US Prosecutors Charge Iranian Behzad Mesri With Game of Thrones Hack

American premium cable and satellite television network, Home Box Office (HBO) is set to experience some relief as United States prosecutors have charged an Iranian national with hacking into cable TV network HBO and stealing episodes and plot summaries for unaired programs including Game of Thrones, then threatening to release the data unless he was paid  a ransom of $US6 million ($7.91 million).

Behzad Mesri, 29, also known as “Skote Vahshat,” was charged with the hack in a sealed indictment that was released on Tuesday by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan.

The Iranian is also being accused of computer fraud, wire fraud, extortion and identity theft.

Mesri’s hack caused huge trouble for HBO toward the end of the summer, though it wasn’t as damaging as the infamous Sony hack. He was able to leak previously unaired episodes of high-profile shows like Curb Your Enthusiasm, Ballers, and The Deuce, in addition to stealing scripts and plot summaries for upcoming episodes of  popular show Game of Thrones. He also compromised e-mail accounts for various HBO employees.

Acting U.S. Attorney Joon Kim said at a news conference that Mesri was in Iran. He said Mesri would face consequences even though U.S. authorities could not immediately arrest him.

“He will never be able to travel outside of Iran without fear of being arrested and brought here,” Kim said.

Kim described Mesri as an “experienced and sophisticated hacker who has been wreaking havoc on computer systems around the world for some time.”

Prosecutors allege Mr Mesri, who has been added to the FBI’s most wanted list, had worked for Iran’s military and been involved in a campaign to deface US websites.

Prosecutors say Mr Mesri began conducting online reconnaissance of HBO’s computer networks and employees in May 2017.

“Over the next couple of months, he successfully compromised multiple user accounts in order to obtain access to the media giant’s servers,” court documents say.

“Through the course of the intrusions into HBO’s systems, Mr Mesri was responsible for stealing confidential and proprietary data including… scripts and plot summaries for unaired programming, including but not limited to episodes of Game of Thrones.”

A few weeks later, the documents allege, Mr Mesri claimed to have stolen about 1.5TB of data and began an extortion campaign that included an email to HBO employees that read: “Hi to All losers” Yes it’s true! HBO is !”

HBO spokesman Jeff Cusson declined to comment on the indictment, and on whether the company’s investigation into the breach was complete or how much the incident had cost the cable network.

It is unclear whether any ransom money, demanded in Bitcoin according to the court documents, was ever paid.

Mr Mesri has not yet commented on the charges.