College Cyber Attack Criminal Jailed for Four Years

A cyber criminal who tried to blackmail Jisc and committed a raft of other cyber crimes was yesterday (10 Jun) sentenced at the Old Bailey to four years in a young offender institution.

At an earlier hearing, Daniel Kelley, aged 22, from Llanelli in South Wales, admitted sending Jisc an email in 2015 threatening to disclose data he claimed to have stolen unless he was paid a sum in bitcoin. We reported the blackmail to Action Fraud and to the police.

Kelley had also admitted cyber attacks on a college where he was a student and was part of a gang involved in the huge, high-profile data breach of TalkTalk in the same year.

Jisc’s CEO Paul Feldman said:

“We will always look to support our members and law enforcement authorities involved in investigating crimes. In this case, we were able to help the police to identify Daniel Kelley.

“We encourage universities and colleges to report all instances of cyber crime to Action Fraud. This information helps the police in tackling and prioritising work to combat cyber crime. As in this case, reporting crime can pay dividends further down the line and our experience shows the benefits of working closely with the authorities.”

Members can access advice and support on dealing with cyber crime and attacks through our computer security incident response team (CSIRT).