Computer Crime

Hobbes

http://www.nypostonline.com/news/regionalnews/26868.htm

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HOW NYPD CRACKED THE ULTIMATE CYBERFRAUD
Tuesday,March 20,2001 By MURRAY WEISS

USING computers in a local library,
a Brooklyn busboy pulled off the
largest identity-theft in Internet
history, victimizing more than 200 of
the "Richest People in America"
listed in Forbes magazine, authorities
say.

Abraham Abdallah, 32, a pudgy,
convicted swindler and high-school
dropout, is suspected of stealing
millions of dollars as he cunningly
used the Web to invade the personal
financial lives of celebrities,
billionaires and corporate executives,
law enforcement sources told The
Post.

Abdallah allegedly breached the
bank, brokerage and credit-card
accounts of such movers and shakers as Steven Spielberg,
Martha Stewart, George Lucas, Sumner Redstone, Oprah
Winfrey, Ross Perot, George Soros, Warren Buffett, Ted
Turner, Ronald Perelman, Carl Icahn, Larry Ellison, Michael
Bloomberg, David Geffen, Barry Diller and Michael Eisner.

He skipped No. 1 on the Forbes list - Bill Gates - perhaps
feeling he is too well known, sources said.

Abdallah's elaborate scam went undetected as he first duped
companies - including Equifax, TRW and Experian - into
providing detailed credit reports on his rich victims, authorities
said.

He then used the confidential data to clone their identities -
and gain access to their credit cards and accounts at such
prestigious brokerage houses and investment banks as
Goldman Sachs, Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch and Fidelity
Investments, officials said.

For nearly six months, the elusive Abdallah allegedly worked
his scam, remaining nothing more than an electronic pulse on
the Web.

He skillfully insulated himself by using Web-enabled cell
phones and virtual voice mail - enabling him to pick up
messages and faxes anywhere at any time, sources said.

Even on the streets of New York, Abdallah kept himself out
of the picture - dispatching couriers to pick up packages
ordered in his victims' names and then sending them on
complicated delivery routes to elude cops, sources said.

But his world of alleged cybercrime ended a month ago when
cops nabbed him behind the wheel of his 2000 Volvo.

After his arrest, cops recovered a dog-eared copy of last
fall's Forbes "400 Richest People in America."

On page after page, next to the biographies and photographs
of the rich and famous, sources said, cops found home
addresses, cell phone and Social Security numbers, bank and
brokerage account numbers and balances - even mothers'
maiden names, meticulously jotted down.

And that was only the start, sources noted.

Cops said they also found small notebooks and ledgers, phony
corporate papers, and rubber stamps bearing the names of
Goldman Sachs and Bear Stearns.

The NYPD is still trying to unravel a voluminous electronic
trail to determine exactly how much Abdallah allegedly stole.
They fear it could be well into the millions.

"He's the best I ever faced," said Detective Michael Fabozzi
of the NYPD's Computer Investigation and Technology Unit.

"You rarely run into someone this good," added Detective
Jahmal Daise of the Manhattan South detective squad.

Abdallah's criminal career started when, as an 18-year-old,
he was charged with credit-card and bank fraud, federal
authorities said.

His arrests include three here by the FBI and a fourth in the
Virgin Islands for trying to cash a phony $50,000 check. He's
spent several years in prison.

But all that was chump change.

Abdallah has denied any wrongdoing. His lawyer declined to
discuss the case.

His brother Ahmed told The Post that Abdallah had never
been in trouble with the law and would never do what he's
been accused of.

Based on court records and law-enforcement officials and
sources, this is the inside story of how the cybercrime spree
cops called "Operation CEO" unraveled.

It started last December, when Merrill Lynch received an
e-mail request to transfer $10 million from an account
belonging to Thomas Siebel, founder of Siebel Systems, to a
new account in Australia.

The request triggered red flags because the transfer would
have "imbalanced" Siebel's account. The brokerage house
contacted Siebel, who said he never made the request.

The case went to Fabozzi, the computer unit's crack Wall
Street cybercop.

Sources say he helped Merrill Lynch track the $10 million
transfer request back to two e-mail addresses:
"LT265@yahoo.com" and "RS264@yahoo.com."

Merrill then checked its entire system and found hits with
those addresses involving five other wealthy clients.

Lt. Kenneth Ling and Sgt. James Doyle, the unit's
commanders, alerted major brokerage houses and investment
banks about the addresses.

Hits turned up all over.

Cops then began checking the business addresses of the
cloned victims.

Some didn't exist.

But at 29 John St., they were stunned to find mailboxes
rented in the names of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and
James Cayne, the head of Bear Stearns.

