Turkish court to try alleged hackers as spies in terrorism court

ANKARA

A Turkish court has ruled that 17 defendants accused of breaching multiple state institutions and selling citizens’ personal data must be tried on espionage-related charges, moving the case to a court that handles terrorism and crimes against the state.

Prosecutors say the suspects breached the systems of public bodies, including the education, health and land registry authorities, obtaining sensitive data such as national ID numbers, addresses and bank details.

Investigators found personal data sets belonging to approximately 101 million Turkish citizens on computers, mobile devices and cloud storage accounts linked to the suspects, daily Hürriyet reported on Dec. 29.

According to the indictment, the stolen data was shared or sold via a website hosted abroad, with around 24,000 registered users.

The case was initially filed on charges including illegal acquisition and distribution of personal data, possession of banned software and devices, and violations of the Cybersecurity Law.