Hamza Bendelladj ( ar, حمزة بن دلاج, Ḥamza bin Dalāj , th, แฮมซา เบ็นดิลลาดจ์, Haemsa Bendinlat), born either in 1988 or in 1989 in

Tizi Ouzou Tizi Ouzou or Thizi Wezzu (, Kabyle: Tizi Wezzu) is a city in north central Algeria. It is among the largest cities in Algeria. It is the second most populous city in the Kabylie region after Bejaia. History Etymology The name ''Tizi Ouzou' ...

, is an Algerian cyber-criminal and a carder who goes by the code name BX1 and has been nicknamed the "Smiling Hacker". Bendelladj is a polyglot speaking 5 languages often used in profit in view of his linguistic knowledge in order to extract money almost everywhere in the world. This led to a search for him that lasted 5 years. He was on the top 10 list of the most wanted hackers by

Interpol The International Criminal Police Organization (ICPO; french: link=no, Organisation internationale de police criminelle), commonly known as Interpol ( , ), is an international organization that facilitates worldwide police cooperation and cri ...

and the

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...

''Le "hacker riant", héros d'Algérie''
,

Europe 1 Europe 1, formerly known as Europe n° 1, is a privately owned radio station created in 1955. Owned and operated by Lagardère Active, a subsidiary of the Lagardère Group, it is one of the leading radio broadcasting stations in France and its pro ...

, 9 janvier 2013. for allegedly embezzling tens of millions of dollars from more than two hundred American and European financial institutions, via a computer virus, the "SpyEYE Botnet" that infected more than 60 million computers worldwide (mostly from the United States),''États-Unis : le hacker algérien Hamza Bendelladj condamné à 15 ans de prison''
.

Jeune Afrique ''Jeune Afrique'' (English: ''Young Africa'') is a French-language pan-African weekly news magazine, founded in 1960 in Tunis and subsequently published in Paris. It is the most widely read pan-African magazine. It is also a book publisher, unde ...

- 21 avril 2016 which he developed with his Russian accomplice Aleksandr Andreivich Panin, aka "Gribodemon", to steal banking information stored on infected computers.

Mode of operation

Using malicious software called "

SpyEye SpyEye is a malware program that attacks users running Google Chrome, Opera, Firefox and Internet Explorer on Microsoft Windows operating systems. This malware uses keystroke logging and form grabbing to steal user credentials for malicious use. ...

", Bendelladj under the pseudonyms "BX1" or "Daniel HB", broke into the computers of the banks or private individuals to acquire passwords and identification codes. Once he took control of an account, he emptied them.

Arrest

After a three-year chase, Bendelladj was arrested on January 7, 2013 by Thai police while making a stopover in

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estima ...

in transit between

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

and

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

. He did not resist arrest. He said goodbye to his family as he was arrested and his wife and daughter continued their journey to Egypt without him. He earned the nickname "Smiling Hacker" due to the smile on his face during his media presentation on all the photos taken after his arrest even when handcuffed. According to Thai police, Bendelladj was in the top 10 most wanted by the

.''Algérie : Hamza Bendelladj, cracker indécryptable''
,

, du 30 janvier 2013. Despite much false information on the internet Bendelladj did not get sentenced to death, and claims saying he donated any money to charity are almost impossible to verify. Trial documents did not mention any donations or charity activities.

Extradition to the United States

He was

extradited Extradition is an action wherein one jurisdiction delivers a person accused or convicted of committing a crime in another jurisdiction, over to the other's law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement procedure between the two jurisdict ...

in May 2013 to the United States. He was tried in Atlanta where he pleaded guilty on June 25, 2015. He faced a sentence of up to 30 years in prison and a fine of fourteen million dollars.''Détenu à Atlanta (États-Unis) : Le hacker Hamza Bendelladj n’a pas été condamné à mort''
,

El Watan ''El Watan'' (Arabic:الوطن, meaning ''the Homeland'') is an independent French-language newspaper in Algeria. History and profile The paper was founded in 1990 after Omar Belhouchet and nineteen colleagues left the FLN government-owned ne ...

, du 24 aout 2015. His accomplice Aleksandr Andreevich Panin was arrested on July 1, 2013, at

Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 li ...

and pleaded guilty in January 2014 to the Atlanta Federal Court.

Support on social networks

In 2015, a Tunisian website posted a rumor that Bendelladj had been sentenced to death. This rumor spread on social networks in

Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , relig ...

and several

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

support groups were created in reaction to support him. A petition was launched demanding that the Algerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and

President Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...

intervene for his release. The US ambassador to Algeria, Joan A. Polaschik wrote on her

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

account, "that computer crimes are not capital crimes and are not punishable by the death penalty".

Conviction in the United States

Bendelladj has been in prison in the United States since May 2013, with the US court sentenced him on April 20, 2016 to 15 years in prison and 3 years of probation. His Russian accomplice Panin, 27, aka "Gribodemon", was sentenced 9 years and 6 months. In their report, the

United States Department of Justice The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of justice in the United State ...

estimated the "SpyEye" virus had stolen approximately a billion dollars. Between 2010 and 2012, the affected banks repaired the damage caused by this

malware Malware (a portmanteau for ''malicious software'') is any software intentionally designed to cause disruption to a computer, server, client, or computer network, leak private information, gain unauthorized access to information or systems, depri ...

. Bendelladj's lawyer announced that he intended to appeal against the court's decision.''US bank hackers get long bail term''
.''

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

- 21 avril 2016''

Notes and references

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bendelladj, Hamza 1988 births Living people 21st-century Algerian people Hackers Identity theft People from Tizi Ouzou Phreaking Security breaches