Indian teen arrested in US for cyber attack choking 911 lines

November 1, 2016

San Francisco, Nov 1: An Indian-origin teenager has been arrested in the US for carrying out a cyberattack that swamped Arizona's emergency services with several bogus calls, an incident he claimed was a non-harmful joke gone wrong.meetkumar

Meetkumar Hiteshbhai Desai was taken into custody after the Surprise Police Department, Arizona, notified the Sheriff's Office of more than 100 hang-up 911 calls.

The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office arrested the 18-year-old, accusing him of carrying out a cyberattack on the 911 system, according to a Sheriff's Office statement.

Desai was booked into a Maricopa County jail on suspicion of three counts of computer tampering.

Interference with critical infrastructure could have disrupted the 911 system in the Phoenix area and potentially other states, The Arizona Republic reported.

Investigators traced the calls and discovered they originated from a link posted to Twitter, according to the statement.

The link was to a site named "Meet Desai" and its domain was hosted out of San Francisco. When the link was clicked, it continually called 911 and would not let the caller hang up.

Peoria police and the MCSO also received a large number of calls, and the volume had the potential to shut down 911 service across Maricopa County, the Sheriff's Office said.

MCSO detectives identified 'Meet' and took him in for questioning last Wednesday.

"Meet claims that his intention was to make a non-harmful, but annoying bug that he believed was 'funny'," the Sheriff's Office statement said.

Desai told investigators that he was approached by an online friend with a bug. Desai then tweaked the bug so it would add pop-ups, prompts to open e-mail applications and activation of automatic telephone dialing on iOS devices, all via coding that Desai wrote himself.

Desai told sheriff's detectives that he was interested in programmes, bugs and viruses that he could manipulate and change. Desai said Apple Inc., the hardware and software company, would pay and credit him for discovering such bugs and viruses.

The MCSO cybercrimes unit executed a search warrant and seized multiple items at Desai's residence that will be forensically examined, the Sheriff's Office said.

Comments

naren kotian
 - 
Tuesday, 1 Nov 2016

hahaha madrasa products galige idakku death sentence kodbekanthe ...as per sharia bere anthe ... yaan panpe avu sari ath hahaha ... shariat panda sari ath ... hahaha... pudaar de unduge ,...

first of all he is a computer freek and geek , it is quiet common and he has served apple inc before ... 100% he is brainy ... it is not a terrorist act and more over he doesnot belong to blood thirsty jihadist community ... only immatured madrasa products can demand life long imprisonment ... Inshallah he will be released soon .

Satyameva jayate
 - 
Tuesday, 1 Nov 2016

Why not call him Hidutvas terrorist

hANNI
 - 
Tuesday, 1 Nov 2016

REALY RSS IS TERORIST,IF BJP IS NOT POWER RSS WILL BAN,F THE NOT KILL HEMANTH RSS WILL NOW ALL READY BANED,

suresh
 - 
Tuesday, 1 Nov 2016

If the person from minority communivty then the headline will be cyber attack by terrorists. Now they will give statement as he is psyco patient. This is the double standard.

Mohammed SS
 - 
Tuesday, 1 Nov 2016

well done USA cops these culprits should be behind bars throughout their life

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coastaldigest.com news network
February 16,2020

Mangaluru, Feb 16: A 45 year-old man committed suicide by jumping into Netravati River from the bridge near Thokkottu along with his six-year-old son in the early hours of Sunday here, police said.

The deceased have been identified as Gopalkrishna Rai and his son Aneesh Rai, residents of Baltila in Bantwal.

According to the police, Gopalkrishna along with his wife Ashwini Rai and son had come to Konaje for a family programme. At about 4:30 a.m. he came to the bridge with his son, left a suicide note and jumped into the river.

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News Network
April 11,2020

Dubai, Apr 11: An Indian expat in the UAE is facing police action for allegedly insulting Islam on social media in response to a Facebook post on the coronavirus, according to a media report.

Rakesh B Kitturmath, who worked as a team leader at Emrill Services, an integrated facilities management (FM) headquartered in Dubai, was sacked on Thursday after his post sparked outrage on social media, the Gulf News reported.

“Kitturmath’s employment stands terminated with immediate effect. He will be handed over to Dubai Police. We have a zero-tolerance policy towards such hate crimes,” said Stuart Harrison, CEO of Emrill Services.

"As an organisation, we have worked hard over the years to embrace diversity and create a culture of inclusion, where every nationality, religion and background is welcomed and celebrated. We have a strict social media policy for our employees to ensure they respect our values, both inside and outside of work," the newspaper quoted Harrison as saying.

Harrison said they are trying to find out if Kitturmath was still in the UAE, according to the report.

“We have over 8,500 employees so this may take a while. That said, we have fired him. If he’s still in the country, he will be handed over to Dubai Police,” he said.

For latest updates on coronavirus outbreak, click  here

Originally from Ranebennuri, Karnataka, Kitturmath joins an ever-growing list of Indian ex-pats who have landed in trouble for alleged Islamophobic messages in recent days.

Earlier this week, Abu Dhabi resident Mitesh Udeshi was sacked for posting a cartoon mocking Islam on his Facebook page while a police complaint was filed against Sameer Bhandari of Future Vision Events & Weddings’ in Dubai after he asked a Muslim job seeker from India to go back to Pakistan.

The UAE outlaws all religious or racial discrimination under a legislation passed in 2015.

The anti-discrimination/anti-hatred law prohibits all acts “that stoke religious hatred and/or which insult religion through any form of expression, be it speech or the written word, books, pamphlets or via online media.”

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Agencies
March 24,2020

New Delhi, Mar 24: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday announced total lockdown in the country from 120'clock tonight in a bid to contain the spread of coronavirus.

"From 120'clock tonight there will be a complete lockdown across the country,"said Prime Minister Modi said during his second address to the nation within days.

He also hailed the people for the success of 'Janata Curfew' saying that they showed how Indians can come together and fight against any trouble which comes before the country.

"The one-day Janta Curfew showed how we Indians come together and fight against any trouble which comes before the country and the mankind,"he added. (ANI)

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