The city of Athens, Ohio has recovered more than half of the $722,000 stolen in a 2024 cyber fraud scheme that spoofed an emailed invoice from contractor Pepper Construction.
U.S. Attorney David Waterman in the Southern District of Iowa has also filed criminal charges against Chijioke Timothy Odimegwu and Harafat Mogajidescribed as “members of the US Air Force” stationed at the service’s base in Dover, Del., accusing them of cyber theft against more than a dozen victims, and also noted that Athens could be added to the total if the fraud is found to have been caused by them.
In November 2024, the city made a scheduled payment of $721,976 in Pepper for a new fire station. The hackers superimposed the U and the C in the construction of the word on a Pepper email address and sent a link that redirected the payment to themselves. Because Atenes filed a lawsuit just days after making the mistaken payment, the funds were able to be frozen in the Republic Bank account used by the hackers, and after going through mediation, she was able to recover the rest of what was in the account at the time.
Athens was able to get $205,000 of the $349,522 still in the account and also received $200,000 from an insurance claim, bringing the total recovery to $405,000.
Odimegwu and Mogaji were indicted in November by Waterman in Iowa, where other cyber crimes alleged in the indictment occurred.
The indictment accuses the men of “commercial email compromise” fraud. It describes one of the alleged crimes, which involved using a fake email to redirect payment for a construction project in July 2024. The amount in that case was more than $1.6 million. The indictment identifies that victim as an unnamed architecture firm. Another victim is believed to be a non-profit organization.
Athens officials were notified by the FBI field office in Iowa City that evidence uncovered in an investigation appeared to link the city’s cyber theft to the cases alleged in the indictment. Athens is not named as a victim in this case, but has been told it could be added for restitution purposes depending on the outcome. The case is scheduled for trial. The indictment alleges the men monitored emails and waited to send a fake email address for the fraud, as detailed by Athens and her interactions with Pepper.
The construction has become a target-rich environment for hackers and cybercriminals because of the complicated web of transactions with payment and procurement requests coming from parties that are often not personally known in projects, especially those in the public sector.
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