A Pakistani fraudster was sentenced to 12 years in prison earlier this week after AT&T, the world's largest telecommunications company, lost over $200 million after he and his co-conspirators coordinated a seven-year scheme that led to the fraudulent unlocking of almost 2 million phones.
Throughout this operation, Muhammad Fahd — the scheme leader — bribed multiple AT&T employees to do his bidding, including unlocking phones, giving him access to their credentials, and installing malware that gave him remote access to the mobile carrier's servers.
"Beginning in 2012, Fahd, 35, conspired with others to recruit AT&T employees at a call center located in Bothell, Washington, to unlock large numbers of cellular phones for profit," the Department of Justice (DOJ) said.
"Fahd recruited and bribed AT&T employees to use their AT&T credentials to unlock phones for ineligible customers.
"Later in the conspiracy, Fahd had the bribed employees install custom malware and hacking tools that allowed him to unlock phones remotely from Pakistan."
Bribes, malware, and rogue wireless access points
Between the summer of 2012 and April 2013, Fahd recruited AT&T employees as insiders by bribing them with hundreds of thousands of dollars to remove the carrier's protection that locked cellular phones to its network.
Starting with April 2013, the fraudster was forced to hire a malware developer to design malicious tools after AT&T introduced a new unlocking system that prevented corrupt employees from continuing unlocking phones on his behalf.
Once deployed on the company's network by bribed employees, the malware collected enough info to create additional malware, which the fraudsters used to remotely "process fraudulent and unauthorized unlock requests" from Pakistan.
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