Hackers steal concert tickets of Taylor Swift and others worth Rs 5.5 crore

Two individuals have been accused of stealing and reselling nearly 1,000 concert tickets. These cybercriminals who were working for a third-party contractor of US-based online ticket marketplace StubHub, reportedly collected $635,000 (nearly Rs 5.5 crore) by stealing and reselling the concert tickets, with the majority of them being from Taylor Swift's Eras Tour.
New York prosecutors have alleged that Tyrone Rose, 20, and Shamara Simmons, 31, exploited a loophole in an offshore ticket vendor's platform while employed by Sutherland Global Services in Jamaica, a contractor for StubHub.
Apart from Taylor Swift's popular Eras Tour, the pair also targeted tickets for other high-profile events, including concerts by Ed Sheeran and Adele, NBA games, and the US Open Tennis Championships. Prosecutors state the scheme involved intercepting nearly 350 StubHub orders to steal the tickets.

In a press release, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said: “The Sutherland employees, defendant Tyrone Rose and an unapprehended accomplice, allegedly used their access to StubHub's computer system to find a backdoor into a secure area of the network where already sold tickets were given a URL and queued to be emailed to the purchaser to download. Rose and his co-conspirator re-directed the URLs to the emails of co-conspirators Shamara Simmons in Queens and a now deceased accomplice who lived in Queens.”
The investigation remains active as prosecutors work to uncover the full scope of the operation, including any additional co-conspirators who have yet to be identified.
The Sutherland employees were arrested in New York City and put on trial this week. They are facing a criminal complaint that charges them with second-degree grand larceny, first-degree computer tampering, fourth-degree conspiracy, and fourth-degree computer tampering.
If convicted on the most serious charge, they could each face a maximum prison sentence of three to 15 years.
“According to the charges, these defendants tried to use the popularity of Taylor Swift's concert tour and other high-profile events to profit at the expense of others. This takedown highlights the vigilance of my office's Cybercrime and Cryptocurrency Unit as well as the importance of working with our industry partners to combat fraudulent activities and ensure the protection of consumers,” District Attorney Katz added.