Romanian hackers took over almost two-thirds of Washington, D.C., police's outdoor surveillance cameras days before President Donald Trump's inauguration.
According to an unsealed affidavit, the hackers accessed 123 out of 187 cameras for multiple days as part of a ransomware extortion scheme.
On Jan. 12, 2017, the Secret Service learned that certain police computers — and the cameras they were connected to — had been compromised. They found the hackers by tracing email addresses accessed on the infiltrated computers.
The two hackers were arrested in Romania on Dec. 15. The U.S. Justice Department charged them with "conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit various forms of computer fraud." They could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
