14 DAY TRIAL // A 24-year-old Dutch gamer, Anil Kheda, is accused of hacking into the servers ownedby Rampid Interactive, the New Hampshire-based publisher and host of Outwar, the multi-player online role-playing game.
According to the indictment, the man and his co-conspirators – all of which avid Outwar players – breached Rampid servers between November 2007 and August 2008.
The hackers are accused not only of disrupting the game for several days, but also of altering player accounts, stealing Outwar source code and blackmailing the company.
The source code they stole was used to create a competitor online game called Outcraft, which currently has around 10,000 players worldwide.
Kheda allegedly earned around $10,000 (€8,000) from operating Ourcraft. On the other hand, Rampid lost more than $100,000 (€80,000) because of the hacks.
They also lost their exclusive use of the proprietary source code in which they had invested $1.5 million (€1.17 million).
If found guilty, the suspect faces a maximum of 7 years in prison for conspiracy and interstate threats charges.