- A British hacker with The Dark Overlord group has been sentenced to five years in prison
- Nathan Wyatt helped steal U.S. medical records and demand a Bitcoin ransom for them
- Wyatt only recently finished a stint in a British prison for fraud
A British hacker with The Dark Overlord hacking and extortion group has been sentenced to five years in prison in the U.S. after pleading guilty to extortion charges. Nathan Wyatt, known as the Crafty Cockney, helped The Dark Overlord illegally obtain medical records and demand a Bitcoin ransom for them in 2016 following a spell in a British prison on unrelated fraud charges.
Dark Overlord Hackers Demanded up to $300,000
Wyatt was accused of his part conducting attacks against four unnamed healthcare companies and a public accounting firm in 2016 on behalf of The Dark Overlord, threatening to leak sensitive information if the victims didn’t pay up.
The fees commanded ranged from $75,000 to $300,000 and were payable only in Bitcoin, although The Dark Overlord didn’t always honor their demands – in one case a firm agreed to pay the $75,000 blackmail demand, only to see sensitive information posted on Twitter anyway.
The Dark Overlord was also responsible for leaking episodes of Netflix show Orange Is The New Black even after Netflix paid a ransom in 2017, forced school closures in the U.S. by threatening students and their families, and in 2019 published stolen legal documents related to the 9/11 terror attacks in New York.
Wyatt No Stranger to Police Investigations
Wyatt is no stranger to a police cell, having been arrested in September 2016 for allegedly hacking into the iCloud account of Pippa Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge’s sister, and trying to sell the photos. He was released without charge on that count, but was jailed in November 2017 after admitting blackmail and using a bank card in the name of his deceased stepfather.
Having served his sentence Wyatt was hit with an extradition order after being identified for his part in the 2016 extortion attempts, where his role was to create email and phone accounts that he used to threaten victims. Wyatt was extradited in December 2019 and initially pleaded not guilty, changing his plea recently to admit his part in The Dark Overlord operation.
