Idaho Man Gets 10 Years for Hacking, Cyber Extortion

Idaho Man Gets 10 Years for Hacking, Cyber Extortion

November 14, 2024 at 03:53PM

Robert Purbeck, 45, was sentenced to 10 years in prison for hacking 19 US servers, stealing personal information of 132,000 people, and extorting an orthodontist for Bitcoin. He accessed sensitive data from a medical clinic and a police department. He must also pay over $1 million in restitution.

### Meeting Takeaways

1. **Defendant Information**:
– Name: Robert Purbeck
– Age: 45
– Sentence: 10 years in prison

2. **Criminal Activities**:
– Hacked into 19 computer servers in the US.
– Stole personally identifiable information (PII) of 132,000 individuals.
– Attempted to extort an orthodontist for Bitcoin by threatening to release stolen patient records.

3. **Key Incidents**:
– **2017**: Purchased access to a medical clinic’s server, downloading records for over 43,000 individuals including sensitive personal information.
– **2018**: Acquired credentials for a police department server in Newnan, GA, stealing sensitive documents and information of over 14,000 individuals.
– **July 2018**: Extorted an orthodontist, threatening to reveal stolen PII of the orthodontist’s child.

4. **Legal Actions**:
– FBI executed a federal search warrant at Purbeck’s home in 2019, leading to the seizure of his computers and devices.
– Purbeck pleaded guilty to two counts of unauthorized access to protected computers.

5. **Judicial Outcome**:
– Prison Sentence: 10 years
– Supervised Release: 3 years following prison
– Restitution: Ordered to pay $1,048,702 to victims.

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