Lapsus GTA 6 hacker handed indefinite hospital order BBC News

pAn 18yearold hacker who leaked clips of a forthcoming Grand Theft Auto GTA game has been sentenced to an indefinite hospital orderppArion Kurtaj from Oxford who is autistic was a key member of international gang LapsusppThe gangs attacks on tech giants including Uber Nvidia and Rockstar Games cost the firms nearly 10mppThe judge said Kurtajs skills and desire to commit cybercrime meant he remained a high risk to the publicppHe will remain at a secure hospital for life unless doctors deem him no longer a dangerppThe court heard that Kurtaj had been violent while in custody with dozens of reports of injury or property damageppDoctors deemed Kurtaj unfit to stand trial due to his severe autism so the jury was asked to determine whether or not he committed the alleged acts not if he did so with criminal intentppA mental health assessment used as part of the sentencing hearing said he continued to express the intent to return to cybercrime as soon as possible He is highly motivatedppThe jury was told that while he was on bail for hacking Nvidia and BTEE and in police protection at a Travelodge hotel he continued hacking and carried out his most infamous hackppDespite having his laptop confiscated Kurtaj managed to breach Rockstar the company behind GTA using an Amazon Firestick his hotel TV and a mobile phoneppKurtaj stole 90 clips of the unreleased and hugely anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6ppHe broke into the companys internal Slack messaging system to declare if Rockstar does not contact me on Telegram within 24 hours I will start releasing the source codeppHe then posted the clips and source code on a forum under the username TeaPotUberHackerppHe was rearrested and detained until his trialppThis video can not be playedppWatch What have we learnt from the GTA VI trailerppEarlier this month the trailer for GTA 6 was released clocking up 128m views on YouTube in just 4 daysppIn sentencing hearings Kurtajs defence team argued that the success of the games trailer indicated that Kurtajs hack had not caused serious harm to the game developer and asked that this be factored into the sentencingppBut Her Honour Judge Lees said that there were real victims and real harm caused from his other multiple hacks on individuals and the companies he attacked with Lapsus ppRockstar Games alone told the court that the hack cost it 5m to recover from plus thousands of hours of staff timeppAnother Lapsus member who is 17 and cannot be named because of his age was found guilty in the same trial which lasted six weeks at Southwark Crown Court ppHe worked with Kurtaj and other members of Lapsus to hack tech giant Nvidia and phone company BTEE and steal data before demanding a four million dollar ransom which was not paid ppThey also stole directly from individuals through their cryptocurrency walletsppThe 17yearold was sentenced to an 18 month long Youth Rehabilitation Order including intense supervision and a ban on using VPNs onlineppAs well as hacking offences the boy was sentenced for what the judge described as unpleasant and frightening pattern of stalking and harassment of two young women ppKurtaj and the 17yearold are the first members of the Lapsus group to be convicted but it is thought others are still at largeppThe gangs audacious attacks in 2021 and 2022 shocked the cybersecurity world The group from the UK and allegedly Brazil was described in court as digital banditsppThe gang thought to mostly be teenagers used conman like tricks as well as computer hacking to gain access to multinational corporations such as Microsoft the technology giant and digital banking group RevolutppDuring their spree the hackers regularly celebrated their crimes publicly and taunted victims on the social network app Telegram in English and PortugueseppIt prompted US cyberauthorities to issue a lengthy report into Lapsus and other teen hacker gangsppIt concluded that Lapsus made clear just how easy it was for its members juveniles in some instances to 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