Prisoners Hacked the Jpay System to Add Credit to their Accounts

As per Jeffrey Ray, spokesman of Idaho Department of Corrections, an inquiry shows that the JPay system has been hacked by over 360 inmates for increasing their account balances. The account balances were increased by around $225,000 in credits for downloading games and music, as well as for using the email. The JPay manufactured tablets were intended for accessing the games, ebooks, music and emails.

The spokesperson, Jeff Ray gave out a statement in which he explained the way 50 inmates transferred more than $ 1,000, and also explained the way how one of them even managed to transfer an amount of $10,000 to his account balance. Mashable.com further posted on July 29, 2018, that the money which was stolen was not the taxpayer's money.

In his statement to the Associated Press, Ray further added that "this conduct was intentional, not accidental. It required knowledge of the JPay system and multiple actions by every inmate who exploited the system's vulnerability to improperly credit their account". The inmates added credits to their account balance by hacking into the system, in order to purchase the access of email and entertainment.

As per Wired, Jpay is the only company who provides tablets for the prisoners. For inmates, the cost involved in sending an email through a tablet is $0.47, and to download music the cost goes up to $3.50. As the inmates were on low wages in the prison, and the costs involved in downloading music and sending emails was high, these together might have motivated the prisoners to carry out the hacking.

JPay has recovered around $65,000 of credit till now, and unless they recover the total hacked amount, the inmates would not be able to have complete access of the tablets. Now, the inmates only can use tablets for email purposes (send and receive). JPay in its statement said that the "vast majority of individuals use our secure technology appropriately," since the tablet allows inmates to communicate with family members and also provide access to entertainment and educational programming.

A disciplinary offence has been charged against the inmates who were involved in the hacking, which might lead to inability to access the given privileges for the time-being.

» SPAMfighter News - 8/6/2018