furtherance of fraud, two counts of intentional damage to a protected computer, and four counts of violating the Travel Act.
According to the indictment, between 2012 and 2017, Fahd recruited various AT&T employees to the conspiracy. Some early recruits were paid to identify other employees who could be bribed and convinced to join the scheme. So far, three of those co-conspirators have pleaded guilty, admitting they were paid thousands of dollars for facilitating Fahd’s fraudulent scheme.
Initially, Fahd allegedly would send the employees batches of international mobile equipment identity numbers for cell phones that were not eligible to be removed from AT&T’s network. The employees would then unlock the phones. After some of the co-conspirators were terminated by AT&T, the remaining co-conspirator employees helped Fahd develop and install additional tools that would allow Fahd to use the AT&T computers to unlock cell phones from a remote location, according to the indictment.
August 7, 2019
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