Official News - page 6

REAL LIFE NEWS: INTERNET PHONE CALL LANDS FUGITIVE IN JAIL

by Hazed

Don't you just love it when criminals on the run get caught because they do something dumb? Or are outwitted by technology in some unexpected way? Here's the story of a hi-tech chief executive who had turned fugitive because he faced fraud charges over a stock options scandal. He was tracked down when he made a one-minute phone call using the Skype IP Telephony service - this betrayed his presence in Sri Lanka to intelligence agencies.

Jacob Alexander became the target of a worldwide manhunt after he skipped out on security fraud charges. Two of his former colleagues were charged and released on bail earlier this month. All three of them resigned from the voicemail company Alexander had founded, Comverse, over allegations of multi-million dollar stock options fraud. They are accused of profiting at the expense of the company's stockholders.

At first, it was thought Alexander had fled to Israel, a country where he had allegedly transferred $57m. But the hi-tech detective work led to his arrest in Sri Lanka, from where he is likely to be extradited back to the US.

Since Skype is supposed to offer confidentiality, it is not clear exactly how his one minute phone call was traced. If you are interested in the technical details of how it might be possible to track anonymous VoIP traffic, there's a link in this Ars Technica article to a PDF that explains it.

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