Apan Jewellers website hacked, again

For the second time this year, the website of controversy-ridden Apan Jewellers has been hacked by a group that had taken the site down the first time last month. The website was found defaced Thursday afternoon with a message from the group named “Eyncrypted Warrior’s BD” which read: “YoUr IntELLiGeNcE Is MY ComMoN SeNsE,” alongside “N0 SySt3M !S S4F3” (No system is safe). It said, a hacker going by the name of “Hax0r Abub4kk3r” was the one responsible for taking down the site, which was not restored till evening. At the end of the message, the hacker also left a link to a Facebook page, apparently run by him or herself. Hacking a government website is always the easiest way for hackers to steal the spotlight, as these portals usually have poor security and lack proper maintenance. In January, the Election Commission’s Bangla version website was hacked by another group of hackers. The site was later restored. However, hacking the website of Apan Jewellers might just have a different agenda as it’s a private business, which mostly deals in precious metals including gold and diamonds, and has been controversial since the son of one of its owners was implicated in a rape case last year. Shafat Ahmed, son of one of the Apan Jewellers owners, Dildar Ahmed, and four others were accused of raping two female private university students at the Raintree Hotel in Dhaka’s Banani on March 28, 2017. Shafat and his cohorts in the alleged crime - Nayem Ashraf and Sadman Sakif – are currently behind bars. After that incident, the three Apan Jewellers owners came into the limelight in August last year when Customs Intelligence and Investigation Directorate (CIID) filed five cases against them after seizing 15 maunds of illegal gold and some diamond jewellery from several branches of the company. Five CIID assistant revenue officers had filed the money laundering cases with Gulshan, Dhanmondi, Ramna, and Uttara police stations, following National Board of Revenue directives.

Who is ‘Hax0r Abub4kk3r?’

According to a post on the Facebook page of “Hax0r Abub4kk3r,” the hacker had defaced the Apan Jewellers website in February too. The page’s 'about' section and the long list of posts suggest the hacker is a Bangladeshi. The page contains numerous posts claiming credit for hacking a number of government websites and sites of different schools and colleges, apart from some belonging to private organizations and companies. The hacker earlier also claimed credit for hacking 35 Indian websites in January. That month, the hacker claimed he/she had also taken down the website of the Chittagong Stock Exchange. However, in response to a comment on a post last month, the hacker claimed he hacked websites of Bangladeshi organizations and institutions as he was “just helping” the developers of those sites develop their skills.