------------------------------ Date: July 3, 1991 From: Various Subject: The CU in the News (data erasing; cellular fraud) ******************************************************************** *** CuD #3.24: File 8 of 8: The CU in the News *** ******************************************************************** From: Subject: Ex-employee Attacks Data-base Date: Thu, 27 Jun 91 17:19:23 CDT "Ex-Employee Guilty of Erasing Data" By Joseph Sjostrom CHICAGO TRIBUNE, June 27, 1991, Section 2, p. 2 A computer technician pleaded guilty Wednesday in Du Page County Court to erasing portions of his former employer's database last November in anger over the firing of his girlfriend. Robert J. Stone, 30, of 505 W. Front St., Wheaton, entered the plea on a charge of computer fraud to Associate Judge Ronald Mehling. In exchange for the guilty plea, prosecutors dismissed a burglary charge. Mehling scheduled sentencing for Aug. 8. Defense lawyer Craig Randall said after the hearing that Stone still has a 30-day appeal period during which he can seek to withdraw the guilty plea. "I don't think he erased anything as alleged, and I don't think the {prosecution} would be able to prove that he did," Randall said. Stone was indicted last January for one count of burglary and one count of computer fraud for entering the office of his former employer, RJN Environmental, 202 W. Front St., Wheaton, and deleting eight programs from the company computer. Assistant Du Page County State's Atty. David Bayer, who prosecuted the case along with Assistant State's Atty. Brian Ruxton, said the progams were part of a company project for the state of Florida in which RJN was, in effect, redrawing maps in digital form and storing them in a computer. Bayer said Stone had left the company the previous April and that his girlfriend, who was not identified, worked there too but was fired in November. Bayer said Stone entered the firm's office last Nov. 24, a Saturday when nobody else was there. Employees who came to work on Sunday discovered that data had been erased and a quantity of data storage disks were missing. Bayer said the disks contained several months' worth of work, but were recovered. It took about a week to restore the rest of the missing computer information, Bayer said. Bayer said Wheaton police Detective Kenneth Watt interviewed Stone the following Monday, and said Stone admitted to erasing data and taking the disks. Bayer said Stone told the detective where to find the disks, which he had left under a stairwell at RJN. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Date: Tue, Jul 2, 1991 (22:30) From: Barbara E. McMullen and John F. McMullen (Newsbytes Reprint) Subject: Arrests in "Multi-Million" Cellular Phone Fraud ****ARRESTS IN "MULTI-MILLION" CELLULAR PHONE FRAUD 07/01/91 ALBANY, NEW YORK U.S.A., 1991 JUL 1 (NB) -- The New York State Attorney General's office has announced the arrest and arraignment of four individuals for allegedly illegally utilizing Metro One's cellular service for calls totalling in excess of $1 million per month. According to the charges, the arrested individuals duplicated a Metro One customer's electronic serial number (ESN) -- the serial number that facilitates customer billing -- and installed the chip in a number of cellular phones. Th defendants then allegedly installed the phones in cars which they parked in a location near a Metro One cell site in the Elmhurst section of Queens in New York City. From these cars, the defendants allegedly sold long distance service to individuals, typically charging $10 for a 20 minute call. Metro One told investigators that many of the calls were made to South American locations an that its records indicate that more than $1 million worth of calls were made in this manner in May 1991. The arrests were made by a joint law enforcement force composed of investigators from The New York State Police, New York City Police Special Frauds Squad, United States Service, and New York State Attorney General's office. The arrests were made after undercover officers, posing as customers, made phone calls from the cellular phones to out-of-state locations. The arrests were, according to a release from the Attorney General's office, the culmination of an investigation begun in September 1990 as the result of complaints from Metro One. The defendants, Carlos Portilla, 29, of Woodside, NY; Wilson Villfane, 33, of Jackson Heights, NY; Jaime Renjio-Alvarez, 29, of Jackson Heights, NY and Carlos Cardona, 40, of Jackson Heights, NY, were charged with computer tampering in the first degree and falsifying business records in the first degree, both Class E felonies,- and theft of services, a Class A misdemeanor. Additionally, Portilla and Villfane were charged were possession of burglar tools, also a Class A misdemeanor. At the arraignment, Portilla and Renjio-Alvarez pleaded guilty to computer tampering and the additional charges against those individuals were dropped. New York State Police Senior Investigator Donald Delaney, commenting on the case to Newsbytes, said "This arrest is but the tip of the iceberg. There is an on-going investigation in the area of cellular phone fraud and we are looking for those that are organizing this type of criminal activity." (Barbara E. McMullen & John F. McMullen/Press Contact: Edward Barbini, NYS Department of Law, 518-473-5525/19910701) ******************************************************************** ------------------------------ **END OF CuD #3.24** ********************************************************************