Major e-crime case goes to court in Pakistan

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http://www.techserver.com/noframes/story/0,2294,500236449-500345839-501991772-0,00.html

MAZHAR ABBAS, Agence France-Presse

KARACHI, Pakistan (August 6, 2000 12:47 a.m. EDT
http://www.nandotimes.com) - Three young Pakistani men from "good
families" will be tried this week for alleged Internet fraud, in a
case that has raised long-overdue questions about the country's
ability to police computer crime.

Immad Ahmed, Shahid Hussain and Ali Owais were arrested late last
month after a foreign bank complained that one of its clients had
found 2.7 million rupees ($50,000) worth of unexplained purchases on
his credit card.

The men have allegedly confessed to using the card number obtained
from a local restaurant to go on a cyber-spending spree on a
U.S.-based Web site.

Police admit that tracking down the suspects stretched their resources
and exposed serious flaws in their approach to computer crime.

"This is a new and dangerous phenomenon in Pakistan, involving kids
from educated families like the three boys," Sindh police chief Afab
Nabi told AFP.

Police said they had been stung into action by the case, after almost
ignoring the initial complaint due to a lack of experience in cyber
crimes.

"I am planning to establish a cyber crime unit soon which will work
under a team of police officers specialized in computers and will be
headed by the deputy inspector general of crimes," Nabi said.

The case has exposed the yawning gap between the younger generation of
well educated, tech-savvy Pakistanis and the poorly funded police who
still pound out reports on typewriters.

20-year-old Ahmed said he used a stolen credit card number to buy a
laptop computer, digital camera, scanner, cordless keyboard and DVD
drive after learning how to do it in an e-mail chat session.

"It all started during the chat when one person informed me about the
procedure of using web site shopping. Chatting on e-mail turned me
into a criminal," he told police in a statement.

He said his friend Ali Owais, who worked at a restaurant, provided him
with credit card numbers from a local branch of a foreign bank, one of
which he used to shop at Navitech Corporation, an Indianapolis-based
online technology market.

He did it all from his home on a Pentium II computer which his father
gave him as a present after he passed a computer course last year.

"So far the accused boys have admitted that they have done the
shopping in the U.S. through the Internet," said deputy inspector
general of crimes Tariq Jamil, adding that the other two accused were
in their late teens.

"It was not an easy case, which was first referred to a federal
investigating agency, but they apologized and said they didn't have
specialized people for this kind of offense."

Jamil said it was "disturbing" that the young men came from "good
families" and made good grades.

"One had done his 'O' Level, the other has just completed school and
the third did a computer course with distinctions," he said.

"What they considered adventure turned into a crime for which they can
go to prison for seven years."

They are expected to appear in court on Wednesday.

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