Report: Romanian Authorities Bust VoIP Hacking Group

Authorities in Romania have disrupted a large hacking ring accused of stealing Voice over IP (VoIP) data from hacked servers and using it to place bogus calls to premium rate numbers.

Agence France Presse reported on Tuesday that 42 people were arrested in the sting, breaking up a network that was headed by two Romanians and that had caused more than $13.5m in losses to firms in the U.S., Britain, South Africa, Italy and Romania.

The scheme involved compromises of Internet-based VoIP servers.

VoIP hacking has become an increasing problem as more firms migrate to Internet-based telephony. There have been cases in which VoIP hackers have been prosecuted in some cases, and there has been increasing attention by vendors to vulnerabilities and attacks on VoIP platforms.