Testimony: Hacker Says News Corp. Unit Hired Him
A computer hacker testified in a corporate-spying lawsuit Wednesday in California that a unit of News Corp. hired him to develop pirating software to penetrate a rival satellite service’s security system.
Christopher Tarnovsky, who says his first $20,000 was paid in cash hidden in electronic devices mailed from Canada, denied ever using the software against Dish Network, Reuters reports.
Dish Network is suing News Corp’s NDS Group, which provides security technology to a global satellite network, including DirecTV. Reuters says NDS denies it engaged in corporate spying and asserts the company was merely engaged in reverse engineering, exploring how a technology product works, which is standard practice in the industry.
Tarnovsky testified that he was hired to develop a pirating program to make DirecTV more secure. But DISH claims Tarnovsky’s real mission was to steal the security code and flood the market with pirated smart cards that enable access to premium channels, which cost the network $900 million in lost revenue.
