How did their private detective agency work?
When police began watching Active Investigation Services (AIS), they found a complex web of staff, associates and clients involved in the illegal activities. The trial at Southwark Crown Court heard that AIS – run by Jeremy Young and Scott Gelsthorpe – had a number of “lucrative sidelines” under the title “Hackers Are Us”. Key to the operation was Michael Hall who made much of the hacking possible. The 36-year-old “telephone interception specialist” from Battersea was responsible for fitting devices to telegraph poles and roadside junction boxes all over the UK to listen in to more than 1,100 calls. He was paid 1,000 by AIS for each device and together with others, caused 29,000 of damage to British Telecom equipment. ‘Piggybacking’ Hall’s activities went unnoticed for some time, partly because he wore uniforms taken from genuine telecommunications companies for which he had worked. As prosecuting QC Miranda Moore said: “He looked for all the world like a BT engineer. If you saw him at
