“Tyler King hacked into a major technology company, damaged its systems, stole its data, and laughed about it, all from the comfort of his sofa in Texas. He will now serve 57 months in federal prison,” stated U.S.

Tyler C. King, a savvy man from Dallas, Texas was accused of computer fraud and aggravated identity theft, which he conducted in a major tech company based in New York. The company prefers to remain incognito.

The history of the breach is follows: in distant 2015 thanks to an insider Tyler C. King gained access to the company’s network.

Right after this Tyler and his devoted accomplice Ashley St. Andria created admin accounts to access to internal resources. 

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These resources comprised of proprietary company information, featuring real-time access to the emails of senior company executives, personnel files, and financial documents. 

It is noteworthy to mention that company’s IT specialists detected the unauthorized trespassing and immediately disabled the fraudulent admin accounts, however, the charming criminal couple restore the access to company’s networks and this time decided to still business records.

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In the press release published by the DoJ it is stated that in response to the company shutting down the fake administrator accounts, King regained access to the network with the assistance of St. Andria, stole proprietary business records, and – through a series of sophisticated steps, including the use of password-cracking programs – bypassed the company’s security measures.  In doing so, King illegally used the credentials of two company employees based overseas. The jury convicted King of conspiring to commit computer fraud and two counts of aggravated identity theft. 

Last week King was sentenced to 57 months in prison and a $ 15,000 fine. He also needs to pay more than $ 21,000 in damages.

King's accomplice, Ashley St. Andria also pleaded guilty. She was released in March 2020 under 2-year supervision.