14 DAY TRIAL // Some Indian politicians have stopped using their smartphones for important communications after news broke out that hackers were being hired by their political opponents.
Times of India reports that hackers and security experts are being offered Rs 1 lakh ($1,852 / €1,416) and sometimes even more to breach the smartphones of ministers, members of the legislative assembly and members of parliament.
N Nityanand, CTO of Entersoft Information systems at Ameerpet, says that he has been approached on numerous occasions and offered as much money as he wanted to break into the email accounts of top politicians. Nityanand has refused for ethical reasons, but not everyone is like him.
Usually, the hackers are contacted by mediators of the political leaders who don’t name the individuals they represent. They want to be able to intercept phone calls, text messages, emails and anything else that might be of interest.
To gain control of the smartphones of politicians, the hackers send out emails that point to cleverly designed websites. When the links from the emails are clicked, a malicious software is downloaded onto the device.
One of the pieces of malware utilized by the hackers is the NotCompatible Trojan.