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A federal grand jury indictment was unsealed in Newark, NJ accusing
three people in custody in the Philippines with being part of an
international phone hacking conspiracy financed by suspects in Italy.

The financiers allegedly used information from hacked corporate
telephone networks in the U.S. to illegally transmit and ‘re-sell’ over
12 million minutes of telephone calls valued at more than $55 million
over the hacked corporate phone networks in America.

The indictment was unsealed after Italian law enforcement searched
approximately 10 locations in four regions of Italy, and arrested the
suspected financiers of the hacking operation, Pakistani citizens with
Italian residency.

According to the U.S. Attorney, the criminal conspiracy’s financiers
paid the hackers approximately $100 for each hacked telephone system.

Reuters
reports that accused financiers in Italy allegedly used proceeds from
the conspiracy to fund Islamic fundamentalist groups in Southeast Asia.

According to the Italian newspaper Giornale di Brescia,
the country’s Divisione Investigazioni Generali e Operazioni Speciali
(‘DIGOS’) unit began working with the FBI on the case in 2006.

You can read the complete PBX phone hacking indictment below: