The ex-owner of the T-Mobile retail store Argishti Khudardyan sentenced to 10 years in prison for the scheme for unlocking mobile phones by hacking the internal systems of T-Mobile. In total, illegal operations brought a man more than $ 25 million.
In the period from August 2014 to June 2019, a 44-year-old man unlocked hundreds of thousands of mobile phones for his “customers”. At the same time, in June 2017, T -Mobile, suspecting something was amiss, annulled the contract with an enterprising American – the operator drew attention to the suspicious activity of the Khudardyan computer in the company’s network.
According to the investigation, together with his former business partner and co-owner of the Cellular store Alena Garehbaglu, Khudaverdian gained access to the T-Mobile internal computer systems, using the accounting data stolen during more than 50 different operator employees.
Stolen data was used to access the internal computer systems of the operator and, in many cases, to reset the password, which blocked the access of owners of accounts to the system.
According to the US Ministry of Justice, using stolen data and IMEI-Nomer, Khudardyan unlocked hundreds of thousands of smartphones on the Android and iOS mobile operating systems.
Fraudsters advertised “Premium direct unlock services for all mobile operators” in various ways, including mailings and messages on sites, such as unlocks247.com, swiftunLocked.com, unlockkital.com, tryunlock.com and unlockDlocted.com.
As explained in the press release of the Ministry of Justice, “unlocking allowed to sell smartphones on the black market.” In addition, T-Mobile clients were able to stop using the operator’s services and thereby deprive him of income.
T-mobile sells phones on the terms of service contracts. This means that smartphones are attached to the operator, and customers cannot use purchased devices for communication of other providers.
Khudardyan pleaded guilty. In addition to imprisonment, he must pay $ 28 million as compensation.
Alain Garehbaglu also pleaded guilty. The verdict should be announced to him on February 23, 2023.