P2P identity thief sentenced

Author: Gareth Halfacree
Published: 19th March 2008
Comments (7) Stumble
Kopiloff was found guilty of fraud and sentenced to four years for stealing personal data via P2P networks.

Kopiloff was found guilty of fraud and sentenced to four years for stealing personal data via P2P networks.

A Seattle man who used the at-the-time popular file sharing application LimeWire to scour unsuspecting users harddrives for personal data has been sentenced to four years imprisonment according to an Associated Press article.

Gregory Kopiloff, 35, was indicted in September of last year after being caught opening credit card and bank accounts using personal data downloaded from at least eight-three different P2P users. After entering a guilty plea in November, he has finally been sentenced to 51 months imprisonment and a three-year supervision order for mail fraud, accessing a protected computer without authorisation to further fraud, and aggravated identity theft.

Kopiloff's crimes were made possible by users misconfiguring the LimeWire software to share more than a single directory. Unlike BitTorrent which only shares files that have a corresponding .torrent, LimeWire will happily allow any J. Random to download whatever the software finds in its shared directory. If you configure the software to share, for example, C:\Documents and Settings then just about every file you've ever created will be a simple search away.

Taking advantage of the misconfigured computers, Kopiloff was able to download saved data including tax returns, official forms in varying states of completion, and bank account records. Once this information was in his grasp, it could be turned into valid bank accounts and credit cards the same as if he'd rummaged through bins for old bank statements.

At the time of his indictment, Assistant Attorney Kathryn Warma – prosecuting, unsurprisingly – described Kopiloff as “a poster child of a 21st-century thief.” During the summation at Kopiloff's sentencing, Judge James L. Robart described the man as “a highwayman in the virtual world.”

Although modern file sharing systems based around the BitTorrent protocol offer in-built protection against this kind of issue, it's always worth remembering that it's not just the RIAA who'd like a look at what you've got stored on your PC.

Pleased to see a criminal get his just desserts, or do you believe that the users of the file sharing program should shoulder some of the blame for not securing their systems properly? Share your thoughts over in the forums.
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Quote proxess 19th March 2008, 08:27
Honestly I think everyone are to blame. The guy is to blame because he was obviously stealing. Limewire is to blame for allowing Docs and Settings to be shared and the people are to blame for putting such valuable information somewhere where it shouldn't be.
Quote Almightyrastus 19th March 2008, 08:30
When I was using Kazzaa a few years ago, a simple search for 'CV' would often yield dozens of people's CVs with personal information on them. I never used them for anything and never kept them, it was more of a 'I wonder if...' sort of thing.
Quote fakeN 19th March 2008, 09:09
eighty-three
Quote profqwerty 19th March 2008, 09:27
I know a farmer who had a lot of red diesel stolen by some gypsies who broke in at night [the diesel tank isn't exactly anywhere near a road!]. Then they dumped a load of it in a ditch after the police came after them, so the farmer was fined for not protecting the diesel and made to clear out the ditch and pay for extra security.
This is kind of the same as the identity theft - but this time it is the thief who is being prosecuted?!?!?!?
Quote knyghtryda 19th March 2008, 16:11
what the guy did was ethically wrong, but his victims were blissfully ignorant and almost had it coming to them. I don't think the sentence was wrong, but I do think that people really need to take a more proactive stance when it comes to how they treat their own information.
Quote Cheapskate 19th March 2008, 20:52
Yesterday I had a computer here that had limewire installed. It had disabled the virus scanner and totally fugged the system up.
I've had to fix a few kazaa-killed rigs too.
I guess the quest for internet porn is like chocolate dipped minefield.
...?
My analogies stink.
Quote completemadness 19th March 2008, 22:52
Quote:
accessing a protected computer without authorisation to further fraud
Hold on, if users are openly sharing their data, how can he be done for this

If i hand you a photocopy of my bank statement, how can i charge you for that?
Ok, now if you use that for fraud/identity theft, i understand where i can charge you, but still
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