14 DAY TRIAL // Yesterday, an Israeli judge at the Beersheba District Court in Israel indicted Maagad Ben Juwad Oydeh, a Palestinian known as the main hacking expert for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) movement.
Israeli forces arrested Oydeh at the start of the year and have accused him of hacking drones, CCTV video feeds, cellphone networks, airports, and the Israel Interior Ministry database.
As the Jerusalem Post reports based on court documents, Oydeh was recruited by PIJ as a teenager and was first tasked with managing PIJ's radio station, where he first started receiving a monthly salary from the group.
Oydeh started by hacking CCTV cameras installed on Israeli roads
As his technical skills grew, PIJ's leadership first asked Oydeh to hack into Israel’s Road Safety Authority, so the group leader could see video feeds from road cameras on his laptop.
Seeing that the new guy has talent, the group then asked Oydeh to hack IDF (Israel Defense Forces) UAVs (drones), which he managed to achieve after the third try in 2011.
This allowed PIJ forces to pinpoint the position of IDF drones and even see their video feeds, but only until 2014, when IDF updated their UAVs, and Oydeh's hacking technique stopped working.
Oydeh was PIJ's top hacker
Later on, in 2013, Oydeh was also asked to hack into cellphones operating on the Palestinian Jawwal mobile network, and the Israeli Cellcom and Orange mobile networks so that PIJ could detect Israeli moles activating in Gaza. Oydeh only managed to hack Jawwal's network.
In the same year, PIJ also requested Oydeh to hack the Ben-Gurion Airport, so the group could view video feeds, access information on flights, and even plan rocket strikes against certain airplanes.
At one point in 2013, PIJ also secured a training session in Iran so Oydeh could improve his skills, but the deal fell apart right at the end.
The hacker's activities continued in 2015 when Oydeh hacked into the Israel Interior Ministry, which allowed PIJ to gather information about dissidents that could be recruited in their ranks.