Albert Gonzalez, the 28 year-old hacker convicted of stealing and reselling over 170 million credit and ATM card numbers, was being paid $75,000 by the U.S. Secret Service to work undercover informing on other credit card thieves before he got arrested.
The new revelation comes from Stephen Watt, Gonzalez’s best friend and convicted accomplice. Watt was convicted of creating the sniffer program that Gonzalez used to hack into the corporate systems.
The Secret Service would not comment on the pay or identity of informants.
Former federal prosecutor Mark Rasch adds: “It’s a significant amount of money to pay an informant but it’s not an outrageous amount to pay if the guy was working full time and delivering good results. It’s probably the only thing he was doing — other than hacking into TJX and making millions of dollars.”
For pleading guilty to identity theft, wire fraud, computer fraud and conspiracy, Gonzalez is expected to receive over 20 years in prison when he is sentenced later this week.
Result for: new revelation
In a situation that should crush the credibility of the ongoing court case, it has been revealed that police officer Jim Keyzer, the “star” witness in the investigation against the The Pirate Bay was recently employed by Warner Bros, one of the companies suing the admins at TPB.
The website tpbKopit.se made the discovery yesterday after searching the officer’s Facebook profile. He has since deleted his profile but the damage is done.
Pirate Bay’s Peter Sunde (brokep) added: “He [Keyzer] confirmed that he is an employee there and we can’t see it in any other way than this being the reward for a work well done from the new employer of the police, the entertainment industry”
“This is a legal outrage. Talk about biased,” Sunde continues. “Keyzer is in charge of the investigation. No matter the reasons to switch employer, this investigation has not been fair. We have felt that the investigation has concentrated on trying to locate something to point out as wrong with The Pirate Bay instead of determining if the activities of the site are unlawful or not.”
“This is pure, classic corruption,” says Rickard Falkvinge leader of the Swedish pirate party. “Big companies from foreign nations trying to affect the outcome in a Swedish Court of Justice with straightforward bribes. Now the copyright lobby is showing its true face.”
The consequences of this new revelation is that the case, and the investigation, which was started nearly 2 years ago, may have to be redone, making a huge setback for Swedish investigators.
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