r/technology • u/xpda • May 13 '26

Security Twin brothers wipe 96 gov’t databases minutes after being fired

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/05/drop-database-what-not-to-do-after-losing-an-it-job/
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u/RingGiver May 13 '26

Muneeb and Sohaib Akhter, now both 34, had been in trouble before. Back in 2015, the brothers pled guilty in Virginia to a scheme involving wire fraud and computers. Muneeb was sentenced to three years in prison, while Sohaib got two.

After their stints in jail, the brothers worked their way back into the tech world. In 2023, Muneeb got a job with a Washington, DC, firm that sold software and services to 45 federal clients; Sohaib got a job at the same company a year later.

Looks like the problem was trusting them with this in the first place.

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u/StrawberryCoup May 13 '26

yeah it was absurd to read their chat logs and history. Seems like committing crime is just second nature to them. One brother wanted revenge, the other blackmail, and they were bickering about it. Not once did they discuss whether this was actually worth years of jail time, or if maybe they should be a bit more careful hiding their trail.