By installing keyloggers on public computers in a string of libraries, the perpetrators obtained sensitive information about other citizens – name and password for NemID key cards.
Then new key cards were ordered, which were fished out of the unsuspecting people’s mailboxes, after which they were drained for money. It appears from an indictment which has just been released and of which Ritzau has received a copy.
Eight men have been charged. Among them is a 27-year-old man who is already familiar with exactly this kind of data fraud. In 2019, he was sentenced by the Court in Sønderborg to three years in prison.
Incidentally, his criminal CV also states that some years ago he tried to arrange training with the terrorist organization al-Shabaab in Somalia.
He and the others were arrested by officers in the special group Special Investigation West in June last year.
Since then, police investigations have been assessed by the prosecution, which has decided to prosecute a total of 185 criminal acts.
Almost all of them are scams, and the amount totals approximately DKK 45 million. However, a large part was not realized. Much was trial and error.
This applies, for example, to one alleged fraud number, which occurred in the week leading up to the arrest, and which amounts to more than the others.
Four of the defendants are alleged on that occasion to have obtained private information about a single citizen with the intention of trying to seize the person’s assets of DKK 15.5 million, among other things in the form of shares.
The cunning scam with keyloggers must have stretched from December 2018 until the arrests in June 2020, it is claimed.
Four of the men are also alleged to have wrongfully obtained information about 6,580 social security numbers from libraries. This in itself constitutes an attempt at data fraud, the prosecution believes.
The eight deny guilt. The court in Aarhus will assess the police material during court hearings from October until January next year.
The affected libraries are the following: Lyngby, Vallensbæk, Hundige, Østerbro, Christianshavn, Jægersborg, Herlev, Gentofte, Odder, Ordrup, Taastrup, Skibby, Gilleleje, Espergærde, Bagsværd, Islands Brygge, Københavns Hovedbibliotek, Vangede, Nørresundby, Albertslund, Middelfart, Roskilde, Svendborg, Jagtvej in Copenhagen, Aalborg and Hasseris.
In February, two people confessed to their part in what a judge described as organized and carefully planned crime. The offenses have been “extremely intrusive towards each individual victim and have undermined confidence in NemID”, the judge ruled.
Source: The Nordic Page
