Hyderabad: A 23-year-old aspiring model was cheated by a hacker who allegedly hacked into her mailing and social media accounts and accessed her private files.
The hacker was arrested by police on Tuesday. The 17-year-old boy from Chhattisgarh learnt hacking from online portals and using proxy servers targeted the woman.
According to police, the victim found that her Gmail, Facebook and iCloud accounts were logged in and her recovery email id and the mobile number link were changed. However she recovered her accounts.
While holidaying in Gulf in the first week of June, she got her private pictures and videos from an unknown number through Whatsapp and realised that the same person who hacked her account had sent her the images and clips.
“The boy identifying himself as an ad film maker started chatting with her on Facebook messenger and sent her a link to upload her profile to audition for modelling. When she clicked on the link, a new Facebook page was opened asking her to login again. Unaware of the threat, she logged in and updated her profile,” Cyberabad additional DCP, Crimes, B. Srinivas Reddy said.
Police tracked the boy from Mumbai to Pune, where he cheated models and then to his home town Chhattisgarh using reverse footprinting method and produced him before the Juvenile Board.
Police said that while storing personal information on networking and cloud storage sites, different passwords should be used and different mailing and social accounts should not be accessed at a time on the same browser.
“While carrying out financial transactions online, this process should be followed. Using multiple windows at a time increases chances of being hacked,” Mr Srinivas added.
Police also advised teens learning hacking techniques online to be careful as they can be caught easily and end up behind bars.
