WhatsApp hacker busted

The Cyber Crime Unit of the Criminal investigation Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service has apprehended a mobile phone repairer who allegedly hacks into people’s social media accounts and uses the information for his nefarious activities.

The suspect, David Sam-Essandoh, according to police reports, had connected the WhatsApp application of his victims through WhatsApp web to a MacBook Pro laptop and had been monitoring their conversations.

He was nabbed when one of the victims detected that her WhatsApp conversation was being monitored, and reported the matter to the police.

The director in-charge of the unit, Chief Superintendent Dr Gustav Herbert Yankson, confirmed to DAILY GUIDE that Sam-Essandoh was arrested on 15th August, 2017 in Accra.

On 10th August, a complaint was received at the Cyber Crime Unit from a victim that she suspected her WhatsApp conversation was being monitored.

On receipt of the complaint, Chief Superintendent Yankson said the victim’s mobile phone was examined and it revealed that the WhatsApp application had been connected through WhatsApp web to a MacBook Pro laptop.

David Sam-Essandoh was subsequently arrested while accessing the victim’s conversation via WhatsApp web on his laptop.

Upon interrogation, the suspect was said to have admitted the offence and stated that he only connected the victim’s WhatsApp application to his laptop to find out her conversations about him (suspect).

Further investigations revealed that sometime in July this year, the complainant/victim had a problem with her phone and gave it to the suspect for repairs.

After the repairs, the suspect allegedly did the connection mentioned above without the complainant’s authorization and was intercepting her conversations.

The police also discovered that Sam-Essandoh had connected the WhatsApp application of two other ladies on the same computer using different browsers without the knowledge of the victims, and was monitoring their conversations as well. When he was questioned, he reportedly gave the same excuse that he wanted to know what both ladies had said about him.

He is being processed for court for prosecution but investigations are still ongoing.