An 18-year-old hacker who leaked clips of a forthcoming Grand Theft Auto (GTA) game has been sentenced to an indefinite hospital order.
Arion Kurtaj from Oxford, who has autism, was a key member of international gang Lapsus$.
The gang’s attacks on tech giants including Uber, Nvidia and Rockstar Games cost the firms nearly $10m.
The judge said Kurtaj’s skills and desire to commit cyber crime meant he remained a high risk to the public.
He will remain at a secure hospital for life unless doctors deem him no longer a danger.
The court heard that Kurtaj had been violent while in custody with dozens of reports of injury or property damage.
Doctors deemed Kurtaj unfit to stand trial due to his acute autism so the jury was asked to determine whether or not he committed the alleged acts - not if he did so with criminal intent.
A mental health assessment used as part of the sentencing hearing said he “continued to express the intent to return to cybercrime as soon as possible. He is highly motivated.”
The jury was told that while he was on bail for hacking Nvidia and BT/EE and in police protection at a Travelodge hotel, he continued hacking and carried out his most infamous hack.
Despite having his laptop confiscated, Kurtaj managed to breach Rockstar, the company behind GTA, using an Amazon Firestick, his hotel TV and a mobile phone.
Kurtaj stole 90 clips of the unreleased and hugely anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6.
He broke into the company’s internal Slack messaging system to declare “if Rockstar does not contact me on Telegram within 24 hours I will start releasing the source code”.
He then posted the clips and source code on a forum under the username TeaPotUberHacker.
He was re-arrested and detained until his trial.
Knowing how these institutions work, this is effectively a life sentence without trial. Obviously his mental health will worsen in there, which will be used as justification for keeping him there longer. For stealing some mp4s of a video game. Yet another autistic kid institutionalised for life.
They will likely offer him a deal to work for the government for little pay (if any) or go to prison for a long time. I wouldn’t blame him if he decided to take the fed route given how young he is. There’s no way the government is willing to waste that free talent in an institution.
I believe Russia did a similar thing. They broadcasted this big show of the FSB raiding some hackers’ headquarters/homes and arresting them, but it was speculated that they weren’t even in custody because they had already been hired as government contractors/employees lol
That’s still horrible, but at least he wouldn’t die of boredom. I hope he really does get an offer.