Court grants students who hacked MTN N50m bail

• Published On: 06 August 2024 at 20:02

On Monday, a Federal High Court in Lagos granted N50 million bail to two pupils, Moshood Abiola Polytechnic's Timothy Oluwabukola and Resign Regal Academy's Anthony Odemerho.

The students are accused of breaking into MTN Nigeria Communications' computers and stealing airtime and data worth N1.9 billion.

Justice Akintayo Aluko granted their bail after the defendants submitted two separate applications. In addition to the bail amount, each defendant must provide two sureties: one must be a civil servant in either the federal or Lagos State governments at grade level 14 or higher, and the other must own property within the court's jurisdiction and provide proof of ownership as well as a sworn affidavit of means.

The government servant surety must also produce a reference letter from their employer and proof of their most recent advancement. Both defendants must provide two recent passport pictures to the court registrar. The prosecution is entrusted with checking all supplied documents and the sureties' residence addresses.

Until these bail terms are met, the defendants will stay in the Correctional Center.

On July 30, 2024, the Police Special Fraud Unit arraigned Oluwabukola and Odemerho on four counts of conspiracy, unauthorized access to the company's Application Programming Interface, and unlawful conversion.

Justine Enang, the police prosecution counsel, informed the court that the defendants, as well as others who are still at large, are accused of committing the offenses.