The boxes had been arranged with a few phone calls and
faxes on what appeared to be corporate stationery. The
rental fees had been paid with Allen and Cayne's credit-card
numbers.

"Up until then, the person we sought was nothing more than
an electronic blip," Fabozzi said.

The cops set up a sting.

They asked the NYPD's Technical Assistance and Response
Unit to install surveillance cameras and provide global
tracking devices for packages picked up at the 29 John St.
boxes.

Technical unit Detective John Heintz told Fabozzi that
Detective Daise in Midtown recently had a similar case. The
cops merged their investigations.

Then Merrill Lynch unearthed a bombshell lead.

The Wall Street firm determined that it had been billed for
credit reports it hadn't requested - meaning someone was
getting confidential reports using Merrill Lynch's name. The
same had happened at Goldman Sachs and Bear Stearns.

The cops went to the credit reporting companies.

They told police they had given out the confidential data,
including Social Security numbers and mothers' maiden
names, based on official-looking documents they had
received on Merrill Lynch and Goldman Sachs stationery.
Many had been notarized or stamped with the company
name.

Authorities determined the documents had been forged.

Prosecutors believe Abdallah cloned the identities of his
wealthy victims, set up mail drops and invaded their personal
accounts.

The magic of voice mail added further legitimacy to his
devious dealings, authorities said.

They said he allegedly used a West Coast number for "Paul
Allen" call backs, with the recording: "Hi, this is Paul Allen.
I'm away from my desk. Please leave a message."

Thanks to virtual voice mail, Abdallah was able to pick up
any messages on his sophisticated cell phone and return
them, sources said. He had the same setup for faxes.

"He was everywhere, pretending to be everyone, when he
was really in New York, sometimes working in a restaurant
kitchen," said one source.

The cops - working with U.S. Postal Service inspectors and
the Secret Service - returned to basic police work.

Fabozzi spent three nights in the basement at 29 John St.,
staking out the Paul Allen box.

But Abdallah proved equally elusive on the street.

He allegedly hired couriers, cab companies and even
prostitutes to retrieve packages ordered and paid for in his
victims' names- and then redirected them to other locations,
where other couriers waited.

He had packages sent to nonexistent addresses - then
tracked them on the Federal Express and United Parcel
Service Web sites. He knew the parcels would be returned
and held at their hubs for several days - giving him time to
pick them up, sources said.

"We think he knew no police supervisor would allow a cop to
spend that much time sitting on a single package," one source
said.

And he abandoned packages if he thought he could be
caught, officials said.

In one case, when he went to make a rare pickup by himself,
he left $60,000 in gold coins sitting in a mailbox because he
feared an employee had become suspicious.

"There were so many packages going to so many places at
one time it's impossible to figure out how he kept track of it
all . . . but he did," Fabozzi said.

Abdallah's cybercrime spree finally crashed on Feb. 23 when
$25,000 worth of sophisticated equipment used to
manufacture and magnetize credit cards was sent via UPS to
a bogus Bronx location, authorities said.

A courier service from Brooklyn was waiting to pick it up,
but the cops intercepted it and took over.

Daise was behind the wheel. Doyle hid under a garbage bag
in the rear of the truck.

En route, the cops were redirected to 23rd Street and Third
Avenue and told to go past a construction site through a
security gate to a warehouse down an alley.

They pulled into an auto shop, and delivered the package to a
mechanic, Michael Puglisi, who was arrested.

Then they waited.

Abdallah showed up 30 minutes later in his Volvo. He
realized something was wrong and hit the gas, but the cops
swooped in - with Fabozzi leaping onto the car and climbing
through the open sunroof.

He held Abdallah around the head until he stopped the car.

"I was handcuffing him while I was upside down with my
feet coming up through the roof," Fabozzi recalled. "I was
ecstatic."

Abdallah, who lives in a Brooklyn Heights brownstone owned
by his family, was charged with criminal possession of forged
devices, stolen property and criminal impersonation. His case
has been taken over by the feds.
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satchmo

You've gotta admit, the guy's got balls.

koriordan

I hope they lock him up and throw away the key.

dogs

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But his world of alleged cybercrime ended a month ago when
cops nabbed him behind the wheel of his 2000 Volvo.
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He rips of MILLIONS of $$$, and he buys a *Volvo* ?
*pfft* he deserves whatever he gets.

satchmo

heheheheh

Lenny

well how would you suspect someone his age getting a expensive car with no job

tribble

Volvo, CHEAP?

Don't know 'bout you but i aint got 20-40k lying around...

Lord Khan

Can't say I'd have felt sorry for any of those listed if he had gotten away with it.

vac

Ever see the volvo used in the film "The Saint" minx of a car..

Have to admit hes a cuining sh*t but he sould have got out when he was ahead... being greedy got him caught.