BENGALURU: JB Nagar police on Saturday detained a notorious online hacker Sri Krishna alias Sriki after he was involved in a drunken brawl in a star hotel situated on old Airport road. 25-year-old Sriki was arrested by CCB in November 2020, for allegedly hacking websites to steal data and money, which he would then convert into bitcoins and use to purchase drugs from the darknet.
He was landed in jail and was out on bail two months ago. A senior police officer said that based on the complaint filed by hotel staff, the police detained Sri Krishna and his associate Vishnu Bhat. They had a heated argument with his friend and later when the argument took an ugly turn. The hotel staff immediately alerted police and he was taken into custody.
The police recovered a laptop and other electronic gadgets from his room for verification. Right now he has been detained for questioning and based on the outcome necessary action will be taken, a senior officer said. Sriki was involved in a drug case and a detailed probe led to his website hacks to money and Bitcoins. The police also recovered bitcoins worth 9 crores from him and he reportedly carried out ransomware attacks where after hacking a website, he would encrypt data and demand payment from owners for the site to be unlocked.
A cryptocurrency hacker is snowballing into a political controversy and opposition leader Siddaramaiah told the media that two influential politicians were involved and there was an attempt to cover up their role in the case.
Sriki's modus operandi came to light during an ongoing investigation into an international drug racket where seven people have been arrested, including former Minister Rudrappa Lamani’s son Darshan Lamani and his associates Hemanth and Suneesh Hegde.
Sri Krishna studied till pre-university in Bengaluru before enrolling in a university in Amsterdam, Netherlands, where he graduated in computer science in 2017.