Blackmailers Held Nokia Code To Ransom For Millions Of Euros

Blackmailers Held Nokia Code To Ransom For Millions Of Euros

Blackmail is a nasty business, but it’s not just the stuff of movie plots: Nokia was in 2008 forced to pay “several million euros” to criminals who held its code to ransom, reports Reuters.

The Finnish company found itself in difficulties six years ago, with criminals apparently threatening to reveal the source code “for part of an operating system used in its smartphones”. In fact, according to sources at Finnish MTV, they had obtained the encryption key for Symbian and were threatening to make it public.

It was enough to allow them to extort “several million euros” from Nokia. Like something straight out of Hollywood, Nokia apparently found itself agreeing to deliver the cash to a parking lot in Tampere, central Finland — although it did so only once it had alerted the police to what was happening.

Reuters claims that the money was picked up, but that the police “lost track of the culprits”. The Finnish police has confirmed to Reuters that it’s currently investigating a case of alleged blackmail against Nokia. The case remains open. [Reuters]

Picture: Nicola/Flickr


The Cheapest NBN 50 Plans

It’s the most popular NBN speed in Australia for a reason. Here are the cheapest plans available.

At Gizmodo, we independently select and write about stuff we love and think you'll like too. We have affiliate and advertising partnerships, which means we may collect a share of sales or other compensation from the links on this page. BTW – prices are accurate and items in stock at the time of posting.