McLaren-Mercedes
Formula 1 star
Lewis Hamilton and former F3 Euroseries team-mate
Adrian Sutil came close to becoming the victims of a blackmail plot, it has been revealed.
An unemployed man has been arrested in Germany for having allegedly tried to sell a computer hard drive that used to belong to Sutil to German motorsport magazine
Bild Motorsport for €10,000. The man – known only as ‘Dieter' – now faces charges of attempted blackmail and possession of stolen data, and if found guilty could face a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment.
The disk – which had not been wiped properly – contained personal information, details of Sutil's financial records, Swiss bank account transactions, photographs and private e-mail correspondence between
Force India ace Sutil and close friend Hamilton. Sutil's father Jorge had ‘disposed of the computer some time ago' according to
The Register website, making it unclear just how it came to being in ‘Dieter's' possession.
When ‘Dieter' arrived for a meeting with the editor of
Bild Motorsport to discuss the proposed sale at an autobahn service station near Munich, he was instead met by undercover police conducting a sting operation, having been tipped off in advance. Detectives are now questioning ‘Dieter' over the incident.
Security experts Sophos have warned about identity thieves who wait around junkyards in a bid to pick up old computers within minutes of them having been dropped off, before going on to employ data recovery tools to try and extract financial records, passwords and other information useful for stealing identities.
Sophos senior technology consultant Graham Cluley suggested had Jorge Sutil wholly erased the computer's contents before he got rid of it, Hamilton and Sutil Jnr would not have been at risk of blackmail.
“This is a timely reminder to businesses and individuals alike to securely wipe your PCs' hard drive before disposing of an old computer,” Cluley is quoted as having said by
ITProPortal.
