675k Stolen Credit Cards = Ten Years In Jail

wiredmikey writes "A hacker who had been found with more than 675,000 stolen credit card numbers that reportedly led to losses totaling more than $36 million, was sentenced on Friday to 120 months in prison. After pleading guilty on April 21, 2011, Rogelio Hackett Jr., 25, of Lithonia, Georgia, was slapped with a maximum prison sentence and ordered to pay a $100,000 fine. According to court documents, U.S. Secret Service special agents executing a search warrant in 2009 at Hackett's home found more than 675,000 stolen credit card numbers and related information in his computers and email accounts. Hackett admitted in a court filing that since at least 2002, he has been trafficking in credit card information he obtained either by hacking into business computer networks and downloading credit card databases, or purchasing the information from others using the Internet through various carding forums."

Comments

Sounds about right.

[Kenja]

Is this suposed to be controversial or something? Seems a reasonable sentence for the crime, neither inflated or too short.

Re:Sounds about right.

[Oxford_Comma_Lover]

That's up to 675,000 people he's hurt, so he gets less than two years per hundred thousand people.

On the one hand, that seems really freaking low. On the other, more time won't necessarily help anyone--it won't make him less likely to commit crimes in the future, and the deterrent effect probably isn't great.

Also, there were people at Nuremberg who got ten years, so going much higher than that would be comparatively high by that standard.

Re:Sounds about right.

[sjames]

More properly, he hurt a few banks which insist on a system with virtually no security whatsoever. They then passed the hurt on to up to 675,000 people rather than fixing the problem.

That certainly doesn't make him less guilty, it just makes him the only one who's going to pay for it.

Re:Sounds about right.

[veganboyjosh]

Not been the victim of id theft/fraud much?

Re:Sounds about right.

[Opportunist]

You're right. Let's round up the CEOs.

Re:Sounds about right.

[erroneus]

People who need credit cards aren't managing their money well enough. With few exceptions, I have been off of the credit system for more than a decade now and have lived quite well. Instead of lines of credit, I have money in the bank. And I don't buy stupid stuff like I used to. Turns out, when it's "your money" you think a little more about how you spend it.

I'll go ahead and reveal myself as a Dave Ramsey fan... an atheist Dave Ramsey fan... weird right? A credit score truly is an "I love debt" score. Ramsey is a multi-millionaire and has a terrible credit score. Why? Because he doesn't participate in the system, not because he doesn't have money. I probably also have a terrible credit score... similar reasons + an ex-wife who still uses my last name. But I don't have collections at my door either. And yeah, I do have nice things... and two cars completely paid for and there is simply nothing that I "really wish I had."

Re:Sounds about right.

[hedwards]

He didn't hurt the banks. The banks will pass the loss on to the clients in the form of higher rates. Which is unfortunate because as long as banks can just buy their way out for cheap they aren't likely to invest in the kinds of security necessary to make things more challenging for crooks.

Re:Sounds about right.

[icebike]

No, nothing about the credit card system relies on the belief that the information about you is a secret.

With all due respect to your anti-credit card mentality, most of us get them for convenience, not to remain anonymous or secretive.
We are not victimized by the people we do business with via our cards. We enter into those agreements with full knowledge
that we expect X amount of money to be charged against our card, and we receive X amount of goods or services. We are all adult enough
to realize there is and audit trail and some other uses (fully explained in the TOS) may be made of the information. We are adult enough to realize
no one will do all of this for free.

I absolutely REFUSE to let you EXCUSE the theft of 675 thousand credit card data and 37 million dollars of fraud based on your silly
objection to the TOS that you knew going in.

The system without the fraudsters does not victimize me.
The fraudsters victimize me.

No amount of windmill tilting on your part can change that.

Re:Sounds about right.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is one of the dumbest posts I've ever read on the internet.

1. You're not some messiah for not having a credit card, contrary to your belief. Your failure to manage your money with a credit card is damning evidence of why nobody should bother listening to you on topics related to money. There is not a dichotomy of "has a credit card and makes stupid purchases" versus "does not have a credit card and makes good purchases". Your inability to separate yourself from those in the first category is your own fault, not the card's fault.
2. I frequently make purchases in the $XXXX range. I'm not carrying around a checkbook or that much cash. In the case of a mugging? I call my CC company, they willingly set up no-expense-paid monitoring on my SSN for a year, and then they send me a new number. In the case of cash/checkbook? I'm royally fucked.
3. I don't know who or what David Ramsey is, nor do I care what some radio financial evangelist thinks. If he is truly a "multi millionaire" like you claim, there's a good reason he doesn't need a credit score - whatever he's buying, he can probably afford. The rest of us? Not so lucky.

Re:Sounds about right.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not that serious. If you have an issue with cancelling your credit card, informing a few companies of the change, and filling out a short form to recover your money you have bigger issues than this man. People need to relax.

Multiply that by 675000 times. If it takes you 10 minutes on the phone to the credit card company, and 10-20 minutes to each biller (estimated on the low side - chances are you'll probably be on hold for 30 minutes or more). On average say you have a minimum of 2 direct debits (utilities, phone/internet - not counting rent, etc.), that's at least 30 minutes - which 675000 man hours wasted (30 minutes for you, 30 minutes for the person answering a call).

Not to mention all the police and fraud squad involvement.

675000 / 24 / 365 = 77.05 years.

Hey - maybe he shouldn't be put in jail and given a medal, for all the work he's created.

Not nearly enough time

[icebike]

Ten years means he will probably enjoy the fruits of his labor at 35, when he retires with some of that 36 million (or the other multi-millions the feds never found) that he squirreled away off shore.

Re:Not nearly enough time

[hansraj]

Losses incurred probably include things like time lost in canceling a card and issuing new one. The wordings of TFA don't make it clear whether he used all those cards or he just sold it to other criminals, so I have no idea how much this guy directly made.